Albright Made All The Right Moves -- Dec. 6, 1996

Supreme Court To Hear Multi-Party Case -- Dec. 3, 1996

A New Sectionalism In American Politics?

By Bill Schneider/CNN

WASHINGTON (Dec. 11) -- The basic facts about the outcome of last month's election are clear. President Bill Clinton got re-elected but had no coattails. Incumbents of both political parties did well. It was a status quo election.

But look more closely at the results, and you'll find that there were two different elections on Nov. 5. We could be seeing a new sectionalism in American politics.

Clinton did well in three areas of the country:

• The Northeast: Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland and West Virginia.
• The Midwest: Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa.
• The West: Washington, Oregon, California and Hawaii.

That's 22 states, plus the District of Columbia. Clinton carried every one of them, winning, on average, 54 percent of the vote. Those are the states where Yankee liberalism and progressivism have deep historic roots. Let's call that section of the country the Progressive Belt.

The president did much worse in the other 28 states, which include:

• The South and border states: Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, Texas, Missouri, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Indiana.
• The farm belt: Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota.
• The Rocky Mountain West -- New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Nevada and Alaska.

Call it the Conservative Belt.

Clinton averaged only 43 percent of the vote and carried just nine of those states (Fla., La., Mo., Ark., Ky, N.M., Ariz., Tenn. and Nev.) The other 19 went to Republican Bob Dole. (Va., N.C., S.C., Ga., Ala., Miss., Texas, Ind., Okla., Kan., Neb., S.D., N.D., Mont., Wyo., Colo., Utah, Idaho and Alaska.)

The two sections also voted very differently for Congress. Twelve states in the Progressive Belt elected U.S. senators last month.

Democrats won nine Senate races (Del., Ill., Iowa, Mass., Mich., Minn., N.J., R.I. and W.Va.), while Republicans won just three (Maine, N.H. and Ore.). None of those seats changed parties.

In the Conservative Belt, there were 22 senate races (Ala., Alaska, Ark., Colo., Idaho, Kan. (two races), Ky., Miss., Neb., N.M., N.C., Okla., S.C., Tenn., Texas, Va., Wyo., Ga., La., Mont. and S.D.). Republicans won 18 of them, including three pickups from the Democrats -- Alabama, Arkansas and Nebraska. The Republicans' net gain of two Senate seats happened entirely in the Conservative Belt, where Clinton seems to have had negative coattails.

By contrast, Democrats gained 18 House seats last month in the Progressive Belt. Republicans gained none. Altogether, Democrats hold 57 percent of the House seats in the Progressive Belt.

In the Conservative Belt, Republicans gained 11 House seats and the Democrats, two. Republicans hold 64 percent of House seats in the Conservative Belt.

What we're seeing is the realignment of American politics. From the 1930s to the 1960s, the Democrats were the majority party. They dominated the Northeast and the South.

From the 1960s to the 1990s, the Republicans were the majority party. Richard Nixon's "Southern strategy" put the South and the West together in a Sun Belt coalition.

The new sectionalism is really a return to the cultural politics that dominated the country before the 1930s.

Before the 1930s, Republicans dominated the Progressive Belt. Now, Democrats do. But how much good will it do the Democrats since so much of the population is moving out of the Northeast and the Midwest?

Today, the Conservative Belt has 249 electoral votes, just short of a majority.

The Progressive Belt has 292 electoral votes, just more than the 270 needed to win the White House. So the advantage goes to the Democrats. But they can't be too secure, because without California, their majority is gone.

California is now the battleground of American politics. That's why Dole spent so much time and money there, but still only got 38 percent of the vote. California is a libertarian state; it's conservative on economic issues, moderate on social issues. For Republicans to carry California, either the GOP will have to moderate its position on social issues like abortion, or the Democrats will have to forfeit the election by going back to their taxing and spending past.