Why is Indiana a Republican State?

[BritishDixie]

Aside from Obama's carrying it in 2008, the state has only been carried by the Democrats once since 1936, when LBJ crushed Goldwater in one of the largest landslides in U.S History. Despite being part of the unionized rust belt, it still votes heavily Republican. Can someone explain this?

[Supersonic]

No major cities, which are Democratic, is one of the reasons.

[I Can't Get That Sound You Make, Out Of My Head]

Voting laws tend to be quite strict iirc.

But, very good question. You'd think it'd at least be a swing state.

[Is JCL in mushy sappy love]

We also have one of the strictest anti-abortion laws short of banning it. Pro-Life politics are a strong thing around here.

[kenyanobama]

We also have one of the strictest anti-abortion laws short of banning it. Pro-Life politics are a strong thing around here.

This is true. Indiana is full of good Christian people.

[crypto-fascist superhero]

No major cities, which are Democratic, is one of the reasons.

Um, Indianapolis?

But yes, the main reason is that urban areas are outweighed by rural and suburban areas, and said urban areas are whiter than average.

[Kevin]

No major cities, which are Democratic, is one of the reasons.

Um, Indianapolis?

But yes, the main reason is that urban areas are outweighed by rural and suburban areas, and said urban areas are whiter than average.

True the state is largely made up of farmers and small businessmen the historic mainstay base of the Republican Party.

[Is JCL in mushy sappy love]

No major cities, which are Democratic, is one of the reasons.

Um, Indianapolis?

But yes, the main reason is that urban areas are outweighed by rural and suburban areas, and said urban areas are whiter than average.

True the state is largely made up of farmers and small businessmen the historic mainstay base of the Republican Party.

That could be another reason. Indianapolis is a swing city because of those busisness intrests. It has a conservative mayor who is doing a solid job.

[cope1989]

I believe I posted about this very question a while ago.

Indiana is, in my opinion, kind of strange in that it's a (mostly) red state surrounded by swing and blue states. My theory is that it's a state in the Midwest that historically, didn't take part in many of the trends that shaped the politics of the Midwest.

- It has no large cosmopolitan city like Illinois
- No large black population like in Michigan
- Not as many unionized manufacturing workers like in Ohio
- No large progressive Scandinavian immigrant population like in Wisconsin and Minnesota

Indiana is the best example today of what the Midwest might have looked like before movements like the great migration and the Rustbelt industrial boom shaped the region. It's a state where most people still claim German, protestant ancestry, full of small towns and farmers. Which, as someone said, was an original base of the Republican party.

[AmericanNation]

I believe I posted about this very question a while ago.

Indiana is, in my opinion, kind of strange in that it's a (mostly) red state surrounded by swing and blue states. My theory is that it's a state in the Midwest that historically, didn't take part in many of the trends that shaped the politics of the Midwest.

- It has no large cosmopolitan city like Illinois
- No large black population like in Michigan
- Not as many unionized manufacturing workers like in Ohio
- No large progressive Scandinavian immigrant population like in Wisconsin and Minnesota

Indiana is the best example today of what the Midwest might have looked like before movements like the great migration and the Rustbelt industrial boom shaped the region. It's a state where most people still claim German, protestant ancestry, full of small towns and farmers. Which, as someone said, was an original base of the Republican party.

yes, also you have a unique combination of Indiana being very lightly settled by New England Yankees compared to every other Midwestern state AND being significantly settled by 'Greater Appalachians'.  The Yankee settlement band that stretches from northern PA and across OH's(northwestern reserve) narrows significantly across northern Indiana.  I remember it having something to do with soil, but it might have been the Appalachians pushing north in southern Indiana -- that pushed the Midlanders North --- and the Yankees were boxed out- squeezed against lake Michigan.  

So you have:
1) Midlanders who have probably been the longest lasting cultural base of the Republican party(with a brief exception of FDR realignment) ,
2) Greater Appalachians who tend to be somewhat Libertarian, and
3) a sliver of Midwestern Yankees who used to be Strong Republicans, but now produce mostly knee jerk leftists.

