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Summary of Findings, Spring 2006
Most don’t want another Bush; divided on next Congress. A majority (58%) do not want the next president to be similar to President Bush, but they split into thirds over which party should control the next Congress and should win Bill Frist’s U.S. Senate seat. (Contact: Bob Wyatt).
Bush’s overall approval remains in the tank. Just 42% of Tennesseans approve of the job President Bush is doing, while 52% disapprove. This is marginally but not significantly different from our fall findings, where 40% approved. Partisan splits here are deep. (Contact: Bob Wyatt).
But Bush approval nears majority on Supreme Court, terrorism, wiretaps. There are bright spots for Bush in the state. A majority approve of Bush’s actions on Supreme Court nominations, the campaign against terrorism, and unauthorized post-9/11 wiretaps. (Contact: Bob Wyatt).
Evangelicals’ expectations of conservative policy change continue to decline. As President Bush’s approval ratings have declined, so have state evangelicals’ expectations that he will deliver policy changes hoped for by the religious right. (Contact: Ken Blake).
War in Iraq/Afghanistan No. 1 national
problem. One-fourth (25%) rate the wars in
Despite
Less than a third satisfied with national direction. Only 31% of Tennesseans are satisfied with the way things are going in the nation, while 63% are dissatisfied. Again, the partisan split is deep. (Contact: Bob Wyatt).
Majority rate national economy only fair or poor. Nearly two-thirds of Tennesseans rate the national economy only fair (42%) or poor (22%). But about a third rate (33%) the economy good, though just 4% give it an excellent mark. (Contact: Bob Wyatt).
State divided on
whether illegal immigrants take jobs from
Details of Findings, Spring 2006
Tennesseans
don’t want another Bush; divided on next Congress, senator
Despite their conservatism and their approval of Bush on a few important domestic issues, Tennesseans are certain that the do not want the next president to be like George Bush. They are also closely divided about the partisan makeup of the next Congress and are split about whether they want their next senator to be a Republican or a Democrat.
A solid majority (58%) do not want the next president to be similar to Bush, though just more than a third (35%) prefer a Bush-like chief executive. The partisan divide is deep. Fully 70% of Republicans want someone similar to Bush, while only 24% of independents and 33% of those identifying no party agree. Just 4% of Democrats want someone like Bush.
Tennesseans are split 38% to 35% about whether they want the next Congress to be controlled by Republicans. Fully 83% of Republicans want a Republican Congress, compared to 26% of independents and those with no identification. Only 2% of Democrats prefer a Republican Congress.
Concerning their next senator, Tennesseans are split 30% to 30% about whether they want a Democrat or a Republican. And fully 39% don’t know which they prefer at this point.
A full 71% of Republicans want a Republican, while 74% of Democrats want a Democrat. But the jury is out for all others, including independents – with a strong majority (57%) saying they don’t yet know what they want.
Thus, the president’s current problems seem to have deepened the polarization between Republicans and independents and increased the alienation of Democrats.
Bush’s overall approval
remains in the tank
Just 42% of Tennesseans approve of the job President Bush is doing, while 52% disapprove. This is marginally but not significantly different from our fall findings, where 40% approved. Thus, the main damage seems to have been done between last spring and the fall. A year ago, Bush’s approval stood at a healthy 55% in the MTSU Poll.
The partisan split here is obvious. An overwhelming 82% of Republicans approve of Bush’s performance, followed at a distance by 38% giving no affiliation, then 27% of independents and 7% of Democrats.
But Bush
approval nears majority on Supreme Court, terrorism, wiretaps
There are, however, several bright spots for Bush among Tennesseans. On specific items such as the handling of Supreme Court nominations, the general campaign against terrorism, and unauthorized post-9/11 wiretaps, nearly a majority approve of his actions. In fact, fully 53% approve of Bush’s actions on the wiretaps, 49% approve of his handling of the campaign against terrorism, and 48% approve of his performance on Supreme Court nominations.
