Please freepmail me if you want on/off this list
Posted on 07/15/2006 5:51:58 AM PDT by NYer
White Catholics will decide the upcoming US elections, according to William Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and former domestic policy adviser to President Clinton.
Galston reviewed the past 50 years of religious and political trends and how they will help researchers predict future elections, which the US faces this November when all seats in the House of Representatives of the US Congress are open.
Galston presented his research in a seminar hosted by The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life in May at Key West, Florida among journalists and research participants from publications like the New York Times, GQ, Fortune, The Economist, and The Chicago Tribune.
Democrats are planning on re-taking the majority of the House and Senate seats this November. Both chambers of Congress have been controlled by Republicans since 1994 - a mid-term election year when President Clinton, a Democrat, was in office.
Democrats see similarities between 1994 and today with a Republican in the Oval Office who has low approval ratings and in the middle of an unpopular war in Iraq. In 1994, Clinton was in the middle of the Monica Lewinsky scandal when Republicans gained the majority in the House for the first time in forty years.
But William Galston cautions Democrats of overlooking religion among the public which has been strongly captured by Republicans since a tipping point in 1992.
Galston reviewed the differences between Republican and Democrat voters, which he explained as the biggest single surprise in his study. He said between 1952 and 1988, the Democratic and Republican divide between frequent and less-frequent church attendance was only 3.7 percent with Republicans holding the slight advantage.
But starting in 1992, an unbroken string of double-digit differences developed, Galston explained, being even more pronounced among white voters who make-up the largest voting demographic in the US. Among whites, the gap increased to 17 percent and has stayed there ever since, favoring Republicans.
Religion and Class
Religion has become significantly more important over the past 20 years, Galston said. But he stated that it has not replaced the impact of income and economic class on voting behavior.
Between 2000 and 2004, according to the data Galston presented, the largest percentage rise was related to church attendance affecting the how people vote, rising from an impact factor of 22 percent to 28 percent. Membership-in-a-union household was second. Both income and religion had greater impact in 2004 than in 2000.
Galston said the importance of this is laid-out in the 2004 Presidential election.
"Whites who attended church weekly or more frequently, even if they didn't make any money at all, still voted for Bush. As a matter of fact, those who attended church weekly-or-more frequently at every income level voted for Bush," he said.
This led journalists to focus on traditionalist evangelical Protestants, but Galston explained they did not really swing all that much in 2004 relative to 2000; nor was their turnout huge. "As a matter of fact, the turnout gain in the entire electorate was 10 percent; the turnout gain among traditionalist evangelical Protestants was only 7 percent," he said.
The Catholics
By contrast, Galston's research showed a significant swing among practicing Catholics - 17 points toward Bush - and there was also a large increase in their turnout - 12 percent. "The real story of the 2004 election was much more about Catholics than it was about Protestants," he said.
"Despite the well-advertised decline of mainline Protestants, which is a genuine phenomenon, that arguably evangelical Protestants, as a percentage of the total population, peaked about 15 years ago and has been relatively stable ever since," Galston continued, "The real story of American politics in the next 10 years will be written as much around the behavior of Catholics, persuadable Catholics, as it is around the mobilization of traditionalist evangelical Protestants.”
"I did an analysis in an article I wrote right after the election in which you could prove statistically that it was the shift of Catholics in Florida and Ohio that made the difference. That wasn't even a close call, analytically. That was the ballgame - not evangelical Protestants," Galston said.
Democrats toss Catholics out of Eden
Once a major player in the Democrotic Party, making up the bulk of the union members in the northeast, Catholics have been moving away from the party through the years. According to Galston, the McGovern-Fraser reforms of the '68-'72 period caused "the evisceration of urban Catholic influence in the Democratic Party".
"The expulsion of Catholics from "Democratic Eden" was also a period in which younger, more upscale and more secular voters entered the party and quickly assumed leadership positions within the party," Galston said.
