What Cards Will Values Voters Hold In 2008 Election?

One of the most intriguing and important questions leading up to the 2008 election is regarding the God Vote -- the values voters who so clearly dominated the 2004 election and handed President Bush his victory. When one-third of the electorate supports one candidate by an 80% margin, that is a foundation for victory. Bush and Rove road the backs of the values voters to reelection.

Fast forward to 2007-2008. Last month, the "Values Voter" Republican presidential debate was held in Ft. Lauderdale. Giuliani, Romney and Thompson all skipped and it barely made the national news. Georgetown Professor Jacques Berlinerblau recently wrote, "The idea that the road to the White House must go through Evangelical America is, I believe, about to go out of style."

is Berlinerblau correct? Whatever happened to the values voters?

Issues Gap
First, values voter issues are not dominating the headlines. In 2004, a few homosexual activists in Massachusetts and San Francisco just about gave the election to President Bush by making traditional marriage a galvanizing issue for millions of citizens. Notice how quiet the Democrats have been on this issue? They don't want to stir the hornet's nest again, and they likely will not.

The abortion issue seems to be in a stalemate. Pro-life citizens are still disillusioned about the lack of progress on this issue during the Republicans' 12 years of control of Congress. And again, Democrats are getting smarter. With the prospects of a Giuliani nomination, Republicans now face the biggest exposure and risk on this issue.

The big issues facing our nation today are the war and immigration. I don't think the war will be a losing issue for a Republican nominee in 2008, but it will not be the winning issue. And the religious right has been virtually silent on immigration and therefore has not had a voice in the biggest domestic debate taking place right now.

Religious Left getting smart
Second, the evangelical left has made significant inroads into claiming the high moral ground in political philosophy on issues like global warming, caring for the poor, etc. Perhaps then-candidate Bush started this eight years ago by running as a "compassionate conservative," wrongly implying that conservative values were not compassionate. Such thinking has played right into the hands of the religious left and Democratic candidates who now love to talk about God and faith.

Leadership in transition?
While the values voters may not have changed much, clearly the leadership has. First, some key leaders and no longer here. Don't underestimate the passing of Jerry Falwell and D. James Kennedy and the general aging of other leaders whose influence may be waning. The revival of faith-minded folks back into political engagement over the past two decades was led by strong individuals with a clear sense of purpose along with a strong support base. Can we expect another generation to produce so many strong leaders?

Recently, social conservatives met for their semi-annual off-the-record Council For National Policy (CNP) meeting. CNP is the most influential ad-hoc association of social conservative leaders in the nation. The big news unofficially coming out of that meeting? CNP leaders pledged to run their own third-party candidate if Giuliani wins the nomination (as reported in NYTimes). This seemed to me to be a unintentional admission of shrinking influence. Why are CNP leaders threatening to push the panic button months before the first primary votes have been cast? A better question is, why couldn't values voter leaders get together 6 to 12 months ago and unify around a candidate of their liking?

Clearly, Sam Brownback banked his entire campaign on Values Voters coming together and vaulting him to the top tier. It never happened for Brownback. But perhaps the problem was with the candidate. Then what about Huckabee? He is still the dark horse in this race, largely because of the presumption that values voters will emerge in Iowa and early primary states like South Carolina. Politics is about holding cards and Values Voters sure would have more cards to hold if a candidate like Huckabee is able to jump to the top tier. So far, the polls are not supporting that conclusion.

Hillary may save the day
I'm not convinced that Berlinerblau is right. Values voters may yet prove to hold the key to the White House in 2008, thanks to Hillary Clinton.

President Hillary is the worst nightmare for the religious right -- far worse than Bill. Hillary's nomination will bring the values voter issues back to the forefront. It may be that the threat of Hillary is enough to bring the VV leadership and the base together around a less-than-ideal candidate, even Giuliani. For example, if Giuliani gives an iron-clad pledge to appoint Supreme Court justices like Scalia and Alito, many pro-life leaders may come to the conclusion that this is really all they can expect from a president. One more vote on the Court swings the pendulum toward life and frees the pro-life movement to chip away at abortion state-by-state. Compare that to a Hillary stacked Court which guarantees two decades of abortion-on-demand. Many may find it worth swallowing a little pride and voting for the less-than-ideal candidate.