Western Ohio's Catholic voters have clout

Tuesday, September 30, 2008 3:13 AM
By Alan Johnson
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
This Dispatch series focuses on the race between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama in Ohio's six major -- and vastly different -- media markets. Combined, these regions could determine the next president and extend Ohio's long record for picking presidential winners.

TIPP CITY, Ohio -- When Catholics first began worshipping at St. John the Baptist Church here, a presidential campaign rife with racial overtones was raging across the country.

An up-and-coming U.S. senator from Illinois was battling an older, well-respected veteran politician. The year: 1860. The candidates: Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas.

Ed Dock of Tipp City doesn't consider himself old at 83 and he certainly wasn't around for that election. But he's been a faithful voter for decades, and this year he'll cast an absentee ballot to avoid the two-hour wait he experienced at the last presidential election.

"I'll hold onto that absentee ballot until the end," he said. "I just haven't made up my mind."

John Hitchens, 51, an airline pilot from Tipp City, knows whom he'll vote for -- any candidate who opposes abortion. It's the deciding factor for him, regardless of all other issues.

"The basis for any society is the right to life," he said last week after the morning Mass at St. John. "Whoever we elect this time could have a huge impact on the Supreme Court."

Although Hitchens likes Republican presidential candidate John McCain, he's wildly enthusiastic about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, McCain's running mate. "I'd certainly vote for her in a heartbeat," he said.

The once reliably Democratic Catholic voting bloc is no longer reliable and not so Democratic. Still, Ohio has more than 2 million Catholics.

And the Catholic vote has particular clout in western Ohio, including the Dayton area and 13 rural counties north and east of the city. That area alone accounts for nearly 500,000 Catholics in 221 parishes, more than any other part of the state except Cleveland, says the Catholic Conference of Ohio. About one out of four voters is Catholic; the percentage on Election Day might be higher, as Catholics are generally more faithful about going to the polls than other voters.

The Rev. John Putka, a Marianist priest and political-science professor at the University of Dayton, is convinced that "The Catholic vote is going to decide the election."

Putka says there is not one, but three Catholic voting blocs.

• "Observants," as Putka calls them, are conservative, attend church regularly and typically vote Republican, based on abortion and other social issues. They supported President Bush over Democrat John Kerry 65 percent to 35 percent in 2004.

"McCain's selection of Palin totally galvanized this pro-life group," Putka said. "They were lukewarm before but not now."

• "Modernists" go to church less frequently, are less guided by Catholic beliefs, and include "Reagan Democrats" who migrated to the Republican Party during Ronald Reagan's 1980 and 1984 campaigns. Putka said they are often called "cafeteria Catholics" because they selectively pick and choose from a menu of beliefs.

This, Putka said, is the true swing vote of the Catholic populace.

• "Secularists" include people who rarely attend church and are not typically guided by church beliefs. Those voters went heavily for Kerry in 2004 and are likely to support Democrat Barack Obama, Putka said.

Over the eight years of the Bush administration, Catholic voter identification with Republicans dropped from 28 percent to 21 percent, while it remained at about 38 percent with Democrats, according to a study by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

The number of Catholics in the middle -- swing voters not loyal to either party -- climbed from 35 percent to 41 percent, the study showed.

At St. John, the congregation is split about 50-50 between McCain and Obama, churchgoers said.

"I don't think abortion is the first thing on people's minds," said Dottie Zimmerman, 80. "People are thinking about the economy. I know we're giving out more baskets to the needy than ever before."

June King, 89, will vote absentee but, like Dock, doesn't yet know whether she will vote for McCain or Obama.

"How do you know who's telling the truth?" King said. "I'm waiting. I'm just undecided."

About 20 miles south of Tipp City, the Rev. Lee Sciarrotta, a Marianist priest, pastors a melting-pot congregation of 700 families at Emmanuel Catholic Church in downtown Dayton. The 136-year-old church building survived Dayton's Great Flood of 1913, which washed away the pews but not the parish.

This month, Sciarrotta preached on "Making Moral Choices in Voting," a subject strongly suggested by the U.S. Conference of Bishops.

Abortion, which Sciarrotta calls an "intrinsic evil," was the focus. But the death penalty, economic justice, education and stem-cell research also are important, he said.

"Some will say abortion is just one issue," he said. "I am saying it is a fundamental issue. I look upon it like building a house. I tell you, 'I can guarantee you a good roof, but I'm not certain about the foundation.' Abortion is a foundational issue."

Sciarrotta said his diverse congregation, which is drawn from all across Dayton and surrounding areas, is conservative and likely to vote for McCain-Palin.

Christopher M. Duncan, a University of Dayton political scientist, said Catholics will find it difficult to be one-issue voters this year "in the face of a radical insecurity that's growing in the American populace. We're talking about chaos of the financial markets, coupled with the ongoing war and natural disasters."

ajohnson@dispatch.com

"Some will say abortion is just one issue. I am saying it is a fundamental issue."
The Rev. Lee Sciarrotta
Marianist priest