"It doesn't matter how moderate or how liberal the Catholic is; this sense of expulsion from the Eden of the Democratic Party is pervasive. And the abortion issue is at the center of that sense of expulsion. I cannot find a Catholic intellectual who, during a conversation, will not somehow manage to refer to the Bob Case, Sr. episode at the 1992 Democratic Convention," he explained.
Why Catholics vote Republican
Between 1996 and 2004 Bush carried the white Catholic vote from a seven point to a 13-point difference. "That's a huge swing from plus-seven to minus-13, and that's the problem that Democrats are now wrestling with," Galston said.
Galston explained that it's clear that something happened after Clinton to send the white Catholic vote in a very strongly Republican direction.
According to Galston, Catholics went toward Bush for reasons that were predominantly not the hot-button social issues. "They are much more inclined to emphasize factors such as personal integrity, family values issues and personal conduct - called variously here the Golden Rule and the Social Compact."
The Golden Rule principle was demonstrated in the 2004 campaign between Bush and Kerry. "I think that for Catholics, as for a lot of other Americans, foreign policy had something to do with it. For Catholics, as for most other Americas, values issues have a lot to do with perceptions of personal integrity and character, and rightly or wrongly, I think the general election campaign did have the effect of calling John Kerry's character into question," Galston said.
The shift also came as perceptions about the Democratic Party changed among Catholics. Through his research, Galston said there are positive Democratic Party associations among white Catholics, but also a number of positive party associations for Republicans, including "shares your values," "can be trusted to keep America safe," "respecting religious faith" and "know what they stand for."
"If a party does not share your values, does not respect religious faith, can't be trusted to keep America safe, and doesn't know what it stands for, that sounds like a pretty powerful indictment to me. And I think these data tend to support what intuition confirms: These were very important factors driving white Catholics toward the Republican Party in this period," Galston said.
Current Climate
Galston argues the country is polarized and therefore leading to thin election results. The polarization for the past 15 years, he says, has left voters in both parties unhappy with the results and claiming that conservative Christians have gone too far in trying to impose their religious values on the country. He believes voters now seek a different kind of discourse.
"We are now reaching one of those hinge moments in American politics when there's a sense of exhaustion of old agendas and old arguments and a desire that is not confined to one political party to turn a page and see if we can't have a better, more productive discussion.
"I don't think [voters are] any happier about polarized debates on entitlement programs than they are on the hot-button social issues. I think that there's a desire for coming together on both. And the first leader of the first political party that figures out that the American people are just exhausted - they're so tired of this debate at home and abroad and would like a different one - I think is going to pick up a lot of the marbles on the floor," he said.
For both parties, Galston recommends a broadening of the evangelical issues agenda instead of a narrow band focusing on hot-button topics. "Amy Sullivan has written a very suggestive article in the New Republic about the possibility that that's now occurring. And on the other hand, Elaine Kamarck and I argued in a very unpopular political manifesto published last fall, "The Politics of Polarization," that Democrats are going to have to do some rethinking about their stance on the kinds of issues that have served as such stumbling blocks for the more centrist and traditionalist portions of the religious community," Galston said. He continued, "Has the Democratic Party learned nothing from the political debacle that followed the military debacle in Vietnam? Have we not learned the difference between questioning a policy and questioning the legitimacy of institutions, or even questioning the country? The Michael Moore Democrats certainly haven't learned those distinctions."
A New Deal: The Clinton Model
Galston pointed to Bill Clinton's experience as a New Democrat, who made a breakthrough in moral change for the party and broke the religious barrier that candidates experience today, which was exhibited in the abortion debate. Clinton supported the legality of abortion and sought to make it safe, legal and rare. "The politically operative term there was 'rare,'" Galston said.
Galston believes Democrats can use Clinton's abortion model and move away from the idea that abortion is morally neutral, to instead become "a misfortune, and when necessary, a regrettable necessity," he said.
Although Catholic trends showed a move from Democrat to Republican voting patterns, Clinton carried the white Catholic vote in 1992 and a larger vote in 1996. Galston believes Democrats can emulate Clinton's success if they simply have the will to pick it up again. "I think that a portion of the Clinton breakthrough, which needs to be recovered, is the theoretical and practical correlation between individual responsibility and social responsibility," Galston said.
