WASHINGTON, (UPI) -- If the trends evident in this year's primaryelections are predictive, voter turnout in November is likelyto be very low.
The South has risen
By United Press International
WASHINGTON, (UPI) -- If the trends evident in this year's primaryelections are predictive, voter turnout in November is likelyto be very low.
It is true that voter turnout, as a generalproposition, has been declining for some time though the evidencesupporting this thesis may include a methodological imperfection.Voter turnout is typically measured as a percentage of the totaluniverse of registered voters. Since the federal motor voter lawwas enacted during the Bush 41 administration, the roles haveswelled considerably.
In 2000, the total number of votes castfor president exceeded 104 million. In 1996 it was 94.6 million.In 1992 it was just less than 103.5 million yet the conventionalwisdom holds that voter participation in the electoral processis declining.
The political elites, the experts who actuallyrun elections in America, have out of necessity been redesigningtheir tactical models. They now assume that those whom formerClinton consultant Dick Morris, called the vital center are, withincreasing frequency, declining to participate in the processwhile interest groups and people who derive direct income, influence,or employment from government are increasing their activity.
We are now in an era when, as former HouseSpeaker Newt Gingrich has put it, "All politics is personal."
Political scientists Merle and Earl Blackprovide a meaningful prism through which to view this new politicalreality in their book "The Rise of Southern Republicans."
Earl Black is the Autrey professor of politicalscience at Rice University in Houston. Merle Black is the Candlerprofessor of politics and government at Atlanta's Emory University.They are two of the most distinguished political scientists inAmerica.
They have assembled, from their vantagepoints in Georgia and Texas, the definitive study of how the recenttransformation of the once-solid South from a bastion of Democratpolitical power to the anchor of a new Republican majority occurred.
The title is somewhat deceptive. The storyof the South's transformation has as much if not more to do withthe collapse of the Democrats than with the rise of the Republicans.
The rise of the region's political powerbegan in 1932 with FDR's New Deal coalition. The southern whiteconservative Democrats that entered congress rose in power andstatus through the seniority system and held sway over the institutionthrough to the mid-70s.
As they were stripped of their power byMcGovernite reformers, the New Deal coalition began to unravel.At the same time the Republicans increased their regional strengthat the presidential level -- moving forward from Goldwater's strongshowing in 1964 and the pro-Nixon tide of 1968 and 1972.
The political coalition that began to coalescebehind Ronald Reagan in 1976, consisting of evangelicals, pro-defenseanti-communists, advocates for limited government, tax cuttersand others whom contemporary conservative strategist Grover G.Norquist has dubbed the "Leave Us Alone" coalition providedthe seeds from which the current conservative majority has sprung.
Much of its success was driven by a valuesbased agenda. The majority of southern voters remain conservative.The national Democrat leadership -- especially those in Congress-- have moved increasingly to the left, at great political cost.
The Blacks theorize the GOP was able tobuild a congressional majority in the region because of this drift.As southern Democrats in Congress began to vote like "nationalDemocrats" --- meaning to vote like congressional leadersand northern liberals --- they were more likely to be defeated.
According to the Blacks, race is an importantfactor in the change. "Greater black participation (in theSouth) significantly changed the ideological dynamics of Democraticprimaries and general elections. By the 1980s moderate democratsincreasingly dominated or discouraged Republican opposition bydeveloping majority biracial coalitions."
This benefitted the Democrats tremendously."Voting as moderates would enable Democrats to establishand then market an ideologically mixed voting record, one thatsupported black preferences on many issues but also permittedenough conservative votes to insulate themselves against Republicancharges of liberalism," they write.
This may also explain the general driftof the Democrats where race is concerned. Recall that, in thedarkest days of impeachment, former President Bill Clinton madesure to be seen in the White House with former South African PresidentNelson Mandela -- a genuine hero to all and more than that toblack Americans especially. Mandela reproached those who soughtto remove the president from office for high crimes and misdemeanors,a statement that resonated throughout the black community.
This development identified by the Blacksmay also explain the seemingly odd and politically damaging commentTexas Democrat Ron Kirk, who is running for U.S. Senate, madein September.
Kirk explained that, were he a current memberof the senate, he could introduce a resolution specifying thatthe first 50,000 U.S. soldiers sent to fight in the next war mustcome from families with incomes of more than $1 million per year--- clearly not the blacks and Hispanics who make up a sizablechunk of the current all-volunteer army.
The observation might be dismissed in thewhite community but could conceivably increase the participationof blacks and Hispanics on Kirk's behalf.
For all the talk of a GOP gender gap amongwomen, the gap between white men and the Democrats is even wider.What Clinton, Kirk and others may be doing --- in a way that underscoresthe power of the Black's theory --- is to deliberately drive upturnout among southern blacks and Hispanics so that they needfewer and fewer votes from whites in the South --- including theborder states --- if they are to continue winning elections andavoid being reduced to the status of a regional party.
Political scientists and consultants alikewill read the Rise of Southern Republicans for many years as theylook for guidance about partisan and electoral behavior in theregion. It may be the definitive study to date --- it certainlyprovides enough information to keep them all business for sometime.
"The Rise of SouthernRepublicans" by Earl and Merle Black, Belknap Harvard Press,442 pages