Fear of growing ties between government and religion and concern for social justice issues were central elements which led American Jews to favor Democratic candidate Walter Mondale over President Reagan by a three to one margin in the Presidential elections last November, according to the American Jewish Congress.
The AJCongress, in a report released by AJCongress president Theodore Mann, found differences in voting patterns within the American Jewish community based on such factors as age, sex, and income. But the perception of President Reagan as the candidate advocating a breach in the constitutional wall between church and state cut across generational, educational and economic lines, the AJCongress survey indicated.
The finding were based on a national exit survey conducted by the AJCongress of 2,932 Jewish voters as they left their polling places. The survey, spanning 14 regional areas across the country, is believed to be the largest inquiry of American Jewish voters ever undertaken. By contrast, the number of Jewish respondents in exit polls conducted by the media, including major networks, rarely exceeded 500.
There was also concern expressed by those Jews surveyed about the alleged anti-Semitism associated with the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s campaign for the Presidential nomination and his prospective role in a Democratic administration, the report said. Jackson’s potential influence on government apparently was viewed as a less imminent danger than a breakdown of separation between church and state as reflected in Reagan’s public utterances and his support for such policies as allowing organized prayer in the public schools, the report said.
MARKED CONTRAST WITH GENERAL POPULATION
Another voting pattern emerging from the survey was the seeming disregard of Jewish voters for their own financial interests, said the AJCongress report, which cited the fact that even more affluent Jewish families overwhelmingly supported Mondale. “Thus Jewish voters with family incomes of over $50,000 gave Mondale 67 percent of their votes as opposed to 32 percent for Reagan,” the report explained. In contrast, voters in the general population with over $50,000 incomes gave Reagan a majority of 59 percent and Mondale only 40 percent.
“The Jewish voter, unlike other voters,” the report said, “was not voting his or her pocket book.” Jewish voters, the report continued, “appear to be a unique group among the American voting public in that they defied their economic self interest and voted for a candidate who advocated a more socially challenging approach to our nation’s social and economic problems.” The report attributed this characteristic, in part, to religious teachings mandating help for the less fortunate.
Among other characteristics of Jewish voting patterns in the November election, the AJCongress survey indicated there was no swing among Jews from their traditional place in the Democratic Party to the Republicans, despite much discussion and anticipation of such a shift during the campaign. The report speculated that Jewish voters may have aborted a swing to the Republican Party because of Reagan’s strengthened ties with evangelical fundamentalist supporters.
Another characteristic of the Jewish voting pattern, the report said, was that among Jewish voters, “secular” Jews gave 83 percent of their votes to Mondale and 16 percent to Reagan. Orthodox Jews, meanwhile, gave Mondale 49 percent and Reagan 48 percent. Conservative Jews gave Mondale their votes by a margin of nearly three to one as did Reform Jews.
The AJCongress also said that a moderate gender gap emerged in the voting, with 77 percent of Jewish women giving their votes to Mondale while 62 percent of male voters did so.
JEWISH VOTERS OVER 60 SUPPORT MONDALE
Voting patterns among Jewish voters in various age brackets indicated little change with each group–ages 18-29, 30-44 and 45-59 — strongly supporting Mondale. This is in contrast to the voting patterns of those age groups in the nation’s general population which gave a majority of their votes to Reagan.
However, among Jewish voters 60-and-over support for Mondale was even stronger than among younger voters, with 75 percent of over-60’s voting for Mondale and only 23 percent for Reagan. This again represented a sharp departure from the nation’s general voting pattern which showed the 60-and-over population supporting Reagan over Mondale 63 to 36 percent.
THE JACKSON FACTOR
The most frequent single factor cited by Jewish Mondale voters as influencing their vote was Reagan’s support for closer ties between religion and government. Fifty-nine percent of the 2,073 Jewish voters supporting Mondale said their vote was “strongly” influenced by this issue. An additional 19 percent said this factor “slightly” influenced their vote.
Among the 805 Jewish voters for Reagan, 34 percent indicated their votes for the Republican ticket were “strongly” influenced by Jackson’s campaign while 14 percent said their vote was “slightly” influenced by the Jackson factor.
NO CONSERVATIVE SHIFT
The AJCongress analysis said that, based on the survey results, suggestions of a Jewish shift to conservatism in political life was unfounded. Some 41 percent of Jewish voters — twice as much as the general voting population — identified themselves as “liberal.” Another 37 percent identified themselves as “moderate.” Only 17 percent said they were “conservative.”
This liberal and moderate self-identification was underscored by the Jewish voters’ responses to questions on specific social issues. Forty-three percent stated that the government was not sufficiently responsive to the needs of Black and Hispanic minorities; 40 percent indicated the government is adequately responsive; and 10 percent declared that government is “too responsive” to these needs. A heavy majority also opposed a government ban on abortion and efforts to introduce prayer in the public schools while indicating support for federal action to reduce unemployment and increased aid to education.
Jewish voter support for President Reagan in 1984 — 27 percent — was the same as in 1980 — 27 percent. The 71 percent Mondale vote among Jews represented a sizable increase over the 49 percent received by Jimmy Carter in 1980. However, in the 1980 election, 13 percent of Jewish voters supported John Anderson, the independent candidate. Most of these voted Democratic in 1984, contributing to the heavy Mondale vote, the report noted.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
