Michael Barone:Forget Deep/Old South vs New/Upper SouthIn the Age of Obama,it's "The South Atlantic" vs. "The Interior South"

Over at the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog, the free daily’s senior Political Anaylst Michael Barone parses the House roll call vote on the Waxman-Markey climate change bill – aka “cap-and-trade.” It’s a vote worth dissecting as it’s one of the first major roll calls of the Obama Administration where partisan solidarity took a back seat - especially on the Democratic side of the aisle - to economic worries back home.

Per his methods in his authoritative biennial guide, “The Almanac of American Politics,” Barone analyzes the vote geographically, digging into partisan breakdowns in various regions to examine how the vote played out, and to handicap the bill’s prospects in the Senate. (He’s skeptical, if it’s not amended, noting Democratic Senators such as North Dakota’s Kent Conrad, who voiced, and Missouri’s Claire McCaskill, who Tweeted(!), their public skepticism of the bill’s potential burdensome economic impact on their constituents’ wallets.)

Barone still assigns regional monikers that bear a sort of charm redolent of an earlier era of political science: “The Germano-Scandinavian Midwest (IA, MN, WI).” Others are more contemporarily shrewd.

Barone updates the traditional “Deep South” vs. “Upper South” or “Old South” vs. “New South” dichotomies. In 2009, the Obama Era, Barone cleaves the coastal “South Atlantic (FL, GA, NC, SC, VA)” from the vast “Interior South,” limning a wide arc through what’s left of the Section across states of seemingly dissonant political traditions: from Appalachian West Virginia, through once decidedly “Upper South” Tennessee and Kentucky, snapping up the old Wallace/Thurmond redoubt and segregationist strongholds of Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi, onto western-tinged Oklahoma and Texas.

Roughly, Barone is drawing a distinction between the growing, suburbanizing states that Obama won, but George W. Bush took in 2000 (FL, VA, NC) and the rest of the South where population and incomes remains stagnant, and Democrats still struggle for traction.

Of course, these are only blunt designations. Barone’s “Interior South” includes bastions of educated Southern natives sprinkled with highly educated transplants, trend-setting metropolises like Austin, TX; Nashville, TN; and Lexington, KY that may one day overwhelm the Wacos and Memphises and Paducahs that keep those states conformably combined within the same category as West Virginia, Oklahoma and Mississippi.

And his “South Atlantic” includes South Carolina, once the most “Solid” of the “Solid South” in its Democratic partisan fervor and electoral expression of Southern Sectional defiance. (SC Dem presidential vote performance ranged from 1896-1944 spanned from 85%-98%.) But, the once-Dixiecrat Strom Thurmond impressed a durable Republican tradition when he switched parties back in the ‘60’s. The urbane Gov. Mark Sanford hails from a resort-dotted coast that’s the growing part of the state that gave an openly lesbian – if business friendly - Democratic Congressional candidate a respectable vote total in 2008. Sanford’s Coastal Carolina taste in genteel plantations and “exotic” Argentine paramours contrasts with the Up Country, South Carolina’s “Interior South,” where Mike Huckabee’s blend of social conservatism and economic populism played better.

Georgia is a sort of awkward fit in this column, too; something of a lagging indicator. Atlanta’s ‘burbs are driving demographic shifts at play in Virginia and North Carolina, but the Peach State’s Republicanism bloomed later than that of other Southern states, possibly retarded by Favorite Son Jimmy Carter’s legacy. Nevertheless, Obama scored the highest raw Dem vote total ever here, and snared the biggest share of Georgia’s popular vote since “that peanut farmer” bested Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan.

But, Barone needed to hammer these circled squares into contiguous clusters. And, I-95 is useful as a spine that conjoins “The South Atlantic.” If trends in Tennessee and Texas continue apace, and Georgia’s and South Carolina’s still lollygag along, Barone may have to engage in his own creative Reapportionment.

But, for 2009, Barone’s updated distinction between “The South Atlantic” and “The Interior South” offers a more-than-serviceable thumbnail snapshot of an ever-changing Southern political landscape.

The "Social Issue," Crime, and Inner Cities--Are They Still Important???

Some seemingly random, but I think connected, thoughts on crime, urban life, demographic change, and politics:

I’m working my way through Richard Scammon and Ben Wattenberg’s “The Real Majority.” Written in 1970, it is in many ways a follow up to Phillips’ “The Emerging Republican Majority.” Though not nearly as exhaustive or as focused on political geography and history, it does grapple with the same turbulent time period—the late 1960’s—and tries to figure out how we seemed to move from LBJ to Nixon so quickly. Whereas Phillips had worked for the Nixon campaign, Wattenberg had worked for Johnson, and later Henry “Scoop” Jackson. Thus, their political leanings (at the time) and agenda differ a bit. Central to “The Real Majority” is the contention that the country’s rejection of LBJ was not rooted, as many have argued, in a disdain for the Vietnam War. While there was certainly opposition, the support for first Eugene McCarthy, and ultimately Nixon, was driven by what Scammon and Wattenberg call the “Social Issue.” Foremost among voters’ concerns was a combination of crime, urban unrest, racial strife, alienation, and other related issues that produced a broad uneasiness or malaise about the direction of the country. Whereas Vietnam may have been the most “important” issue for the country, it was not the “voting” issue that defined politics. In this vein, one can see how politicians like George Wallace, Ronald Reagan (first as California Governor), and even, I’d argue, William F. Buckley in his 1965 race for NYC mayor could tap into the anxiety of voters. Because elections are ultimately about putting together coalitions, the ability of candidates to capitalize on these sentiments and have them (rather than economic concerns, for example) determine voting outcomes can lead to a re-ordering of our politics.

As our country has become both 1) more suburbanized and 2) less afflicted by crime, we tend to forget how big of an issue the problem of our cities was by the late ‘60’s. With mass migration out of the central cities attention turned to other issues. I’ve always been fascinated with big cities—not only their politics, but also how they grapple with issues like crime, housing, education, and transportation. A few weeks ago, the New York Times came out with a fascinating story, and interactive map, on the incidence of murders across the five boroughs over several years. The first thing that we note is that compared to earlier years—especially during the ‘70’s and ‘80’s--the murder rate in New York City is substantially lower today. Whereas there were 2245 murders in NYC in 1990, last year saw only 521. Thus, we might imagine—using the parlance of “The Real Majority--that the “Social Issue” has receded in importance for New Yorkers, and others nation wide. One also finds, and the interactive map is amazing is allowing one to track each murder, that there are definite patterns in 1) who tends to commit murder; 2) who tends to be a victim; and 3) where these crimes take place. The combination of these variables will probably contribute to how people think about the severity of crime and the way it affects them. We see that murders in NYC tend to be concentrated in certain areas and tend to have perpetrators and victims who belong to the same race.

All of this—the rise of the “Social Issue,” issues of race and poverty, and the prevalence of crime—conditions how we view not only our cities, but our politics more broadly. Rarely, unfortunately, do we get the opportunity to take a step back and reflect upon these areas and the people who occupy them. These issues have been bouncing around in my head since I became aware of (and now obsessed with) an amazing photographer who has devoted the last 30 years to documenting inner city America. Camilo Jose Vergara currently has two exhibitions going, one in New York and one in Washington, that showcase his documentation of places (and people) we tend to overlook. While he primarily photographs inner city buildings, his work forces you to think about how our cities change (or don’t) and what those changes mean. He has created a website devoted to his work—Invincible Cities—that takes one to Harlem, Camden NJ, and Richmond CA and allows you to go street by street to see not only how these neighborhoods look today, but how they looked over several decades. His show currently in Washington, “Storefront Churces” presents his look at inner city houses of worship. A central theme to these portraits is that inner city churches have tended to spring up in places previously occupied by businesses, schools, or other, now departed, congregations. By tracking these changes one can get an understanding not only of the importance of religion to these communities but of how our urban areas have transformed themselves over time. Whereas many of the neighborhoods Vergara photographs were originally home to European immigrants, they are now virtually entirely black.

How do we put all of this together??? Ultimately (but perhaps unfortunately), politics and policy is about the issues that we are paying attention to and that we feel directly affect us. A generation ago, crime and the “problem of the cities” were among the top few issues driving our politics. Now these issues would seem to fall far down the list of Americans’ concerns. These urban areas, however, don’t disappear even if their problems get subsumed within the mix of more pressing concerns. Fortunately we have artists like Camilo Jose Vergara who force us to remember and ponder what is going on there.

Virginia Guv Primary Reminiscent of Feingold's Badger State Breakthrough

Multicandidate primaries are always tricky to predict. Turnout is usually low. Candidates have different bases of support. Each needs to decide which of their opponents they should attack and how. As a result, the final outcome is oftentimes completely out of whack compared to pre-voting polls and expectations. Such was the case with yesterday's stunner in the Virginia Democratic Governor's primary (see coverage here, here, here, and here). Prior to the vote, polling suggested an extremely tight race between Terry McCauliffe, Brian Moran, and the eventual winner Creigh Deeds. While Clinton booster and former DNC head McCauliffe was the early favorite in the race, based largely on his fundraising prowess and ties to the establishment Democratic machinery, downstate State Senator Deeds had been gaining momentum in recent days. Moran, a former state legislator from vote rich northern Virginia, was counting on a huge turnout among his suburban base to put him over the top. With three relatively evenly matched candidates one would have expected a nail biter. The result???--a Deeds landslide as he captured 50% compared to McCauliffe's 26% and Moran's 24%.

As I was reading the commentary on the race and looking at the results, something about this contest seemed awfully familiar to me. It hit me that yesterday's outcome, and the campaign leading up to it, mirrored almost exactly a campaign that I witnessed firsthand back in Wisconsin. In 1992, Democrats were looking for a nominee to challenge incumbent GOP Senator Bob Kasten. The three Democrats who emerged were 1) Joseph Checota, a wealthy Milwaukee attorney and former head of the Wisconsin Democratic party; 2) Congressman Jim Moody, a multi-term House member from Milwaukee, the state's largest vote center; and 3) Russ Feingold, a relatively unknown State Senator from Middleton, a suburb of Madison. Checota and Moody were by far the best funded and best tied to the party establishment and supporting interests. Feingold, while respected in the State Senate, was seen as the weakest of the three and least likely to win. The campaign quickly devolved into a nasty and expensive spat between the Checota and Moody. Checota was able to contribte considerable sums of his own wealth to the race and Moody was able to tap into numerous reliable sources of Democratic donors. As these two spent months attacking each other, Feingold plodded on, an afterthought to most. When the early September vote was held, Feingold scored a massive upset, capturing 70% of the primary vote, with Checota and Moody evenly splitting the remainder. See some coverage of the race here).

Fast forward to Virginia's race this year and the parallels are striking. You have a wealthy former party head (McCauliffe/Checota) with no previous elective experience, a well known legislator from the state's largest bloc of voters (Moran/Moody), and a relatively unknown, folksy, yet respected, State Senator (Deeds/Feingold). In Virginia this year, as in Wisconsin in 1992, McCauliffe and Moran spent much of the race focusing their fire on each other, especially given how much of the vote was expected to come from the place both resided--northern Virginia. Checota and Moody fought heavily over the Milwaukee area's bounty of voters in their back yards. The candidate most expected to trail far beyond the frontrunners was left to develop his own campaign, almost in isolation of the others. In doing so they were able to court a bloc of voters seemingly being ignored by those at the top. In '92, Moody and Checota were both seen as somewhat distant from Wisconsin's progressive tradition--Checota for his wealth and Moody (though sporting a generally liberal voting record) for his tenure on the Ways and Means committee. Feingold, on the other hand, came to the race with unblemished progressive bona fides. In Virginia, Moran and McCauliffe positioned themselves toward the left end of the spectrum while Deeds, hailing from the rural western part of the state, espoused a more Blue Dog-like platform.

While there are no doubt some differences between these races--most notably the fact that Deeds had run, and barely lost, a state-wide race previously whereas Feingold had no such state-wide exposure--the commonalities are worth noting for no other reason than how much the highlight the unpredictability of primaries. With each additional candidate in the race, the tactical calculus becomes much more complicated. While focusing attention on one candidate might seem obvious, such a decision may in fact present opportunities to those being ignored. When nobody is paying attention to a particular candidate, that candidate not only evades some scrutiny and bloodying, they also don't have to worry about their campaign devolving into a series of reactions and tit for tat responses. They can, in a sense, define their own candidacy, something that is no doubt how most candidates would like to appeal to voters.

When it comes to making predictions in these contests, perhaps these examples suggest that, when in doubt, pick the candidate running last. They oftentimes win.

Why is John Cornyn Being So Nice to Sonia Sotomayor???

To continue our look into the political, geographic, and demographic ramifications of the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, I thought I'd speculate a bit on how various Senate Republicans might approach the confirmation process. Over the past week the lines seem to have been drawn around the question of whether biography should affect one's view of the law. As we approach the confirmation hearings and vote, we'll move (thankfully) from the stage that we're currently in--all sorts of "legal analysts," interest group representatives, and other flaks pontificating their positions and advancing their agendas--to one in which those actually voting on her nomination (i.e. Senators) are at the forefront. Unlike the current crop of voices, Senators are actually accountable to voters. Thus, they tend to approach these decisions with a bit more tact and caution.

To get a sense of the calculations that some Republican Senators might be going through, I thought I'd look at the size of the Hispanic populations in their relative states. Opposing the first Hispanic nominee to the Supreme Court leaves one open to retribution from Hispanic constituents. If it comprises a sizable component of the electorate, an energized Hispanic bloc bent on retribution could prove decisive in defeating the Senator who votes "No." Given the degree to which Hispanics moved to the Democratic ticket last fall, and given the rate of growth in the Hispanic population, a number of GOP Senators are going to spend the next few months walking a delicate tight rope.

I've created the following chart that looks at each of the 40 current GOP Senate seats. Note that because we're focusing on the electoral dimension of the confirmation vote I haven't included the retiring Senators but have listed their seats as open. I've coded, first, when that seat is up for re-election. We might expect those Senators with re-election races next year to perhaps be most fearful of the charge of being anti-Hispanic. I've next coded the percentage of their state that is Hispanic, based on numbers from the Pew Hispanic Center. Obviously, those states with a larger Hispanic vote present "No" voting Senators with a greater risk. Next I've coded the margin of victory in each Senator's last election. Those GOP senators who had extremely large margins of victories might have little to fear (especially if they come from states w/a small Hispanic population) in voting against Sotomayor compared to those who had close races. Next I identify the seven current Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. These members will be in the spotlight as they lead the questioning of the nominee and cast the initial votes on her. Committee members also tend to "carry the water" for the party at large during the nomination process so we will see the emerging GOP strategy on Sotomayor implemented by this group. Finally, I've indicated how Senators in office at the time voted on Sotomayor's elevation to the U.S. Court of Appeals in 1998. It will be interesting to see whether those who supported her in 1998 now vote against her, or vice versa,--and how they justify such a vote.

A couple of interesting things to note. As I noted in the title of this post, Texas Senator John Cornyn has been conspicous in his even-handedness toward the Sotomayor nomination. One reason for this, perhaps, is the demographic reality that is modern Texas. Percentage wise, the Lone Star State has the largest Hispanic population in the country. While Cornyn was just re-elected last fall with a relatively healthy margin, any future ambitions that he may have in the state (or nation-wide) are going to be affected by his standing among Hispanic voters. The fact that he also sits on the Judiciary Committee would seem to be further evidence of why he is taking such a moderate tack at this point. Finally I'd note that Cornyn is currently the head of the Republican Senatorial Committee and thus in charge of the effort to recruit and fund GOP Senate candidates this cycle. Unlike other Senators he needs to be especially attuned to the national mood and electorate. His recent comments that the GOP needs to become a "national" party again show that he is at least aware of how much work needs to be done among certain groups (including Hispanics) of the electorate. Cornyn's colleague from Texas, Kay Bailey Hutchison, is also worth watching. While her most recent victory was double that of Cornyn's, she has perhaps a more difficult decision to make. First, Hutchison is widely expected to declare herself a candidate for the upcoming governor's race in which she will challenge incumbent GOP Governor Rick Perry in what will no doubt be a blockbuster primary fight. Thus, each decision she makes will be parsed for its electoral ramifications. Complicating this is the fact that she voted against Sotomayor in 1998. The result is some pretty complicated political jujitsu---how do you 1) win a Republican primary in which the incentive is to move right (anti-Sotomayor) yet leave yourself in a position to 2) win the general election where over 1/3 of the electorate is Hispanic???

A similar dynamic exists further west in Arizona. Here, John McCain is on the ballot next year. While he's had relatively little difficulty in his recent re-elections, the trendlines have not been favorable for the GOP in Arizona over the past few cycles. Democrats have gained 3 House seats since 2006 and many believe that it will go Democratic in the next presidential race. With 30% of the population being Hispanic, one can see why these trends have emerged. One can envision a scenario in which McCain sides with the Sotomayor pick in the end. It fits his image of an "independent" or "maverick" while also, I'd suggest, being an easy vote. He will have to explain why he changed his mind after his 1998 vote against Sotomayor, though. Because McCain doesn't sit on Judiciary, the fate of the Sotomayor nomination will probably be well known by the time it gets to the Senate floor. If it appears that Sotomayor is going to be easily confirmed, McCain can vote "Yes"without worrying that his decision will change the outcome. He maintains good standing back home while not incurring the wrath of his party--he wins on all counts. John Kyl, the other Arizona GOPer, is in a much more tricky spot. He faces the same treacherous demographics, yet 1) had a closer re-election last time; 2) sits on Judiciary (and will thus be forced to stake a position relatively early on); and 3) voted against Sotomayor in 1998.

Other Senators to watch??? I'd pick out Richard Burr from North Carolina. Electorally he's in a state that has been moving Democratic and has a Hispanic population that while not huge, can be decisive--see Nate Silver's discussion of the Hispanic vote in Obama's Tarheel State win. He's also been pulling some pretty underwhelming poll numbers for an incumbent. The fact that he's not on Judiciary and wasn't in the Senate in '98, and thus didn't vote on Sotomayor then, gives him a lot of room to maneuver now. He could vote "Yes" in the end too.

The Political Geography of the East Bronx

President Obama's nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court offers another opportunity to visit some interesting political geography. While there is already heated debate about how her background, ethnicity, and upbringing will affect her jurisprudence, I don't want to enter that controversy. Rather, her nomination allows us to further explore the complexity of our political and electoral landscape, in arguably the most complex city of all--New York.

Judge Sotomayor grew up in the East Bronx's Soundview neighborhood, and more specifically, the Bronxdale Houses. Later her family moved to the massive Co-Op City. While public housing is commonly associated with blight and urban decay, a more correct reading of its history in America would note that it was for many, especially in the years following World War II, a stepping stone to the middle class and home ownership. Indeed, for working class strivers like the Sotomayors and other recent immigrants, these neighborhoods were a vital point of transition between where they came from and a hopefully prosperous future. For an exhaustive, and indeed critical, history of how New York City's housing and other infrastructure developed in the post WWII period, there is no better source that Robert Caro's much lauded history of Robert Moses, The Power Broker.

The Bronx is in many ways a misunderstood or understudied part of the city. Typically associated with 1) the Yankees and 2) crime, it has historically been an extremely diverse though also divided borough (see a discussion of the East Bronx, South Bronx, and the West Bronx). To get a sense of the largest ethnic concentrations in the current Bronx, see the map below.

The neighborhood in which Sotomayor was raised is currently part of New York's 16th congressional district, represented by Rep. Jose Serrano. In many ways, this district is extremely atypical. For example, census data reports that it is the nation's poorest district, with over 40% of the population below the poverty line. The Hispanic population makes up nearly 2/3 of the total. It was also, in the last election, the country's most Democratic. Barack Obama won 95% of the vote there, giving the district a Cook PVI of D+41. CQ's Politics in America notes:

"The South Bronx, overtaken by a post-World War II influx of Hispanics to New York City, has elected men of Puerto Rican origin to the House since 1970. The 16th's strong Puerto Rican influence is complemented by African and South and Central American immigrant communities. The district's 3 percent non-Hispanic white population is the nation's lowest."

Adjoining parts of the Bronx are included in the 17th district, represented by Eliot Engel and the 7th district, represented by Joseph Crowley.

While the confirmation process will certainly allow for Judge Sotomayor to articulate how her upbringing has affected how she views the law, any discussion of her home's politics will be more than tangential. Its these tangents, though, that I tend to find the most interesting.

If you're interested in all the happenings in Bronx politics, check out the Bronx News Network.

Mississippi Turning???

