Joint Center/AARP research shows Clinton, Obama lead all others in favorability ratings

The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies has issued a national poll of African Americans who are likely to vote in the 2008 primaries and caucuses that shows an extremely high level of engagement and a strong preference for two leading Democrats.

C-Span covered the news conference.
Press release
Poll detail
About the poll

African Americans see a widening gulf between the values of middle class and poor blacks, and nearly four-in-ten say that because of the diversity within their community, blacks can no longer be thought of as a single race, according to a new nationwide Pew Research Center survey.

The survey, entitled, “Optimism about Black Progress Declines Blacks See Growing Values Gap Between Poor and Middle Class,” was conducted in association with National Public Radio. David Bositis, senior research associate at The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, was a consultant on the survey.

http://pewsocialtrends.org/pubs/700/black-public-opinion

By David A. Bositis
Senior Research Associate
Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies

After the passage of landmark civil rights legislation in the 1960s, Lyndon Johnson observed that the Democrats had probably lost the South for a generation.  The change he forecast did not arrive as neatly as predicted, but by 2004, the South had become the most reliably Republican region in the country.

Now, there are signs that some of the region may be poised to move beyond the negative reaction of whites to the gains of African Americans that began in the 1960s and ended with a solidly conservative, and Republican, South.  Virginia -- with its high tech industry and a rapidly growing population in its northern suburban Washington region -- is witnessing a renaissance of the Democratic Party.

Virginia has been the most solidly Republican of any southern state in presidential elections. Since 1952, Virginia's presidential vote has gone to the GOP in every election except LBJ's 1964 landslide.  Virginia and Tennessee were the only southern states to prefer Nixon to Kennedy in 1960, and in 1976, Virginia was the only southern state to opt for Gerald Ford over Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter.  Virginia was also one of the earliest southern states to elect a Republican governor (1969).

At the time George W. Bush was elected president in 2000, Virginia was as solidly a Republican state as any in the country.  The governorship, both U.S. Senate seats and most House seats, and both state legislative chambers were under Republican control.

Despite the Republican dominance, the largest and most influential jurisdiction in Virginia was showing signs of changing its political coloration.  Fairfax County, with its one million residents, had been trending Democratic starting in the late 1990s.  A significant indicator of Fairfax politics was that it was one of the handful of jurisdictions in the South that had been removed from the oversight provisions of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.  A jurisdiction is removed from oversight only when it has demonstrated that it has moved beyond racial discrimination in its voting system.
 
The first political changes began to be seen in 2001 with the election of Mark Warner as governor.  Warner, a high-tech executive from northern Virginia, ran strongly enough in Fairfax and other northern Virginia areas to win statewide.  The next signpost of change was seen in 2004, when John Kerry, who lost the state, carried Fairfax County -- the first time a Democratic presidential candidate had carried the county since LBJ in 1964.  In 2005, Warner was succeeded (Virginia governors are term-limited to one term) by another Democrat, Tim Kaine, former mayor of Richmond -- again with large majorities in Fairfax and the rest of northern Virginia.  

Some observers attributed Warner’s and Kaine's gubernatorial victories to personal factors, namely Warner's charisma, which also helped Kaine in his 2005 campaign. However, in 2006, the Democratic U.S. Senate candidate, Jim Webb (former Secretary of the Navy, former Republican, and noted author), defeated incumbent George Allen, who at the start of the campaign was contemplating a presidential run in 2008.  Allen's famous “Maccacca” moment captured on video and posted on You-Tube, undoubtedly contributed to his defeat. But the fact that an ethnic slur could undermine the campaign of a popular incumbent and former governor indicated a whole lot of change had come to Virginia.

In this month's elections in Virginia, Democrats gained a majority in the state senate, and picked up seats in the state assembly, with northern Virginia again being the engine of change. Gaining control of the state assembly was unlikely because of partisan gerrymandering; the current districts were drawn with Republicans in complete control of the process, a situation that will not be repeated after the 2010 Census.  

Former governor Mark Warner is running for a U.S. Senate seat in 2008, left open by retiring Republican U.S. Sen. John Warner (no relation).  At this time, Mark Warner is polling more than 20 percentage points ahead of his likely opponent, a former Republican governor, Jim Gilmore.

The changes to Virginia politics in such a brief period of time are remarkable.  There remains however one larger question that affects more than the residents of Virginia: Is Virginia poised to move into the Democratic column in a presidential election?  A Democratic victory in Virginia in 2008 would mean a Democrat in the White House in 2009.