The early alignment would be Midlanders+Yankees vs. Appalachians
The current alignment would be Midlanders+ Appalachians vs. Yankees

The Republicans have always been able to form a majority coalition of the three groups is the bottom line answer.  

               

[freepcrusher]

the state has always leaned republican nationally but it hasn't always aligned with local races. The state has elected democrat senators over the years (Evan and Birch Bayh as well as Vance Hartke) and some of the CDs which always were republican leaning have elected democrats for periods of time such as Phillip Sharp, Lee Hamilton or John Brademas.

[Jayhawker]

I have a lot of knowledge here, but my steam has been taken by others who posted earlier.

I'm the only active member of this forum (sorry JCL ) who lives in southern Indiana. Southern Indiana is not part of the Rust Belt. I consider Southern Indiana to begin a little above I-70.

In my neck of the words, we'll vote Democratic often at state and local levels, much like Kentucky. But we are very reliable to the GOP in national elections.

Even here, unions are pretty strong, but what gets people going is that they're evangelicals, aka, they're big on social issues. Issues like gay marriage and abortion largely keep IN in the GOP column. Honestly, outside of Marion County (which isn't too Democratic), and up around Chicago (which I honestly don't consider part of Indiana, Indiana is pretty much a bunch of farmers.

As to Obama - he only won in 2008 because he spent money here and McCain hardly did. Obama also visited the state; McCain didn't. I promise you, had McPalin made a couple stops here, he would have won it.

[Proud Lieberal from Northeast]

Indiana is basically Illinois without Chicago.

[Ѕenator Αverroës]

The responses that cite Indiana's settlement history, from Cope and AmericanNation, provide your answer.

[Is JCL in mushy sappy love]

I have a lot of knowledge here, but my steam has been taken by others who posted earlier.

I'm the only active member of this forum (sorry JCL ) who lives in southern Indiana. Southern Indiana is not part of the Rust Belt. I consider Southern Indiana to begin a little above I-70.

In my neck of the words, we'll vote Democratic often at state and local levels, much like Kentucky. But we are very reliable to the GOP in national elections.

Even here, unions are pretty strong, but what gets people going is that they're evangelicals, aka, they're big on social issues. Issues like gay marriage and abortion largely keep IN in the GOP column. Honestly, outside of Marion County (which isn't too Democratic), and up around Chicago (which I honestly don't consider part of Indiana, Indiana is pretty much a bunch of farmers.

As to Obama - he only won in 2008 because he spent money here and McCain hardly did. Obama also visited the state; McCain didn't. I promise you, had McPalin made a couple stops here, he would have won it.

It's ok Tmfth. As you have the southern part I've got the central part.

Because people from Indiana are total dumasses who won't vote for the change America needs under Obama.

Ever thought that most Hoosiers (like myself and Tmfth) just don't want what Obama's offering. If Mitt and whoever his runningmate is come here, Obama will get bodied like Wesker bodys beam assists in UMVC3.

[BaldEagle1991]

Indiana is Republican state, because it's practically the only Midwestern state than hasn't been overrun by minorities, immigrants, and non-Christians by a large scale. It's practically like a Midwestern Oklahoma or Arkansas.

[Gustaf]

I don't know how relevant that is, but Indiana was historically quite strongly for the Democrats until Lincoln won it in 1860. After that it was a bellwether during the Gilded Age. So it seems as if it was a bit more border state-ish and a bit less solidly Republican Midwestern in its voting patterns until WWI.

[CathKhan]

I don't know how relevant that is, but Indiana was historically quite strongly for the Democrats until Lincoln won it in 1860. After that it was a bellwether during the Gilded Age. So it seems as if it was a bit more border state-ish and a bit less solidly Republican Midwestern in its voting patterns until WWI.