Some fascinating news out of Mississippi. This week saw the election of James Young as the first African American mayor of Philadelphia, Mississippi (NYTimes coverage here). For anyone familiar with the history of race in America and the Civil Rights Movement, Philadelphia is known as the place where civil rights workers Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and Michael Schwerner were murdered in June of 1964. Along with the Montgomery bus boycott, freedom rides, the Birmingham campaign, and the March on Selma, these deaths during Freedom Summer were a major chapter in the march toward the passage of the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act of 1964 and 1965. Likewise, they've cast a long shadow that has been difficult for the city to shed. This election may help its residents turn a corner.

Later, Philadelphia was home to another event--viewed differently by competing camps--that speaks to our complicated history. Namely, Ronald Reagan kicked off his 1980 presidential campaign there at the Neshoba County Fair. By arguing strongly for "states rights," many have argued that Reagan, in coded language, was presenting himself as a more polished, refined, and less menacing version of George Wallace. This was, for critics, the personification and perfection of the "Southern Strategy." Others have offered a more benign interpretation of the Gipper's words to suggest that he was simply articulating his small government platform.

While Mississippi has the largest number of elected African American officials in the country, the bulk of these politicians come from the Delta region in the western part of the state. Back during the primaries I wrote a post about this region and how it differs from the rest of the state. Neshoba County is not in the Delta but sits in central Mississippi and has demographics that, even without its troubled history, would make the election of a black mayor more difficult. The county as a whole is 65% white and only 20% African American. Philadelphia has a larger black population with the breakdown being roughly 55% white and 40% African American. In last year's presidential race, McCain overwhelmed Obama in Neshoba County, winning 72% to 27%, 16 points better than he did statewide. Within Philadelphia itself, McCain bested Obama 59.5% to 40.5% (Results available here).

Its always dangerous to extrapolate from local races. As the coverage of Mayor Young's victory suggest, he campaigned as a reformer against a long-time incumbent and thus was certainly able to tap into voters'--black and white--dissatisfaction with the performance of city government. Nonetheless, one wonders whether the Obama campaign, despite losing badly in the state, benefitted someone like James Young. We know, for example, that black turnout in 2008 reached virtual parity with that of whites and that states with large black populations such as Alabama, Mississippi, and South Carolina saw voter turnout increase. If voters, once energized and mobilized, continue to vote over the long term then we might see something like an "Obama effect" in these other races. Its certainly too early to conclude that this is what's happening. Likewise, a four month old Obama administration isn't going to heal decades of racial tension and create national unity. Regardless of whether these campaigns are connected and regardless of whether James Young's election as mayor signifies something much larger than one candidate beating another in a small town race, one can't deny the symbolism.

**Top photo courtesy of the Neshoba Democrat

Fun With Maps--Are Democratic States More "Developed"???

This comparison may not mean much but let's consider it. I just came across a map (and companion article) of the U.S. that breaks down states based on their respective Human Development Index (HDI) measure. The HDI was created by the United Nations to gauge a country's level of development. It incorporates measures of educational attainment, life expectancy, and income to create a continuum along which a country (or now state) can be placed. As a result, one can make comparisons between countries, and do so over time, to track growth and progress. When I saw the map I immediately thought that there was something familiar about it--it resembles pretty closely the results of the 2008 election.

For example, of the 21 states that have the highest HDI (.95 and above), Barack Obama won all of them except Alaska. Of the 8 lowest scoring states--HDI of .849 and below, McCain won them all. For the 15 states in the second highest cohort (.900 to .949), Obama won 6. Of the 6 states in the middle of the continuum, Obama only won Florida. What we see is a strong correlation between a state's HDI and Obama's success there. All of his electoral votes came from states at the upper end of the continuum with the exception of Florida. McCain was only able to capture 3 electoral votes from the most developed states, aided by Sarah Palin's Alaska roots.

Mere coincidence??? Perhaps, but if we look at the recent trends we shouldn't be so surprised by this. Exit polling conducted on election day (and indeed during the primaries as well) showed that Obama and other Democrats had begun to make in-roads among those at the top of the economic ladder. We've similarly seen great movement away from the Republicans among the most highly educated. Thus, whereas traditionally it had been thought that the Republican base was among the high income/high education chunk of the electorate, this no longer seems true.

For more on this question of how class, education, and other variables are affecting voting trends, see Andrew Gelman's work.

***Update: Speaking of which, Gelman critiques and tweaks the numbers a bit here.

***Further update: After some more data critiquing, a re-scaling of the data and the following map. The electoral correlations I suggest still largely hold although Obama does better on the low, but not lowest, part of the continuum.

How Do You Stop the Bleeding If You're the GOP???

Recently released data from a new Gallup Poll is not good news for the GOP. As you see in the graphs above, every single demographic group surveyed has seen their Republican identification decline. About the only groups that have remained steady are seniors and frequent church goers.

Normally when a party is in decline, it is a result of the defection of part of its coalition. In the classic "realignment" school of thinking, new eras of party dominance are precipitated by a re-organization of the groups supporting each of the parties. What you have is a reshuffling of the deck, in other words. Depending on the size of the groups moving from one side to the other, the degree and durability of the new electoral majority can vary. Even in large realignments, though, you tend to see some parts of the minority party's coalition remain strong.

While these numbers may be temporary, the real problem with them, from the Republicans' standpoint, is that they don't offer much of a path forward. If Democratic gains were concentrated among particular groups--say the young, the un-married, those in urban areas, etc.--Republicans could create a strategy to isolate these groups from those who are still part of your coalition as well as from those whose allegiances aren't firmly defined (i.e. those traditionally seen as independents and moderates) Republicans would ideally also be able to target parts of the Democratic coalition that is shaky. By trying to define the Democrats as only representing a segment of the electorate the GOP could position themselves as a viable alternative. This is classic party politics. Whether it be Democrats reaching out to urban and minority voters with the ascendance of FDR or Reagan's courting working class whites, party majorities have their genesis when the party out of power is able to pick off the other's "low hanging fruit," especially when they are of a sizable number. However, when you are losing ground among virtually everyone, its much more difficult to stop the momentum working against you.

So what does the GOP do?? Does it simply try to hold on to those groups that, while they are running away, are doing so the slowest? Do they try something more radical? Or, perhaps most likely, do they stay in a holding pattern and hope that the Democrats overreach and fail to meet the heightened expectations of the American electorate? In other words, can you win by default?

Does the Career of David Souter Tell Us Anything About the Current State of “Conservatism” in America???

With Friday’s announcement that Justice David Souter is retiring from the Supreme Court, attention has turned to how President Obama will approach the vacancy and attempt to put his imprint on the court. In much of this discussion, the conventional wisdom has been that the balance of the court is not likely to change with the confirmation of Souter’s successor. Pegged as a member of the four justice “liberal” wing of the court, Souter has been viewed—especially among those on the left—as a reliable defender of choice, the separation of church and state, and other progressive stances . As such, he has become the justice that conservatives most love to hate. For those on the right, Souter’s decisions have been those of an apostate in light of the assurances originally made by his supporters including President George H.W. Bush.

This picture of Souter, I’d argue, is off base. Justice Souter, it seems to me, is not a “liberal” as we tend to define the term. Similarly, those who argue that his “conservatism” never materialized on the high court are misreading his approach. While I don’t want to argue that Souter’s jurisprudence is analogous to either the Democrats’ or Republicans’ ideologies, untangling his record and style might help us understand some of the troubles currently vexing the modern GOP.

Perhaps the best retrospective of Souter’s time on the court that I’ve read over the past few days is provided by the New Republic’s Gordon Silverstein. Combating the conventional wisdom, Silverstein argues that Souter has been the quintessential “judicial conservative”. He writes:

Souter's departure offers a timely reminder that when it comes to the courts, we need to be careful about our terms. Though Souter's decisions were welcomed by ideological and partisan liberals, they were judicially conservative decisions. In fact, his were among the only consistently conservative decisions the court has known for the last two decades.

The reason is that there is a difference between an ideological or movement conservative and a judicial conservative. Judicial conservatives generally have great respect for the law, and for legal decisions that have been made. This is the essence of what is called stare decisis--let the decision stand. Upholding precedent staunches the forces of change--and typically, that generates conservative results. But when the precedent you are upholding is precedent set by the Warren Court, holding back the forces of change means enforcing liberal decisions against radical demands for change from movement conservatives.

What Souter’s case illustrates more broadly, it seems, is the debate about what “conservatism” really means. This is a debate, I’d note that has been raging for the last few years on Andrew Sullivan’s blog and to which he has devoted an entire book. It is also a debate that has been necessitated by the evolution of the modern GOP. The Souter nomination is just one small chapter in this story. As traditionally understood (and defined by Sullivan among others), conservatism’s central tenet is a skepticism about the ability of man (especially via government action or the power of the state) to change or re-order the world. For these writers “conservatism” and “doubt” are analogous. Thus, conservatives have a respect for the status quo, tradition, and that which has served society well over the long term. This strain of conservatism doesn’t argue that society and culture don’t or shouldn’t change, but rather that such change should be allowed to take its natural course rather than through state led engineering. Attempts to legislate change are not only likely to fail but will also endanger our liberties and freedoms. Thus, when faced with the choice of acting and non-acting (despite the severity of the problem at hand), a conservative will in almost all cases choose non-action as the best course.

With Souter’s retirement, I’ve gone back and found many of the profiles written about him upon his nomination for the court in 1990. In addition to providing some interesting nuggets of irony—i.e. words of praise from David Keene and words of criticism from Planned Parenthood—these stories repeatedly used a term to describe Souter’s personality and judicial temperament--cautious. The Souter of 1990 was someone uncomfortable with attempts, including by the court, to disrupt the status-quo. A Newsweek piece at the time noted that “His record suggests that he sees the judiciary as an institution with limited powers.” In retrospect, then, we shouldn’t be surprised by his opinions in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey or Bush vs. Gore. In both, it can be argued that he took the conservative position—not using the court to overturn longstanding precedent or interfere with the normal workings of other institutions of government. In both cases, as well, Souter drew further ire from those on the Right.

In reflecting upon this, I went back and re-read some of former Senator Warren Rudman’s memoirs, “Combat.” Rudman has been one of Souter’s closest friends since Souter served under Rudman in the New Hampshire Attorney General’s office back in the late 1960’s. Rudman had long advocated the elevation of Souter to the high court and was aided in this effort by the fact that former NH Governor John Sununu served as White House Chief of Staff in 1990. When Souter’s nomination was announced, Rudman made it his personal mission to shepherd the nomination through the Senate. When we examine Rudman’s career and ideology we see someone who epitomized this “cautious conservatism.” In the last chapter, he writes:

If someone had told me in the 1960s that one day I would serve in a Republican Party that opposed abortion rights—which the Supreme Court had endorsed—advocated prayer in the schools, and talked about government inspired “family values,” I would have thought he was crazy.

To me the essence of conservatism is just the opposite: government should not intrude in anything as personal as the decision to have a child, it should not be championing prayer or religion, and family values should come from families and religious institutions, not from politically inspired, Washington based moralists. (p. 243)

Rudman left the Senate just as the conflict between this version of conservatism and “movement” conservatism came into stark focus. With George H.W. Bush’s intra-party challenge from Pat Buchanan in 1992 (and also recall the 1988 success of Pat Robertson), followed by the ascendancy of Newt Gingrich and a heavily southern-tinged GOP congressional majority in 1996, a pragmatic, “cautious” conservatism espoused by people like Rudman, Howard Baker, Bill Cohen, John Chafee, and John Danforth was cast aside. In its place was a more confrontational, activist, and ideological version. This metamorphosis reached its apotheosis during the Bush 43 presidency. Whether it be Terry Schiavo, the War in Iraq, or funding for faith based initiatives, the policies of the Bush Administration, though branded as “conservative,” were premised on activism, not the status quo. “Caution” is not a word one would use to define the past eight years. Electorally, one region of the country has responded most negatively to this governing philosophy—the northeast. I don’t think it’s accidental that this is the part of the country that produced David Souter (and Rudman).


To get a sense of how the GOP has suffered in the northeast, consider the following. Of the 33 Senate and Governor’s seats in the Northeast, Democrats currently hold 27 (including Senators Sanders and Lieberman). In 2008 every one of these states voted for Barack Obama as well. Looking back over the past three decades we see how much the Republicans’ fortunes have declined in this region. Even in 1976, in the aftermath of the brutal Watergate election for the GOP, Republicans held twice as many statewide seats in the Northeast as they do now. What’s happened is that the traditional “Yankee” or northeastern Republican has become virtually extinct, a point highlighted by one of the few remaining of this species, Olympia Snowe, in an op-ed to the New York Times last week. Yankee Republicans are quite different in outlook than the modern day “movement conservative.” Writing about the northeast, Kevin Phillips argued that it has been this region more than any other that has been the bastion and defender of the “establishment.” While the “establishment” or “old order” is “conservative,” it is not conservative in the “movement” sense. Rather, this conservatism is temperamental, privileging the status quo over attempts to re-order or re-make society. When Phillips penned The Emerging Republican Majority, the northeast had become the most “liberal” part of the country because at that time, “liberalism” was indeed the status quo: “ As America moved into a new political era in 1968, the Northeast once again assumed its position…as the national stronghold of the old order, which this time was an institutionalized liberalism.”

What this all shows, I think, is that while its dangerous to equate a judge’s philosophy and decisions with an underlying political ideology, its equally dangerous to assume that terms like “conservative” have a single meaning. Rather, as I think the Souter example shows, this term means different things to different people, at different times, and perhaps in different places. Whereas it certainly makes no difference to Justice Souter how more politically minded conservatives and Republicans untangle these conflicting definitions, for the GOP it seems imperative if they want to recover their footing and become, as Texas Senator John Cornyn said last week, a “national party” once again.

Some Quick Thoughts On Where the Parties Are Strong (and Weak)

I'm going to be doing a few posts over the next week or so on the regional strengths and weaknesses of the Democrats and Republicans. For a quick first post on this, above is the geographical distribution of our country's governors. To get a sense of how broad the Dems' regional strengths are, consider the following: one could walk from Canada to Mexico--beginning your destination in each of 5 different states (Maine, New Hampshire, New York, Michigan, and Montana)--and not pass through a state with a Republican governor. The longest of these routes takes you through 10 states.

For Republicans it's only possible to make this trip via one route through three states (ID-->UT-->AZ). We should note, too, that this is only possible because Arizona's Democratic Governor Janet Napolitano resigned to become Secretary of Homeland Security and was replaced by the state's Republican Lieutenant Governor. Looking at elected Republicans, this trip can't be done.

**Also note that Kathleen Sibelius, upon becoming Secretary of HHS, was succeeded by Kansas' Republican LG. Thus, we could have colored both AZ and KS blue if we based our map strictly on which party was elected to the seat.

More Info On the 2008 Electorate--Guess Who Had the Highest Turnout

Much too long without a post. Several are in the works so stay tuned. Until some longer ruminations, I'd point to this report, released yesterday, on the composition of the 2008 electorate. Produced by the Pew Research Center, it gives us more insight into last year's turnout as well as the composition and participation of different subsets of the American electorate. A couple interesting points to note:

• The composition of the American electorate is the most diverse ever. 2008's electorate saw increases in African-American, Asian, and especially Hispanic voters. The white share of the electorate was its lowest ever at 76%.
• The historical white/black turnout gap virtually disappeared in 2008. White turnout was 66.1% and black turnout was 65.2%. Obviously the Obama candidacy was a crucial component in this but this cannot be good news for future Republican candidates in the black electorate can stay energized.
• The gap between men and women overall in turnout continued. Female turnout was 65.7% while for men it was 61.5%
• The highest turnout among any group--factoring in race and gender--was African American women. Turnout for black females was 68.8%!!!
• While turnout among the young and their composition of the electorate was rather stable compared to 2004, the highest turnout rate among the young--by race--was among black voters. Black voters between the ages of 18 and 29 had a turnout rate of 58.2%.

I found these last two points to be really interesting. What we don't know, of course, is the durability of these trends and whether they will manifest themselves in elections without Obama on the ballot (say the 2010 midterms). It would seem, though, that this increased turnout among especially young and female African Americans produced some tangible outcomes. If you look at a state like North Carolina--which Obama won by a mere 14,000 votes--it seems likely that the Tarheel State would have stayed in the Republican column had we not seen this spike in turnout.

ElectionDissection.com Book Club--"Triangle"

Its been a long while since I've posted but I've been pretty engrossed in David Von Drehle's "Triangle: The Fire That Changed America." Like many great historical works, Triangle manages to weave a number of important threads together, all while centered around a common event. In this case its the March 25, 1911 fire at New York's Triangle Waist Company which resulted in the death of 146 people. Prior to 9/11 it was the largest workplace disaster in New York history. The book is masterful in that it uses this tragedy to illustrate how movements are oftentimes the result, or culmination, of unpredictable events.


This book came to my attention a few weeks back when I was at an event at the Center for American Progress celebrating the launch of their Progressive Studies program. During the Q&A session John Podesta mentioned the book, almost in passing, as being one of the best explanations of the birth of progressivism in this country. What Von Drehle (a reporter for the Washington Post) does so well is show us how modern liberalism was in many ways descended from this tragedy. There were a number of ingredients, all discussed at length, that contributed to the ascendancy of what he calls "urban liberalism" and ultimately the election of FDR and the New Deal. Among these were rapid industrialization and the mechanisation of production--in this case consumer apparel; the need for a low wage workforce to feed this demand; massive European immigration (mainly Eastern European Jewish and Italian) to provide this workforce; an urban political machine (Tammany Hall) initially standoffish to the demands of this new workforce but later converted by virtue of the number of votes to be gained; a rapidly developing labor movement; suffragist agitation; and a decidedly upper class reformist clique to provide resources and credibility to the demands of workers. The fire on March 25 managed to bring all of these forces together and lead, ultimately, to a more activist and regulatory government, working on behalf of the masses. Individuals such as Frances Perkins, Al Smith, and Robert Wagner play key roles in the aftermath of the fire to ensure that those issues raised by the tragedy did not recede into the background, but were rather translated into concrete policy.


Another interesting argument made by Von Drehle is that the resulting political regime--urban and liberal--by virtue of its policy implementation, managed to stifle the advancement of more radical political movements. We forget that while socialism never took hold in the U.S., many of the ingredients for its success were present--and in clear sight leading up to the fire. Also, the later rise of FDR and the New Deal managed to bring about the death knell of Progressivism. Like many other third parties in American history, the Progressives failed because a larger force (the Democratic Party) subsumed them.

For anyone with an interest in urban politics, immigration, the labor and suffragist movement, or the birth of the modern Democratic Party, this book is highly recommended.

Keystone Konundrum: Is Arlen Specter the New Joe Lieberman???

Its never to early to be thinking about 2010 and a bruising Senate primary in Pennsylvania has the potential of giving Democrats the magic 60 seats they need to end minority filibusters. Like in 2004, Arlen Specter finds himself challenged from his right flank by Pat Toomey, former House member of the 15th district and now president of the anti-tax, fiscally conservative think tank Club for Growth. While Specter clearly enjoys his position as the fulcrum of the current Senate—one of a small cadre of moderate Republicans who decide what legislation will go forward (Yes on stimulus; No on card check)—he has opened himself up once again to Toomey’s claim that Specter is out of step with Keystone State Republicans. While Specter might have no problem winning the general election next year, he may not get that far given current trends in the state and national GOP. If we look back to 2004 and move forward we can see some clear signs of danger for Specter.

In the 2004 contest, Specter narrowly held off Toomey, winning by just over 17,000 votes out of 1.4 million cast. I’ve built a spreadsheet of the county returns that can be viewed here. The map at left gives a visual of each candidate’s regional strengths. Specter counties are in blue; Toomey counties in red. For the most part, the primary results hewed to the conventional wisdom about Pennsylvania politics. Namely, western and central Pennsylvania tend to be more conservative than the southeastern part of the state, centered around Philadelphia. The Philly area is not only the more liberal part of the state but it is also Specter’s base going back to the beginning of his career as Philadelphia District Attorney. The one exception to this pattern is the area to the north of Philly in the Lehigh Valley. This was the area represented by Toomey during his four terms in the House so it’s not surprising that they supported him in his Senate race

More importantly, we need to look at the county by county vote in terms of overall votes. Obviously the electorate is spread out unevenly across the state so the above map only gets us so far in understanding what happened. In my data set I’ve created a variable called “County Share” which calculates the percentage of the overall vote produced by a particular county. This allows us to see the concentration of voters. One thing we find, for example, is that half of Pennsylvania’s primary vote came from just 10 counties, as shown in the map at left. As we see, nine of these are found in the southeastern and south central part of the state. Another way of stating this is that the largest concentration of voters came from Specter’s backyard. This can be further seen when looking at the “Specter Share” or “Toomey Share” variable. Here, I look at how much of each candidate’s vote came from each county. If both candidates were equally strong in each county, we’d see no difference in these numbers. The fact that we see variance confirms the fact that each candidate had different bases of support. Again, for Specter it’s the Philadelphia area that allowed him to squeak by. Montgomery County is a good example. As I wrote during last year’s primary season, Montgomery County is a large suburban county increasingly characterized by voters who are affluent, highly educated, socially liberal, yet fiscally moderate. For the pro-choice Specter, this was the place to run up the score. In 2004, he received 9.2% of his votes in Montgomery, compared to Toomey who received only 6.6% of his votes there. Specter also won significantly more of his votes in neighboring Delaware (7% vs. 5.7%), Bucks (6% vs. 4.9%), and Chester (5.1% vs. 4.2%) Counties as well as the city of Philadelphia (4.1% vs. 2.9%). Thus, without the cushion provided in this part of the state, Specter would not have survived. Also helping him fend off Toomey were endorsements by President Bush and the state’s other senator, the arch-conservative Rick Santorum.

