It’s very interesting to me to hear the media talk about how much people want moderation and bipartisanship because that isn’t the way that people vote. Our politics have gotten more partisan and not less, which is somewhat a consequence of the shrunken GOP tent. The GOP is down to its base of mainly white Southerners. In the past incumbency has given a huge boost to a candidate’s re-election chances and party switchers have not seen much punishment.
In the 1960s people like Strom Thurmond, Arlen Specter and Ronald Reagan switched from Democrat to Republican. Jesse Helms, Elizabeth Dole and Trent Lott switched from Democrat to Republican in the 1970s while Phil Gramm and Condoleezza Rice switched in the 1980s. There was another burst of party switching in the 1990s after the Gingrich revolution, the most prominent being Richard Shelby and Ben Nighthorse Campbell. I think most of these party switches could be explained by the changing politics of the South – going from Democrat-dominated to Republican-dominated since the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
As you can see, most of these party switchers weren’t punished by voters, but the same isn’t true today. Two prominent party switchers have gone down to defeat in this election cycle. Republican turned Democrat Arlen Specter was upset by Joe Sestak in the PA-Sen primary and last night Democrat turned Republican Parker Griffith was defeated in the AL-05 Republican primary by Mo Brooks (decisively enough in a 3-way race that no runoff will be needed).
It’s not only party switchers that are being punished. Insufficiently partisan legislators are being punished as well. Republican Senator Robert Bennett of Utah was defeated at his party’s convention in May. The delegates cited his vote on TARP as the reason. Last night, Rep. Artur Davis was defeated by Ron Sparks for the Democratic nomination for Alabama governor. Davis pursued a move to the right strategy:
“Well, Artur Davis certainly has done a lot of things different in this campaign,” said Lawson Veasey, the chairman of the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at Jacksonville State University.
“He did not seek the support of the old-line guard, the African-American political standard-bearers.” And that, he continued, was about the only strategy that could have worked for Davis in the long run, one that was obviously rife with risk.
Davis, Veasey said, made the calculated risk early in the campaign hoping it would improve his standing with white voters in the general election on Nov. 2.
Indeed, in his race against Sparks, the state’s agricultural commissioner, Davis essentially ignored institutions of the old guard, the New South Coalition and the domain of Joe Reed, the Alabama Democratic Conference.
Davis, a congressional moderate, also drifted to the right in his voting as his campaign intensified, refusing to support President Barack Obama’s historic health care reform bill to the astonishment of many of the constituents in his majority-black district.
Davis lost his own district and lost the primary by an almost 2:1 margin, 62-38. Other Democrats who positioned themselves on the right of their party have struggled (like Blanche Lincoln) are still in danger of losing their primaries this year. Some Democrats have severely misjudged the nation’s mood. Creigh Deeds guaranteed his own defeat by trying to move right (criticizing health care reform) in the Virginia governor’s race which drove down turnout on the Democratic side.
Where we’ll need to watch is the switch to Independent. Florida Governor Charlie Crist switched from R to I and is trying to run as the de facto Democrat in Florida (he holds a narrow lead). R to I switcher Lincoln Chafee is running for governor in Rhode Island, and is favored to win there as well. Probably the most famous Independent is Joe Lieberman, who went Independent after losing a Democratic primary in 2006. I think this may portend the rise of a 3rd party, a center right party. Conservatives are not very comfortable in the Democratic party right now and moderates aren’t welcome in the Republican party. I think it’s possible we’ll see a lot more Independents, especially if Charlie Crist wins in November.