The Hidden History Of The American Electorate

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The Hidden History Of The American Electorate
Our analysis of exit-poll results from five presidential elections reveals which demographic subgroups tend to swing and which ones rarely move.

by Ronald Brownstein

Saturday, Oct. 18, 2008


National Journal has taken an unusually detailed look at the American electorate over the past 20 years. The project examines the results since 1988 from the general election presidential exit polls conducted outside polling places across the country by a consortium of newspapers and television networks.

Results for key voting groups will be released regularly on NationalJournal.com through Election Day.

With anxiety over the nation's direction approaching hurricane force, the 2008 election could blow away many of America's familiar political landmarks.

The collapse of public faith in Washington and the meltdown on Wall Street are generating gales of discontent that could reconfigure each party's electoral coalition and reorder long-standing patterns of support. Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama is seriously competing for at least 10 states that President Bush carried last time -- including two, Indiana and Virginia, that haven't voted Democratic since 1964 -- and seeking to ignite a historic surge in turnout, particularly among young people and African-Americans. Republican presidential nominee John McCain, meanwhile, is battling these headwinds while trying to mend the GOP's frayed appeal among independent voters and restore the party's reach into states (such as Minnesota, New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania) where suburban swing voters have moved toward the Democrats under Bush.

With Obama now consistently leading in national surveys, McCain's best hope in this difficult climate may be the durability of the underlying partisan allegiances that have divided the country almost exactly in half between the parties for much of the past 15 years. Thirty-four states voted the same way in all four of the presidential elections from 1992 to 2004. And many of the demographic trends in this fall's polls follow familiar grooves. Most surveys, for instance, show McCain continuing to lead Obama among culturally conservative groups, such as working-class whites and regular churchgoers, that have resisted Democrats for three decades. Yet deepening economic anxiety may produce a demand for change powerful enough to tear even those patterns from their roots. After two presidential elections in which each party measured its gains in inches, polls now show Obama and his Democratic Party with the opportunity for a major breakthrough.

To understand the possibilities of sweeping change, and the barriers to it, National Journal has taken an unusually detailed look at the American electorate over the past 20 years. The project examines the results since 1988 from the general election presidential exit polls conducted outside polling places across the country by a consortium of newspapers and television networks. (The organization performing the exit polls has changed over the years. Edison Media Research/Mitofsky International conducted the most recent one, called the National Election Pool survey.)

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http://www.nationaljournal.com/njmagazine/cs_20081018_7864.php