So, going into next year’s contest might Specter simply try and repeat his 2004 performance? While in theory this might be desirable, changes over the past several years make following the old playbook precarious. If we look at more recent elections it becomes apparent that much of Specter’s base of support has been defecting from the Republican fold. It must be noted that Pennsylvania primaries are open only to registered partisans. Thus, Specter cannot rely on independents or Democratic voters to carry him to victory. Only registered Republicans will determine his fate, despite his recent attempts to get state leaders to change the primary rules. If we compare party registration figures for 2004 and 2008 we see problems for Specter. I’ve isolated those counties that provided Specter’s best performance to illustrate this point. As we can see, over the past four years Philadelphia, Montgomery, Delaware, Bucks, and Chester Counties have shed over 124,000 registered Republicans. Democrats, meanwhile, have gained over 220,000 registrants. Whether these Republican losses have become independents or Democrats is irrelevant for the primary. The important fact is that they are now out of that electorate and out of Specter’s reach unless he can get them to re-register, a daunting process in the midst of a campaign.

To get a sense of how these changes in the Philly area have been changing the tenor of the state’s politics, its useful to compare the presidential vote in 2004 and 2008 (numbers are provided in the spreadsheet). As shown in the chart at left, Barack Obama performed significantly better than John Kerry in all five of these key counties. This is especially notable in the suburbs. Thus, whereas Kerry’s statewide victory was about 144,000 votes, Obama took the state by 620,000 votes. When Pennsylvania was called so quickly on election night it was because of the sizable shift to the left taken by this region.

To get a visual sense of how 2004 and 2008 played out on the presidential stage, the two maps at left illustrate some of the shifts. We see how Obama was able to expand the Democrats' perfromance in the southeastern part of the state while he suffered losses, relative to Kerry, in the more conservative parts south of Allegheny County (Pittsburgh). He also managed to extend the blue northward into the Lehigh Valley, the part of the state formerly represented by Toomey. Finally, he captured a scattering of counties in central PA, most notably Centre County which is the home of Penn St. University.

So, as Specter contemplates how to approach his looming primary fight, he’s confronted with the fact that the part of the state that has been his base of support for the past three plus decades is in the process of a steady move to the left. Those voters who, while moderate, were willing to stay registered as Republicans have been fleeing the GOP. A more conservative Republican electorate is clearly much more advantageous to Toomey. What Specter needs to hope for is that Republican voters see the virtue in having him in his current position—namely that of a dealmaker in the Senate. Toomey, while more in line with these voters' ideology, won’t have the institutional sway that Specter does. Is an influential, yet Republican-lite Specter more useful than a more pure, but marginalized Toomey? Specter will also hope that Toomey has lost the connection to the state that he had while representing it in Congress. The years spent running an outfit like the Club for Growth have necessarily removed him from the day to day workings of the state. He may thus be hampered in his attempt to swoop back in and knock off someone who has been courting and serving constituents for years.

Another option for Specter that has been discussed would be to run as an independent. Theoretically, he could decide to do this either before or after the primary. Given how much the landscape could change over the next year, its difficult to speculate on which option, if either, would be more desirable. A big unknown so far is what the Democratic field will look like. If Specter wants advice about how to go about this, though, he doesn’t need to go far--just a few steps across the Senate floor. Just three years ago, one of his colleagues went this route—Joe Lieberman. In many ways the Democratic Party’s version of Arlen Specter, Lieberman was challenged from his flank. Defeated in the Democratic primary by Ned Lamont, Lieberman regrouped and was elected as an independent. Thus, while we don't know how Senator Specter will ultimately play the hand he's been dealt, at this point there seem to be troubling signs ahead.

What Do We Know About White People???

I’ve been meaning to do some number crunching on the role of race in the presidential election, given how much discussion and coverage it received during the campaign. While I wrote about this subject a bunch prior to the election, I haven’t done much in depth analysis in the aftermath so let’s return to the topic. For this post I want to focus pretty much exclusively on the “white vote.” We know that among African American voters, not only was Barack Obama’s vote overwhelming (about 95%) but also that there wasn’t much variance across regions or states. While some of the states with high African American populations moved into the Democratic camp this year (North Carolina, Virginia) others did not (Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, etc.). It is this latter group of states that was the focus of the oft cited (and discussed here) “Schaller Effect”—the tendency of southern states with large black populations to have white electorates that vote overwhelmingly Republican. Essentially, Schaller argues, the politics of these states have become so defined by the issue of race over the decades that white voters, regardless of class, education, religion, etc., tilt Republican. With an African American on the ballot this year we got a chance to test this theory like never before.

To look at how white voters cast their ballots this year, and to determine whether any underlying patterns exist, I gathered the exit poll data compiled by CNN. The resulting spreadsheet is available here. Nationwide, Obama won 43% of the white vote. When we look at the vote preference based on race, we see that Obama won a majority of the white vote in 18 states, plus the District of Columbia. The map at left highlights those states and shows a pretty clear geographic clustering in the northeast, upper Midwest, and Pacific states with the exception of Colorado--a new battleground between the parties. If the electorate was 100% white he would have received 222 electoral votes, not enough to win the presidency. Thus, we look to those states where he lost the white vote (to varying degrees), but found a large enough minority electorate (black, Latino, Asian, etc.) to overcome his poorer showing among whites. This netted him an additional 10 states (FL, IN, MD, NV, NJ, NM, NC, OH, PA, VA) and provided him the solid electoral college victory that propelled him to the presidency. While there’s probably not anything overly surprising here—Democrats have for years had to rely on a multi-racial coalition to win the White House—looking at the raw numbers is instructive.

Conversely, if we look at the McCain vote among whites, we see a strong geographical dimension to his support. Nationwide, McCain received 55% of the white vote. The map left highlights those states where his white support was the highest--over 10% above his national average. Thus, in a cluster of mostly southern states the Republican nominee got 2/3 or more of the white vote.

Another way we might approach these numbers is to go to those states with the largest black populations relative to the state as a whole. Here we get to the phenomenon described by Schaller—how does Obama do among whites in the “blackest” states?? At left is a chart showing his performance among whites in the 15 states with the most significant black electorates. Overall, he won 8 of these states. However, with the exception of Washington, DC, Obama received a majority of the white vote in only 3 (Joe Biden’s Delaware, his home state of Illinois, and New York). He received more than his national average (43%) in only one additional state—Maryland. When we look at his performance in the Deep South states we seem to see evidence of the white backlash Schaller talked about with his extremely poor showing among whites in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, and South Carolina standing out. These states have large black populations but saw whites vote strongly Republican, a point noted in the map above as well.

What happens when we look at the inverse of these states—i.e. the “least black” ones?? Does McCain do as well as he did in the Deep South or did we see, conversely, Obama do really well? If McCain does equally well we might conclude that northern and southern whites aren’t really that different. If there is a geographical difference, maybe there is something to the hypothesis of racialized voting in the South. At left is a chart showing the 15 “least black” states in the country and Obama’s % of the white vote in each. Here his performance is much better. He won 8 of these states overall and in 7 of these 8 (with the exception of New Mexico) he not only got higher than his national average among whites, he won a majority of white voters. In fact, had some states in this group had a sizable enough minority population—Montana, the Dakotas—he may have added their electoral votes to his total as well. Clearly, it seems, there is a difference among white voters based on geography.

From this, can we conclude that white southerners voted against Obama because he was black?? Not necessarily. An alternative hypothesis is that these voters voted against Obama not because he’s black, but because he’s a Democrat. To get a better sense of what happened in November we need to go back further in time. Let’s look at 2004 when you had two white candidates on the ballot. If the results among white voters are quite similar to what we saw in 2008, our conclusions might need a bit more nuance. By looking at 2004 we can also get a sense of what changes might be taking place across the electorate and whether there is a geographic pattern. Thus, I also gathered the statewide CNN exit polls from the Bush/Kerry contest. What do we see?? Nationwide there wasn’t much difference between the support Obama and Kerry received among whites. In fact, Obama did better, getting 43% of the white vote to Kerry’s 41%.

Looking at the results state by state, we see that in all but 7 states, Obama did better among white voters than Kerry. In 8 states the performance of the two Democrats was identical. In the remaining 35 states, plus DC, Obama did better among whites than Kerry. If you look at the 18 states where Obama’s gains were the greatest (5% or more), he won 13. Four of these states voted Republican in 2004 (Indiana, Colorado, North Carolina, and Virginia). Thus, while the black and Hispanic vote was crucial in helping bring these states over to Obama’s side, we can’t ignore his increased performance among white voters as well.

Whereas Obama won 8 of the blackest states, Kerry only won 5. In these states, Kerry received below his national average among white voters (41%) in 8. Aided partially by increased support among African American voters (and also changes in turnout among whites and Republicans, plus greater support among Hispanics), Obama was able to outperform Kerry electorally. Narrowing further in on the white vote (and getting at the Schaller Effect) we see that in these states, Obama’s performance was worse than Kerry’s in four (Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, and Louisiana). Given that 2008 was a much better environment for Democrats than 2004 this is quite interesting. With a faltering economy, an unpopular president leaving office, and unprecedented national organization and fundraising, he did worse among some whites than did a candidate that, while white, was hardly a “good ‘ol boy.” Kerry, portrayed as elite, effete, “French,” and the epitome of northeastern liberalism outperformed Obama in much of the old Confederacy. Plus, given Bush’s cultural affinity with the South, his evangelical faith, and his political rearing in Texas, you’d have expected him to have high levels of support among southern whites. That McCain did better among some states’ white voters lends credence to Schaller’s argument, it seems.

So where does that leave us? With the low level of support Obama received among white voters in some states--relative to John Kerry and in an extremely favorable electoral environment--its hard to discount the assertion that race played some role in the vote. While some of these states have been heavily Republican, we saw Obama outperform Kerry among whites in equally Republican states in other parts of the country. We've also seen many of these states elect Democrats to other offices. The fact that white voters behaved differently in various parts of the country suggests that race is an issue that cuts across the electorate in a multitude of ways. Because race has been intertwined with politics in some places, and completely absent in others, we shouldn't make sweeping assertions about how important this cleavage is. Rather, we should approach the issue with nuance, an appreciation for historical context, and a willingness to explore multiple explanations for the outcomes we've observed. Given that we've had only one election to test our hypotheses, we should hold off on definitive statements until there's more data to parse.

Micropolitics in NYC: Don't Ignore the Trees for the Forest

For those of us who are fascinated by way ethnicity, religion, culture, race, income, and other variables affect political behavior, there's no place more compelling than New York City. Too often, I think, people gloss over the Big Apple's voting patterns because of its overwhelming Democratic tilt. In 2008, Barack Obama captured over 75% of the vote in 4 of the city's 5 boroughs (he got 47% in Staten Island). Underneath these numbers, though, are a myriad of stories. With so many voting blocs--some newly empowered, others in decline--New York politics is extremely fluid.

I recently came across this story from last summer in the NYT about the transformation in the city's electorate over the past several years. Whereas we normally think of "ethnic politics" being about the Irish, Italians, Jews, and other groups, the reality of today's Gotham is that Koreans, Russians, Pakistanis, Haitians, and dozens of other groups comprise the patchwork of voters that politicians must now cater to. The result, while perhaps more complicated for those running for office, is also empowering for these groups seeking to gain a foothold in America. As we celebrate St. Patrick's Day and Irish Americans' ascendance to our country's socio-economic and political heights, it is appropriate to appreciate how, historically, the ballot box has been a vehicle for groups' advancement. A similar story from October looks at how New York's Muslim community has experienced a political awakening.

Some of the most interesting scholarly work on New York's changing demography is being done by John Mollenkoph at the Center for Urban Research at CUNY's Graduate Center. Back in 2003, Dr. Mollenkoph co-authored this incredibly detailed study of the changes, and political implications, taking place in both New York and Los Angeles. It also provides some wonderful historical context for urban demographic change in other large cities. His findings challenge our conventional way of understanding urban politics. Whereas in past generations we saw a white/black divide and cleavage in big cities (and also Latino based in some places), the new urban landscape is much more balkanized and complex, requiring a more sophisticated approach to campaigning and governing.

To complicate things even further, we must remember that these ethnic or racial groups are not monolithic in their political behavior. Consider the maps at left, produced by the Center for Urban Research. They show the 2008 vote overall in the city as well as Barack Obama's performance vis a vis John Kerry's. While Obama did better than Kerry in most parts of the city, there are patches where McCain improved upon Bush's numbers. Given that Bush himself did relatively well in NYC--in the aftermath of 9-11--this further bump for the Republicans is quite interesting. The part of this map that immediately jumped out at me, and illustrates this need to dig deep into the micropolitics of the city, is southern Brooklyn. New York reports its election returns by Assembly district. Thus, Assembly Districts 45, 46, 47, 48, and 49 are of interest.

What caused these districts to be so different from the rest of the city in terms of its voting? One thing of note about this part of the city is that it has a large concentration of Orthodox Jews. Neighborhoods such as Midwood, Bensonhurst, and Borough Park have seen large numbers from this community settle in recent years. Likewise, Brighton Beach and Sheepshead Bay have seen an influx of Russians (many Jewish). The conservatism of the Orthodox Jewish electorate oftentimes gets overlooked given its relatively small size. Despite the discussion during the campaign season of Barack Obama's "Jewish problem," he ended up receiving 78% of the Jewish vote on election day--on par with the performance of John Kerry and Al Gore. Among Orthodox voters, however, there has always been a greater tendency to support Republican candidates given their positions on social and foreign policy issues. The Orthodox community is more likely to be pro-life, against gay marriage, and in favor of a hawkish defense and foreign policy than the Conservative and Reform movements. During the campaign the Jewish Press, which is a strong voice and based in this community, endorsed John McCain along these lines. Given this, then, we perhaps shouldn't be surprised with the voting results shown above.

While most of the data on demographic changes in the U.S. points toward a bright future for Democratic candidates--especially in regard to the Latino vote--its important to recognize that diversity entails tremendous complexity as well. Different voting blocs will bring with them different interests, agendas, and perspectives on policy. These agendas will compete with each other in an increasingly crowded environment, creating the potential for tension. While cities like New York and Los Angeles are on the front lines of this dynamic, it won't be long until its effects are felt much more broadly. Thus the need to dig deep and examine not just the forest, but the trees as well.

What the Wilderness Looks Like

For the past several posts, John and I have been spending a bit of time writing about the current state of the Conservative Movement. With the results of the past two elections showing a clear trend in the Democrats’ direction, aided not only by the failures of the Bush administration, but also by demographic and cultural shifts—see Teixeira and Judis—a lot of ink is now being spent debating how the Republicans, and conservatives more broadly, should respond. Do they move leftward and try to recapture some of the vast middle ceded to Obama (thus potentially alienating the conservative base) or do they retrench at the right flank and hope that events bring the electorate back in their direction? While many on the right argue that we are a “center-right” country by temperament, a misreading of the country’s pulse and preferences could spell disaster over the medium and long term. Hence, whether or not the right has a true leader—hence the current kerfuffle about Rush Limbaugh’s place in the conservative pantheon—they seem to be in wilderness mode.
While two election cycles don’t necessarily mean the country is on an irreversible move leftward, I thought I’d look a bit at the last time the country was moving strongly in one direction. Here, however, the move was to the right. If what is happening now is of the same magnitude and duration, Republicans are in for a long period of soul-searching and electoral defeat. My decision to look at where conservatives find themselves was spurred by today’s announcement that Al From, the founder and longtime head of the Democratic Leadership Council, is stepping down as head of the organization. The DLC was created in the midst of the Democrats’ last long period of exile. The goal of the organization, simply stated, was to make the Democrats relevant again. As liberalism reached its nadir in the 1970’s & 1980’s following the collapse of the Great Society, the “big government” solution to policy problems was thrown into disrepute. Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan were able to capitalize on the excesses of the 1960’s and America’s fear and loathing of rising crime, growing welfare dependency, and affirmative action and bring about a re-ordering of the American polity. The result?? Republicans won 5 of the 6 presidential elections between 1968 and 1988.

To get a sense of just how bad the Democrats’ period of exile was, consider the five elections between 1972 and 1988. With the exception of Jimmy Carter’s Watergate-aided win in 1976, the Republicans not only won all of these contests but won them handily. Here is the Electoral College vote in each of the contests. Overall, Republicans won 2200 electoral votes to the Democrats’ 487—82% of the total. Note how in 3 of these elections (’72, ’80, and ’84) Republicans won more electoral votes in a single contest than the Democrats won in total over all 5!!! While the Democrats managed to maintain majorities in the House and Senate (with the exception of ’81-’87) the party’s national standing was in tatters. It had no dominant spokesperson and no compelling narrative to explain how it would fix the country’s ills beyond simply rehashing liberal dogma. The question then confronting the Democrats, like the dilemma of the Republicans now, was what to do.
When the DLC was founded in 1985 the Democrats were perhaps at their lowest point nationally. In order to regain the party’s footing, the organization called for an end to the traditional “liberal” approach to policy. Rather, building on a cadre of centrist governors and members of Congress—Bill Clinton, Sam Nunn, Joe Lieberman, John Breaux, and Dave McCurdy among others—it proposed solutions that were more market based, pragmatic, and fiscally responsible. With Clinton’s election in 1992 the movement reached its ascendancy and policies such as NAFTA, welfare reform, a balanced budget, and the earned income tax credit helped reposition the Democrats as a party once again competent and identified with economic growth and prosperity.
While Bill Clinton brought the Democrats victories at the ballot box in 1992 and 1996, his centrism brought criticism from his left. Many members of Congress, still ensconced in the old liberalism (now rebranded “progressivism”) were critical of his stands on trade, welfare reform, and health care. While these intra-party squabbles were not totally responsible for the Republicans’ capture of Congress in 1994, one can argue that Clinton was more successful in dealing with the likes of Newt Gingrich and Bob Dole than he was in corralling the Democratic base. Whichever side one took in this fight for the heart of the Democratic Party, one can’t deny the fact that the debate revitalized the party and made it think hard about policy. Despite George Bush’s capture of the White House, the elections of 2000 and 2004 were fought much more closely than those of the 1970’s and ‘80’s. The Republican’s Electoral Vote margin over those two contests was a mere 40 EVs and Bush never captured 51% of the popular vote. Democrats regained their congressional losses of the mid 90’s and laid the groundwork for what we saw transpire last year.
So what can the right learn from the Democrats’ period in the wilderness?? One lesson that can be drawn is that a party needs to grapple honestly with its past excesses. Those on the left who were being honest with themselves realized that there was a reason that voters moved so definitively to the right. While events such as last weekend’s CPAC gathering isn’t going to cater to this type of reflection among today’s conservatives, other more sober venues must. What makes this introspection complicated for many on the right, though, is that they are convinced that what was repudiated in 2006 and 2008 was not conservatism, but Bush-ism. For them, Bush failed not because he was too conservative (or because conservatism more broadly was being rejected) but rather because he was too liberal. With exploding deficits and long term expansions and commitments to Medicare and other programs, “compassionate conservatism” was simply liberalism by another name. Among many congressional Republicans, the decision to now vote against spending increases—despite consistently voting for them during Bush’s reign—signals an attempt to recapture the mantle of fiscal responsibility.

