Democratic Presidential Candidates Research Articles

The Christian Right in the Old Dominion: Resurgent Republicans or Holy War?

In early 1994, Virginia Senator Chuck Robb appeared extremely vulnerable. Once touted as a potential Democratic presidential candidate, Robb spent much of his first term defending himself against charges that he had attended parties where drugs were used, had engaged in extramarital affairs, and had known that his aides had possessed illegally taped cellular telephone conversations of long-time rival Governor Douglas Wilder.Robb's difficulties began soon before he launched his campaign in March 1994. He issued a letter to Virginia Democratic leaders and activists in which he admitted to having extramarital sex, although he consistently denied that this contact had ever included inter-course. This fine distinction made him no friends among moral conservatives, who disapproved of any extramarital activity, or among liberals, who found his behavior sexist and his account implausible.Yet on election night, Robb survived a Republican tidal wave to win a surprisingly easy victory over Republican candidate Oliver North, of Iran-Contra notoriety. North spent approximately $20 million, more than four times Robb's total, and deployed a huge volunteer army that covered the state with placards. He had the strong endorsements of Reverends Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, and could count on the organizational efforts of the Christian Coalition, the Family Foundation, and the National Rifle Association. In the home state of the former Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition, however, North failed to carry Lynchburg (a stronghold of Falwell and the former Moral Majority), or Chesapeake, and only narrowly carried Virginia Beach (home of both Robertson and the Christian Coalition).

No Place to Be a Child: Growing up in a War Zone

Explore the lifelong psychological impact of war and violence on children This book should stab the conscience of the world. No one can read its gripping account of the terrifying impact on children of modern war and remain unchanged.--George McGovern, former U.S. Senator, South Dakota and 1972 Democratic presidential nominee

Statement by Zachary Fisher: Founder and Chairman Fisher Medical Foundation

Hillary Rodham Clinton was one of four 2007–2008 Democratic presidential candidates who had voted to authorize U.S. military use in Iraq. Given her status as the front-runner, Clinton's vote, in particular, presented a public relations problem for her among primary voters who strongly opposed the war and favored its prompt end. This study analyzes Clinton's attempts in debate performances to repair her image among voters. Clinton attempted to reduce offensiveness through differentiation, attempted to evade responsibility through defeasibility, and employed qualified mortification. Clinton's strategies were rated as inconsistent and their effectiveness is questionable.

Southern Politics After the Election of Presidential Clinton: Continued Transformation Toward the Republican Party?

To whom does the South belong politically, now that an all-southern ticket has reclaimed the White House for the Democratic party? Review of 1992 voting returns for national, statewide, and legislative races in the South, contrasted with those from earlier presidential years, lead to only one conclusion: the South continues to move toward the Republican party. The Clinton-Gore ticket ran behind its percentage of the national vote in most southern states, as well as behind all Democratic candidates in statewide races, and would have won without any southern electoral votes; whereas Bush-Quayle ran ahead of their percentage of the national vote in every southern state except Clinton’s Arkansas, while Republicans gained seats in southern legislatures and congressional delegations. It is suggested that southern electoral college votes won by Democratic presidential candidates in 1976 and 1992 hinged upon Democratic vote-getters in races for statewide offices in each state carried except the presidential candidates’ home states.

Judging presidential character: The demise of Gary Hart

This article investigates the public reaction to the scandal which effectively ended Gary Hart's quest for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination. Employing NES panel data covering the period in which the scandal surfaced, and integrating arguments drawn from research on attitude change, media priming, and candidate evaluation, this analysis of the Hart case illuminates more general questions about how citizens respond to media communications during the course of an election campaign and of the factors that facilitate or inhibit attitude change. The investigation lends support to contemporary theories of attitude change that emphasize citizens' levels of political involvement and prior predispositions; uncovers evidence of media priming as views about controversial standards of morality were newly engaged in defining citizens' post-scandal evaluations of Hart; and yields evidence that negative responses to Hart in the wake of the scandal were tempered among citizens who typically weigh policy criteria alongisde candidate characteristics when formulating their overall candidate evaluations.

