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GOP could be losing Catholic support

Date published: 4/20/2006

FAIRFAX--Catholics are often referred to as the "swing vote" in American politics. At one-fourth of the voting population, they are indeed a loud voice in electoral campaigns, although not a unified one. Once a reliable part of the old New Deal coalition that anchored the Democratic Party for years, in the past quarter-century Catholics have moved increasingly toward the GOP. The loosening of Democratic ties and the movement toward the GOP for many Catholics have largely been the result of two factors: economic success and the issue of abortion.

First, Catholics used to be largely members of the immigrant underclass that moved to the inner cities, joined labor unions, and voted Democratic. But as their children and grandchildren became better educated, achieved economic success, and moved to the suburbs, these newer generations of voters started warming up to the GOP.

Second, beginning in the 1970s with the open embrace of abortion rights by the Democrats and Roe v. Wade, many Catholics questioned whether the party any longer represented their values. Republican strategists targeted Northeastern and Midwestern Catholics along with Southern evangelicals on moral values, a tack successfully employed for the first time on the national level by Ronald Reagan in 1980.

Since that election a majority of Catholics have voted for the Democratic nominee only once: Bill Clinton in 1996. The once solid Democratic vote of Catholics splintered and then moved increasingly toward the GOP. George W. Bush won a majority of the Catholic vote in 2004 against the Catholic Democratic candidate John Kerry. Bush's improved margin among Catholics in Ohio from 2000 to 2004 was more than the margin of victory in that state, and thus arguably the determining factor in his re-election.

As Catholics abandoned their Democratic Party loyalties, the fortunes of the GOP have soared. But the recent heated debates on two issues potentially threaten the relationship between Catholics and the GOP: immigration and, surprisingly, abortion.

Date published: 4/20/2006