Another lesson for conservatives to ponder is the need for policy debate, intra-party discussion, and diverse solutions. While not everyone on the left shared the DLC’s approach to issues, it not only helped to stop the party’s decline (perhaps it couldn’t sink any lower) but allowed it to regain a foothold in certain parts of the country where the damage of the 1970’s and 80’s was most severe—i.e. the south. Not only was the DLC a centrist organization, it was also heavily southern flavored. Whereas New Deal liberalism was strongest in the urban north, southern Democrats have always been a different breed. By giving Democrats another model, and winning elections because of it, the DLC was able to help the party begin to grow again. One can’t help but look at today’s Blue Dogs and their contribution to the Democrats’ new and expanding majority in Congress as the progeny of what Clinton and others began. If the right wants to regain not only relevancy but power, it seems obvious that they must realize that parties—should they hope to be successful nationally and over the long term—are at root coalitions. The creation and maintenance of these coalitions requires a degree of pragmatism and leadership that seems lacking on the right. It also requires a belief that many of those not currently in the coalition should be allowed under the tent. This also seems to be a point of contention among many conservatives. If the right fails to come to these realizations, they may be closer to the beginning of their time in the wilderness than to the end.

The State of the Conservative Movement--The Battle Between Purity & Pragmatism

Like John, I was at Tuesday's press conference by David Keene of the American Conservative Union, built around the release of their 2008 ratings of Congress and a preview of this weekend's CPAC conference. While perusing the ratings guide prior to Keene's remarks, I focused in on those members who received a perfect "100" rating from the ACU. As John noted, the ACU selects a handfull of votes in a given year, equates one side of that vote with the "conservative" position, and tabulates each member's vote over all the votes in their sample. Thus, each member is arrayed along a continuum of liberal to conservative. This year, 31 Republican House members received the magic 100.

In looking at those 31 members I immediately asked myself if there was anything that linked these members together--region, district composition, level of seniority, electoral safety, etc. The second question I asked was how these members--and their number (31)--compare to earlier Congresses. In other words, did 2008 have more pure conservatives and what might this tell us about how Congress has changed. Fortunately, ACU has posted their rankings for the past thirty odd years, allowing for some further exploration.

There's one caveat we must deal with first. Rankings like these suffer from a number of methodological problems. The most fundamental one is that because each year looks at different votes--dealing with different issue areas--making meaningful temporal comparisons is difficult. Its an apples to oranges dilemma. While the ACU says that they try to find a good cross section of votes across a range of issue areas, looking at each year's sample shows a wide disparity. Another problem is that not all votes are the same, even within a year's sample. Some votes might be more likely to produce one outcome over another. In this year's sample, for example, two votes (SCHIP and Farm Bill) were veto override votes. In a vote of this type one would assume that members would be under more pressure than normal to vote with their party, thus--for Republicans--making it more likely that they would cast the "conservative" vote. So, in short, we need to take these rankings with a big grain of salt. Another thing I will note is that focusing just on those members who receive a perfect score from the ACU might emphasize a distinction without a difference. In other words, how different is a member with a score of 95 from one with a score of 100?? Having said this, what do we see?

Again, this year 31 House Republicans received a perfect 100 score. Geographically, a few--mostly southern--states dominate the ranks. Georgia and Florida each produced 5 members. Next was California with 4 and Texas with 3. Arizona, Ohio, Indiana, and North Carolina had 2 members each with 1 member coming from Colorado, Louisiana, Minnesota, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Utah. While this "southernness" dimension may speak to the increasingly southern composition of the House Republican ranks, a more appropriate explanation may lie with the redistricting process. States such as Georgia, Texas, California, and Florida all have had very robust gerrymandering episodes in recent years. In fact, this recent study by Avencia Inc. which studied this process, listed GA, PA, OH, NJ, and CA as 5 of the 10 most gerrymandered states in the country. So we need to look at these members district by district.

To further explore this, I next looked at the competitiveness of these members' recent campaigns. One would expect the most conservative members (as with the most liberal) to have easy re-elections, especially if they come from very favorably drawn districts. At left is a simple spreadsheet that looks at these 31 members and their four most recent elections (except for those members who have been elected fewer than 4 times). One thing that immediately jumps out (and which I picked up on when first looking at the list) is that 2 of these members were defeated in 2008--Steve Chabot in OH-1 and Tom Feeney in FL-24. Also of note is the poor performance of Michelle Bachmann in MN-6 who managed to win despite receiving just 47% last year. The fate of these members in particular raises the fundamental question of this post--How do members straddle the dual pressures of ideology and pragmatism?? If one's district is becoming less and less conservative, does one change their behavior in order to stay in office?? In looking at these members over the years one can see how several have seen their margin of victory decline. Others, we should note, have seen relatively stable levels of support or increased margins of victory even in the face of two consecutive election cycles highly unfavorable to Republicans. This might be further proof of a gerrymandering effect. At the bottom of each column I provide the average vote of these members for each year. One sees the degree to which the last 2 cycles decreased the performance of even these most staunchly conservative members.

Next, we can look at the prevalence of these "perfect conservatives" over time to give a sense of whether or not some broader, more systemic, changes might be taking place. While I didn't look at the ACU ratings for each year, I did pull out their scores for 1974, 1984, and 1994. Election years tend to produce higher degrees of partisanship within Congress as both parties jockey for electoral advantage. I also picked these years because they represent both presidential ('84) and midterm ('74 & '94) elections as well as years with a Republican in the White House ('74 & '84) and a Democrat ('94). So we've got a good cross section of political contexts and governing arrangements to look at. In all of these years, though, I'd note that you had Democratic majorities in the House (more on that in a minute). What do we see in terms of the number of members receiving perfect scores from the ACU??

In both 1974 and 1984 9 House Republicans received a perfect rating--roughly 30% of 2008's total. Thus, we may have some evidence of a more moderate Republican caucus during that era. This would seem to jibe with much of the literature on partisanship in Congress which discusses not only increased partisan voting in recent years but also the changing composition of the membership over time. Of the members in the '74 & '84 classes, only 4 hail from southern states (1 each from GA, LA, TN, and TX). Compare that with the 5 Georgians, 5 Floridians, 3 Texans, and 2 North Carolinians in 2008's class. During these early Congresses you still had a sizable number of Southern Dems. whose voting record would be a mixed bag in the ACU's estimation.

1994 is the year where we seem to see these changes in partisanship and member composition materialize in greater conservatism. In that year 46 House Republicans received a perfect rating from the ACU. What might we conclude from this?? A few things, I think. 1994 was the one year in this quick examination that saw Republicans facing a Democratic President. Thus, being in the minority in Congress and up against a partisan adversary in the White House pushed the House Republican caucus in a more ideologically cohesive and rightward direction. With little chance of winning votes, attention turned toward obstructionism. What we also know is that the election that year brought the Republicans into the majority. This is where things get a little interesting. As a result of the '94 election the Republicans gained 52 seats in the House. We would expect, then, that the number of members with a perfect ranking from the ACU would go up as a result. With many more members plus very little turnover in the existing membership (i.e. few R's in office in '94 but not '95) how could they not go up?? Well, they didn't. When we look at the ACU ratings for 1995 we see that only 33 House Republicans got a perfect score. What happened??

What happened is that the Republicans became the majority and becoming the majority entailed a different set of responsibilities in terms of governing. Simply stated the tradeoff between ideology and pragmatism became more pronounced. In order to pass legislation--and get it signed by a Democratic president--members were forced to make compromises and thus dilute the ideological purity of their policy preferences. Any examination of this period of the Clinton presidency will note the delicate dance that the Clinton White House and the Republican Congress engaged in to try and get things done. If you look at the '94 and '95 classes of those with perfect ratings, several of the '94 class weren't present in '95. 18 of the 33 for 1995, in fact, were freshmen members--those most radicalized as a result of the '94 campaign. More senior members--those most responsible for getting legislation passed as committee chairs for example--were more likely to compromise their ideology in order to pass legislation.

Thus, as conservatives hit Washington this weekend for a mixture of pep rally and rebuilding session, they must grapple with the competing demands of their ideology and quest for power. While David Keene and others in the movement would note that "conservative" and "Republican" are not necessarily synonymous (he was very critical of George W. Bush, for example), the realm of practical politics requires figuring out how to get enough votes to win. Did Republicans lose because they were too conservative or not conservative enough?? How does this jibe with the direction the country is moving demographically, economically, and socially?? More fundamental to some conservatives--What good is winning if the result is a retreat from one's principles?? How these questions get answered will go along way toward explaining our politics in the future.

***Watch streaming video of CPAC here.

Bunning's Bluegrass Blues

Fresh on the heels of their gains over the past two cycles, Democrats are looking to an elusive Senate seat in Kentucky as an opportunity to finally get to the magic 60 seat--filibuster proof--majority. Their target is the irascible and intemperate (and Hall of Fame former major league pitcher) Jim Bunning. Despite Kentucky's reliable Republicanism in recent presidential races, Bunning has always been a lackluster campaigner and performer. With a reputation for making things, perhaps, harder for himself than they should be--in his last race he said that his challenger, and current Lieutenant Governor, looked like "one of Saddam Hussein's sons," Bunning managed to again get himself in hot water this past week. At a local GOP meeting in Kentucky, Bunning noted that a Supreme Court nomination was likely because of Justice Ginsburg's recent cancer diagnosis and operation. In his words, "Even though she was operated on, usually, nine months is the longest that anybody would live."

If this weren't bad enough, Bunning has managed to get into a sniping contest with current Republican Senatorial Committee Chair John Cornyn. Unsure of the party's loyalty, Bunning has threatened to sue the NRSC should they back a primary opponent against him (see coverage here and here).

All of this might not be much of a big deal if Bunning enjoyed widespread popularity in the state, had a massive campaign war chest in place, and could count on previous big victories to deter a serious challenge. Unfortunately, he enjoys none of these. In his previous two Senate races he has never reached 51% of the vote. His nailbiter of a re-election in '04 (50.7% to 49.3%) took place at the same time George Bush won Kentucky with 60% of the vote. In 1998, despite having won 7 terms to the House, he managed to win by just 6,000 votes. His campaign committee, as of now, reports just $150,000 in the bank--hardly an intimidating amount. In this environment, Dan Mongiardo, aka "one of Saddam Hussein's sons" has already announced his plans to challenge Bunning again.

At left, compare the maps from the '04 presidential and senatorial races (Dem. counties in red, Rep. in blue). Bush's success was much more widespread than Bunning's. While this can certainly, to
some degree, be attributed to the lukewarm reception John Kerry received in the state, Bunning supporters must nonetheless be nervous.

Goldwater Girls Gone Bad: Can the ACU's Cong. Honor Roll Really Make Them Right in Their Heart Again?

The American Conservative Union issued its 2008 congressional scorecard today. Both of ElectionDissection.com’s editors showed up at the Nat’l Press Club, and grabbed hard copies of the ratings. It’s a good thing we stopped by; the ratings are yet to be available online, though the site has a deep archive dating back to 1971 that looks like it a offers a fascinating peek at the changes that have occurred in Congress since then, and how the conservative movement looks at the institution and its Members.

One of the “NPC Newsmaker” events the Club holds regularly, the press conference was sparsely attended, and among those who couldn’t fill up the smaller Murrow Room, there seemed to be as many or more conservative movement/activist types on hand as journalists. No surprise, considering the “Newsmaker” was ACU president David Keene, a movement veteran, and the NPC advertised that he would “discuss the state of conservative activism following the 2008 elections” and hype CPAC, this weekend’s ACU-sponsored young Republican tent revival.

The yawn that greeting this year’s ratings – nobody from Roll Call, The Hill, Politico, CQ, NattyJo, etc. were recognizable in the seats – might be attributable to the trend, distinct since the ’94 Republican takeover, that’s seen more ideological cohesiveness among Members in both parties in both chambers.

Keene conceded that “the real change in America is, of course, demographic,” in parrying what the conservative activist questioner thought was a softball he lobbed at him. No, it wasn’t all that anti-immigrant haranguing that scared Hispanics away from the Republican brand, even rejecting John McCain and his solid open borders credentials in bigger numbers than G.W.’s slide from 2000 t0 2004. It was just message; a failure to communicate and appeal to the natural social conservatism of the bulk of Hispanic voters.

Keene’s prescription: just reiterate more emphatically – or, in his view, return to, after the Bush Administration’s various apostasies – a core Republican message that is disseminated more efficiently and effectively by harnessing new media. (À la Anuzis: Twitter to the kids more!) And the ACU’s, and CPAC’s, role, of course, is to inspire the conservative base to make sure Republicans in Congress adhere to that philosophy.

So, ElectionDissection.com started breaking down how many of those Members the ACU deemed sufficiently devoted to Reagan’s legacy hailed from its Southern and Great Plains regional rumps, but gave up halfway. Certainly more of the “wets” hailed from the Northeast. Maine’s stimulus-saving Senators Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins clock in with a 12 and 20, respectively, and fmr. Conn. Rep. Chris Shays, New England’s last Wooly Mammoth (read: House Republican) could only muster a 32. Similarly anomalous is fmr. Rep. Robin Hayes of No. Carolina, who shifted to the left on economics in an effort to hang on in his CD of shuttered textile plants after an unexpected nail biter in ’06 and scores a mere 48.

But with three-quarters of the 110^th Congress’ House Republican Conference scoring 80% or higher in agreement with the ACU position on the roll call votes they rate, the “honor roll” is basically reflective of the Conference at-large. (Of course, it’s tempting to be selective with which votes are selected, to reward friendly Members and not alienate influential committee chairs, etc. Democrats made so many gains in 2006 and 2008 that they now boast a caucus more diverse than any Congress since before ’94, which might make the Americans for Democratic Actions’ – the ACU's liberal inverse – ratings more telling after the 111^th first session. Nevertheless, the ADA’s 2008 ratings are about as unilluminating as the ACU’s.)

So, let’s take Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), whom Keene dubbed the “smartest guy” in the House GOP Conference; a stalwart exponent of the message he’s advocating. Ryan’s CD flipped in ’08, when Obama captured 51% even as Ryan was reelected with nearly two-thirds of the same electorate. (Bush bested Kerry 53%-46% here four years before.) So, Ryan held on, a rare case vindicating Keene’s strategy.

One state to the south offers a starker contrast. Republicans are salivating over a potential special election for embattled Sen. Roland Burris’ Illinois Senate seat, once held by Obama himself. Two Republican U.S. Reps. from neighboring suburban Chicago districts are staring down each other for the GOP nod: reliable Republican Peter Roskam (ACU ’08 rating: 96) and perennial target of conservative ire Mark Kirk (ACU ’08 rating: 48). Considering that GOP primary electorates remain very conservative, even in Blue States, Roskam would be favored at first blush.

While the main counties in both Members’ CDs – Lake Co. in Kirk’s; DuPage Co. in Roskam’s – saw a dramatic shift to Obama, like affluent, educated suburban locales nationwide, these counties are remarkable even given that the trend here may be over-pronounced due to Obama’s Favorite Son status. These counties have been so reliably Republican that even “homegirl” Hillary Rodham Clinton was a Goldwater Girl here back in ’64.  But HRC followed a trajectory now familiar among women of her generation who hail from the Collar Counties: product of a conservative, upwardly-mobile Republican household goes off to an elite institution of higher learning (say, Wellesley) and graduates with an even higher earning potential and the de rerigueur decidedly liberal politics that ascending in those circles demands.  To smarting conservative Republicans: Goldwater Girls Gone Bad.

While Roskam increased his reelect margin from ‘06, and Kirk held steady, could Roskam’s more rigid conservatism win in Lake Co., now much more Democratic? It’s more plausible that Kirk’s more malleable positions could take DuPage as well as Lake and dig into Democratic margins in Red County Lincolnland.  Can Roskam's unwavering conservatism, more than Kirk's more moderate stands, really bring those Goldwater Girls Gone Bad back into the fold?

If Illinois’ political melodrama plays itself out, we may get a test of Keene’s strategy soon.

***

A parting thought: it should be noted that the most salient issues that divide moderate and conservative, suburban and rural Republicans remain those explosive cultural issues. Not a single so-called “social issue” roll call vote merits a rating by the ACU in ’08, save for a vote on benefits to “illegal” immigrants.

How Important is the Urban Vote and What Does the Furture of Urban America Look Like???

Two recent articles about the nature of urban America and urban voting caught my attention. The first, in the recent Esquire by Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com looks at the 2008 election through the prism of urban/suburban/rural voters. Its pretty straightforward stuff, showing that not only did Obama win the urban vote (as expected) but that he did so with such margins that his deficits in rural areas were rendered meaningless. 2008 also saw Obama win the suburbs, the first Democrat to do so since Clinton. What is of interest here is not the numbers, per se, but the trends. Recent demographic data shows an America that is becoming increasingly suburban and urban. Whereas the 1960's and 70's saw the phenomenon of "white flight" out of the cities, much of that movement is being reversed. While the big cities are still not as large as they were during their industrial boom times, there is reason to wonder whether a "re-urbanization" is underway and ask what is driving it.

The second article on this topic is by Richard Florida in the March issue of The Atlantic. In looking at the potential ramifications of the current economic crisis on our country's urban landscape, Florida wonders what changes will be brought about--how will Detroit fare? Whither the Sun Belt? How does the type of work done in a particular place affect its current health and its future? For comparison's sake, he creates this series of interactive maps showing changes in income, population, and innovation over the last 30 years. The follow up question to this discussion--which Florida doesn't address--relates to the political ramifications of these changes. What type of politics do we see in areas that are growing, adapting, innovating, and prospering as opposed to those areas that are shrinking, stagnating, and suffering? Does one party benefit? Does a certain type of politics--message, tone, style--become more prevalent? When opening up this line of thinking, I'm reminded of the argument of Judis and Texeira in "The Emerging Democratic Majority." Their model for Democratic resurgence was based on the notion of "ideopolises"--urban/suburban centers composed of highly educated, innovative, and diverse individuals. When following some of Florida's trends you can't help but see some parallels. The important question, though, is whether these trends continue.

Happy Birthday Mr. Lincoln

Today marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln. In commemoration of this bicentennial, I thought we'd look back at the 1860 election that brought Lincoln to office and kick started the slide to Civil War. Obviously there are a number of important points to raise about the 1860 election, most notably the fact that it brought about a new party system with the ascendancy of the Republican party (rising out of the collapse of the Whigs). In the aftermath of the Civil War this party system became highly regionalized with Democrats in control of the "solid South" and Republicans in control of the northeast and midwest. It took a century for the south to become open to voting consistently for Republicans.

As has been discussed a lot on this site, the regional dimension of American politics is of great interest to both John and I. Understanding how regional attachments to parties and ideologies have shifted--and what brought these shifts about--helps us understand many of our history's macro-level changes. These shifts, at the same time, also help explain the success of individual candidates, running in particular places for particular offices, at distinct points in time.

I'll try to find some more Lincoln-related material to post in the days and weeks ahead. Until then, for those of us who are interested in the contours of American political history, we should remember how there are few figures of greater consequence than Mr. Lincoln.

**Graphic courtesy of http://www.uselectionatlas.org/

Obama's Silver Streak Through Elkhart: Will It Stimulate More Hoosier Dem Turnout?

President Obama had good reason to blow trough Elkhart, Indiana on his two-city barnstorming tour touting his stimulus plan. This small, once-oasis of a Rust Belt city is a savvy choice for a campaign-style backdrop, and a perfect place to refer to repeatedly in his first prime time White House press conference last night.

GF-R slapped together a thumbnail sketch of Elkhart for WaPo’s website, noting its economic slump as the capital of the scuttling RV industry. Elkhart’s staggering, and swelling, unemployment rate has been cited as the prime reason Obama advisors selected this recently struggling city as a backdrop, including Almanac of American Politics guru Michael Barone, even though he makes passing note of its recent stunning electoral shifts.

Economic factors pointed to this locale as a newsworthy whistle-stop on this tour, but ElectionDissection can’t resist investigating those very electoral shifts that Barone merely mentioned, electoral shifts that made Elkhart a “must stop” for Obama on a road show mapped out to shore up his political base as much as to push PR for this legislation.

Elkhart County was ground zero in the electoral upheavals that made Indiana an unexpected battle ground in Election ’08. This last reliably Republican redoubt in the Rust Belt – only Indiana rejected Bill Clinton for Bob Dole in this region in ’96 - offered up a nail biter in November, when Barack Obama became the first Democrat to carry the Hoosier State since LBJ’s ’64 landslide, albeit narrowly.

John McCain still managed to claim Elkhart, but at a drastically diminished majority from the overwhelming differential that George W. Bush scored over John Kerry in ’04. Even while ceding the county, Obama scored the highest Dem presidential raw vote total ever in Elkhart Co., and the nearly 14,000 more votes that Obama garnered than Kerry amounted to roughly half of Obama’s statewide margin of victory.