Source Credibility and Presidential Campaigns: Governor Clinton and the Allegation of Marital Infidelity

The McCroskey and Jenson source credibility scale was administered to a sample of 178 college students before and after watching Governor Clinton, candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination, answer questions relating to charges of marital infidelity on a nationally televised program. Four source credibility attributes showed no statistically significant changes in scores before and after the program on competency, character, sociability, and extroversion.

U.S. urged to change CO emissions policy

As the June United Nations Conference on Environment & Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro approaches, the Bush Administration is under increasing pressure to change its current position regarding stabilization of carbon dioxide emissions to curb global warming. These pressures are coming from an international alliance of legislators, major U.S. environmental groups, and Democratic Presidential candidates. In preparation for UNCED, popularly called the Earth Summit, representatives of 120 to 130 countries have met four times to negotiate a framework convention on global climate change. So far in these negotiations, all the industrialized countries except the U.S., Turkey, and Saudi Arabia have committed to stabilizing carbon dioxide emissions at 1990 levels by 2000. The U.S., the largest producer of carbon dioxide, has remained resolute in its opposition to setting targets to be met in a specific year. It advocates a more flexible approach—one that calls for stabilizing greenhouse gas emissions as soon ...

Health Screening for Political Candidacy: A Partnership Model

HEALTH SCREENING FOR POLITICAL CANDIDACY: A PARTNERSHIP MODEL PAUL R. SCHATTMAN* Public confidence in the physical and mental health of political leaders is particularly important in democratic systems. Where political power is in the gift of the people, misinformed choice can be as dangerous as uninformed choice. One of the chief means of informing the electorate is the political party. Parties bring organization and coherence to politics, and without coherence politics loses accountability. As Schattschneider said, "political parties created democracy and modern democracy is unthinkable save in terms of parties" [1, p. I]. Over the last 30 years, the link between the voter, politics, and party has been severely eroded by spiraling election costs, PACs, television imagery, and personal campaign organizations. But recent events have offered a unique opportunity to begin reforging that linkage and have provided the medical profession with an opportunity to participate in returning coherence and accountability to the political life of the nation. On August 2, 1988, the sudden rash of rumors to the effect that Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis had undergone psychiatric treatment for unspecified mental disorders prompted the Republicans and others to call for disclosure of the candidates' medical records, once again raising the issue of health screening for political leaders. The rumors concerning Dukakis's mental health, as reported by NBC "Nightly News" on August 3, appear to have been a political smear engineered by the supporters of independent presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche and to have had no basis in fact so far as is known. The Dukakis campaign immediately and specifically denied any and all such claims, and Gerald Plotkin, the candidate's personal physician for 17 years, categorically denied that the governor ever exhibited any psy- *Visiting assistant professor, Department of Political Science, Texas Tech University, Box 4290, Lubbock, Texas 79409-1015.© 1989 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved. 003 1 -5982/90/330 1-066610 1 .00 Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 33, 1 ¦ Autumn 1989 \ 45 chiatric symptoms or complications or had ever received any counseling, treatment, or therapy. The furor that erupted over this allegation raises a significant point relative to health screening for office seekers. In the absence of a trustworthy source, incomplete or erroneous medical information can be used to smear the candidate, to undermine his campaign, and to impugn the judgment of his party. Since the Eagleton nomination debacle in 1972, the tendency has been for presidential and vice-presidential candidates to voluntarily but only partially disclose their medical histories. This current controversy, too, is likely to result only in the continuation of that trend of limited disclosure . The voluntary disclosures have been made most often by the candidates and/or by their personal physicians. The public pronouncements usually consist of declarations of the soundness of the candidate's mind and body without disclosure of the actual medical records or an attempt to present a complete medical history. For political or personal reasons, these assertions of good health may be less than candid [2]. The extent to which any office seeker reveals his true medical history remains subject to the discretion of the candidate himself and to the skill and determination of the media to ferret out the facts. The doctor/ patient privilege and the individual's right to privacy under the Constitution can make it extremely difficult for the public and the media to obtain accurate data. This was clearly demonstrated on October 30, 1986, when a Florida court dismissed a suit brought by three Florida newspapers seeking access to Senator Paula Hawkins's medical records on the ground that the individual's right to privacy outweighed any public right to know, and, however public-spirited or well-intentioned, the news media had no independent brief to act in the capacity of a health-screening agency for those seeking public office. The public relies on the media to convey accurate information about the candidates. Despite the possibility of bias, superficiality, and sensationalism in coverage, the media do as well as can be expected under the current system's restraints, but the system needs to be modified to give the media greater access to more accurate medical information about those who seek...

