For years, pundits believed that the only Catholics a liberal Democrat could win en masse were theologically liberal, "Cafeteria Catholics" who don't attend mass or listen to the Pope very often.
While Obama did clean up with those lefty Catholics, a new survey by Professor John Green of University of Akron in First Things, shows that he also made stunning improvements among more traditional white Catholics.
(A "traditional Catholic," according to Green's methodology, is one who is more likely than average to attend mass, pray, and read scripture; more likely to believe in God, the afterlife, scripture and the devil; and more likely to say religion is very important in their lives.)
In 2004, white traditional Catholics went 78%-22% for the Republican, George Bush, over the Democrat, John Kerry. In 2008, they went 61%-39% for John McCain over Barack Obama. That represents an amazing 17 point improvement for the Democrat.
How did a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, Protestant make such inroads? Green suggests that the first reason is the economy. These traditional Catholics voted for Obama despite his liberal views on social issues.
Mark Silk of Trinity College offers a different theory - that these results reflect less Obama's strength than John Kerry's weakness. Kerry was battered by Bishops for being pro choice but also for, in effect, being a bad Catholic.
"On the one hand, it suggests that the message that Catholic politicians should be pro-life ...has definitely gotten through to the old-time faithful. On the other, it indicates that such Catholics understand this to be less a natural law injunction incumbent on all members of society than a religious obligation for their own kind."
Or, as I usually get myself in trouble by saying, Obama did better among Catholics because he wasn't Catholic.
Green and Silk hit the two most important factors but I'd like to throw out a few more (less fully-baked) theories.
The Pope As Secondary Influence. In the run-up to the Iraq war, Catholics heard Pope John Paul II's opposition and Bush's support - and sided with Bush. But that doesn't mean the Pope's views didn't register at all. When the war turned south, Catholic opinion turned rapidly against it. I can't help but think the Church planted seeds of doubt. One of the reasons traditional Catholics supported Obama was because they oppose the Iraq war.
The Recessive FDR Gene. Catholics became Democrats in the early 20th century because the party welcomed immigrants and created jobs. As those Catholics grew older, they became more distant from the immigrant experience and more secure economically. They then had the luxury of worrying about other issues like crime and abortion. In 2008, for the first time in almost 90 years, we saw an economic calamity AND a growing anti immigrant sentiment -- both attributed to Republicans. And you had the Catholic Church preaching economic equity and support for immigrants. On some level, the children and grandchildren of the FDR Catholic Democrats may have carried Democratness as a recessive gene, minor, rarely seen, but ready to reawaken under just the right circumstances.
"Abortion Reduction." The survey data also showed that about a quarter of Obama's vote came from people describing themselves as pro-life. Many of these pro-life voters picked Obama in spite of his views on abortion, not because of them, but Obama's talk about "abortion reduction" in effect gave them "permission" to vote for a pro-choice candidate on other issues.
My hunch is that the white traditionalist Catholics are the most fragile part of the Obama coalition. They're subject to tremendous peer-pressure: most of their demographic compatriots voted Republican, so they need to withstand the mockery of their friends. The economy may recede a Democratic issue in the future, either because conditions worsen and Democrats are blamed, or improve, liberating people to think about other issues. All this is why, to keep traditionalist Democrats in the long run, Obama will not only have to improve the economy but deliver on some set of socially conservative issues such as abortion.
Portions of this post first appeared on The Wall Street Journal Online (WSJ.com)
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Steven,
You pulled my rebuke of MarcM's ad hominem attacks and gratuitous, non sequitur slurs against the Bishops as a whole, yet allow his posts to stand. Is this the tone and tenor you desire for these threads?
Nice.
Gerard, I dont personally police the boards so i have no idea what you're talking about but I'm asking our monitors to find out.
As for this:
"I appreciate your response, but the method is fatally flawed. Nobody in the pro-life movement finds abortion acceptable under ANY circumstances. Period! Let alone "in a few circumstances."
YOU may feel this way. And the Catholic Church may feel this way. But over the years, MANY politicians (and voters) have described themselves as pro-life while allowing for exceptions for rape and incest.
For instance, Elizabeth Dole says "I am pro-life, with exceptions in cases of rape or incest." The Pro life groups supported her and never challenged her claim that she was pro life.
Or there's this exchange between John McCain and George W. Bush:
'McCAIN [to Bush]: Do you believe in the exemption, in the case of abortion, for rape, incest, and life of the mother?
BUSH: Yeah, I do."