Elkhart was one of only nine out of Indiana’s 80 counties carried by Obama in this year’s primary when he gave Hillary Rodham Clinton a fright in a state that most pundits assumed was firmly in her column. Obama campaign organizers successfully harnessed the enthusiasm that spilled over from Obama’s comfortable 18 point victory over Hillary to maximize his general election vote in Elkhart, pushing him closer to capturing those 11 electoral votes.

Elkhart was once home to Miles Laboratories, the original makers of Alka-Seltzer. Miles has since been swallowed up by Bayer AG, the German pharma giant, but, like the millions of Americans nursed back to health to the sing-song of its celebrity cartoon spokescharacter Speedy Alka-Seltzer™, the previously perpetually-strong recreational vehicle and mobile home industries spared Elkhart much of the heartburn that ailed surrounding counties in Michiana, and the Rust Belt at-large. Elkhart has posted continual population increases at each decennial census, while the rest of Michiana stagnated.

At the outset of an economic downturn, it’s often recreational and other “non-essential” industries that take the first, and sharpest, hit as consumers tighten their belts. Elkhart’s troubles may well prove to be over-pronounced in the immediate term, and may yet rebound back to former fortitude once consumers regain confidence.

So, Elkhart doesn’t yet confound the pattern that ElectionDissection has been illuminating from our inception. Conventional Wisdom is insisting that Elkhart’s troubles spurred the spike in its Democratic vote in 2008 with traditionally Republican voters now demanding a more activist economic agenda. Demographic and electoral trends may not yet permit us to declare that “Elkhart is Obama-country,” but Elkhart does resemble on a more modest scale - with its relative historical economic strength and a more educated electorate, less susceptible to the siren call of economic populism of either the Democratic John Edwards stripe or the Mike Huckabee Republican variety - the thriving ‘burbs of North Carolina, Colorado and Virginia that have pushed those states from Ruby Red to Perplexed Purple.

Can You Import Hope??? Maybe! We! Can!

A quick detour into the international realm. One thing that people who follow campaigns know is that winners get copied. Strategies, tactics, and messages that work in one context inevitably get tried in another. While we're normally familiar with this in the U.S., we're seeing an interesting attempt at borrowing taking place in the current Israeli Knesset elections. While I'm not going to even attempt an analysis of what's going on or what's likely to happen--I know my limitations--there have been a number of stories pointing to how candidates on all sides have looked to replicate what Obama did. For complete coverage leading up to next week's vote, see the Jerusalem Post's rundown.

A few weeks ago, the New York Times wrote about Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu's appropriation of Obama's website design. Yesterday, the Washington Post looked at the efforts of Kadima's Tzipi Livni (she even has a Facebook page!!) as well as those of the smaller Shas party (which largely represents Israel's Sephardic population). The latter has gone so far as to adopt "Yes We Can! (With God's Help)" as their slogan. For you Hebrew readers out there, here's Shas' bumper sticker:










Pay attention to next Tuesday's vote to see how things play out. I may deputize some of my in-laws for post election analysis so stay tuned.

Some Quick Hits

Just a couple of quick notes on some stories I've come across:

Today's Politico has two stories on the increasingly irascible Blue Dog Coalition. As I hinted at the other day, the Pelosi vs. Blue Dog relationship is turning out to be an interesting early storyline this year. See stories here and here.

Politico also has a story on the race to succeed newly appointed Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. NY's 20th District is historically Republican so this should prove to be a barn burner.

In Esquire's profile of Obama campaign manager David Plouffe we get a little more elaboration on what "Organizing for America" will look like (see originial post on this topic here).

Finally, the January/February issue of the Atlantic has a number of stories revolving around the issue of race and "the end of white America." While I'd recommend all the stories, one snippet in Marc Ambinder's piece "Race Over?" jumped out at me. He points out that one advantage Obama had over previous Democratic nominees like Kerry and Gore was that he didn't need to worry, by election day, about rounding up black votes. While the African American vote, we know, is overwhelmingly Democratic, turnout can be tricky. Obama's primary victories had mobilized black voters and given them the sense that Obama could win. Thus:

Exactly four years earlier, John Kerry was flying from urban center to urban center, enlisting the support of Bill Clinton to pump up minority turnout. In some states, internal Kerry polling in mid-October showed Bush overperforming among black voters. Democrats were obsessed with what they called the "African American piece": the quadrennial party efforts to get out the black vote, usually with visits from black leaders and robocalls from Bill Clinton...But on October 22, 2008 Obama was in largely white exurban Virginia.

By the end of any campaign, resources and time become extremely thin. Thus, Obama was fortunate to be able to spend his last days reaching out to those voters that had eluded Gore and especially Kerry (moderate, suburban whites), and do so using a message that was directly aimed at them. Whereas Gore and Kerry had to talk to both black and white audiences, as Ambinder writes, Obama

did not have to pander to black leaders; he did not have to target specific messages at the black community with the attendant risk of exacerbating economic tension between blacks and whites. He did not have to bring up race...Obama was able to credential himself as an African American without engaging in overt racial politics. Or, rather, the black community credentialed Obama without his resorting to racial politicking, something that white candidates had to do.

Is Kirsten Gillibrand the New Senator from New York State or New York City???

Back in December I wrote a post about the advantages, if any, possessed by statewide candidates who hail from their state's largest city. What we see with the current Senate is no real correlation between electoral success and one's residence. Today's New York Times runs a profile of the newly appointed Senator from New York, Kirsten Gillibrand. The former House Rep. hails from an upstate (and traditionally Republican) district centered around Albany. She originally won the seat in 2006, defeating Republican incumbent John Sweeney.

In the story, a short snippet caught my attention that is pertinent to this question of whether it matters where in a state a candidate comes from:

Her appointment occasioned yawps of disappointment from downstate Democrats, who tend to view Senate seats as proprietary possessions. Charles E. Goodell, who was appointed to fill Robert F. Kennedy’s seat in 1968, was the last senator to come from outside New York City or its suburbs.

If there's any state in the country where the big ciy/out state dynamic is more pronounced than New York, I can't think of one. In the weeks leading up to the appointment, one of Gillibrand's biggest advocates was New York's other senator, and former head of the DSCC, Chuck Schumer. That the Brooklynite would go to bat for Gillibrand indicates that he thinks she can win NY city area voters. His track record in recruiting candidates over the past two cycles is beyond reproach, it seems, given the Dems pickup of 13 seats and reclamation of the majority. To give a sense of how much of the New York vote is provided by the metro area, I looked at the 2008 totals by county. Statewide, there were 7,594,813 votes cast. Using a somewhat broad definition of the NY metro area, the relevant county vote was:

New York (Manhattan): 667,594

Kings (Brooklyn): 759, 848

Queens: 597,695

Bronx: 381,322

Richmond (Staten Island): 166,578
Nassau: 635,482

Suffolk: 659,403

Westchester: 413,044

Rockland: 132,193

All told, then, the yield out of this part of the state was 4,413,159 votes or 58% of the statewide total. When one looks at how these counties voted, one sees both the wisdom in the Gillibrand pick, and the danger. Here is Obama's % of the vote in each county:

New York: 86%

Kings: 79%

Queens: 75%

Bronx: 89%

Richmond: 47%

Nassau: 54%

Suffolk: 53%

Westchester: 64%

Rockland: 53%

So, while the immediate NY city area is overwhelmingly Democratic (with the exception of Staten Island), the Democratic vote share declines as one moves out into the broader suburban counties. Though these counties still went blue, one can imagine these voters being receptive to a candidate who has a much more moderate profile than a traditional liberal from the boroughs. This was no doubt on Schumer's mind as he pushed her candidacy. Gillibrand will have to defend the seat in 2010 so someone with a bigger base of support (coupled with a great fundraising record) would seem to have a leg up.

What's the danger?? While Gillibrand's candidacy has a lot of "up state up side", she needs to watch her left flank. As the Times article makes clear, on issues such as gun control and immigration her voting record has been to the right of most of her Democratic colleagues. Thus, she opens herself up for a potential primary challenge. There was speculation during the appointment process that more liberal House reps. such as Carolyn Maloney (14th) and Jerold Nadler (8th) were being considered. So, as the new senator begins to learn the issues of importance to a broader constituency, she must do so fearing the City's desire to reclaim its "rightful" ownership of the seat.

Meanwhile, On the Democratic Side of the Stimulus Vote...

Last week I wrote about the Republican caucus' universal opposition to the Stimulus Bill. Today, lets take a quick look at the 11 Democrats who broke ranks to vote against the legislation. Politico has a story about these 11, noting that 9 of them came from districts carried by John McCain last year. The 11 nays are (with those from McCain winning districts in bold):

Allen Boyd (FL-2)

Bobby Bright (AL-2)

Jim Cooper (TN-5)

Brad Ellsworth (IN-8)

Parker Griffith (AL-5)

Paul Kanjorski (PA-11)

Frank Kratovil (MD-1)

Walt Minnick (ID-1)

Collin Peterson (MN-7)

Heath Shuler (NC-11)

Gene Taylor (MS-4)

In this list, 4 members are freshmen--Bright, Griffith, Kratovil, and Minnick--so one might hypothesize about an effect similar to the one I described happening during the 1993 Budget Resolution vote (see Mezvinsky, Marjorie Margolies). Coming from normally strong Republican constituencies, these new members decided (unlike Mezvinsky) to stick with the district. To get a further sense of how red these districts are, in 2004 each gave George W. Bush at least 60% of the vote: AL-2--66%; AL-5--60%; MD-1--62%; ID-1--68%.

Perhaps the best explanations for the bulk of these defections, as the Politico story notes, is 1) the bill's cost and 2) the role afforded to Democratic skeptics in the drafting process. Of the non-freshmen no votes, all but Kanjorski are members of the Blue Dog Coalition. Led in this fight by Jim Cooper,a veteran of the budget battles of the early and mid 90's, these fiscally conservative Dems seem to have been shut out of the drafting and strategizing stages by the Pelosi leadership team. With the bill destined to pass handily, these Blue Dogs felt comfortable making a stand in favor of fiscal prudence and against the strong arm tactics of the party leadership. Indeed, this appears to be a recurring dynamic within the Democratic caucus. A more progressively minded leadership, buoyed by a large majority, seems unfazed by the defection of a small cadre of members. If the final bill is less "watered down" as a result of this more hard-line stance, then Speaker Pelosi seems quite content to live with a disgruntled--yet seemingly impotent--right flank. When the Stimulus Bill returns for final passage we'll get to see whether this dynamic repeats itself, albeit with an interesting twist--will more moderate (or threatened) Republicans vote in favor of the package at the same time that these Blue Dogs vote no??? If this indeed were to happen, is that what Obama-era bi-partisanship will come to look like??

50 State Steele?

A rudderless Republican National Committee wrapped up a raucous winter meeting today, selecting Michael Steele, a man who whiffed on a primary for Maryland state comptroller he was favored to win against a field of unknowns just a decade ago, as their new face in the post-Obama drubbing era.

Both of ElectionDissection.com’s editors secured press credentials - just like a legitimate news media outlet! – and were on hand, crowded into the designated press corner for all six, tension-fraught ballots that committee members needed to elect a new chairman.                                        

Steele boasted repeatedly of his tenure as Maryland GOP chair, and the election of Bob Ehrlich as governor and himself as Lt. Governor, under his watch.  Of course, Steele glossed over his ticket’s ousting four years later by then-Baltimore mayor Martin O’Malley, and falling 10 points short in his 2006 U.S. Senate bid against Ben Cardin. 

Word around the hall had it that Steele enjoyed strong support fellow Blue Stater RNC members.  Indeed, Steele enjoyed the support of DC’s Republican Party Chair Bob Kabel and national committeewoman Betsy Werronen.  

ElectionDissection ran into Patrick Mara, the Republican who fell short for an at-large DC Council seat last fall, after unseating veteran Republican Council Member Carol Schwartz in a bitterly contested, low turnout primary. 

Mara voiced his support for Steele, citing not only his support for his recent council bid, but also - reminding us that he cut his political teeth in his native heavily Democratic Rhode Island - an affinity for Steele as a Blue State Republican.  Mara explained that Steele understands that it takes a different sort of Republican, a more moderate Republican or one from a more diverse background, to compete in unfavorable terrain.  

Steele’s own rhetoric and from those who advocated on his behalf insisted that only he, the RNC’s media savvy first Afro-Am chairman, could appeal to diverse constituencies, rebuild party infrastructure and reinvent the partisan brand.  Critics drew parallels to the Obama campaign’s “change” theme that opponents found sorely lacking in specifics.  

But in his victory speech, Steele thanked RNC members from all regions of the country, including those from the Northeast, where Republican support has almost dried up in recent years.  (He also thanked the 18 members from the territories, key players on a committee of only 168, where the national committeewoman from the Northern Marianas Islands has a vote equal with the Republican chair from Texas, the nation’s largest Red State.)  “Get ready, baby,” he advised them.  A Steele-led RNC intends to compete there, too.  This was meant to contrast sharply with the man who was his last standing challenger, Katon Dawson, the slick, Southern, well-coiffed chairman from the Deep Red, Deep South Palmetto State, who resembled much of the traditional RNC membership.

Those remarks reinforced what occurred to me during our conversation with Mara: that a Steele chairmanship would implement a strategy similar to Howard Dean’s 50 State Strategy, one that’s built up infrastructure in Deep Red states and enable Democrats to win recent races that they couldn’t contest earlier in this decade.  Given the daunting demographic trends that Republicans face these days, it’s hard to conceive how even more durable infrastructure can save the GOP.  But then again, few foresaw Democrats snaring the seat of a retiring Republican House Speaker, after Dean put his strategy into effect.

Can You Have Bi-Partisanship When You're Highly Polarized???

Today’s big story is the House’s passage of President Obama’s economic stimulus bill without a single Republican vote. The 244-188 vote saw all 177 Republicans vote against the package of tax cuts and spending increases aimed at job creation, infrastructure improvement, and other investments. In the early days of his administration, Obama had made numerous attempts at reaching some accord with the Republican membership, including visiting the members on Capitol Hill and engaging them in a wide ranging discussion and debate about the legislation. For those looking for a new era of bi-partisan cooperation, these early efforts were greatly welcomed. With yesterday’s vote, though, many of these same people are asking whether anything in Washington has changed. While some commentary has scolded Republican House members for talking a good game of bi-partisanship without being willing to walk the walk, a larger question must be explored—one that goes to the heart of the modern day Congress. Namely, why would we have expected many Republican votes in the first place???

Over the last several election cycles, we’ve seen the membership of the House of Representatives become increasingly polarized. This has been due to changes in both the Democratic and Republican caucuses. For the Democrats, the decline of the party’s fortunes in the south over the past generation or so has led to the virtual disappearance of the southern conservative (often rural) Democrat. As these seats became solidly Republican the Democratic caucus became increasingly liberal ideologically. While we’ve seen a slight reversal of this trend with the election of some more Blue Dogs recently, the Democrats nonetheless remain, as a whole, a more liberal bunch than their predecessors. For the Republicans we’ve also seen a geographic shift with the emptying of New England GOP seats as well as losses in the industrial Midwest. Thus, the GOP ranks have become increasingly conservative ideologically. As a consequence there are fewer members who find themselves occupying the middle range of the political spectrum—and thus acting as potential votes for the opposite party from time to time.

This polarization has also been aided, many argue, by the redistricting process that tends to create safe districts for members of both parties. With little fear of a serious electoral challenge, members don’t perceive any cost to adhering to their party’s agenda as opposed to their constituents’. Both agendas, are in essence, the same. To get a sense of this, I’ve taken a look at the last two House Republican caucuses. What we’re seeing is that the Republican members in office now have become quite safe in their re-election, despite going through two pretty wretched cycles. When defining what makes a member potentially vulnerable for defeat, political scientists have tended to use either 55% or 60% of the vote in one’s most recent campaign as a warning sign. So, for example:

In 2008, 37 Rep. House members received 55% of the vote or less
In 2006, 41 Rep. House members received 55% of the vote or less

In 2008, 38 Rep. House members received 55-60%
In 2006, 60 Rep. House members received 55-60%

Thus, close to 60% of the House Republican caucus received over 60% of the vote in 2008. Overall, 2006 seemed to be considerably worse than 2008 in putting members in the “danger zone.” Another way of looking at these numbers is to look at each member’s performance in 2008 compared to 2006. Here again, we see more members doing better. In 2008, 79 House Republicans got a higher % than they did in 2006; 66 got a lower %; and 9 received the same %.

So, for your average House Republican, despite the fact that your party has taken a beating over the past two cycles, their individual performance hasn’t been quite as bad. While a number of members have been swept out of office—thus Democratic gains of 32 and 21 seats—those that are left would seem to be quite secure. So perhaps expecting large swaths of them to start voting Democratic was premature. While trying to be bi-partisan is certainly admirable, the distance that Obama was trying to cover may have been too far. One might also argue that given the cushion he had given the large Democratic majority, he could afford to make bi-partisan overtures and still be rebuffed. The Stimulus bill still passed handily.

One group of members that we might want to focus on more closely, especially when the Stimulus bill comes back to the House for final passage, is the freshman class. The Republicans have 23 members who have never been through this type of process before and for whom the Stimulus vote was their first consequential decision. When we look at this group we see a much more insecure bunch. Of these 23 members, 13 received less than 55% last year and another 6 received between 55 and 60%. With their no votes they have served to put a big target on their backs.

When yesterday’s vote took place, I was reminded of a similar vote that took place at the beginning of the last Democratic presidency. In 1993, the House vote on President Clinton’s $500 billion deficit reduction package transpired in a very similar fashion. With every Republican vote against the bill, the legislation managed to pass by a single vote. The story of this vote is one I use in the first lecture I give as a part of my course on the U.S. Congress. With the vote of freshman House Democrat Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky of Pennsylvania, the budget resolution squeaked through giving the new president his first major legislative victory. In making her decision, Mezvinsky angered a large segment of her suburban, affluent constituency. Because of the bill’s provisions to increase taxes on upper income earners, she immediately put herself in electoral jeopardy. Sure enough, in the 1994 Republican landslide, Mezvinsky was a casualty.

The reason I bring this story up is because Mezvinsky, like all freshmen members, was just learning how to do her job when this vote took place. Unlike her more senior colleagues, she didn’t have much experience in determining how her constituents would react to her vote and how she could regain their trust. The big difference between the 1993 vote and yesterday's, of course, is that the Clinton package raised taxes while the Obama bill cuts them. While it has been proven dangerous to vote for a bill that hits your constituents in the wallet, we don't know whether there's a cost in voting against a bill that will add money to them. This uncertainty is no doubt running through many of the current freshmen after yesterday’s vote. While we’ll have to wait a while to see how their votes play out both at home and in Washington, you can be sure they will be getting a lot of attention—attention they’d no doubt rather avoid—over the coming weeks.

Tomorrow, ElectionDissection.com will be at the Republican National Committee meeting in Washington to get a sense of how the party is grappling with the state they find themselves in. We'll report back, with special focus on the election of the new party Chairman.

From Campaigning to Governing--"Going Public" Version 2.0

In the mid 1980’s presidential scholarship by political scientist Samuel Kernell argued that presidents were able to gain bargaining power and leverage with Congress by “going public.” In an environment in which politics was becoming increasingly individualized and fragmented—due to the decline of political parties, candidate-centered campaigns, and greater constituency driven pressures on legislators—presidents found it necessary to go outside of Washington to generate support for their agenda. By going over the heads of recalcitrant legislators and appealing directly to the public, presidents could get constituents to, in effect, do the work of compelling Congress to act. Whether it be through public appearances and speeches in person or through the air waves, the office of the President, aided by technology and its ability to draw media coverage, was at an advantage vis a vis a more fractured Congress.

With the advent of the Obama administration, it seems as if we may be on the verge of a new, and potentially more powerful, iteration of this “going public” dynamic. As has been much discussed, one of the Obama campaign’s greatest strengths was its organizational muscle. By not only harnessing the best technology and social networking tools of the day, but pairing it with a campaign ethos premised on community organization and grass roots mobilization, Obama was able to register scores of new voters, provide continuous updates to a 13 million strong email distribution list, and repeatedly tap its network for campaign contributions. With victory in hand, the question then became—“Now what???” How do you keep this network engaged when the immediate pressures and excitement of a campaign are gone? Can you put the network to use in trying to enact your agenda? Can these people help you govern?