Democratic Incumbents and the 1984 Presidential Election: A Case Study

This article examines the advantages a single Democratic incumbent utilized to win reelection in 1984 despite an overwhelming victory by Ronald Reagan at the top of the ticket in the congressional district. The incumbent won reelection because of two types of ticket splitting: Republican-inclined voters who voted for Republican candidates for president and U.S. Senate and split to vote for the Democratic incumbent for Congress, and Democratic voters who supported Democratic candidates for U.S. Senate and Congress but split to vote for Ronald Reagan for president. Ticket splitting was found to be associated with basic political orientation-weak Republican and independent voters split in favor of the Democratic incumbent and were far less likely to vote a straight ticket for either party. Support for the Democratic incumbent was explained in nonideological terms and was based upon high recognition and favorability, constituent service, voting record, and personal familiarity. For the Republican challenger, who never achieved a high level of recognition (despite significant campaign expenditure), support came almost solely from the most partisan Republican members of the electorate and was based simply upon the party affiliation of the Republican challenger. In 1984, despite one of the most one-sided presidential elections in American history, the Republicans gained only fourteen seats in the House of Representatives and lost two seats in the Senate. Almost all Democratic congressional incumbents who ran for reelection in 1984 won. The focus of this research is on the reelection of one Democratic incumbent congressman and provides an opportunity to examine at the micro level the advantages that one Democratic incumbent utilized in 1984 to win reelection. The willingness of a significant number of KURT C. SCHLICHTING is Associate Professor of Sociology at Fairfield University. The author wishes to thank the Fairfield University Research Committee for support. Public Opinion Quarterly Volume 53:83-97 ? 1989 by the Amerncan Association for Public Opinion Research Published by The University of Chicago Press / 0033-362X/88/0053-01/$2.50 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.64 on Sat, 03 Sep 2016 04:04:58 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 84 Kurt C. Schlichting voters to split their ticket proved decisive. The Democratic incumbent won reelection to Congress with 53% of the votes cast while Walter Mondale, the Democratic presidential candidate, received 36%. The likelihood of ticket splitting was found to be directly correlated with the strength of political affiliation and the high level of recognition and positive evaluation of the incumbent by almost all segments of the electorate. The incumbent congressman was also able to take advantage of the fact that a significant portion of the electorate had decided in favor of the incumbent before September 1984. Since the 1950s a great deal of attention has been focused on the voting behavior of the American electorate, but the emphasis has been on voting in presidential elections. A recent major study of congressional elections by Goldenberg and Traugott (1984:6) points out the predominantly presidential focus of virtually all large studies of elections until 1978. It is not until 1978 that the National Election Study (NES) conducted by the University of Michigan substituted congressional districts for counties as primary sampling units and began to include questions specific to the congressional elections. The major limitation of the NES, the primary source for survey data on congressional elections, is that few interviews are conducted in any one congressional district. The Goldenberg and Traugott analysis focuses on types of congressional races: open seats, incumbent seats, incumbent-sure winners, incumbent-vulnerables, and not on any one congressional district. The authors analyze 86 contested races among the 108 congressional districts in the NES sample (1984). The survey data is drawn from the 1978 NES and consists of 1,843 interviews, an average of 21 interviews per district in the contested districts (N = 86). The present study examines survey data from a single congressional district for the 1984 presidential election. The congressional district analyzed is located in a large midwestern state and consists of urban, suburban, and rural areas. Its other demographic characteristics mirror those of the state as a whole. The congressional district is one which was identified by both parties as marginal (vulnerable in Goldenberg and Traugott terminology) in 1984. The incumbent Democrat faced a strong challenge from a well-financed Republican. The Republican challenger spent over $450,000, while the incumbent's campaign expenditures exceeded $555,000.

