Political Mobilization in the Pews: Religious Contacting and Electoral Turnout

Abstract

Objective. We probe the impact of voter contact by religious groups, in the form of direct attempts to encourage voters to vote in a certain way and the placement of voter guides in churches, on voter turnout among white evangelical Protestants, white mainline Protestants, white Roman Catholics, and black Protestants in 1994, 1996, and 1998. Methods. Using data from the 1994, 1996, and 1998 National Election Studies, we fit a series of logistic regression models of voter turnout that feature, as key predictors, variables indicating whether an individual was contacted by “any groups concerned with moral or religious issues that tried to encourage you to vote in a particular way” and whether “information about candidates, parties or political issues [was] made available in your place of worship before the election.”Results. These forms of contact were most commonly experienced by white evangelicals and black Protestants, and in many instances such contacts accomplished their intended purpose. Conclusions. Interest group contacts—at least contacts from the types of groups examined here—have the potential to be no more effective than contacts by political parties, perhaps because their messages can be more narrowly targeted.