Initial indications are that this is exactly what the Obama Administration is hoping to do. Over the last few weeks, we have begun to see the roll out of “Organizing for America” (See NYTimes coverage here). While the specifics of this plan are still pretty vague, one can imagine how it could be put to use in pressuring Congress. Just as people were alerted to various developments in the campaign, a similar communications apparatus could be used as the House or Senate is preparing to vote on the Economic Stimulus plan, health care reform, etc. With individuals getting specific information on their particular member of Congress, the poor staff assistants who answer the phones in congressional offices might find themselves deluged with pleas for congressional action. Having answered such calls myself and knowing how legislative offices sometimes discount mass appeals of this type—especially when they seem generated by an outside entity—the team behind Organizing for America will need to be quite sophisticated in their methodology.

On a related level, another indication that Obama is going to attempt to maintain his organizational structure is the recent ascension of Virginia Governor Tim Kaine to the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee. Hand-chosen by the President, Kaine shares not just a close relationship with Obama (he was one of Obama’s first high profile endorsers) but also a governing ethic. Both have fashioned themselves as pragmatists more than ideologues and Kaine’s success in Virginia (seen first by Mark Warner) showed the viability of a campaign premised on “expanding the map.” With Kaine now topping the Democratic Party, he seems charged not only with the more traditional party leadership responsibilities—fundraising, candidate recruitment, and organizational maintenance—but with using the tools developed by the Obama campaign to push its governing agenda. In fact, Organizing for America will be housed at the DNC. One potential outcome of this (and indeed danger) that I speculated about earlier in the campaign is that the “Democratic Party” ceases to exist in any true sense, and is replaced with the “Obama Party.” Given the unprecedented degree of marketing and branding that the Obama campaign did, one wonders if tensions could emerge down the road. Might rank and file Democrats bristle at being subsumed within the Obama machine? Might they resent pressure generated by Organizing for America? How do policy differences and conflicting agendas get resolved? While all of these questions will no doubt get answered—and probably in a messy fashion from time to time—what seems clear is that a new method and machinery for “going public” is in the offing.

TARP Trends

With its first notable post-Inauguration vote, the new Congress is indicating that, even if all those platitutudes heralding a new post-partisan and/or post-racial Era of Good Feelings should indeed dawn on us, ushered in by the new Administration, sectional rifts will still sometimes rend both parties.

A quick look at the break down of Members who crossed the aisle over today’s House vote amending the TARP econ bailout plan points to a more identifiable regional trend animating the votes of GOP rebels than the Dems who opposed their leadership. Although The Hill describes the vote as “largely symbolic” and the title of the WaPo article notes the bill includes “Strict New Requirements on Use of Bailout Funds,” this vote can be considered one of the Obama Administration’s first tests in Congress

Given that the House Democrats’ swelled ranks have brought in a caucus that is more diverse in age, ideology, region and in intesity of the loyalty each feels to various elements of the victorious Democratic majority of 2008 (to name a few), more splits seem likely on roll call votes, esp. should Obama’s honeymoon with Congressional Democrats prove to be abbreviated.

But on this early vote, the atrophied Republican rump in the House looks like it feels more confident in opposing their leadership now that Tom DeLay’s old mantra of keeping a Republican majority at any cost is a moot point.

Of the 18 Republicans voting “aye,” 11 hail from Rust Belt states hit hard by the economic downturn and who might expect constituents to benefit from bailout funds. (This group includes seven from Michigan alone, include the traditionally conservative Rep. Peter Hoekstra, from the state’s Dutch-settled southwest. Hoekstra was joined in this group by social conservative fire breather and Speaker Gingrich failed coup plotter Rep. Mark Souder, from a hard-pressed Fort Wayne-based northwestern Indiana district.):

Camp (MI)
Ehlers (MI)
Hoekstra (MI)
LaTourette (OH)
McCotter (MI)
Miller (MI)
Rogers (MI)
Schock (IL)
Souder (IN)
Turner (OH)
Upton (MI)

Reps. Lance of New Jersey and Castle of Delaware might be lumped in here too, hailing from industrial states.

Among other GOP rebels:

Rep. Dave Reichert, also, represents Washington state, home of heavy Boeing layoffs.

Rep. John Campbell, who’s made a name for himself as a spending hawk, hails from a far Southern California CD home to possibly ailing aerospace firms.

The last three rebels hail from Florida, including the brother duo of Reps. Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart. Interestingly, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, their Cuban-American Republican cohort who usually votes with them, stayed loyal on this vote, though Rep. Vern Buchanan of a demographically shifting Sarasota-based CD joined them.

Democratic apostates include a few Southern Democrats from Old South CDs who frequently defy their leadership: Reps. Shuler and McIntyre of North Carolina, Rep. Marshall of Georgia, Rep. Gene Taylor of Mississippi and freshman Rep. Bobby Bright of Montgomery, Alabama, whom is voting more with the GOP already despite their failure to recruit him as a candidate this cycle.

Other potential trends at work here:

Western freshman from districts that have boomed in recent years: Reps. Walt Minnick of Idaho and Ann Kirkpatrick of rural Arizona.

The other two rebels hail from Hillary-heavy voting and hurting Pennsylvania CDs – Reps. Jason Altmire and Tim Holden – who may think the package isn’t generous enough.

Can You Rebuild a Party Based On Nostalgia??? Or, What Do the Republicans Do About George W. Bush???

A few weeks back John wrote about the Republican party’s current search for a new Chairman. While I haven’t followed the sweepstakes blow for blow, some aspects have caught my attention and led me to think more broadly about the direction of the party.

In a much publicized debate (watch here) on January 5th hosted by Grover Norquist and Americans for Tax Reform, all six of the candidates to head the RNC were asked to name our greatest president. Not missing a beat, each dutifully answered “Reagan” in an almost Pavlovian fashion. This fealty to Reagan seems to be the first commandment of modern Republicanism. While the Gipper was certainly the modern GOP’s most successful politician, there seems to me to be some real danger in trying to refashion the Republican Party around a theme of Reagan revival and nostalgia.

As much of the data on last year’s election has made clear, a strong predictor of the vote was age. Among the cohort of voters under the age of 30, Obama won two thirds of the vote. As much of the literature on political socialization has shown, party loyalties tend to be fashioned early in one’s life and endure rather well over time. Thus, the Democrats are salivating over these numbers, seeing a solid voting block extending well into the future. While its naïve to think that this age cohort will continue to have such solid Democratic loyalty as they enter their 40’s, 50’s, and beyond, its not far fetched to speculate on the numerical advantage they’ll have, especially when combined with other variables pointing in the Dems favor—increases is the minority population and the correlation between level of education and Democratic support.

So why the danger in dwelling on Reagan?? When this was originally reported I couldn’t help but think of the students that I teach. My current group of students—those just entering political life through voting, internships, and other types of mobilization—was born in 1988. They have absolutely no direct recollection or memory of Ronald Reagan. In fact, they were twelve when Bill Clinton left office!!! For them, the only President they’ve had any meaningful experience with is George W. Bush. And from the exit polling we’ve seen, that experience doesn’t appear to have been too positive. In thinking about this phenomenon, I got to wondering about how presidential legacies are both important in shaping people’s view of parties and policies yet also hindrances in allowing parties and politics to move forward.

When presidents get elected and parties come to power, they do so through the formation of coalitions—a collection of individuals and groups who, at best share a common set of policy preferences and interests, and at the very least, are drawn to one side more than the other, usually out of disappointment with the ruling party’s performance. These coalitions are oftentimes fragile as coalition members differ about policy specifics or priorities. In these cases, the interest of maintaining power takes precedence over ideological purity. Whether or not these coalitions remain intact and endure over time has been crucial to our thinking about eras of party dominance or “realignments.” When a coalition disintegrates, parties enter into periods of self-examination. They must figure out why their support disappeared and how to cobble together the support necessary to return to power.

Some historical examples can be used to illustrate this. In the aftermath of the Civil War, the Republican Party used the memory of Lincoln and "waving the bloody shirt” to ensure a series of victories throughout the Gilded Age. At some point, though, that was no longer enough to win. Lincoln, though an American giant, was no longer at the forefront of Americans’ consciousness and the Civil War generation had died off. A new strategy was needed. Later, the Democratic Party rose to dominance with the formation of the “New Deal Coalition.” With support from the South, big cities, unions, farmers, and increasingly African Americans, FDR was able to win 4 successive elections and the Democrats were able to control Congress consistently for over a generation. By the end of LBJ’s term, though, the coalition had frayed. This brings us to Reagan. Reagan’s success was not just in giving some clarity to the Republican Party’s policies, but in co-opting those prodigal members of the old Roosevelt coalition—working class whites, southerners, etc. and bringing them over to the Republican side.

While Clinton was able to bring some of them back, George W. Bush’s two victories, though extremely narrow, had many in the GOP ranks positing an enduring Republican majority. We now know how that turned out--and that’s where the GOP’s problem lies, in my view. I don’t know how you can rebuild the GOP by trying to act as if Bush never existed. How do you rewind to Reagan and start over? Again I think of my students’ generation. When they think of the Republican Party, they don’t think of Reagan, they think of Bush. Even on the Democratic side this year we saw how the American electorate has a short term memory. Much of Hillary Clinton’s campaign seemed premised on the notion of a Clinton Renaissance—“vote for me and we’ll go back to the 90’s when everything was great.” Again, we’ve seen how that turned out. A candidate who was wholly forward looking captured voters’ attention, offered a new type of politics, and rode to victory.

This brings us to Bush. As he prepares to leave office next week, a number of press outlets have been compiling retrospectives on the Bush years. As one might expect, the pictures have not been positive. Whether it be fiscal, foreign, or domestic policy, the Bush legacy is not one that many will point to, especially in the near term, as worth being repeated. How, then, does the Republican Party regroup? How do they address the Bush legacy? Do they, after a respectful period, go through a period of disavowing everything done over the past eight years—essentially arguing that Bush was not a true conservative? With explosive spending, hubristic foreign policy ambitions, and a regular disregard for limited government and “states rights,” there is certainly ample evidence for this claim. The question of Bush’s “real” conservatism was a subject explored in depth in Andrew Sullivan’s “The Conservative Soul.” The downside of this strategy, of course, is that you alienate much of the party’s base, those Americans who still give Bush relatively high approval ratings. The other downside is that, over the past two elections, there seems to be a greater willingness for Americans to accept “more government.” A more ideologically pure Republican Party may in fact be an even less popular one.

For a second strategy, on the other hand, do you try and move forward, acting as if the Bush years were a bit of an aberration in conservatism’s march (never articulating this belief, though) in hopes that the American electorate will forget, over time, their negative feelings about the past eight years and return to the Republican fold? While there is an ebb and flow to our politics--bringing parties in and out of power--that might justify riding out the storm, I’m still not convinced that pining for a return to Reaganism is the right course. A party built on an image or nostalgia for the way things used to be will have difficulty moving forward, especially when the electorate they are trying to court has moved on.

Some More Good Post-Election Analysis Coming Out

Another quick post while I keep digesting some of the more comprehensive post-election analysis that's coming out. The Forum is an on-line journal edited by UW-Madison political scientist Byron Shafer. The great thing about it, in my mind, is that it seeks to bring together a more academic mindset and rigor to the analysis of contemporary events. Thus, it acts as a first draft of political science research. They've just put out an issue that focuses on the election with articles on turnout, the role of race, the election results in historical perspective, and an interesting piece by Thomas Schaller that sees Obama's victory as a culmination of changes wrought by the Great Society. Good reading.

ElectionDissection.com Book Club--The Rosetta Stone for 2008

The first comprehensive examination of the '08 election has been published this week and I'm just beginning to get through it. They'll be a lot of posts generated by this analysis so I'm going to wait until I've had a chance to digest the numbers. The book is "How Barack Obama Won" by NBC's Chuck Todd and Sheldon Gawiser. The best thing about the book is that it gives a state by state and regional analysis rather than simply a national one. As readers of this site know, we much prefer these micro level examinations over more generalized descriptions of electoral outcomes. There's too much variance across the country. Also at first glance, it seems, is that their analysis is heavily driven by exit polling data. While this is certainly a useful tool--and something I've relied on in some of my analysis--it can't be the only data we draw upon. Until I'm able to get through the whole text, though, I don't want to get too critical. So stay tuned.

Obama's 365th Electoral Vote

When the votes were finally finished being counted, Obama's electoral vote count got increased by 1 due to an ununsual feature of one state's allocation of its votes. Nebraska is one of two states (Maine being the other) that awards its electoral votes by congressional district rather than giving the statewide winner the state's total haul. While Obama won each of Maine's two congressional districts, the Nebraska vote was split. Despite the fact that McCain won the state by about 15 points, Obama actually captured one of the congressional districts--the 2nd. As a result, he captured its electoral vote with the remaining 4 going to McCain.

While this outcome might be an interesting bit of trivia in its own right, its useful to compare 2008's numbers with 2004. In '08, Obama was able to claim the district with a narrow 3,370 vote margin of victory (138,809 to 135,439). In 2004, however, Bush won the district handily, capturing 61% of the vote (153,041 to 97,858). This historically strong Republican flavor of the district is seen in the fact that only once since voting for Harry Truman has it gone Democratic. It has a Cook Partisan Voting Index of R+9. Given this 11 point shift, I thought I'd explore the district a little more.

With the aid of Jack Huerter, one of my students and Omaha native, I got a sense of the district's demographics. The 2nd District is comprised of Douglas County and a small slice of neighboring Sarpy County. Douglas County is made up of the city of Omaha plus its suburbs extending westward from the city center. While being the most diverse of the state's 3 congressional districts, the 2nd is still overwhelmingly white with 10% of the population being African American and 6% being Hispanic. Overall, Douglas County provided 81% of the district's votes in 2008 while the Sarpy County portion provided the remaining 19%. Comparing the Douglas and Sarpy votes, we find that, using the 2 party vote totals, Obama beat McCain in Douglas 52% to 48% while McCain beat Obama in the Sarpy portion 57% to 43%.

To aid in the exploration of the district, I created the map shown above which focuses on Douglas County. Thanks to the Douglas County Elections Commission I was able to get both the precinct level voting data and precinct map. From it I created the color coded map that shows the distribution of Obama's and McCain's support throughout the county. I've created an excel file for the precinct level voting for Douglas County that is available here. Here is the original map without the color coding that provides a clearer picture of the boundaries and streets.

What we see is an Obama vote that is concentrated within the city of Omaha and some of its more western neighborhoods and a McCain vote that is, as we'd probably expect, heavily suburban. Within the city, the African American community is concentrated on the north side (see precincts in Ward 2 especially). For the Hispanic population of Omaha, the city's south side is where the largest concentration exists, especially in the areas around I-80. These south side neighborhoods were historically white working class and Omaha, like many cities, has seen this group move to the suburbs over the years. As we move westward out of the city, Jack suggests that the suburbs begin in the area of around 90th Street. We see from the map that this is where the McCain strength intensifies and we enter areas of solid red--the urban grid ends and is replaced by neighborhoods of winding streets and cul de sacs. A final group I was interested in was the Omaha student population. Creighton University is a mid sized Jesuit school located in the heart of downtown (precincts 2-15, 2-16). Its area went solidly for Obama. The University of Nebraska at Omaha has a sizable student body of about 15,000 but according to my Omaha expert is largely commuter based and thus not concentrated in any one voting area.

I had hoped to do a close comparison between the 2008 and 2004 numbers at the precinct level. However, in talking to someone at the Elections Commission, I was told that there were some pretty dramatic changes to the precinct boundaries, thus making a comparison difficult. Nonetheless, I did get the precinct level numbers that are available here so that you can make your own observations. On a very basic level we can get some sense of Obama's improvement over Kerry. In 2008, Obama won 151 of Douglas County's 350 precincts (43% of all precincts). In 2004, Kerry managed to win only 94 of the 341 precincts (28% of all precincts). While Obama's best precincts were no doubt some of Kerry's best, especially among African Americans, Obama would seem to have benefitted from a greater number of votes coming out of these areas.

Does It Matter Where a Senator Comes From???

Before all of the shenanigans in the Illinois Senate seat appointment emerged, there was an underlying discussion about the ability of whoever was appointed to win "statewide." With the assumption that the designee would hail from Chicago, attention immediately turned to the fact that whoever was chosen would have to run two years later for a full term. An even more daunting schedule awaits Hillary Clinton's successor as the new Senator will have to run first in 2010 for the right to fill out the term, and then in 2012 for a full 6 years.

Given that the designee will not initially gain their seat via the will of the people, there is uncertainty as to how palatable they will be to the electorate once they are on the ballot. More ethically minded governors than Rod Blagojevich need to speculate about how the new Senator will fare across a state's myriad voting groups. In the case of Illinois, should the designee come from Chicago they begin, potentially, with a large voting bloc ready to support them (or that is at least familiar to them). This would especially be the case for appointees already holding some elected office--House members, mayors, state senators, etc. Once in office, however, they will need to broaden their appeal to voters across the rest of the state.

Complicating this, sometimes, is the fact that voters "out-state" tend to receive coolly politicians from the "big city." These candidates might be perceived as arrogant, unconcerned with the needs of people from small towns or rural areas, or too ensconced in the ways of the state's dominant metropolis. Thus, "out state" voters might react against them in favor of someone more familiar. Central to Richard Fenno's theory of "home style" is the need for voters to identify with candidates in order to trust them. This tension between the big city and "out-state" has manifest itself in my home state of Wisconsin where a governor who hailed from Milwaukee hasn't been elected since the late 1920s despite the fact that the Milwaukee metropolitan area accounts for roughly 30% of the state's population. While Chicago clearly dominates Illinois' economy and is by far the population center, there is no guarantee that a Senator from there will automatically win. This question got me wondering, then, about how common it is for Senators to come from their state's largest city or metropolitan area. Is it truly an advantage or might "out state" Senators be more attractive. Thus, I decided to look at the current Senate (minus Obama) to see if one type of candidate is more prevalent.

In answering this question I would note that there are numerous caveats to raise. Many many factors, aside from residence, account for why candidates win Senate seats. Among these are their previous experience (elected offices, private sector work, etc.), the underlying partisanship of the state, the quality of their challenger, whether they are an incumbent or seeking their first term, fundraising prowess, and the political climate in which their campaign takes place. Also, we can't automatically assume that the candidate will automatically win these big city voters in a proportion greater than the norm. Further worth noting is that some states have many population centers, thus creating numerous "big city" vs. "out state" dynamics. California comes immediately to mind with L.A., San Francisco, and San Diego acting as population meccas; Texas and Florida might also be cited. Thus, this analysis, and any conclusions we might draw, will be crude at best. Nonetheless, what do we see.

Above I've produced a simple spreadsheet that shows each state's two Senators followed by the state's largest city and metropolitan area. I included both city and metro areas because of the possibility that the suburban spread of one city might make it larger than that of the state's largest city proper. Because metro areas share common media a candidate might be able to take advantage of this to attract a large voter base. I also included metro areas because in some states the largest metro area is in fact a cluster of suburbs to a city in a neighboring state--New Jersey being the obvious example here. Next I've listed both the residence and city of birth for the Senator. While we see that many Senators reside in the same places in which they were born, Senators will also try to identify both their residence's and birthplace's voters as their own. Should there be a match between either the Senator's residence or birthplace and either the state's largest city or metro area, I've highlighted the correlation.

As a bit of trivia, I'd note that Brooklyn seems to be a great place to be born if you aspire to represent a state other than New York in the Senate, as Barbara Boxer (CA), Bernie Sanders (VT), and Norm Coleman (MN) all hail from there.

Overall, we see that for just barely a majority of Senate seats--52--does the incumbent Senator come from their state's population center. Thus, there doesn't seem to be, on its face, much of an advantage from coming from the area with the most votes. Candidates seem to be able to emerge from a variety of places within a state--some from big cities, some from tiny hamlets. One thing that might be worth exploring--which I didn't calculate--is whether the size of the biggest city vis a vis the rest of the state--matters. If the biggest city in a state is comparatively small the advantage accrued by winning those votes is less that if the state's biggest city is proportionally much larger.

I'd be happy to entertain any other theories or observations that anyone has about how meaningful the "big city" vs. "out-state" dynamic is.

Saul Anuzis to GOP Economic Populists: "This is not your average Republican twitter page!"

ElectionDissection strolled down to the offices of Americans for Tax Reform for the latest in the series of Newsmaker Breakfasts hosted by the American Spectator.  The “newsmaker” on hand was Saul Anuzis, the Michigan Republican Party chairman who earned the Paultards’ enduring animus by calling for Ron Paul’s exclusion from Republican presidential primary season debates after his symbiotically beneficial contretemps over 9/11 blowback with fmr. NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani in South Carolina.

Despite the fact that its Congressional delegation has been shrinking in recent rounds of redistricting and expects to at the next census, Michigan’s noteworthy political legacy is even more salient as potential bailouts for the Big Three dominate the headlines.  It’s clear that Anuzis’ decades of experience in the trenches of Wolverine State politics do color his vision for a revivified GOP as he vies for RNC Chair.