Intra‐party political debates and issue learning

This study examined issue learning outcomes in three intra‐party political debates during the 1984 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. The results indicated that intra‐party political debates produce significant viewer learning (1) about the issue positions of each participating candidate, (2) about most issues, and (3) among all categories of viewers. In addition, the study found that intra‐party political debates produce distinct outcomes, including: variation in learning between debates about candidate positions on particular issues; significant increases in learning about the positions of the Democratic candidates on the part of Democratic, Republican, and nonaffiliated viewers; and a negative effect on viewer knowledge about nonparticipating incumbent Ronald Reagan's positions on the issues.

The Political Behavior of American Catholics: an Assessment of the Impact of Group Integration Vs. Group Identification

IN RECENT years scholars have given increasing attention to the politics of American Catholics (Reichley 1984; Formicola and Stark 1986; Hoffman 1986; Leege and Welch 1986). Much of this attention has involved comparing the political attitudes and behavior of Catholics with those of non-Catholics (Greely 1977; Lopatto 1985; Reichley 1984 and 1986). Attention has also been given to comparing the political attitudes and behavior of Catholics over time and to explaining variance in Catholics' political attitudes and behavior (Fee 1976; Dionne 1981; Penning 1986). Efforts to explain the political attitudes and behavior of American Catholics suggest that a variety of factors have shaped Catholics' politics. Some studies emphasize the impact of immigration and ethnicity, pointing out that during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, immigrant Catholics tended to settle in Northern cities dominated by the Democratic party (Dionne 1981; Lopatto 1985). There, a close link between the Democratic party and Catholics developed, with the party benefiting from Catholic support and Catholics using the party as a tool to facilitate social assimilation and economic advancement. Although these partisan ties have weakened over the years, they continue to influence American Catholics (Hanna 1979; Kellstedt 1986; Leege and Welch 1986). A second explanation of Catholics' political attitudes and behavior stresses the importance of social class. This explanation suggests that American Catholics, faced with economic discrimination by Protestants, found it exceedingly difficult to prosper financially. An important consequence of this situation was the attraction of Catholics to the Democratic party, with its relatively greater advocacy of social egalitarianism and welfare-state liberalism (Greer 1961; Greeley 1977). Finally, some studies have noted that election-specific, short-term variables such as the presence of Catholic candidates for public office have also had an important impact on Catholics' political attitudes and behavior. For example, the nomination of Catholics Al Smith (1928) and John F. Kennedy (1960) as Democratic presidential candidates may have

Presidential voting in the west

Voters in the western United States are becoming more Republican than the rest of the country in their presidential choices. The Solid West has replaced the Solid South as a reality of presidential campaigns. This is in spite of a long term national trend away from strong party loyalties. This article examines the ten states of the Interior West at the county level during the eight presidential elections from 1956 through 1984. All parts of the region did not simultaneously embrace the Republican Party from the onset of the New Western Normal Vote episode. Those areas that lagged were characterized by sizable employment in forestry and mining, large Hispanic or Native American populations, or were among the region's few large urban concentrations. Some of these areas still remain outside the Republican fold in presidential elections. The overall magnitude of change in Republicanism in the 549 counties was not uniform, but rather impacted some areas such as Nevada and Idaho to a much larger degree than others such as Montana and the Dakotas. This article generally confirms Archer and Taylor's assertion that the Western Periphery constitutes a new Republican heartland. But some Indian and Hispanic populations continue to vote for Democratic presidential candidates. Rural areas with strong organized labor such as the mining and forestry areas of Montana, and big cities like Denver are only weakly Republican. Hence, the conversion to strong and unwaivering Republicanism is not total and may never occur.

