White evangelicals agree with the Republican party only on social issues

White evangelicals–both men and women–are a mainstay of the Republican Party. What accounts for their ongoing loyalty, particularly when Republican candidates and leaders fail to embody closely held moral standards around sexual monogamy and propriety, as Donald Trump did in 2016? To answer this question, I draw on research about social sorting and polarization, as well as gender and religion gaps in public opinion, to theorize about the nature of the cross-pressures partisans may experience as a result of the religious and gender identifications they hold. Using data from the 2016 American National Election Study, I evaluate whether cross-cutting identities have a moderating effect on partisans’ thinking about gender issues, their evaluations of the presidential candidates, and their relationship to the parties. I find only modest evidence that gender and evangelical identification impact political thinking among white Republicans, including their reactions to the Access Hollywood tape. Other groups, however, experienced more significant cross-pressures in 2016. Both evangelical Democrats and secular Republicans reported less polarized affective reactions to the presidential candidates and the parties. The results highlight the contingent role that gender and religious identities play in the United States’ highly polarized political climate.

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IdentityversusIdentity: Israel and Evangelicals and the Two-Front War for Jewish Votes

Politics and Religion ◽

10.1017/s1755048309990198 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 2 (3) ◽

pp. 395-419 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Eric M. Uslaner ◽

Mark Lichbach

Keyword(s):

Republican Party ◽

Voting Behavior ◽

Democratic Party ◽

Social Issues ◽

Strong Support ◽

Election Study ◽

American Jews ◽

Democratic Attitudes ◽

National Election Study ◽

American National Election Study

AbstractRepublicans made major efforts to win a larger share of the Jewish vote in 2004 by emphasizing their strong support for Israel. They partially succeeded, but did not make a dent in the overall loyalty of American Jews to the Democratic party, since they lost approximately as many votes because of Jews' negative reactions to the party's evangelical base. We argue that both Israel and worries over evangelical influence in the country reflect concerns about Jewish identity, above and beyond disagreements on specific social issues. We compare American Jewish voting behavior and liberalism to the voting behavior of non-Jews in 2004 using a survey of Jews from the National Jewish Democratic Coalition and the American National Election Study. For non-Jews, attitudes toward evangelicals are closely linked to social issues, but for Jews this correlation is small. The Jewish reaction to evangelicals is more of an issue of identity and the close ties of evangelicals to the Republican Party keep many Jews Democratic. Attitudes toward evangelicals are far more important for Jewish voting behavior than for non-Jewish voters.

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‘A Prolife Disaster’: The Reagan Administration and the Nomination of Sandra Day O’Connor

Journal of Contemporary History ◽

10.1177/0022009417699865 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 53 (2) ◽

pp. 391-414

Author(s):

Prudence Flowers

Keyword(s):

Republican Party ◽

Reagan Administration ◽

Social Issues ◽

Ronald Reagan ◽

Symbolic Capital ◽

Right To Life ◽

Political Conservatism ◽

Litmus Test ◽

The Right ◽

Life Movement

The victory of Ronald Reagan in the 1980 presidential election was a victory for a new form of US political conservatism that emphasized both social and economic issues. Abortion was paramount among these new social issues, and opponents of abortion supported Reagan with the belief that he would work vigorously to overturn Roe v. Wade. Less than six months after Reagan’s inauguration, the national anti-abortion movement was vociferously condemning the President over the nomination of Sandra Day O’Connor to the Supreme Court. This article explores the nature of the passionate reaction to O’Connor and the fragility of the coalition that opposed her. Anti-abortionists were deeply troubled by the realization that their access and symbolic capital did not translate into influence, and were shocked that abortion was not a litmus test for their ‘pro-life President.' The article argues that the relationship between the right-to-life movement, the Reagan administration, and the Republican Party was often fraught, contested, and precarious. In Reagan’s first year in office, the place of the right-to-life movement in the new conservatism of the 1980s was remarkably uncertain.