Before the reign of Republicans, Indiana was practically a Southern state. The same goes for Southern Illinois. Both of them went for Buchanan in 1856. It was a state like Indiana that really didn't want to fight a war just for the sake of slaves. During the Gilded Age, it was possible for a Democrat like say, Grover Cleveland, to win the state by pretty solid margins. I'd agree that it's around WWI that it started going solidly Republican.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I have a lot of knowledge here, but my steam has been taken by others who posted earlier.

I'm the only active member of this forum (sorry JCL ) who lives in southern Indiana. Southern Indiana is not part of the Rust Belt. I consider Southern Indiana to begin a little above I-70.

In my neck of the words, we'll vote Democratic often at state and local levels, much like Kentucky. But we are very reliable to the GOP in national elections.

Even here, unions are pretty strong, but what gets people going is that they're evangelicals, aka, they're big on social issues. Issues like gay marriage and abortion largely keep IN in the GOP column. Honestly, outside of Marion County (which isn't too Democratic), and up around Chicago (which I honestly don't consider part of Indiana, Indiana is pretty much a bunch of farmers.

As to Obama - he only won in 2008 because he spent money here and McCain hardly did. Obama also visited the state; McCain didn't. I promise you, had McPalin made a couple stops here, he would have won it.

I would agree, but it's not a "Republican state", it just leans that way.  Kentucky and West Virginia tend to be Republican in presidential elections but actually more Democratic at the statewide level, from what I've seen.  I guess Indiana just tends to be more rural.  And remember, there are a lot of swing states in the Upper Midwest where unions are strong, too.

[InsaneTrollLogic]

I heard that its basically part of the "Butternut" reigon, where Southerners have migrated across the Ohio to work in Indiana, Illinois, Ohio and Pennsylvania....and probably Indiana is really white, too...its where the KKK formed when it was basically the Tea Party of the 1920s which helped push through Prohibition and  3 Conservative Presidents, back to back.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

I heard that its basically part of the "Butternut" reigon, where Southerners have migrated across the Ohio to work in Indiana, Illinois, Ohio and Pennsylvania....and probably Indiana is really white, too...its where the KKK formed when it was basically the Tea Party of the 1920s which helped push through Prohibition and  3 Conservative Presidents, back to back.

You mean where the KKK re-formed, don't you?  You realize what a hackish post this is, trying to portray all whites as racist and tying conservatives and Tea Partiers to the KKK.
The KKK was actually founded in the South during Reconstriction as the terrorist wing of the Democratic Party.  While a large number of Northern Republicans especially in Indiana, joined the Klan in the 1920s, it remained a mostly Democratic organization.

[InsaneTrollLogic]

Oh...the KKK you are talking was dealt with pretty quickly. The KKK was a major part of the Indiana GOP in 1920s. About 20% of the electorate was in the Klan in the mid 1920s.  In 1926, it was about as big as a deal as the Tea Party was in 2010....and it wasn't just about racism, either...it was basically part of the bigger authoritarian lean of the 1920s...you know, Prohibition, Eugenics. All the fun stuff that right-wing social engineering has brought us.  

..and let's not forget that in the Civil War, there were a lot of Confederate sypathy in Indiana and rural Ohio.

[asexual trans victimologist]

and it wasn't just about racism, either...it was basically part of the bigger authoritarian lean of the 1920s...you know, Prohibition, Eugenics. All the fun stuff that right-wing social engineering has brought us.  

This is correct, but actually parts of that were considered 'progressive' at the time.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

and it wasn't just about racism, either...it was basically part of the bigger authoritarian lean of the 1920s...you know, Prohibition, Eugenics. All the fun stuff that right-wing social engineering has brought us.  

This is correct, but actually parts of that were considered 'progressive' at the time.

Exactly.  Haven't you ever heard about how active Margaret Sanger was with the progressive movement?  She was also the founder of Planned Parenthood, which, last time I checked, wasn't really into "right-wing social engineering."  Prohibition was also part of the progressive movement.  It may be considered right-wing now, but it was liberal for that time.

[InsaneTrollLogic]

Well, the Klan was, from my knowledge, against that...but they were also very anti-labor. Not only were they violently culturally conservative, but class conservatives as well.