Black Political ParticipationPolitical Process and the Development of Black Insurgency 1930-1970. By Doug McAdam The Origins of the Civil Rights Movement, Black Communities Organizing for Change. By Aldon D. Morris Minority Vote Dilution. By Chandler Davidson The Voting Rights Act, Consequences and Implications. By Lorn S. Foster The Jesse Jackson Phenomenon, the Crisis of Purpose in Afro-American Politics. By Adolph

This essay reviews the recent literature evaluating the impact of civil rights reform on American politics. Black organizations, through a variety of extra-institutional protests in the 1950s and 1960s, forced national political institutions to deal with the denial of full citizenship and political participation to blacks. The civil rights movement created the national political and social pressure for passage of the Civil Rights Acts of 1957, 1964, and 1968, as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and its extensions in 1970, 1975 and 1982. These extensions and their administrative and judicial implementation have increasingly been directed by a group of litigative organizations and activists distinct from the organizations which initiated the protest movement and directed its litigation. This raises important political questions both for the direction of and the control of that policy. It is within this new environment that Jesse Jackson's race for the Democratic presidential nomination is possible. These changes have been examined in a number of recent books. In separate studies, Doug McAdam and Aldon Morris have investigated the necessary and powerful interactions among protest, mass mobilization, and social movements, as well as their effect on the reorganization of political institutions required for the political incorporation of blacks. Chandler Davidson and Lorn Foster, in two collections of original essays, explore post-protest legislative and judicial politics which involve more specialized groups of actors. Finally, Adolph Reed, Jr., addresses the most recent manifestation of the post-Southern civil rights era in Amer-

Progressive Ambition among United States Senators: 1972-1988

A rational-choice model is used to account for the decisions of United States Senators to run for president. The model predicts that senators will be more likely to run for president if their relative costs of running are low, if they have no political liabilities that might reduce their chances of winning, and if they have a propensity to take risks, which we measure by their past willingness to take risks in running for the Senate. The model works well in accounting for the decisions of Democrats to seek the presidency in 1972, 1976, and 1984, and can explain why few Republican senators ran in 1980. The model is used to predict which senators in the 99th Congress are relatively likely to run for president in 1988. The model works better in accounting for the past behavior of Democrats than Republicans, and also generates more plausible predictions about future Democratic presidential candidates. This partisan difference results largely from the different opportunity structures of the two parties. Finall...

Seven Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate Educational Issues

Seven Democratic Presidential Candidates Debate Educational Issues

Does Heavy Turnout Help Democrats in Presidential Elections?

There is conventional political wisdom that high voter turnout in a U.S. presidential election advantages the majority party. Because the Democratic party has been the dominant party in recent decades, this turnout advantage is often believed to accrue to Democratic presidential candidates. In an article in the June 1980 issue of the Review, James DeNardo challenged this conventional view. Indeed, he claimed that the majority party was likely to suffer with increased turnout when the behavior of core and peripheral voters is taken into account. Harvey J. Tucker and Arnold Vedlitz take issue with DeNardo's reasoning and evidence, and DeNardo embellishes and underscores his original case.

Does Heavy Turnout Help Democrats in Presidential Elections?

There is conventional political wisdom that high voter turnout in a U.S. presidential election advantages the majority party. Because the Democratic party has been the dominant party in recent decades, this turnout advantage is often believed to accrue to Democratic presidential candidates. In an article in the June 1980 issue of the Review, James DeNardo challenged this conventional view. Indeed, he claimed that the majority party was likely to suffer with increased turnout when the behavior of core and peripheral voters is taken into account. Harvey J. Tucker and Arnold Vedlitz take issue with DeNardo's reasoning and evidence, and DeNardo embellishes and underscores his original case.