"For example," he continued, "when white Catholics are given the opportunity to support a Democratic candidate who believes in a woman's right to choose but believes that all sides should come together around the common goal of preventing and reducing the number of abortions with more sex education, including abstinence, access to contraception, and more adoption, intriguingly, 74 percent of white Catholics polled said that kind of position would make them more likely to support a Democrat as opposed to only 22 percent who said less likely, for a net positive of 52."
The Tim Kaine Model
E.J. Dionne, a reporter with The Washington Post asked William Galston what can be learned from Tim Kaine's victory for Virginia Governor in a Republican state, explaining that when the Republicans tried to use his opposition to the death penalty against him, Tim Kaine affirmed he was opposed to it but that he'd enforce the death penalty because it was the law, as he worded it, "My faith teaches me that all life is sacred."
According to Dionne, Kaine also advertised extensively on Christian radio long before his position on the death penalty became a public issue. "Interestingly, he described himself on Christian radio as a Christian missionary. He never once mentioned the word "Catholic;" he was actually a Jesuit missionary. But, surprisingly, Kaine's people found in their focus groups that when people learned that Tim Kaine was religious, many of them said, 'That means he can't possibly be a liberal.'" Dionne said.
Galston replied, "Look at the gravest white Catholic charge against the Democratic Party; namely, they don't know what they stand for. I think Kaine conveyed authenticity because he was being authentic. He knew what he believed. He was pretty forthright about declaring it and then connecting it with the public stance that he took. People sensed that he was saying what he believed, and that what he believed was worthy of respect. They might not have agreed with him, but agreeing with someone is not the most important thing in politics."
Kaine ended his commercials with the tag: 'This is what I believe.'
Religion and politics isn't going to go away, Galston believes. He said, "I think that there are a lot of Catholics, moderate evangelicals and modernists who aren't crazy, who recognize that in the United States in particular, a simply secularist stance by a great political party is a formula for defeat and irrelevance."
Yep. And the irony is, the Dems have a chance to beat Santorum in Pennsylvania solely because they are running his son, who is also pro-life. But PA is about the only state where that happens any longer.
I thought that the Lewinski thing broke fully on the scene after the 1994 election. I think it was the 1998 midterm which may have been effected. This sounds like the LSM trying to blame any low poll numbers for Clinton on Lewinski since they know that the voters don't really want to keep hearing about it.
Pew, Brooking. Suprised they did not hit the last big leftist propaganda Mill Asso Press for this too.
I too am a white practicing Catholic. I was a Democrat until 1994. The Bob Casey incident bothered me too, but that's not why I left the party and started voting Republican.
I left becasue the Democratic party has no new ideas. They seem stuck in the sixties. For them it's all about civil rights (read: special rights for special people), higher taxes, and more government.
They are stuck, stuck, stuck, in the sixties.
Democrats are chasing the illegal alien Catholic voter.
I agree. Unfortunately, they refuse to abandon their pro-death supporters and still believe they will carry them to success. The tide is turning. More and more americans are beginning to recognize the devastation of abortion. It should be interesting to see how the candidates in the next presidential election project their positions.
I could say the same thing about sKerry. He is a CINO, picking and choosing what to believe depending on which way the wind is blowing. Engaging in sacrilege on a regular basis.
No way in the world he was ever going to get my vote. If they give me another panderer, I won't vote for that candidate either.
it isn't about republicans and democrats. its about statesmanship, wisdom, and moral authority. what has the church to do with political parties?
Maybe, Republicans go after these voters while Dems take people for granted. I know I got up and went to church to put flyers on peoples' cars in the last election, part of a statewide initiative. Bishops refusing communion to Kerry may have helped too. It is not about strategy. It is about morality.
The church teaches doctrines based on the 10 Commandments. The following guidelines were issued during the last presidential election.
Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics
THE FIVE NON-NEGOTIABLE ISSUES
These five current issues concern actions that are intrinsically evil and must never be promoted by the law. Intrinsically evil actions are those which fundamentally conflict with the moral law and can never be deliberately performed under any circumstances. It is a serious sin to deliberately endorse or promote any of these actions, and no candidate who really wants to advance the common good will support any action contrary to the non-negotiable principles involved in these issues.
1. Abortion
The Church teaches that, regarding a law permitting abortions, it is "never licit to obey it, or to take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or to vote for it" (EV 73). Abortion is the intentional and direct killing of an innocent human being, and therefore it is a form of homicide.
The unborn child is always an innocent party, and no law may permit the taking of his life. Even when a child is conceived through rape or incest, the fault is not the child's, who should not suffer death for others' sins.
2. Euthanasia
Often disguised by the name "mercy killing," euthanasia also is a form of homicide. No person has a right to take his own life, and no one has the right to take the life of any innocent person.
In euthanasia, the ill or elderly are killed, by action or omission, out of a misplaced sense of compassion, but true compassion cannot include intentionally doing something intrinsically evil to another person (cf. EV 73).
3. Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Human embryos are human beings. "Respect for the dignity of the human being excludes all experimental manipulation or exploitation of the human embryo" (CRF 4b).
Recent scientific advances show that often medical treatments that researchers hope to develop from experimentation on embryonic stem cells can be developed by using adult stem cells instead. Adult stem cells can be obtained without doing harm to the adults from whom they come. Thus there is no valid medical argument in favor of using embryonic stem cells. And even if there were benefits to be had from such experiments, they would not justify destroying innocent embryonic humans.
4. Human Cloning
"Attempts . . . for obtaining a human being without any connection with sexuality through 'twin fission,' cloning, or parthenogenesis are to be considered contrary to the moral law, since they are in opposition to the dignity both of human procreation and of the conjugal union" (RHL I:6).
Human cloning also involves abortion because the "rejected" or "unsuccessful" embryonic clones are destroyed, yet each clone is a human being.
5. Homosexual "Marriage"
True marriage is the union of one man and one woman. Legal recognition of any other union as "marriage" undermines true marriage, and legal recognition of homosexual unions actually does homosexual persons a disfavor by encouraging them to persist in what is an objectively immoral arrangement.
"When legislation in favor of the recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative assembly, the Catholic lawmaker has a moral duty to express his opposition clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favor of a law so harmful to the common good is gravely immoral" (UHP 10).
ABBREVIATIONS
CCC Catechism of the Catholic Church
CPL Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, Doctrinal Notes on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life
CRF Pontifical Council for the Family, Charter of the Rights of the Family
EV John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life)
RHL Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction on Respect for Human Life in Its Origin and on the Dignity of Procreation
UHP Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Considerations regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons
Note: some of these links may be in need of updating. I have not checked them recently.
Yep. I don't see how you can be Catholic and vote Democrat - given their policies. Of course you could pretend to be Catholic (ala whatshername the one-woman faux-Catholic organization Dems trot out every election)
Not THIS White Catholic...not now, not ever.
So Catholics who support abortion on demand, teaching in school and offices that homosexuality is normal, and that adultery is alright because a BJ isn't sex and lying under oath is okay because "it's just (about) sex" are ready to vote Democrat. < /barf >
The problem, here in the Bay State at least, are the Kennedy/Kerry Democrats for whom the truths of the faith don't matter, only the liberal party line on abortion and government promotion of homosexual activity.
Yellow Dog Democrats, maybe. The same sort of person who is lazy in his politics, blindly pulling the ballot for the Party because that is what his parents and grandparents before them did. They seek people who are lazy in their faith. The Church can be taken over from within (as is happening in many Protestant denominations) in practice even if the Vatican remains firm in biblical teachings.
Ironic that the party that demands a separation of church and state always sends candidates to the pulpit of black churches on the Sunday before an election and that the Party seeks to mold churches to be politically correct and talk about the "moral" need for universal health care while at the same time demanding the acceptance of diversity/perversity and letting moral objections to sexual pairings go away.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.