I dont recall the pro life movement claiming that Bush wasn't pro life because he supported exceptions for rape and incest
All or nothing:
"If the pro-life people in the late 1960's and the early 1970's had been willing to compromise with the pro-choice people, we could have had an abortion law that provided for abortion only for the life of the mother, incest, rape, and defective child; that would have cut the abortions down to three percent of what they are today. But they had an all-or-nothing mentality. They wanted it all and they got nothing."
-C. Everett Koop
“By the time I left the office of the Surgeon General, I had become convinced that both sides of the abortion debate had reached a dead end….Neither side seems to be winning any converts to it’s position. Sometimes I think both sides have forgotten why they are fighting. They care simply about winning. Winning each court case, each legislative battle, each electoral contest, each rally….I wonder if each side has not forgotten the human element that originally prompted the debate: the innocent unborn child, the agonized pregnant woman…
I began to search for a compromise…. I did see the possibility for a practical compromise that would at least lower the number of abortions….Abortion was not the problem. The problem was unwanted pregnancy. If the number of unwanted pregnancies could be reduced, abortion could be reduced. If the number of unwanted pregnancies could be eliminated, abortions could be eliminated. It was as simple as that.
[But] the extremists on both sides, I realized, did not seek compromise; perhaps they did not even seek resolution. They were in it for battle. But there were so many others who were weary of confrontation and who might listen to a better way, who would welcome concentration at the root of the problem….
In the years since the Supreme Court acted, the anti-abortion movement has made a very large tactical error by concentrating on legal and constitutional issues, when the issue is really moral or ethical….as we have seen with alcohol and tobacco, moral suasion can work better than prohibition….
I am enough of a realist to know that the abortion controversy in the United States will never offer an easy or popular solution. I wish no abortions were performed. I think most Americans agree with me on that….Abortions are failures. And for the most part, they are preventable failures. I would like to see both sides of the abortion controversy agree on this: it is one of the few points on which they can agree. And then they could take steps to avoid the failure that raises the issue of abortion.”
– From Dr. C. Everett Koop, Former Surgeon General for the Reagan Administration, written in 1991
Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop has noted, "We are at a very strange place in history, where the people most opposed to abortions are also opposed to the one thing that would stop them, which is contraceptive information."
When Koop resigned as surgeon general, he did not put the abortion debate behind him. Instead, as he did in a 1991 Good Housekeeping magazine article, he lamented the politicization of an issue that came to life as concern for the unborn and the health of women. "I wonder if they have forgotten what originally prompted the debate: the innocent unborn child, the agonized pregnant woman. Many opposed to abortion have been notoriously unhelpful to unwed pregnant women; they must be more forthcoming with their time and money to help pregnant women in hardship. And those who call themselves 'pro-choice' ought to make more of adoption as a clear choice."
Fine, protecting the life of the mother is medically mostly moot. Incest & rape abortions are terribly rare, and they punish the innocent. Handicapped babies have a right to be born too.
Still, all that, all of the pro-choice fodder for argument is only 3-5% of abortions. Can you imagine how many children would already have been saved if anyone would compromise? I'm not asking you to change your belief that abortion even in these circumstances is wrong. I think it is too. But if what we're really about is saving lives- isn't 97%-95% a pretty good number of lives to save? A 100% ban would be ideal, but the reality is that that will never happen. So if that's not a possibility, then if we really want to save lives, rather than have our way, then we should go for what's possible. The pro-choice argument would lose most of it's wind if the lifers would make that concession. They would find themselves arguing for abortion purely for convenience. Not an easy position to muster support for.
P.S. kudos to Catholics for their consistency- boo death penalty, yay charity. Though, specifically:
Latinas have the highest teen pregnancy rate in the U.S. Between the ages of 15-19, Latinas had 81.7 pregnancies per 1,000 girls, while white (non-Hispanic) teens had 25.9 pregnancies per 1,000.
http://latinousa.kut.org/829/
The counselor in the story thought that it was the high level of shame that kids from this culture feel having flunked the virgin test. Hard to separate that from their Catholic roots, if not their outright assiciation. So...
"Many opposed to abortion have been notoriously unhelpful to unwed pregnant women; they must be more forthcoming with their time and money to help pregnant women in hardship."
I'd extend that to "be more forthcoming with their GRACE."
I suggest that the white Catholics that voted for Obama, and any Democrat, are union/government workers that don't want to lose their jobs and outrageous retirement benefits and has nothing to do with their views on abortion. Money talks. The Catholics know and hope they can confess this voting sin before they die. Meanwhile they can't vote an end to the gravy train.
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