Our Divide Is Social, Not Political

First we had the election, in which issue differences were muted and voters could have gone either way. In most elections, one of two themes prevails, either “You’ve never had it so good” or “It’s time for a change.” Election 2000 was odd because voters felt both ways.

Then we had the postelection ordeal, when the country seemed torn apart. The stakes suddenly escalated, and millions of voters had a desperate interest in making sure that the wrong man didn’t get elected. For many, what had been a casual preference turned overnight into a life-and-death struggle.

Now we have the question: How divided is the country?

It sure looks divided. Vice President Al Gore won the nationwide popular vote by about half a percent, the closest outcome since 1960. But Gov. George W. Bush got elected by carrying the electoral college, 271-267, the closest electoral vote margin since 1876.

Republicans have a razor-thin edge in the House of Representatives. And the Senate? Dead even. You can’t get any closer than that.

The parties are as closely divided in the states as they are in Washington. Sixteen states have Republican-controlled legislatures. Democrats control 17. And 16 are split. (Nebraska has a nonpartisan legislature.)

The Clinton years have equalized the strength of the two parties. President Clinton blurred party differences on economic policy while creating a deep division over values. Clintonism is a policy of the center--the “third way,” between left and right. Much of it was stolen from Republicans. And it worked. It brought the country peace, prosperity, declining crime rates and declining welfare rolls. On election day, nearly two-thirds of Americans thought the country was headed in the right direction. Then why didn’t Gore get two-thirds of the vote?

His campaign, for one thing. Gore alienated swing voters by running to the left of Clinton, while he antagonized Democrats by keeping his distance from the president. Then there were certain unmeasurable factors, like the desire for new leadership and the sense of moral decline. You don’t see those forces in the economic figures or the president’s job ratings--or in the experts’ forecasting models.

But they matter. Almost 60% of the voters polled on election day said that the moral condition of the country was on the wrong track. Clinton created a consensus on policy, not on values. You can see the values split in the 2000 election map. The conservative heartland of the country went for Bush. Gore’s support came from the liberal coasts and the liberal upper Midwest (Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa), plus areas dominated by African Americans in the Mississippi Delta, Latinos in South Texas and Florida and Asian Americans in Hawaii.

Lifestyle differences had a powerful impact on the way people voted. Urban America went heavily for Gore. Rural America went for Bush. Suburban voters were split. In the National Review, Kate O’Beirne labeled it “the zip-code election.” Married voters went for Bush. Single voters for Gore. Regular churchgoers for Bush. Less religious voters for Gore. Gun owners came out for Bush. No guns meant Gore.

Why does lifestyle suddenly matter so much? “Lifestyle” is a 1960s word, and Clinton was the first president to come out of the culture of the 1960s--sex, drugs (“I didn’t inhale”) and rock ‘n’ roll. Clinton is a hero to African Americans and Hollywood liberals and feminists because of his liberal values, not his centrist policies. Conservatives hate Clinton for the same reason: the values of the ‘60s, which conservatives believe have corrupted American culture with an ethic of self-indulgence. Read any book by Bill Bennett.

“Why do you hate Clinton so much?” an interviewer asked a Chicago-area conservative during the impeachment hearings. “His policies have not been particularly radical.”

“I’ll tell you why I hate Clinton,” the activist responded. “I hate him because he’s a womanizing, Elvis-loving, non-inhaling, truth-shading, war-pro testing, draft-dodging, abortion-protecting, gay-promoting, gun-hating baby boomer. That’s why.” It’s the values, stupid.

Impeachment and Florida were the latest skir- mishes in the nation’s ongoing cultural war. The election campaign was a contest over policy, and it brought Americans together. Elect either candidate and you’d get some version of Social Security reform, campaign finance reform, tax cuts, prescription drug coverage and a stronger federal role in education.

The postelection campaign was a more polarized contest. Bush appeared smug and arrogant as his campaign talked about victory rallies and transition teams. Gore looked like a man who would do anything to get elected as his campaign talked about ballot technicalities and legal challenges. Suddenly it was all about race and abortion rights, issues that had barely surfaced during the preelection campaign. And partisan lines hardened.

Bush acknowledges that his first task as president-elect is outreach. “I look forward to the chance of healing a nation that has been divided as the result of an election,” he said on Dec. 20. So he pursued the Santa Claus strategy in naming his Cabinet and White House staff: something for everybody. After all, Santa Claus is a pretty popular fellow. Very high job approval ratings.

Bush reached out to groups that didn’t support him. Like African Americans and women--Colin L. Powell for secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice for national security advisor. Moderate Republicans are getting not just Powell but also New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman as head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Both of them support abortion rights. But their jobs don’t have much to do with abortion.

Bush speaks a little Spanish, but Latino voters went over 60% for Gore. So he named a Mexican American White House counsel and a Cuban American secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

Republicans are in a deep depression in California. So Santa Bush brought them an Agriculture secretary, Ann M. Veneman, the first woman to head California’s Department of Food and Agriculture. For the key post of Treasury Secretary, Bush needed someone politically connected. Like Paul H. O’Neill, a close personal friend of Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan and of Vice President-elect Dick Cheney.

Wait a minute, conservatives protested. What’s Santa bringing us? We were good all year, never gave the ticket a minute of trouble. Ho, ho, ho, said Santa. I got you just what you wanted. John Ashcroft, who will be an attorney general with deeply conservative views on social issues and close ties to the religious right.

California and New Jersey are suburban states that used to be reliably Republican. But they also are coastal states whose voters don’t like the ties between the GOP and the religious right. Clinton made it safe for tax-sensitive suburbanites to vote Democratic. He also got economic liberals like Bill Bradley and Ralph Nader to denounce Clintonism as a sell-out. At the same time, Clinton reduced the Democrats’ appeal in culturally conservative areas of the country--like Tennessee, Arkansas and West Virginia, states Gore should have won. Talk to a liberal and they’ll give you this analysis of the 2000 election: Gore lost because he kept his distance from Clinton. But the truth is, Gore lost because he couldn’t keep his distance from Clinton.

Has American politics ever been this closely divided? Interestingly, yes--for 30 years after the Civil War. That war created a deep cultural divide: North versus South instead of left versus right. A president got impeached along straight party lines. For three decades, presidential elections were extremely close. So close that, in 1876 and 1888, the winner of the popular vote lost the electoral vote. Imagine that.