Splits along party lines are predictable. While only 21% of Democrats approve of wiretaps, just over half of independents (51%) approve, compared with a solid 84% of Republicans. For the handling of terrorism, 17% of Democrats approve, followed by 42% of independents and others. But 83% of Republicans approve. For Supreme Court nominations, 80% of Republicans approved, followed by 43% of independents and those refusing to answer, 38% of others, and just 21% of Democrats.
Clearly, the source of poor
ratings for Bush’s overall job performance must be found elsewhere, perhaps in
the handling of
Evangelicals’ expectations of conservative policy change continue to
decline
As President Bush’s approval ratings have declined, so have
what were already-low expectations among the state’s evangelical Christians
that he will deliver policy changes hoped for by the religious right.
Last spring, for example, when Bush’s approval rating stood
at a comfortable 55% statewide and 62% among evangelicals, 42% of all
Tennesseans – and 50% of evangelicals – thought Bush would amend the U.S.
Constitution to ban gay marriage. Today, only about a third in each group – 31%
of all Tennesseans and 36% of
On school prayer, about equal proportions of Tennesseans in
general (23%) and evangelicals in particular (24%) think Bush will end limits
on school prayer. Last spring, 31% of all Tennesseans and 35% of evangelicals
thought Bush would do so. And despite Bush’s success at naming two Supreme
Court justices, predictions that Bush will outlaw abortion rank the lowest of
all. Just 17% of Tennesseans in general – and 17% of
Evangelicals remain highly supportive personally of these changes, though, as do most Tennesseans in general. Fully 80% of evangelicals say the law should not recognize gay marriage. Similarly, 86% think abortion should be legal only under certain circumstances (63%) or illegal in all circumstances (23%). The law should allow daily prayer in public schools, according to 87% of evangelicals, and 92% of evangelicals would approve of displaying a monument to the 10 Commandments in a public school or governmental building.
Among Tennesseans in general, 69% say the law should not recognize gay marriages, 62% say abortion should be legal under only certain circumstances (and 20% choose illegal in all circumstances), 79% favor allowing daily school prayer, and 82% favor allowing displays of the 10 Commandments in schools and public buildings.
Taken together, these findings cast doubt on the common
perception that evangelicals in
Due in part, perhaps, to these shifts, overall approval of Bush among the state’s evangelicals has dropped from 62% last spring to 48% today.
War in
Iraq/Afghanistan No. 1 national problem
One-fourth
(25%) of all Tennesseans rate the wars in
Party identification is the most important predictor of perceptions regarding the nation’s biggest problem. Thus, fully 26% of non-Republicans – including Democrats and independents – name the war as the lead problem in open-ended questions where a consensus of 20% is normally considered a high. And even 20% of Republicans concur.
Attitudes
toward the war in
Despite Iraq war
doubts, Tennesseans hawkish on Iran, Palestinian Authority
Despite
a general sense that the war in
A
majority (56%) of Tennesseans say they would support
In
Tennesseans
are less willing than Americans in general, though, to engage the
Hamas-dominated Palestinian Authority in diplomacy. Just over a third (38%) of
Tennesseans think the
Here,
again, males and females in
As in the fall, the MTSU Poll is reporting two new
“barometer” indexes to measure citizen perceptions of the overall state and
national climate. This spring, the
The three-item barometric indices are calculated from
attitudes toward the governor or the President, the state or the national
economy, and “how things are going” in
In both the state and the nation, the barometer is best predicted
by political allegiances. For
These results indicate that those who rate the state of the state and nation high tend to inhabit separate economic and political worlds.
The MTSU Poll also reported a state barometer only in spring 2003, when the index stood at 53, not much of a difference from the current 51.
Less than a
third satisfied with national direction
Only 31% of Tennesseans are satisfied with the way things are going in the nation, while 63% are dissatisfied.
Again, the partisan split is deep. Although 53% of Republicans are satisfied, only 8% of Democrats and 27% of all others agree that things are going well in the nation.
Majority rate
national economy only fair or poor
Nearly two-thirds of Tennesseans rate the national economy only fair (42%) or poor (22%). But about a third (33%) rate the economy good, though just 4% give it an excellent mark.
The familiar partisan split exists here, too. While 64% of Republicans rate the economy good, just 7% of Democrats agree. Here, as elsewhere, independents and those who profess no allegiance fall in between, with 27% rating the economy good.
