After an election in which 66% of voters under 30 broke for President Obama, many Republicans might find comfort in the old adage about growing more conservative with age:
If you are young and conservative you have no heart, and if you are old and liberal you have no brain.
The saying is often attributed to Winston Churchill, which anyone familiar with his political career knows doesn't make much sense. This is because Churchill actually entered politics as a Conservative, switched to the Liberals when he was 29. He only rejoined the Conservatives at the age of 49, at a moment when electoral support for Liberals was being swallowed whole by Labour. As such, abandoning the Liberals had less to do with ideological drift than Chruchill's ongoing desire to become Prime Minister.
Anyway, no matter who actually coined the phrase (it might have been Shaw, according to one Open Left commenter), in an American context it highly exaggerates traditional youthful support for Democrats and liberals. The following chart graphs the performance of Democratic presidential nominees among voters under 30 from 1976-2008. It shows that the Democratic over-performance among young voters was much larger form 2004-2008 than it was from 1976-2000:
Democratic Performance Among Voters Under and Over 30, Since 1976
| Year |
Dem % Voters Under 30 |
Dem % Voters Over 30 |
Margin |
| 1976 |
54% |
49% |
5% |
| 1980 |
44% |
39% |
5% |
| 1984 |
41% |
40% |
1% |
| 1988 |
47% |
45% |
2% |
| 1992 |
44% |
43% |
1% |
| 1996 |
54% |
48% |
6% |
| 2000 |
48% |
49% |
-1% |
| 2004 |
53.5% |
46.5% |
7% |
| 2006 |
60% |
52% |
8% |
| 2008 |
66% |
50% |
16% |
While President Obama over-performed among young voters noticeably more than any other Democratic presidential nominee or mid-term class, Democratic over-performance among young voters had already set records in both 2004 and 2006. Even if Obama had not become the Democratic nominee, it is likely that Democrats would have over-performed among young voters by 9-10%, given recent trends.
Young voters are not trending more Democratic because they are somehow becoming even younger. Instead, the continuing trend toward Democrats among young voters is because young voters are becoming less white, less Christian, and less closeted. All of these voting demographics favor Democrats by roughly 3-1 margins, and they are over-represented among young voters. In a great article over at Larry Sabato's place, Alan Abramowitz charts what this demographic breakdown means for the partisan electoral balance by age group:
Perhaps there once was a time when younger voters broke toward Democrats and liberals just because they were young, and then grew more conservative as they aged. However, now young voters are breaking toward Democrats at record levels not just because they are young, but because they are non-white, non-Christian, and out of the closet.
This is significant, because while you might trade in your heart for your head when you get older, you don't get more white, more Christian, or less gay with age. As such, Republicans are not going to start winning these voters over until they start performing better among non-Christians, non-whites, and the LGBT community. Given that all of those groups are trending in the opposite direction, it seems entirely possible that the old cycle of trading in hearts for heads will breakdown entirely.
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