According to the Los Angeles Times on 4 Nov 2004, 80% of Jewish voters voted for Kerry. From what I understand the majority of Jews in Israel were pro Bush.
I understand how many decades ago, the Jews felt safer with liberal beliefs but why does this attitude continue to exist.
In asking this question, I would prefer NOt to argue liberalism vs. conservatism butsimply to get answers as to the Jewish vote has been and continues to be overwhelmingly democratic.
Al Franken explained why he was a liberal, and I wish I could remember exactly what he said, but the jist of it was that his father always told him that Jews couldn’t afford not to be on the side of civil rights.
Jew and Democrat here.
There are plenty of historical reasons why Jews aligned with the Democratic Party, which others can probably explain better. They included involvement, as poor but generally educated immigrants, in the labor movement, in civil rights (which Jews did not always have in fact, even if they did in law), etc. Also, I think my grandparents’ generation was deeply committed to FDR for helping to defeat the Nozis in WWII (that mention doesn’t trigger Godwin’s Law does it?).
But now to today. I will discuss only my reasons for not supporting the GOP that relate to my Judaism. I have lots of others that are entirely secular in nature.
As a Jew, my main problem is with the religious right. Frankly, the religious right wing of the GOP is problematic for this Jew on many levels. First, I don’t think we share the same concept of G-d at all, despite their constant reference to “Judeo-Christian values”. I think their concept is so triumphalist and totalist that we risk, if not theocracy, at least a country where every social issue is decided on only specifically Fundamentalist Protestant religious grounds. That’s not good for the Jews. It breeds hostility to other religions (and to the absence of religion), that ultimately leads to discrimination and persecution. We do best when church and state are quite separate, thanks very much, and I don’t think the current makeup of the Republican Party is really very friendly to the concept.
Second, I am deeply suspicious of the Religious Right’s support of Israel. It really seems to be more about fulfilling their prophetic vision so that Armageddon can happen. I really don’t want to be associated with people who are looking to hasten the onset of the War to End All Wars ™.
Those are a couple of the biggies.
-Rick
fact #1: The great majority of Jews vote Democratic.
fact #2: The great majority of Jews live in New York and California.
Simple logic.
(as for the OP’s mention of Jews in Israel supporting for Bush: that’s due to terrorism. Israelis know from deep,deep experience that terrorism can only be confronted by force, not by relying on the UN and France. )
Unfortunately, it doesn’t hold up to simple math. Jews being from New York and California can’t explain why 80% them voted Kerry; those states as a whole only gave Kerry a ten point advantage or so.
New York and California weren’t overwelmingly Kerry country. California was 55% to 44% Kerry while New York was 58% to 40% Kerry.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/US-Israel/usjewpop.html
Jewish people also heavily live in Florida and it went to Bush.
For countless American Jews, loyalty to the Democratic ticket is as automatic as breathing. The roots of that loyalty run deep. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, waves of Jewish immigrants from Europe, where the most anti-Semitic elements of society were often the most conservative, brought with them an intense aversion to right-wing politics - and an appreciation for the left, which they associated with emancipation and equality. Those attitudes were intensified during World War II, when the most lethal enemy in Jewish history was ultimately destroyed by an alliance led by a liberal Democrat named Franklin Roosevelt.
Well, true at the statewide level. However, I think NYC itself went something like 75%+ for Kerry (or at least parts like Manhattan did). Still, I would agree that the location of Jews would explain some but not all of the effect…I still think you would find Jews voting more Democratic than their neighbors on average.
There is, for whatever reason, a strong connection between progressive causes and non-Orthodox Jews. And, I think that relative to some of the Christian sects, there has generally been less concentration on “thou shalt not…” sort of stuff in reform and Conservative Judaism and more concentration on issues of social justice, helping the poor, and so forth.
It is important to note that Orthodox Jews tend to vote much more conservatively…They are the ones more analogous to the Christian fundamentalists. However, that is probably a fairly small minority of Jews. Lots of Jews (like myself) aren’t really religious at all. Remember that being Jewish is an ethnicity in addition to a religion. I don’t really consider myself to be a Jew in any religious sense and yet I still consider myself to be a Jew.