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Conclusion

The End of Empathy ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190069186.003.0012 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 279-283

Author(s):

John W. Compton

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Foreign Aid ◽

Political Behavior ◽

Republican Party ◽

Free Market ◽

First Century ◽

The Political ◽

Religious Authority ◽

Institutional Resources ◽

White Evangelicals

Many present-day Protestant congregations are deeply involved in humanitarian projects—from feeding the homeless to promoting interracial and interfaith understanding. Yet when it comes to political behavior, white evangelicals remain overwhelmingly opposed to programs that benefit the less fortunate, or that run counter to the free market ethos of the modern Republican party. During the first two decades of the twenty-first century, a trio of failed reform campaigns by evangliecal elites—targeting climate change, foreign aid, and immigration, respectively—underscored the fragile nature of evangelical religious authority. In contrast to their postwar predecessors in the Protestant mainline, evangelical elites possess neither the intrinsic religious authority nor the institutional resources necessary to shape the political convictions of their followers. Instead, they serve at the pleasure of the rank and file.

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The Inclusion-Moderation Thesis: The U.S. Republican Party and the Christian Right

Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics ◽

10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.013.665 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Andrew R. Lewis

Keyword(s):

Political Parties ◽

Republican Party ◽

Social Issues ◽

Christian Right ◽

Religious Movements ◽

Conservative Christianity ◽

Conservative Christian ◽

American Party ◽

Moderation Process ◽

The U.S

Conservative Christianity’s alignment with the Republican Party at the end of the 20th century is one of the most consequential political developments, both for American religion and American party politics. In the proceeding four decades, what has been the nature of this relationship? The inclusion-moderation thesis suggests that once religious movements are integrated into political parties, their interests are often co-opted by broader party interests and their positions moderate. For the Christian right in the U.S. there is mixed evidence for the inclusion-moderation process. Considering all the evidence, the most apt description is that conservative Christianity has transformed the Republican Party, and the Republican Party has transformed conservative Christianity. With its inclusion in the Republican Party, the Christian right has moderated on some aspects. The movement has become more professional, more attuned to the more widely accepted, secular styles of democratic politics, and more engaged in the broader goals and positions of the party. Conservative Christianity has also failed to fully achieve some of its most important goals and has lost some of its distinctiveness. In these ways, the party has changed the Christian right. At the same time, the Christian right has altered Republican politics. National candidates have changed their positions on important social issues, including abortion, gay rights, and religious freedom. The party’s platforms and judicially strategies have been strongly affected by movement’s interests, and conservative Christian activists have come to be central to the Republican Party. It’s stability and strength within the party have given the movement power. In these areas, the Christian right has evangelized the Republican Party rather than moderated. A fair assessment is that for the Christian right there has been partial but quite incomplete adherence to the inclusion-moderation process.

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Evangelicals, Issues, and the 2008 Iowa Caucuses

Politics and Religion ◽

10.1017/s1755048309990460 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 3 (1) ◽

pp. 130-149

Author(s):

Kimberly H. Conger

Keyword(s):

Significant Influence ◽

Republican Party ◽

Religious Beliefs ◽

Social Issues ◽

Christian Right ◽

The Core ◽

Recent Scholarship ◽

Evangelical Identity ◽

Unique Study

AbstractEvangelicals form the core of Republican constituencies in many states. This has been particularly true in Iowa, where the Christian Right has held significant influence in the Republican party for almost 20 years. However, recent scholarship has suggested that evangelicals, particularly younger ones, may be changing their candidate choices and partisanship due to dissatisfaction with Republican policies. Based on a unique study surveying caucus-goers' opinions after the January 2008 caucuses, I examine respondents' candidate preferences in light of their religious beliefs, issues preferences, and demographic identities. The results indicate that while evangelicals remain more conservative on social issues than their co-partisans in both parties, issues seem to make little difference in candidate choice. This conclusion suggests that Republican evangelicals remain committed to the importance of social issues – or at least to their evangelical identity – in their voting choices.

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Republicans in the South

Politics ◽

10.1111/j.1467-9256.1994.tb00004.x ◽

1994 ◽

Vol 14 (1) ◽

pp. 21-26

Author(s):

Dean McSweeney

Keyword(s):

Foreign Policy ◽

Republican Party ◽

Presidential Elections ◽

Social Issues ◽

Congressional Elections ◽

Party Organization ◽

The South ◽

White House ◽

Presidential Candidates ◽

Local Party

This article explains the failure of the Republican party to reproduce their dominance of the South in presidential elections at lower electoral levels. First, the foreign policy and social issues that have benefitted Republican presidential candidates have lower salience in state and congressional elections. Second, sustained Republican control of the White House has exposed the party to recurrent mid-term setbacks at lower electoral levels. Third, deficiencies of local party organization and a paucity of identifiers deprives the Republicans of candidates in sufficient quantity and quality to be competitive with Democrats.

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