The 2004 Exit Polls and “Moral Values”

When confronted with a term like "moral values" (not defined in any precise way by the exit polls), most political observers immediately think of abortion and gay marriage — indeed, this impulse is only natural. The 2004 exit polls offer an interesting glance at voters' views of these issues nationwide. 

In honor of the 2006 Values Voters Summit, I thought it might be useful
to look back at key values-based questions from the 2004 national exit
polls — particularly focusing in this post on abortion. In future
posts, I hope to turn also to the issue of gay marriage, as well as to
an even more in-depth analysis of public opinion on abortion.

My old boss, Mark Mellman, was fond of arguing that our country is
moving from a politics largely based on class to one based on culture.
National and statewide data from recent exit polls offer strong support
for this hypothesis. Indeed, religious attendance has become a much
better predictor of vote than income.

Furthermore, early analysis of the 2004 election focused on the
importance of "moral values" as a predictor of vote in the presidential
election. And, again, this focus was not entirely misplaced. A
plurality of 2004 voters (22%) said that "moral values" was the most
important issue — in front of the economy/jobs (20%), terrorism (19%)
and Iraq (15%). Furthemore, President Bush won these "moral values"
voters by a whopping 62 points (80% to 12%). These results confirmed
the fears of many Democrats and has led to great deal of soul-searching
— most of it, I believe both warranted and productive.

When confronted with a term like "moral values" (not defined in any
precise way by the exit polls), most political observers immediately
think of abortion and gay marriage — indeed, this impulse is only
natural. The 2004 exit polls offer an interesting glance at voters'
views of these issues nationwide. As noted above, I will focus this
posting on voters' views of abortion.

On the issue of abortion, the 2004 national exit polls suggest a great
moderate middle. Fewer than a quarter of voters wanted to see abortion
either "always legal" (21%) or "always illegal" (16%). That left a
majority of voters in the great middle (60%) — with a plurality (34%)
wishing abortion to be "mostly legal" and an additional 26% wanting to
see it "mostly illegal." While this data does suggest an evenly divided
country along pro-choice (55%) and pro-life (42%) (if you collapse the
responses), it also suggests a surprising number of relatively moderate
voters — ranging from the "mostly legal" to the "mostly illegal"
position. These are voters open to certain restrictions to abortion,
while also opposing efforts to ban abortion outright.

An important further note on these "abortion moderate" voters is that
Bush did a better job attracting "mostly legal" voters (the plurality
position) than Kerry did "mostly illegal" voters. Indeed, Bush was able
to win a 47-point margin among "mostly illegal" voters, while Kerry
only won "mostly legal" voters by 23 points. While it is important not
to read too much into such bivariate data taken in isolation, it does
suggest that Democrats might want to think about doing more to attract
these "mostly illegal" voters in the years ahead, while also shoring up
their natural base among "mostly legal" voters.

Even as members of this community try to redefine the moral values
debate in this country, we know too well that issues like abortion and
gay marriage continue to dominate the "moral values" discourse — and,
Democrats are rightly engaging Republicans on their own ground, even as
we attempt to broaden the discussion. Just this week, as noted on this
site, many Democrats laid out comprehensive plans on how to reduce
unwanted pregnancies and abortions. It has been wonderful to see many
concerned Democrats find their voices on this issue — whether or not
one agrees with their overall proposals. It is hopefully just the
beginning of an important and timely conversation.