Monday, November 26, 2007

Afro-American Evangelical Voters: Personally Conservative but Socially Liberal?

There is an interesting article on the Washington Post website dated November 26, 2007, about Afro-American evangelical voters being torn between the two parties. On the one hand they lean conservative on issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion, but on the other hand they are liberal in terms of combating racism and on economic issues. This is a quote from the article:

Morality is different in terms of the way we see it and white evangelicals see it," said Pastor Lyle Dukes of Harvest Life Changers Church in Woodbridge, a member of Jackson's group who supported Bush in 2004. "What we think is moral is not only the defense of marriage, but we also think equal education is a moral issue. We think discrimination is immoral."

The above quote sums up the problem for some Afro-American evangelical voters. The GOP will never back them on issues such as fighting racial discrimination or equalizing education opportunities. The Democrats won't back them on issues such as abortion gay rights. In 2004 they resolved that dilemma by backing Bush in greater numbers in such states as Ohio where there was a constitutional amendment on the ballot outlawing same-sex marriage.

That year Bush received 16% of the Afro-American vote in Ohio while nationwide he received about 11% of the Afro-American vote. Given the closeness of the race here in Ohio, that extra 5% was very important to Bush and the GOP.

This year, though, such voters are feeling like there is no one for them to support. The Post article ends with a point made by a Afro-American preacher who supported Bush in 2004:

He thinks the GOP pays attention to evangelicals when it needs their votes but has not delivered when it comes to advancing their causes. Jackson said that after the 2004 election, he attended a White House meeting of evangelical leaders and listened as Rove said he didn't think the church vote had won the election for Bush.

Jackson told him: "I am a registered Democrat. The only reason I am here is because I thought you were working on issues of faith and that it would be better for my folks than the promises, promises of the Democratic party."

Democrats, he said, "come to us under the cloak of darkness at the last hour, get what they want and then act like they don't know us the next day."

That got a big laugh from the conservatives, he recalled. Then Jackson said he told Rove: "You all are doing the same thing to the evangelicals."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This has always been true. The african american community thinks differently from one another just as the european american community. AKA Black people don't all think alike just like white people don't all think alike. However, in a campaign I ran in the painesville area, I was able to convince them that they should prioritize these thoughts to decide where there support should go.