A candidate's religion may hurt more than help

A nationwide poll released this week by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press offers new fodder for discussion on the impact of religion on politics.

Andrew Kohut, Pew’s director, wrote: “So far, religion is not proving to be a clear-cut positive in the 2008 presidential campaign. The candidates viewed by voters as the least religious among the leading contenders are the current front-runners for the Democratic and Republican nominations--Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani, respectively."

“On the other hand," Kohut said, "the candidate seen as far and away the most religious--Mitt Romney--is handicapped by this perception because of voter concerns about Mormonism.”

The poll found that a quarter of Americans--Democratic, independent and Republican alike--said they would be less likely to vote for a presidential candidate who is Mormon.

Among other findings:

* Social issues, such as abortion and gay marriage, are of much less interest to the average voter than the war in Iraq.

* Most Americans say that it is important for a president to have strong religious views. But a candidate need not be seen as very religious to be broadly acceptable to voters.

* Giuliani's image has been largely unaffected by his pro-choice stance on abortion, perhaps because public awareness of his position remains relatively small. Overall, only 22% of the public--and, more significantly, just 31% of Republicans--know that Giuliani favors legal abortion.

The survey was conducted Aug. 1-18 among 3,002 adults. For results based on the total sample, the error margin is plus or minus 2 percentage points; for subsets, it's 3 points. You can peruse the entire poll here.

-- Don Frederick

Comments

[rob]

I personally couldn't care less about a candidate's religion, provided it doesn't turn them into some horrible morality robot who wants the government sneaking in our bedrooms.

There are millions of Mormons in America. I've had Mormon bosses and relatives and they're funny, hard-working, and support the arts. Once a denomination rises to the level of millions of followers, it cannot really remain as a cult, and it cannot be controlled by some kind of "cabal", contrary to the stereotype promulgated by anti-Morrmons.