Anuzis highlighted his vision for harnessing new media to facilitate disseminating the GOP’s message.  (Best line: “This is not your average Republican twitter page!” Oxymoron of the week: “Republican twitter page!”)  And he repeatedly harkened back to the fabled “Reagan Democrat,” citing appealing to this once-decisive voting bloc as the key to a Republican resurgence.  Suburban Detroit’s Macomb County boomed in the 1950s and 60s with auto workers as White Flight emptied the white working class neighborhoods of Detroit’s Wayne County.  Democratic pollster Stanley Greenberg identified Macomb as the spiritual home of this famously crucial electoral demographic.  (It’s interesting to note that Greenberg, post-2008, agrees that this political dinosaur is, in fact, extinct.)   

“Reagan Democrats,” of course were those Northern, often-ethnic and heavily Catholic, white working class voters who were lured away from their ancestral Democratic moorings by GOP appeals to their conservative opinions on moral issues, busing and crime and Cold War hawkishness.  But many of these voters were proud union men (and women) who couldn’t swallow even Ronald Reagan’s free trade agenda.  This was especially acute in Macomb Co., Michigan in the 1980’s as competition from Japanese imports rattled Detroit’s long-term game plan.

While social conservatism can be found in Michigan politicians of both parties – Reps. Dale Kildee, Bart Stupak and John Dingell count themselves as either pro-life, pro-gun or both – so, too, does the state’s formidable strain of economic populism infect voters on both sides of the aisle. 

Alabama’s segregationist governor George Wallace first identified this political animal instinctively, scoring above his national average in Macomb in his 1968 indie bid, and capturing a majority in the 1972 Democratic presidential primary statewide.  Twenty years later, Pat Buchanan barnstormed the state denouncing imports and racked up his best score this side of the Granite State in his challenge to George H.W. Bush’s renomination.  Four years later, he fared even better, denouncing NAFTA at every stop. 

Only an underwhelming performance in Detroit dragged Ross Perot’s percentage statewide back to his national average in 1992.  In over half of Michigan’s counties, his call to heed that “giant sucking sound” supposedly sending manufacturing jobs to Mexico pulled in over a quarter to 30% of the vote.

And in this year’s Republican presidential primary, Mike Huckabee scored well in Dutch-settled southwestern Michigan where his social conservatism no doubt resonated with the Calvinist Dutch Reformed Church-goers.  But, his economic populism seems to have struck a cord here, too.  The area’s Dutch-American U.S. Rep. Peter Hoekstra was the only Michigander Republican to oppose NAFTA back in ’93.  Huckabee’s populist notes also played among Yoopers, too, in the Upper Peninsula’s mining and timber towns. 

But Michigan’s stunted population growth has frozen the smaller, broken rust belt cities like Saginaw, Flint, Muskegon and Bay City, where Wallace, Buchanan and Perot exploited white working class anxiety, as well as both the U.P. and the Dutch southwest where Huckabee found a base far above the Mason-Dixon Line. 

Macomb is growing, but still totals far behind Oakland’s population.  (Besides, Obama captured the county comfortably, flipping the narrow win G.W. eked out in 2004.)  Contrast Macomb to its fellow Detroit suburb, Oakland County.  Once home to Midwestern, Michigan, Gerald Ford-style regular Republicans, as this affluent and educated enclave population expands, it threatens to surpass Detroit’s Wayne County, which still continues to hemmorage residents, as the state’s largest jurisdiction.  Oakland’s Democratic trend is relentless as Obama scored the best Dem numbers since LBJ, beating FDR, even!  McCain’s percentage dipped to near Goldwater and Alf Landon lows.  Once safe GOP Rep. Joe Knollenberg also succumbed to Oakland's Democratic wave in '08, after what shouldn't have been a surprisingly close race in '06, given the county's trends were then becoming evident.  (Note, too, the strong showing by North Dakota Rep. William Lemke’s third party bid here in 1936, whose message melding social conservatism and economic populism was amplified by on air harangues from Father Coughlin, the anti-Semitic radio priest whose Shrine of the Little Flower sits in now-trendy Royal Oak, a leading indicator of Oakland’s partisan progression.  Royal Oak gave Gore a 51-45 win over Bush in 2000.  By 2008, Obama’s margin here had grown to a lopsided 61-37.)

Building on a question from Economist.com blogger Dave Weigel suggesting the GOP's appeals to socially conservative voters and anti-immigrant demagoguing had aliented electorates in similar suburban counties nationwide, ElectionDissection questioned Anuzis about whether his strategy for staving off further losses in Oakland included toning down the economic populism that hasn't been a vote-winner there – especially in light of a Big Three bailout that may play well in his state, but not among the Southern-anchored grassroots of the party he wants lead - his answer focused more on this blog’s analysis of Michigan’s political geography than his thoughts on recasting the Republican message.  But Anuzis did offer some interesting off-the-cuff insight into shifting intra-state demographics – UAW retirees, for instance, migrating up north to retire and the increasingly racially diverse make-up of Oakland Co.’s electorate – which offer fodder for future posts.  

The Twin Cities' Suburbs and Obama's (Lack of) Coattails

To get a sense of why they're still counting votes in the Minnesota Senate race, the above maps might be instructive. Obviously, Obama's support was more widespread than Al Franken's. Initially, I thought the reason Franken wasn't able to capitalize on Obama's big win was due to underperformance in Ramsey County (St. Paul). Being Norm Coleman's home--he was Mayor of St. Paul prior to running for the Senate--this wouldn't be surprising.

When one compares the candidates' performance in both Ramsey and neighboring Hennepin County, however, another explanation seems more plausible. In looking at the countywide vote, Franken actually did better in Ramsey than Hennepin. The third party candidate in the race, Dean Barkley, performed about equally well in each county, receiving 15.5% in Ramsey and 14.7% in Hennepin. Franken, while winning both counties quite handily received 51.1%in Ramsey compared to 49.3% in Hennepin. Coleman thus took 33.3% in Ramsey and 35.7% in Hennepin.

In comparing the maps one sees a noticeable strength for Coleman in the western and southern Minneapolis suburbs, still part of Hennepin County. Whereas Obama was able to win in a number of these outer precincts, Franken fell short.

This split ticket voting was evident not only in the Senate race. Going into November 4th, Democrats were hoping to pick up the open House seat being vacated by moderate Republican incumbent Jim Ramstad in the 3rd District. On election day, however, Republicans were able to hold the seat with the election of state legislator Erik Paulsen. Whereas Obama won the 3rd district with 53% of the vote, Paulsen scored an 8 point victory over Democratic nominee Ashwin Madia.

This dynamic was not confined to the Twin Cities. In a number of suburban areas, sizable Obama wins did not necessarily translate into Democratic congressional pickups. For example, in a similar type of race, moderate Republican Rep. Mark Kirk was able to hold onto his suburban Chicago seat despite the fact that it went for Obama.

**Maps courtesy of Minnesota Secretary of State

Does It Take Two Hurricanes Plus an Indictment to Elect a Republican in New Orleans???

Louisiana has to have some of the most interesting, yet oftentimes confusing, politics in the country. And since the devastation, and demographic chaos unleashed by Hurricane Katrina, Bayou politics has become more unpredictable. The most recent evidence of this came about Saturday as a result of the congressional election in the 2nd district that saw the defeat of long embattled (and indicted), yet long tenured Congressman William Jefferson. The result of the election was the ascent of the first ever Vietnamese-American to Congress, Republican Anh "Joseph" Cao. How we got to this piece of history takes a little explaining.

The arrival of Hurricane Gustav this August essentially pushed back each election for the seat. November 4th was actually the primary, which Jefferson won in the overwhelmingly Democratic district. With the primary completed, the general election was thus held on Saturday. However, as we know, elections held after the general are fraught with both unpredictability and low-turnout (witness last week's Georgia Senate run-off). While Jefferson's indictment, one would think, would be responsible for his defeat, other factors are likely bigger factors. First, as the coverage of the election makes pretty clear (good number breakdown here), turnout among African Americans--the largest group and backbone of the district--was very low. While low turnout among a candidate's base might be enough to spell their demise, Jefferson's difficulties were exacerbated by another Hurricane--Katrina. In my look at HBCU voting last week (see post here) I examined the vote in a number of southern counties. As we would have expected, the total number of votes in these high African American vote counties greatly exceeded what we saw in 2004. In Orleans Parish, however, the opposite happened. Because of the massive out-migration and displacement among African Americans caused by Katrina, 50,000 fewer votes were cast this year than in 2004. Thus, Jefferson found himself faced with an unfavorable environment:

Fewer Total Democratic Voters + Low Turnout + Indictment = TROUBLE

Throw in the fact that Cao has an incredibly compelling story and you have Saturday's result. While people are already doubting the ability of a Republican to hold this district in a more "normal" election year like 2010 (running against someone not under federal indictment), such jockeying for the seat can wait for a while in light of the history this election made.

Indian Republican or Republican Indian? Slurpees or Casinos?

Savvy flaks in the Party of Lincoln are perpetually mindful of their historic paucity of even passably plausible minority public faces.  And, in the midst of the GOP’s post-drubbing soul searching, former Maryland Lt. Gov. – and famously failed Senate nominee – Michael Steele has stepped forward, offering himself as a reform-minded candidate of color for RNC chairman, differentiating himself from the white guys in suits/Republican Regular types who usually vie for the post. 

However, after the smoke cleared from the recent round of internecine squabbling among what’s left of the congressional Republican rump before the 111th Congress convenes, one more of those public faces has fallen by the wayside. 

Only those who follow this sort of insider skullduggery took note that when Rep. Tom Cole (Okla.) withdrew in the face of a seemingly overwhelming challenge to topple him from the head of NRCC, the House GOP campaign arm, Republican leadership lost it’s only American Indian.  Critics hounded Cole as the GOP lost previously safe seats in special elections - including shockers in rural Mississippi and fmr. Speaker Denny Hastert’s in once-rockribbed Republican Illinois – and blamed him for failing to stanch House GOP losses in November.  Tension lingered between Cole and House Minority Leader Boehner.  So, Cole’s distinctive ancestry (at least in these circles) seemed to be the last thing on Members’ minds.  

Much more attention has been lavished on Lousiana Gov. Bobby Jindal.  The Subcontinental Indian descended chief executive of a state that nearly elected a former Grand Wizard as recently as the 1990’s, is repeatedly dubbed a "GOP rising star" in the press. 

With Cole on the way out and the Jindal on the way up, it’s hard to escape hearing Lisa Lampanelli, the “Queen of Mean,” bark out her witty update on the old stereotype, “dot or feathers,” in 2005’s dirty joke biopic, “the Aristocrats.”  The GOP’s new direction?  “Slurpees not Casinos!”       

The Black Student Vote and Barack Obama

Last week I came across this article about Obama’s win in North Carolina. Mentioned at the end is the claim that Obama’s win can be partially explained by increased turnout not just among African American voters, but especially students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU's). The Tarheel State has 11 HBCUs. This got me thinking about the role of this student group across the country and whether or not we can point to any clear gains made by the Obama camp as a result of this energized student base. Also bolstering my interest in this question was the fact that last weekend saw the playing of the annual Bayou Classic in New Orleans, one of my favorite sporting events of the year to watch. If you don’t think the Obama win was important to the student bodies of Southern and Grambling State Universities, check out the halftime performance of the “Battle of the Bands”—in many ways a more passionate and heated contest than the football game itself (Southern here, Grambling State here).

Thus, I decided to build a database of voting across the HBCU universe and do some number crunching. The database has been posted here (Google account required) along with the explanatory key for each column.

HBCU’s were created, beginning in the aftermath of the Civil War, to allow African Americans access to higher education. The vast majority of these schools are located in states of the Deep South, which isn’t surprising given the degree to which blacks were excluded from college enrollment in these states’ flagship universities. Thus, HBCU’s have for decades acted as the route to the professions for many of the country’s black students. Currently, about 14% of all African Americans in college attend an HBCU and about 25% of the bachelor’s degrees awarded to African Americans come from one of these schools. Over time, several HBCU’s have not only welcomed non-black students but have become predominantly white or other minority. The University of Texas El Paso, for example, is now over 70% Hispanic. This school, formerly known as Texas Western, has an important place in collegiate athletics and HBCU history in that its 1966 national championship men’s basketball team was the first to start 5 black players (against the all white University of Kentucky dynasty). Thus, their role not only in educating the black community, but the nation as a whole, has been vital.

There are currently 103 HBCU’s across the country, located in 22 states and 76 counties. Only a small handful are outside of what we would consider “the South”—Lewis College of Business in Detroit; Cheyney and Lincoln Universities in Pennsylvania; Charles Drew University of Medicine and Science in Los Angeles are examples. Alabama is the state with the most HBCU’s—14. Next among the states with many such schools are North Carolina (11), Georgia and Texas (9), and Mississippi and South Carolina (8). Another thing one notices, and which is included in the database, is the diversity in the size of each of these schools. Some have only a few hundred students while others are quite large—Howard University, Florida A&M, Texas Southern, and Southern University are among the largest. Overall, however, in looking at enrollment size, it doesn’t seem as if these schools—within their respective counties—provide enough votes to truly sway an election.

When we look at how each of these schools’ counties voted this year—and compare this year’s race to 2004’s--what do we see? First, Barack Obama won 52 of the 76 counties in which HBCU’s are located. While on the surface this might have been useful for Obama in capturing several states, the reality is that many of these wins took place in states that went solidly for McCain. For example, as mentioned Alabama contains 14 HBCU’s yet was won by McCain with 60%. At the county level, Obama won 3 of the 8 counties containing these schools. Likewise, in Mississippi, Obama won all 6 of the counties containing its HBCU’s and in South Carolina he won 4 of 5 HBCU counties (McCain won each state with 56% and 54% respectively). This fact, it seems, illustrates a much larger point not only about the history of the HBCU movement but about America’s complicated political history.

In numerous posts over the past year or so I’ve dwelled upon the debate about white vs. black voting in the Deep South. What we’ve seen, through not only exit polling, but also simple geography and demographics, is that there has been a clear divide between black and white voters in the region. For example, most of these HBCU’s are physically located in counties that have very sizable black populations. 58 of the 103 HBCU’s reside in counties that are at least 30% African-American. Thus, it would seem as if the decision about where to locate these schools was very deliberate. Because these schools in many cases served a population that was underserved and lacking in resources it made sense to have them close to where the student body would hail from. Also, one wonders how successful these schools would have been (or even if they could have been created) had they been located in overwhelmingly white areas. For example, only one HBCU (Clinton Junior College in Rock Hill, SC) is located in a county that is less than 20% black in the Deep South states of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, or Louisiana. Worth remembering is the degree to which the residence of the black population in the South (as seen across counties) has been remarkably stable. Thus, returning to the vote this year, it seems as if the Obama vote we see at the county level is not so much a result of these schools bringing political change to an area, but rather amplifying the underlying preferences that have always been there. Obama’s candidacy energized this underlying Democratic allegiance and gave it reason to turn out in greater force than it had in years past.

When we compare this year’s vote to 2004, while we do see evidence of change, some of it seems due to other factors. Whereas Obama won 52 of the 76 HBCU counties, John Kerry managed to win only 39. Obama’s improvement on Kerry’s number took place across 8 states, flipping three counties in North Carolina (Cumberland, Forsyth, and Wake); 2 in Louisiana (East Baton Rouge and Caddo) and Texas (Dallas and Harris); and one each in Alabama (Jefferson), Delaware (Kent), Florida (Leon), Georgia (Peach), Pennsylvania (Chester), and Virginia (Henrico). The Texas wins in the counties containing Dallas and Houston can be attributed to no longer having native Texan George Bush on the ballot. Likewise, the addition of Delaware’s Kent County can be tied to Joe Biden’s VP nomination. Here is a breakdown of these counties, their Obama vote %, Black % vote, and HBCU enrollment:

Jefferson AL (Birmingham) 52.6% Obama, 39.4% Black, 3000 Students
Kent DE (Dover) 55.0% Obama, 20.7% Black, 3000 Students
Leon FL (Tallahassee) 62.2% Obama, 29.1% Black, 10000 Students
Peach GA (Ft. Valley) 53.4% Obama, 45.4% Black, 2500 Students
Caddo LA (Shreveport) 51.5% Obama, 44.6% Black, 1100 Students
E. Baton Rouge LA (Baton Rouge) 51.1% Obama, 40.1% Black, 11000 Students
Cumberland NC (Fayetteville) 58.9% Obama, 36.7% Black, 4000 Students
Forsyth NC (Winston-Salem) 55.3% Obama, 25.9% Black, 2800 Students
Wake NC (Raleigh) 57.3% Obama, 19.7% Black, 4300 Students
Chester PA (Cheyney) 54.6% Obama, 6.2% Black, 2800 Students
Dallas TX (Dallas) 57.7% Obama, 20.3% Black, 700 Students
Harris TX (Houston) 50.8% Obama, 18.5% Black, 10000 Students
Henrico VA (Richmond) 56.2% Obama, 24.7% Black, 1500 Students

Of those remaining counties, the only county with both a close margin of victory for Obama and a sizable HBCU population is East Baton Rouge Parish in Louisiana. Thus, whereas Southern University may have lost the Bayou Classic on Saturday, their vote may have helped tipped their county to Obama’s side, something Grambling State wasn’t able to do in Lincoln Parish which went heavily for McCain. Whereas Leon County Florida has a big HBCU population (Florida A&M) it was quite lopsided in its support for Obama. The presence of Florida State University there and its big student population might explain some of the margin and could perhaps show a greater tendency of white and black students to vote in a more colorblind way. For the North Carolina county flips, we see both relatively large margins for Obama and a relatively small HBCU population.

What are some other things we see when crunching these numbers??? Overall, Obama’s performance across these counties greatly improved on that of Kerry, something McCain was not able to replicate vis a vis George Bush. Compared to 2004, the Democrats got a higher % of the vote in 72 of the 76 counties considered here. Obama only underperformed Kerry in Jefferson County Arkansas (which he still won handily), Mercer County West Virginia, and Harrison and Wood County Texas. While McCain’s county %’s versus 2004 are dismal (only gaining in the 4 Obama declined in), an even worse scenario emerges when we look at raw vote totals. Given that the size of the electorate increases over time and that this year saw higher turnout than 2004, one would assume that both McCain and Obama would get more votes in each county than Bush and Kerry did respectively. Not so. Whereas Obama got more votes than Kerry in 70 of 76 counties, McCain only got more votes than Bush in 31 of the 76!!!! And remember, we’re mostly talking about the Deep South here. When you compare the improvements that Obama made with these declines suffered by McCain, you see how Obama was able to turn some areas from red to blue. Here, North Carolina jumps out.

Obama won North Carolina by 14,177 votes. In the HBCU database, we saw how Obama flipped Cumberland, Forsyth, and Wake County. Looking at the net vote gains (Democratic gains in 2008 over 2004 minus Republican gains in 2008 over 2004) in these three counties, Obama had a net increase of 126,563 votes. That’s your win right there. If you take other strong Obama counties in the state included here—Mecklenburg (Charlotte),
Guilford (Greensboro), and Durham (Durham)—you add an additional 162,154 votes!!! That’s nearly 290,000 votes gained in just 6 counties. Not only did Obama vastly overperform in North Carolina, McCain didn't even break even with past Republican showings. That is a sure fire way to lose.

Another state that I thought might show a similar dynamic was Virginia. Overall Obama had a 234,527 vote cushion. In the database here, there are 3 counties with an HBCU (Brunswick, Henrico, and Prince George) plus Hampton and Norfolk cities which are not part of a county jurisdiction. When you add up the net gains made by the Democrats one sees that Obama had a 70,928 vote advantage. Thus, while the Democrats increased their performance against the Republicans vis a vis 2004 in these counties, they had to rely on other counties, especially in northern Virginia to put them over the top. I should be clear that in neither North Carolina nor Virginia do I suggest that the HBCU presence and student vote were the reason these states switched from red to blue. I’d make the same caveat about the county level results as well. Rather, using this lens through which to view the election returns allows us to pick up on things we may otherwise have missed.

By focusing on HBCU’s, the data shows that we are for the most part looking at counties that are southern, black, and consistently Democratic. The Obama campaign and the 2008 election seem to have energized this electorate and given them the opportunity to elect the country’s first black president. Given the politics of the states in which most of these schools exist, we didn’t see the Obama campaign rack up massive numbers of electoral votes. States like Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and South Carolina were never really in serious danger. Most of the gains made by the Democrats in these states and elsewhere seem attributable just as much to Republicans staying home as new Democrats turning out. In those states that did switch (North Carolina and Virginia) other factors surely contributed to the gains—greater white support for Obama, the economic crisis, etc. The HBCU’s, in short, didn’t make Barack Obama our next president. Nevertheless, beyond the more academic exercise of crunching election returns by using HBCU’s as a prime variable, one can’t deny the meaning that this election had to these schools’ students. If you don’t believe that, watch this.