Jesse Jackson and the Symbolic Politics of Black Christendom

This article examines the significance of the Reverend Jesse Jackson's bid for the Democratic party's presidential nomination. Jackson's candidacy represents a new use of political revivalism, an old evangelical political praxis recast in the modalities of African American Christian culture. This praxis is an aspect of American political culture that has often been overlooked because of past misunderstandings of American folk religion in general, and black Christianity in particular, as captives of an otherworldly and privatized spirituality. This article contends that black Christianity has an identifiable and coherent political style with both passive and active moods. The dominant manifestations of these moods are, respectively, political cynicism and political revivalism, which are the consequence of the correct folk perception that it is impossible to reason with the purveyors of the absurdities of racial injustice. A critical assessment of black Christianity's political symbolic capital seems appropriate.

Harold L. Ickes and the National Park Service

In 1933, President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt sought to balance his cabinet by nominating supporter to be secretary of the interior. Senators Hiram Johnson of California and Bronson Cutting of New Mexico both turned him down, preferring to remain in the Senate.' Roosevelt then turned to Harold LeClair Ickes, an independent Republican lawyer from Chicago. Ickes would serve as secretary of the interior from 1933 to 1945, longer than any man before or since. His responsibilities included the National Park Service, which-except for certain of its personnel -prospered under the leadership of this complex and colorful figure. Born in 1874, Ickes spent his first years in Pennsylvania but moved to the midwestern metropolis during his youth. As reporter for the Chicago Record, he covered Republicans in the 1900 election and became particular admirer of vice-presidential candidate Theodore Roosevelt. He worked actively in Roosevelt's 1912 Bull Moose campaign, reverted to regularity on behalf of Charles Evans Hughes in 1916, but then supported every Democratic presidential candidate during the 1920s. At home in Chicago he battled Samuel Insull and the colorful Mayor William H. Big Bill Thompson. His tireless and uncompromising advocacy of reformist principles and his facility for verbal attack made him almost the incarnation of lonely, righteous, and inextinguishable pugnacity. When Ickes finally found himself on the winning side of presidential campaign in 1932, he thought first of becoming commissioner of Indian affairs; then he resolved to shoot for the top position in the Interior Department. He was not from the western states that traditionally supplied secretaries of the interior, and he had no personal familiarity with his successful candidate. He made his interest known to FDR through mutual acquaintances, however, and eagerly accepted the post upon his call to Roosevelt's Hyde Park home.2 The new secretary of the interior was a remarkably complex and profoundly suspicious man who thrived on

The Changing Structure of Party Identification

However one wishes to characterize Walter Mondale's campaign for the presidency, his loss was only the latest in a series of Democratic presidential candidate defeats beginning in 1968. In 1968, Hubert Humphrey got 43 percent of the popular vote. In 1972, George McGovem received 38 percent of the popular vote. And in both 1980 and 1984, the Democratic presidential tickets got 41 percent of the popular vote. Only in 1976 did a Democratic presidential candidate receive a (very slim) majority of the popular votes cast. Indeed, Democratic presidential candidates have received only 42 percent of the total votes cast between 1968 and 1984.Although Democratic presidential candidates have not been faring well for 16 years, party identification has remained about the same—with the Democrats as the majority party. Until 1984. And that is what makes the 1984 election interesting, for in this election the voters finally seemed to change their party identification to correspond with what now appears to be their habit of electing Republican presidents.In 1980, when Jimmy Carter received the same proportion of the total votes cast as did Walter Mondale in 1984, self-styled Democrats were still in the majority. But, by 1984, Republicans and Democrats were at a virtual tie nationwide, as these figures from NBC News election day voter polls demonstrate.