Electoral Math
Reality-Based^TM Political Numbers from Nicholas Beaudrot

Karl Rove's fuzzy math, part 867 | Home |

Where are the Christians?

In my last article, I demonstrated that advantage in promoting a same-sex marriage amendment is probably closer to 1 million than 4 million. But as the 2000 election proves, winning the popular vote is meaningless unless you also win the electoral vote. So let's try and look at the geography of American Christianity. I was trying to break it down denomination by denomination, but the good folks at the American Religion Data Archive already has the demographic information I'm looking for, splitting up conservative and liberal churches appropriately. Evangelical churches that have a liberal bend, such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, are actually counted as "mainline" denominations [Update: I'm told that the ELCA was once just called the LCA and wasn't an evangelical church at some point in its history]. So rather than do a blow-by-blow account of the 87 splinter Baptist and Pentecostal groups in America, almost all of which have hard-line stances on homosexuality, if not also women's rights, abortion, race, and pluralism, I can just show you three maps: one for "conservative" Christians, for "liberal" Christians, and one for Catholics. Here is the distribution of evangelical church members:

• Deep red: 24.7% - 43-5%
• Red: 12.7% - 21.5%
• Orange : 12.5% - 10.3%
• Dark tan: 5.4% - 10.0%
• Light tan: 1.6% - 5.2%

As you can see, conservative Christian groups are heaviest in the Deep South and Mid-South. It's worth pointing out that Missouri, at 24.7%, is the least evangelical of the deep states, which is good news because it's also the most vulnerable of any of these states. But for the most part, these heavily evangelical states are states where Kerry had little chance of winning to begin with.

Let's try again, this time with "mainline" denominations:

• Deep red: 14.6%-34.6%
• Red: 10.1%-13.3%
• Orange: 8.8%-10.1%
• Dark tan: 5.9%-8.1%
• Light tan: 1.4%-5.9%

Surprisingly, North Dakota and South Dakota are tops on this list, with several other farm states way up there. However, I should point out that while many of these denominations may have open policies, that does not necessarily mean that all their members agree with them. In fact, many of these churches are starting to splinter over issues related to homosexuality. For example, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, which welcomes gay members and is considering allowing the ordination of gays, represents over 28% of the population in North Dakota. But that's no guarantee that all those church members would vote against Bush; for example, the North Dakota Synod of the ELCA is considering leaving the organization in opposition to the current possibility that the church will vote to ordain gays. Nonetheless, it's clear that Midwest and farm state Christianity is generally a more tolerant form of Christianity.

One more map, this time of the Catholic population:

• Deep red: 31.0%-51.7%
• Red: 20.3%-30.9%
• Orange: 16.3%-19.9%
• Light tan: 8.5%-16.2%
• Dark tan: 3.2%-5.8%

It's hard to interpret this map. Deep red states like Rhode Island, New York, and Massachusetts, are unlikely to suddenly wake up and vote on abortion issues and gay marriage; these are decidedly liberal Catholics. Likewise, it's unclear how Hispanic voters (who are overwhelming Catholic) in New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and California will behave. Polls show that most Hispanics agree with the Catholic teachings on abortion and homosexuality, but that was true in 2000, and they still voted for Gore overwhelmingly. In 2000, these voters went for Gore 66-33, but President Bush's soft line on Mexico may give him a slight edge. Also, Gallup polls show that the jump in Bush's approval after capturing Saddam was much higher for Hispanics than it was for the general electorate. These gains may dissipate more slowly.

So where does this leave us? A stealth voter mobilization campaign using direct mail, Christian radio, and the network of conservative preachers might be used to selectively mobilize the entire Christian Right and half of the center, putting states like Arkansas, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and perhaps Louisiana out of play for the Democrats. It might also make it more difficult to compete in Florida, though voter registration efforts among blacks bitter at disenfranchisement during the 2000 election may counteract that effect. Conservative Evangelicals make up over 40% of the population in AR and OK, plus over 25% in TN. On the flip side, centrist and liberal Christian groups make up over 20% of the population in MN, IA, ND, and SD, plus 15% in WI. So stealth mobilization campaign against the gay marriage amendment could also be used to put new states into play ... especially with a potential sweep among the 3 representatives from South Dakota.

Coming next: I have yet to talk specifically about the impact of mobilizing gays and lesbians themselves. I'll look at the impact of mobilizing the entire gay population of the United States to vote against George W. Bush.

| | technorati

Home | Mail  | RSS

Last updated by Nicholas Beaudrot on 11:29 13 February 2005