In the recent mid-term elections, moral issues such as the war in Iraq and concern over poverty and torture played a significant role — more so than “wedge” issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage, according to a new exit poll released Nov. 15.
The exit poll was commissioned by Faith in Public Life https://www.faithinpubliclife.org/ and Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, https://thecatholicalliance.org/new/ both groups working to mobilize voters concerned about religious issues.
“Americans voted their values in this election,” said Katie Barge, communications director for Faith in Public Life.
Jim Wallis, an evangelical and the founder of Sojourners and Call to Renewal, said during a telephone news conference that the election showed a narrowing of the so-called “God gap” between Republicans and Democrats, and showed that, for moderate evangelicals and Catholics, and particularly for young voters, the moral-issues agenda is broadening to include such things as the minimum wage, the environment, and war-and-peace issues.
The exit poll of 16,477 voters, conducted online by Zogby International from Nov. 7 to 10, found that:
· A little less than half — 45.8 percent of voters — named the war in Iraq as the “moral issue that most influenced your vote.” That’s up 4 points from the 41.9 percent who gave that answer following the 2004 election. And nearly six times as many voters named Iraq as the moral issue most influencing their vote than named abortion (7.9 percent) and almost five times as many as same-sex marriage (9.4 percent).
· Asked to list the most urgent moral crisis in American culture, more voters listed poverty and economic justice, along with “greed and materialism” (a combined 57.5 percent) than abortion and same-sex marriage (a combined 24.9 percent). That was also true among Catholic voters (59.5 percent vs. 25.2 percent), Protestant voters (50.9 percent vs. 30.8 percent) and those who attend religious services at least once a week (45.1 percent vs. 39.3 percent).
· The Catholic vote shifted significantly towards Democrats this year. Across the country, Democrats won support from 55 percent of Catholics this year, compared to 47 percent in 2004.
Catholic support was significant in deciding close elections in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Virginia, said Tom Perriello, co-founder of Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good. And Catholic votes shifted, he contends, in part because of their concern over “moral issues” such as health care coverage, corruption in office, and the minimum wage.
What Perriello described as “mainstream” Catholic groups were more active in trying to influence votes in this election, he said. This year, groups such as his distributed voter guides in Pennsylvania and Ohio, hired full-time field organizers and conducted print campaigns in several states — a strategy they intend to expand nationally.
But Perriello also said “this is less a matter of Catholics switching their loyalty back to the Democrats as re-establishing themselves as one of the key swing constituencies among Americans.”
He said some Catholics elected — such as Bob Casey Jr. in Pennsylvania — were seen by voters as independent thinking. Casey, who is opposed to abortion, “was an independent from his party, he was willing to stand up for right and wrong,” Perriello said.
The groups sponsoring the poll describe issues such as the war in Iraq, torture, and economic justice as “kitchen table moral issues,” and said it was clear they influenced voters.
Americans see the war in Iraq as a moral issue, not just a foreign policy debate, Wallis said. “Somebody had to correct this terrible political and moral mistake of the Bush administration, and the voters did that,” he said.
Now, “many of us are going to call for a national debate” on Iraq, he said. “We hope the administration participates. … But the debate has to occur with or without the involvement of the administration.”
But Wallis also said that the Democrats, while regaining control of both the House and the Senate, cannot take voters’ approval for granted.
“The Democrats must now lead the reform effort, and not just enjoy the benefits of power,” he said. “Religious people are not just a cheap date” — they want real change, Wallis said.
He also said support of religious voters should never be counted as a given by either Republicans or by Democrats.
“We should be swing voters in every election,” Wallis said, with religious voters being “independent and morally-centered, but not centrist.”
Wallis said he’ll be speaking to Democratic state chairs this weekend and will tell them, “This is not an automatic win for Democrats unless Democrats speak a new moral language for politics.” For example, neither Democrats nor Republicans have offered a good plan for fighting poverty, Wallis said.
Their agenda must speak “right and wrong, not right and left,” he said. “A prophetic notion of politics means you hold both sides accountable.”
