Why do states and areas of the United States vote the way they do in elections? For example, what makes Rhode Island heavily Democratic and Arkansas heavily Republican? Also, why are Appalachian areas like Eastern Kentucky and Southern West Virginia so heavily Democratic? Those areas don’t seem very liberal to me. Do you think your average Kentucky voter and your Massachusetts liberal are really voting for the same values when they pull the lever for a Democratic candidate?
bump.
I can say that for some parts of the South, the Democratic party used to have an absolute stranglehold on political power due to the whole Civil War thing. Especially at local levels, because the (conservative) Democratic Party had the overwhelming support of voters, winners of elections were actually chosen during the Democratic primary, not the general election. Think about it: if damn near everyone is a Democrat, and the best conservative candidates are also Democrats, Republicans don’t stand a chance.
So why haven’t conservative voters moved over to supporting Republican candidates? Well, a lot have, but in many places – West Virginia is an excellent example – you stand a lot better chance of being elected as a Democrat, so conservatives have a disincentive to run as a Republican. It’s like a closed-loop political system in which the good candidates tend to run as Democrats to get elected, because political talent doesn’t have a fair shot in running as a Republican.
And comparing a West Virginia Democrat and a Massachusetts Democrat is like arguing about the price of tea in China. In the final analysis, not a lot of Northeastern Democrats move to West Virginia to run for office (Senator Rockefeller excepted), so why should anyone in West Virginia care so long as they like the people they do elect?
And Arkansas isn’t heavily Republican. It has quite a healthy record of electing Democrats. Like Bill Clinton. And all but one member of their current congressional delegation. And their current governor.
But part of that, in West Virginia especially, is that, however socially conservative West Virginians are, there’s also a large number of unionized coal miners. And unionized labor tends to vote Democratic.