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THE “CULTURE WARS” IN THE SOUTH: PARTISANSHIP, RACE, AND CULTURAL CONSERVATISM IN THE 1990 NORTH CAROLINA U.S. SENATE ELECTION
Author(s) -
Wink Kenneth A.,
Laroche Peter
Publication year - 1998
Publication title -
southeastern political review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1747-1346
pISSN - 0730-2177
DOI - 10.1111/j.1747-1346.1998.tb00491.x
Subject(s) - conservatism , race (biology) , test (biology) , population , marital status , educational attainment , political science , demography , gender studies , sociology , law , paleontology , politics , biology
This study is an aggregate, county‐level analysis of the North Carolina Senate race of 1990 between Jesse Helms and Harvey Gantt. The authors test a number of hypotheses concerning the effects of demographic variables that are thought to reflect cultural differences on support for Helms and test the effects of traditional causal variables on Helms votes. Surprisingly, support for Helms was not stronger in counties having relatively large numbers of fundamentalist Protestants. Instead, counties with relatively high percentages of married‐couple households and with lower levels of educational attainment among whites were associated with support for Helms. Thus, marital status and educational achievement may better represent measures of cultural conservatism than religious fundamentalist identity in North Carolina. Additionally, party registration, tobacco production, and the racial composition of the population in the counties strongly affected support for Helms. The finding for race is particularly noteworthy since Gantt is African‐American.