Can a Catholic Win?

Can a Roman Catholic be elected President of the U.S.? Massachusetts' Senator John Fitzgerald Kennedy, a Roman Catholic, is the acknowledged front runner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1960 and intends to push the question to a positive answer. Last week, after sampling the opinions of 9,000 voters of all religions, the Gallup poll gave Jack Kennedy some new answers to ponder. Findings:

A Catholic's chances are better than they used to be. In 1940 Gallup first posed the question: "If your party nominated a generally well-qualified man for President, and he happened to be a Catholic, would you vote for him?" Comparative answers:

1959 1940

Would vote for a Catholic 68% 62%

Would not 24% 31%

Don't know 8% 7%

The younger generation is more tolerant than its parents: only 17% of those in the 21-to-39-year age group would not vote for a Catholic, though 31% of their elders (50 and older) would still refuse. But any Catholic presidential candidate must still start with a handicap of one voter out of every four against him.

The predominantly Protestant South is still the heartland of anti-Catholic attitudes. In 1928, the last year when religion was a big national political issue, Quaker Herbert Hoover soundly defeated Al Smith, a Catholic, by more than 6,000,000 votes, and seven states (Florida, Kentucky, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas. Virginia) split from the Solid South to vote Republican. The Southern trend, according to Gallup:

1959 1940

Would vote for a Catholic 53% 51%

Would not 35% 41%

Don't know 12% 8%

Explaining their attitude, Southerners expressed fears of a Catholic spoils system, with "Catholics getting all the jobs." Other reasons were vague ("I just don't understand Catholics") or fantastic ("I wouldn't want the Pope running the country for us").

More than half of all Catholics would be willing to jump party lines to vote for a candidate of their own faith. Asking Catholics alone if they might vote for a Catholic of a political party other than their own, Gallup got these results:

Yes 52%

No 37%

Don't know 11%

Thus, since 58% of all U.S. Catholics are Democrats (see chart), a Republican Catholic candidate might lure one out of every seven Democratic voters to his cause. Unsurprisingly, nearly all Catholics (95%) said they would vote for a candidate who shared their politics as well as their religion. The insignificant 2% who would not vote for a fellow Catholic of the same political persuasion were afraid of upsetting Protestant-Catholic relations.

Less than half the voters are aware that Senator Kennedy is a Catholic. Only 47% of all voters can identify Kennedy's religion, and even fewer Protestant voters (42%) know that he is Catholic. In his most recent tabulation, without reference to religion, Gallup found that Kennedy led Vice President Nixon in a straw vote by the comfortable margin of 57% to 43%. By deducting from the totals those voters who say they will oppose a Catholic under any circumstances, Gallup evened the odds: Kennedy, 50%; Nixon, 50%. But he had a final word of statistical encouragement for Kennedy: if Kennedy counts those Republican Catholics who would jump fences to vote for a fellow Catholic, he could hope for a narrow popular tally: Kennedy, 53%; Nixon, 47%.

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