Those who argue that Jews vote Democrat because they’re from New York and California have the cause-effect backward (and, in the case of California, their facts).
New York is heavily Democratic because it’s got a high Jewish population.
Jews make up 8.9% of the population in New York. In California they make up 2.9% of the vote.
But Jews are a minority group and many minority groups vote democratic. So when you combine the Jewish vote with the black vote and the hispanic vote that would explain partially why NY and California were democratic.
jshore nailed it. Orthodox Jewry did not exist in massive numbers in the United States until the turn of the (20th) century, but non-Orthodox Jews already had a massive organized presence (the Reform-movement’s Hebrew Union College, for example, was established in Cincinnati in 1875), and therefore all Jews immigrating hooked up with what was basically the only “Jewish community” in America, even though it had a far more liberal attitude about many things than they themselves did. Then WWII added on the Nazi-defeating heroism of FDR and Truman, as well as Truman’s support for Israel’s founding, which cemented even more allegiance from the Jews.
It wasn’t until the 80’s that a Democratic shift leftward combined with a strong anti-Soviet leader in Reagan led Orthodox Jews to realize that the “Jewish community” as politically defined did not necessarily align with their interests/points of view. This led to the Orthodox community building separate political structures, e.g., adding a greater political element Agudath Israel. Al D’Amato and Rudy Giuliani were the first politicians to recognize this new division. But, as the overwhelming majority of Jews in America are not Orthodox, the overwhelming majority of the Jewish vote tends to go Democratic.
Just to expand upon jshore and Chiam’s posts …
Yes, Orthodox Jews are more often voting “values” today, and are not too dissimilar to the Christian Religious Right in their reasons for choosing a candidate.
Us Secular Jews (which generally includes most Reform and Conservative Jews, and the vast majority of American Jews) tend to care less about overtly religious issues (or ritual for its own sake for that matter). The Bible thumpers scare us. Heck, some us are even intimidated by the Torah thumpers! We instead focus on the tradition of Tikkun Olam … the perfecting of the world by working towards social justice. We often have forgotten how to read the prayers all that well, can’t quote Talmudic tractates, and don’t attend services every week … but we remember this from our religious education: “If I am not for myself who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?” -Hillel And we percieve the Democratic Party to more consistent with that ethical mandate than the Republicans.
What ! So why do Neo-Cons keep babbling about Israel ? I thought there was a heavy jewish lobby for these kind of nuts in order to bolster Israel. Or Jews are just prudent and support any party in power in order to help Israel ?
How do american jews view the Bush adm. 100% total support of Sharon ?
cmkeller: […] therefore all Jews immigrating hooked up with what was basically the only “Jewish community” in America, even though it had a far more liberal attitude about many things than they themselves did.
This certainly can’t be true for all Jewish immigrants after the nineteenth century: what about the large influx of Jews who were strongly leftist or socialist? AFAICT, the huge immigrations in the first quarter of the 20th century made the US Jewish population on average more liberal, not less.
The Republican Party is heavily affiliated with the Christian right.
The Christian right believes in Judgement Day and eagerly await its occurrence.
On Judgement Day, the Jews will be cast into lakes of hellfire, to gnash their teeth and wail at their rejection of Jesus as their Savior.
Given all that, is it any surprise most Jews don’t want to hang out with the GOP?
Heck, a big reason why the Republicans are so staunchly pro-Israel is because they believe it will hasten the return of Christ – which, again, isn’t exactly something to warm the cockels of most Jewish hearts…
Funny no one mentioned that jews (everywhere) are very highly educated…
Are you serious? You mean the continued existence of the state of Israel will hasten his return? Why?
It all has to do with “Rapture theology” and the concept of Armageddon and Revalation conspiracy theories. Basically, for Christ to return, Israel has to exist.
Kimstu:
Obviously, those allied themselves with the liberal Jewish community by choice rather than by default. But many, many of those immigrants were Orthodox, but Orthodox Jews were not at the time politically organized.
Thank you. You’re frightening me. I’ll read up on it.
Estimated Jewish population of the United States: 6,155,000
In New York: 1,657,000 (26.9%)
In California: 999,000 (16.2%)