State divided on whether illegal immigrants take jobs from
Tennesseans divide evenly on the question of what impact
illegal immigrants to the
These attitudes remain virtually unchanged compared to spring 2004, when a similarly phrased MTSU Poll question found that 47% of Tennesseans thought undocumented immigrants took desirable jobs and 47% thought such immigrants did not take desirable jobs. Then, as now, education was a key predictor of attitudes, with lesser-educated Tennesseans seeing illegal immigrants as more of a threat to jobs.
Tennesseans’ attitudes on the issue are uncharacteristically out of step with those across the nation. Nationally, 36% of Americans think illegal immigrants take desirable jobs from U.S. citizens, while 56% think illegal immigrants take jobs U.S. citizens don’t want or can’t do, according to a January poll by Time magazine. On national issues, Tennesseans’ attitudes tend to match those of Americans as a whole.
Appendix A: Measuring attitudes in polls
Attitudes toward many issues – such as taxes, military actions, or immigrants – are complex. The same person may hold several contradictory notions and balance them off against each other to determine an overall attitude.
For example, in forming an attitude toward abortion, the same person may believe that abortion should not be used as a method of birth control. When asked bluntly whether he or she is in favor of abortion, that person might reply either “No” or “Yes.” This is because the same person could also believe that abortion is acceptable in cases of incest, rape, or serious defects in the fetus. To learn the person’s attitude, a survey researcher must therefore ask more than one question, then report the results in all their complexity.
Appendix
B: Evangelicalism in
The
label “Evangelical” is claimed by subgroups within a wide array of Christian
types including Southern Baptists, Pentecostals, Catholics, Lutherans, and more.
To complicate matters, many self-described Evangelicals attend
non-denominational churches, and still others hold Evangelical beliefs and
exhibit Evangelical behaviors without identifying with or even recognizing the
term “Evangelical.” In short, Evangelicalism is an abstraction, and there is no
perfect way to measure it. But whatever it is, Evangelicalism is a strong force
in
The
MTSU Poll assesses Evangelicalism by asking individuals whether they consider
themselves an “Evangelical or born-again” Christian and also by measuring three
themes often found in Evangelical belief and practice: Belief that the Bible is
the “actual word of God” and should be “taken literally, word for word,” belief
that “Jesus will return to earth and take all true Christians to heaven,
leaving non-Christians here to face tribulation and the Antichrist,” and a personal
history of having “tried to encourage someone to believe in Jesus Christ or to
accept Jesus Christ as his or her savior.” In
Appendix C: Sample and method
The poll was conducted by telephone Feb.
13-25, 2006 by students in the
The sample varied somewhat from the U.S. Census Bureau’s latest available projections for age, race and gender proportions within the state. Such variation commonly occurs because certain demographic groups are more difficult to contact. The data were thus weighted to more closely match Census projections for these demographics. Here are the Census data, the sample data, and the weights:
|
|
Census |
Sample |
Weight |
Result |
|
Age: |
|
|
|
|
|
18-34 |
29.3% |
22.7% |
1.29 |
29.8% |
|
35-49 |
29.9% |
28.4% |
1.05 |
29.6% |
|
50-64 |
24.2% |
29.5% |
0.82 |
24.0% |
|
65+ |
16.7% |
19.4% |
0.86 |
16.5% |
|
|
100.0% |
100.0% |
|
99.9% |
|
Race: |
|
|
|
|
|
White |
83.6% |
85.7% |
0.98 |
82.5% |
|
Black |
15.1% |
9.1% |
1.66 |
16.0% |
|
Other |
1.3% |
5.2% |
0.25 |
1.5% |
|
|
100.0% |
100.0% |
|
100.0% |
|
Gender: |
|
|
|
|
|
Male |
47.5% |
47.0% |
1.01 |
46.9% |
|
Female |
52.5% |
53.0% |
0.99 |
53.1% |
|
|
100.0% |
100.0% |
|
100.0% |
Small variations in reported percentages (1% or less) sometimes result for rounding variations in different statistical procedures or the way different programs handle population weights.