Georgia Sen Runoff: Could it have been "Peach-ier" for Vernon Jones than Jim Martin?

Most press previews of today’s Georgia Senate runoff focus on how the result is expected to hinge on Afro-Am turnout.  Black voters were believed to have boosted overall turnout by over 600K this year and sliced McCain’s margin over Obama by ten points as compared to Bush’s 2004 margin over John Kerry.  And conservative white Democrats are believed to have returned to the fold down ballot after going for the McCain-Palin ticket for president.  (No wonder that the GOP has sent in Sarah Palin to rally the base in this expected low turnout runoff.) 

Performance doesn’t seem to be too far off, geographically-speaking.

Here’s the map of county returns for president:

 And here’s the Senate county map

Note Mitchell County’s tie!):

 

 Given this playing field, it’s difficult not to speculate how this race might be panning out if Dem nominee Jim Martin, a fmr. State rep. and failed Lt. Gov. nominee, had fallen to DeKalb Co. CEO Vernon Jones in the primary.  Jones’ bid might have been fatally wounded by ethics questions, but given his moderate – and even conservative – views on some issues and his geographic base, Jones might have been an ideal candidate.  In fact, Jones has flirted with Republicans: donating to the Georgia Republican Party and confessing to voting for George W. Bush, twice, all the while hectoring Martin for being insufficiently pro-Obama.   

Jones’ controversial temperament seems to have stunted his growth into a politician in the mold pioneered by Black Caucus Blue Dog Georgia House Democrats Sanford Bishop and David Scott, who have built up a support in white rural Georgia – the heart of Lester Maddox country! – by staking out conservative positions on issues such as gun control and positioning themselves as guardians of local and ag interests – particularly peanuts, in Bishop’s case.

Jones would differ significantly in that he would be the first politician to carve such a support base out of a booming New South county like DeKalb.  DeKalb is now majority Afro-Am, but continues to be fairly affluent even as its residents’ hues have changed.  Despite being home to the notorious giant bas-relief memorial to Confederate generals in Stone Mountain, DeKalb was a rare oasis of support for Richard Nixon, as George Wallace swept the Peach State in 1968.

While Bishop or Scott might be secretly harboring questions of how they might have been better positioned in this post-Obama runoff, Jones might be wondering - if he had crafted a more careful career – how he might have been able to cobble together an energized black Georgia electorate with just enough of a sliver of suburban Atlanta McCain voters still disaffected with the Bush Administration and Saxby Chambliss’ Congressional Republican cohorts to pull off a victory that might be just beyond the reach of the Democratic nominee, Jim Martin. 

County Flips, the Rural Vote, and Changes Out West

During the primary season, I came across the great site Daily Yonder which focuses on rural politics, economics, and society. The site is on outgrowth of the Center for Rural Strategies. In the aftermath of the election, Tim Murphy and Bill Bishop put together the above map that shows the counties that switched their vote between 2004 and 2008. The provide analysis here and here. While Obama's strength was certainly in the urban cores of the country, he did improve upon Kerry's performance in rural counties. Looking at the counties that flipped this year, the midwest was clearly Obama's strength. While his Illinois performance is unsurprising, the Wisconsin changes jumped out at me immediately after November 4 (see earlier post here). Also, as we know, Indiana (post here) and Iowa changed hands this year helping Obama solidify the entire region. I'm curious about the Democratic gains that took place in the string of counties running along the Minnesota/Dakotas borders. Finally, I'd note the Democrats' improved performance in the mountain west, a dynamic that has gotten a lot of play this year. A couple of points about the mountain west:

• Beyond the pickup of Colorado and New Mexico on the presidential level, Democrats gained Senate seats in both states.
• Democrats gained 5 seats in the House (2 in New Mexico, and 1 each in Idaho, Colorado, and Arizona). Democrats now have a majority in the House delegations of AZ, CO, and NM and split evenly with Republicans the Idaho delegation.
• Obama actually won Salt Lake County, Utah. While Utah's electoral votes won't change hands anytime soon, this flip was nonetheless pretty interesting.
• Note the rural county pickups in Montana. In the end, McCain ended up winning the state by only about 12,000 votes.

Godzilla for Senate 2008!!!???

Over 125 million votes were cast in this year's election. We tend to forget, in the midst of this big number, the fact that individual human beings have made choices based on their own beliefs, ideologies, and judgments. As we crunch the numbers and look for patterns, this individuality gets lost. Rarely do individual votes make much of a difference in the outcome. However, from time to time (Florida 2000) we actually get a chance to examine more closely these individual choices. Sometimes, small numbers matter. We have another case this year in the Minnesota Senate race, now in the midst of a recount. Like in the Florida 2000 case, the intent of the voter is open to interpretation when a ballot's markings are ambiguous. Minnesota Public Radio has provided some examples of what election officials are up against. Take a look and make your own determination here. My favorite disputed ballot is the one below:


This ballot comes from Beltrami County. Located in north central Minnesota, Beltrami County has a steady history of Democratic support. This year Obama won 54% to McCain's 44%. Other than going for George W. Bush in 2000, the county has voted Democratic in every election since 1976.


Apparently, however, the choices in this year's Senate matchup were unsatisfying for this particular voter. A quick internet search doesn't find much of a history of "lizard people" running for office in these parts. I haven't done research into how easy it is for third parties to get ballot access in Minnesota either.

Does this voter want Franken? Did he initially choose Franken but then cross him out and write in "Lizard People"? Does he think all of these candidates are "Lizard People"--perhaps an astute observation about the political class? Anyhow, the margin between Franken and Coleman now stands at 136 votes. I would love to watch these ballots be argued about and potentially litigated. God help the election officials. And keep an eye on Lake Superior for any disturbances.

Demographic and State Shifts: Temporary Change or Realignment???

Charles Franklin of Pollster.com has created the above visual showing the performance of Obama versus Kerry across a range of demographic groups. What we see as a broad shift across virtually every group in the direction of greater Democratic support. Thus, like we saw at the state and county level, the movement toward the Democrats was quite impressive. What is no doubt the more fundamental question, however, is the duration or permanence of this shift. In the academic discussion of "realignments," what is necessary for a fundamental re-orientation of the electorate is not just movement of numerous social groups from one party to the other, but the durability of this movement. Also, with every demographic group here moving more Democratic, save three, one must wonder the degree to which the economic downturn and not other factors was ultimately responsible for the magnitude of Obama's win. Should many of these groups move back to their previous levels of partisan support over the next few years then November 4th's results won't seem so dramatic. In other words, with one election we don't have enough evidence to conclude we've had a realignment. These can only be viewed in the rear view mirror. However, much of the analysis of the exit polling that's been done over the past few weeks suggests that Democrats should be very happy about the trend lines. John Judis, who wrote "The Emerging Democratic Majority" with Ruy Teixeira discusses the possibility of this enduring majority here.

The above image of the state by state change compared to 2004 was created by Andrew Gelman at Princeton.

Population Stability and Polarized Voting in the Deep South

The above map, via Strange Maps, overlays the 2008 election returns(Obama counties blue, McCain counties red) with 19th century data on cotton production. The resulting image is striking. We know from exit polling that the white vote in the Deep South was strongly skewed to McCain (Whites in Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina gave McCain 88%, 88%, 84%, 76%, 73%, and 64% respectively) and that the black vote was even more overwhelmingly pro-Obama. Beyond that, though, what we also see quite clearly is the degree to which the African American population in the south is largely concentrated in the same areas it was over a century ago. This is something that I noticed during the primary season as well (see posts here and here).

Thus, while the Great Migration (see post here) of the early and mid 20th century saw millions of southern blacks leave the Deep South for northern cities like Chicago, Detroit, New York, Philadelphia, and elsewhere, many millions also stayed. Also, many narratives of the Great Migration note that it was not unusual for individuals or families to return to south, either because the opportunities up north were not as bountiful as they believed or because the strong ties of family, community, and familiarity beckoned them home.

On a similar note, I highlighted recent Census data on mobility a while back (see post here). One thing that you note about several of the states in this region--especially Alabama and Mississippi--is that they have seen relatively little inward and outward movement of their populations.

Over at Pollster.com, Charles Franklin does an excellent analysis of the state by state change in Obama's support among whites vis a vis Kerry's 2004 performance. He notes not only the decline in white support for the Democratic nominee in the Deep South states, but also points out the improvement Obama made in Virginia and North Carolina. Ed Kilgore over at the Democratic Strategist also comments on this dynamic.

The Obama Bounce Down Ballott

Yesterday's Politico has a nice article on the role of the heavy pro-Obama black turnout on a number of congressional races. Among the 20 Democratic House pickups were several propelled by the black vote. Many of these gains were in districts that have been quite Republican over the past several cycles.

What we've seen in many states' redistricting processes has been an effort to take a black population (oftentimes relatively small) and subsume it within a surrounding area that is more Republican leaning, essentially diluting the power of their votes. Under normal circumstances--i.e. black turnout significantly lower than white turnout; low levels of black mobilization; no coordinated voter registration efforts--the black vote, although heavily Democratic, isn't able to sway electoral outcomes. This year, however, was not a "normal" election year. With the Republican brand in tatters, underlying economic uncertainty, and higher black turnout, mobilization, and registration, the black vote was able to tip a number of districts. To wit:



Virginia 5. Republican incumbent Virgil Goode was defeated, by less than 1000 votes, by Democratic challenger Tom Perriello in a district that includes heavily African American "southside" Virginia. The district is 24% African American. In his past four re-elections, Goode had received 59%, 64%, 63%, and 67%.


Virginia 2. Not far from Goode, Thelma Drake got bounced by 4 points by Democratic challenger Glenn Nye. Encompassing much of the Hampton Roads area, the district is 21% African American.


Connecticut 4. Here, the last House Republican from New England, Chris Shays, was finally taken down after a series of close calls. Unlike the Virginia districts cited above, the black population in this district is only 11% (Hispanic population is 13%) and largely concentrated in the city of Bridgeport. Whereas in previous years black turnout was relatively low, this year's upturn was enough to elect challenger Jim Himes.

Ohio 1. This Cincinnati centered district saw the defeat of Rep. Steve Chabot to challenger Steve Driehaus in a constituency that is 27% black.

Maryland 1. In this House race, just recently called in the past few days, Democrat Frank Kratovil defeated Andy Harris, who defeated incumbent Rep. Wayne Gilchrest in an ugly primary earlier this year. In a district that is 11% black and was once a hotbed of support for George Wallace in his '68 and '72 presidential runs, Kratovil won by roughly 2000 votes.

Alabama 2. The retirement of incumbent Republican Terry Everett created an open seat few would normally think competitive. A Republican has held this seat since 1965. However, the 30% of the district that is African American contributed to Democrat Bobby Bright's upset win. Despite the drubbing that Obama took statewide and the exit polling that showed only 20% of white Alabamans voting for the president elect, the black vote, ironically, seems responsible for Bright's ultimate triumph.

As the article notes, most importantly, the interesting dynamic to be watched will be how these new members act upon their swearing in come January. Owing their victory, largely, to a sizable minority in their district can create complications for a new member. Because these districts have been consistently Republican, these newly minted members will have targets on their backs from the get-go. Nonetheless, their relationship with this sliver of their constituency may prove to be the key to their fate in Congress. If they cast votes or push policy in line with the black electorate (as these voters will surely demand) they may find themselves out of step from the rest of their district. However, should they shun their black constituents, they may find themselves just short of the number of votes they need to secure re-election. Figuring out how to navigate this tricky dynamic will be the first order of business for these new members.

Obama's the Big Ten and McCain's the SEC But the Key to the Presidency Might Be the ACC

Rather than spend all of my time on the more traditional number crunching and map making, I thought I’d take a different approach to looking at last week’s election. One thing we know about American politics—and something I’ve written a lot about—is that it’s very regional. Different parts of the country tend to have different types of politics—driven by different demographics, economies, cultures, etc. Another part of American life that is heavily regional is sports. Where we live, where we go to school, and where we were raised tend to affect not only which sports we tend to be interested in (if any) but also the teams to which we’re loyal.

Both candidates this year, we’re told, are rabid sports fans. Much has been written about Obama’s love of basketball and his election day ritual of starting his day with a pick-up game. McCain, from what I’ve read, is a rabid boxing fan. So, can we merge politics and sport—in other words, how might we use the lens of sports to view the returns? As the college football season is approaching its most crucial weeks and college basketball is just gearing up (Go Marquette!!), I thought I’d see there were any parallels to the regionalism of college sports and the election returns.

College athletics is organized around a series of regionally based conferences, the six largest of which are part of the BCS (Bowl Championship Series). These six conferences are the Big East, Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), Southeastern Conference (SEC), Big Twelve, Big Ten, and Pac Ten. The membership of each conference is as follows:

Big East: Cincinnati, Connecticut, DePaul, Georgetown, Louisville, Marquette, Notre Dame, Pittsburgh, Providence, Rutgers, Seton Hall, South Florida, St. John’s, Syracuse, Villanova, West Virginia

ACC: Boston College, Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Maryland, Miami, North Carolina, North Carolina St., Virginia, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest

SEC: Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, LSU, Mississippi, Mississippi St., South Carolina, Tennessee, Vanderbilt

Big 12: Baylor, Colorado, Iowa St., Kansas, Kansas St., Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Oklahoma St., Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech

Big Ten: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Michigan St., Minnesota, Northwestern, Ohio St., Penn St., Purdue, Wisconsin

Pac 10: Arizona, Arizona St., California, Oregon, Oregon St., Stanford, UCLA, USC, Washington, Washington St.

These conferences cover the entire geographical breadth of the U.S. Thus, they represent the diversity of the American voting public. What I thought would be fun to do is look at how each conference voted last Tuesday. I took each school and looked at how its state and county (in which the school resides) voted. You see some pretty interesting things. The Big Ten, for example, is the most pro-Obama conference. All 8 states in which its schools reside voted for Obama, as did all 11 counties (there are 11 schools in the Big Ten since the addition of Penn St.). The Big Ten schools occupy the industrial Midwest from Pennsylvania to Iowa, the region of the country that Obama dominated, including his pickups of Indiana and Ohio.


The most pro-McCain conference?? Not surprisingly it’s the SEC. Encompassing the deep south, McCain’s base of support, McCain won 8 of the 9 SEC states (losing only Florida). At the county level, however, Obama actually did much better. He won 7 of the 12 counties in which these schools reside (Alachua—Florida; Athens-Clarke—Georgia; Fayette—Kentucky; Oktibbeha—Mississippi St.; Richland—South Carolina; and Davidson—Vanderbilt). Thus, we may see some evidence of the youth vote (which gave Obama 2/3 of their vote) coming through for the Democrat as well as all those liberal faculty members.

The most interesting conference—and the one that got me thinking about this question in the first place—is the ACC. Since the flip of North Carolina and Virginia from the Republican to the Democratic column, many are wondering if the “solid South” is beginning to disintegrate. Given that the ACC encompasses the border area of the east coast—part northern, part southern—its voting might reflect the bipolar nature of the region and whether it is now being pulled in one direction more than the other. Indeed, 5 of the 7 ACC states went to Obama (Clemson in South Carolina and Georgia Tech in Georgia went McCain). At the county level, Obama won 11 of the 12 ACC counties (losing only Pickens County South Carolina, home to Clemson). In most of these counties, the Obama margin was quite large. Only in Montgomery County Virginia (Virginia Tech) did he get less than 55%.

To round out the remaining conferences, the Big 12 was McCain’s next strongest at the state level. This conference encompasses the central plains, another area of Republican strength. Of the seven total states McCain won 5 (losing Colorado and Iowa). Like with the SEC, however, things at the county level were more evenly matched as each candidate won 6 counties.

The Big East is the largest conference geographically (I’m using its expanded basketball membership rather than its 8 team football membership). Stretching from Rhode Island to Wisconsin (Go Marquette!!) and also having South Florida, it’s the least geographically distinct. Nonetheless, it was strongly in the Obama camp. He won 11 of the 13 Big East states (losing Kentucky and West Virginia). At the county level, though, he made a clean sweep of the 16 counties. Monongalia County West Virginia (Morgantown) gave Obama a slim win with 51% as did Hamilton County Ohio (Cincinnati) with 52% and Hillsborough County Florida (USF) with 53%.

Finally, the PAC 10 was strongly Obama and might have given him a clean sweep had it not been for Senator McCain’s presence on the balance. With the exception of Arizona, Obama won 3 of the conference’s 4 states. At the county level, he won 9 of 10, losing only Maricopa County Arizona (Arizona St.) where McCain got 55%.

So, what can we learn from this?? All in all this may not teach us much new but rather allow us to use a different lens through which to view our politics. The dominance of Obama at the county level—he won 89% of the counties surveyed (57 of 64) illustrates, it seems, not only the role of the youth vote but also something about areas that revolve around university life. Even in the Deep South, Obama did well in those areas that have universities in their midst. Beyond students, one is likely to find a populace in these cities and counties with a higher degree of education and income than in the surrounding parts. As the Democrats’ share of the vote among the high education/high income demographic continues to grow, we might begin to see more change at the state level. The concept of the “ideopolis” is key to “The Emerging Democratic Majority” thesis. What we saw last week in North Carolina and Virginia (home to 6 schools in this survey) might be a harbinger for things to come.

Tippecanoe and Obama Too

Perhaps the biggest surprise of last Tuesday was Indiana's move to the Democratic column. Not since LBJ's landslide 1964 victory had the Hoosier State gone blue. In looking at the returns we see that Obama was able to drastically improve upon the performance of past Democratic candidates. His vote share grew in every county versus Kerry's 2004 performance, as the map at left shows (for some coverage from the Indianapolis Star, see here). He was able to win 12 more counties than Kerry (15 total), and his performance in Marion County (Indianapolis) allowed him to generate a huge number of votes to help tilt the state. In 2004, Kerry beat Bush in Marion County by 2% (6,000 votes). This year, Obama beat McCain there by 28% (107,000 votes)!

As during the Democratic primary, Lake County was also crucial to Obama's success. Essentially a part of the Chicago metropolitan area, Lake County's Democratic share increased 6% over 2004 and gave Obama a 71,000 vote margin.

You might also look at the Indiana college population for part of this year's margin. Monroe County (Bloomington) is the home of Indiana University. In 2004, Kerry won the county by 8%. This year, Obama's margin was 32% (20,000 vote margin). Tippecanoe County (West Lafayette) in north east Indiana is home to Purdue. Whereas Bush won Tippecanoe by 20% in '04, Obama switched the county, winning it by 12% (8,000 vote margin). Finally, the University of Notre Dame resides in St. Joseph's County (South Bend). Here we saw another switch--whereas Bush won the county by 2% in '04, Obama enjoyed a 17% win (20,000 vote margin) this year.

For all the details on Indiana politics, see Howeypolitics.com.

The End of the Southern Strategy?

Appropos of my last post, today's New York Times has a long piece on the decline of the south's importance in presidential elections. Given that Obama's margins were worse than Kerry's in the region, despite the widespread economic hardships, and yet he won with such a large margin leads many to ask about the region's relevance. With North Carolina and Virginia breaking with its neighbors in the Old Confederacy, it may no longer be correct to think of the south as a monolithic force in our politics.

The Appalachian Problem Returns

The above map has been getting a lot of attention over the past day. It shows the counties where McCain actually overperformed Bush '04. We see a very clearly defined geographical region--Appalachia, especially the southern stretch--as the source of McCain's strength. During the Democratic primary, there was much discussion of Obama's "Appalachia Problem." For a refresher, the map below illustrates how deep Clinton's support was there (the more blue, the more pro-Clinton).

In a further examination of this, Ben Smith at Politico brings forward the final map below that charts American's self-identified ancestry. The same pattern jumps out as this part of the country is dominated by people who identify their ancestry as "American." In short, this is a region in which large numbers have family ties that stretch back multiple generations--very low levels of movement in and out. Thus, unlike parts of the neighboring states of Virginia and North Carolina, which have seen a much more dynamic population flow (especially Northern Virginia and Research Triangle of N.C.), this interior is perhaps more isolated from the trends and changes that have affected some of their neighbors. Virginia and North Carolina (and seemingly Colorado out west following a similar track) may have thus crossed the threshhold necessary to vote for a Democrat for the White House.