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This article uses surveys of the parties' national convention delegates from 1972 to 1992 to examine the emergence of a religious cleavage between Republican and Democratic activists. The findings indicate that the religious cleavage between the two parties has grown over time, with the Republicans becoming more traditionally religious and with the Democrats growing more secular and religiously modern. This religious polarization has been associated with a growing partisan polarization on "cultural" issues such as abortion, women's rights, and homosexual rights. Finally, the article demonstrates that the impact of religious change within the parties on interparty differences on cultural issues has been even broader than a model focusing only on religious replacement would predict. Not only is religious replacement within the parties occurring, but within religious groups, Democratic activists are becoming more culturally liberal relative to Republican activists.

Examines the emergence of a religious cleavage between Republicans and Democratic activists; suggests that religious polarization is associated with a growing partisan polarization on cultural issues, such as abortion, women's rights, and homosexual rights, 1972-1992; US.

Examines political differences among Catholics, Protestants, Jews, and secularists, and between Protestants who are religious conservatives and those who are religious liberals; based on National Election Studies; US.

AbstractPrior work has shown party activists and religious divisions to be two of the leading causes of party polarization in American politics. Using the Convention Delegate Studies, we examine the interaction between these two culprits and their impact on party polarization. We leverage a novel measure of secularism in the latest wave of the Convention Delegate Studies to demonstrate that active secularism is distinct both conceptually and statistically from low religiosity. Furthermore, we show that both religiosity and secularism drive party activists to take more extreme policy positions, to identify themselves as more ideologically extreme, and to exhibit less support for compromise. As the Democratic and Republican Parties have become more secular and religious, respectively, these results suggest religious polarization may compound existing divisions between the two parties and exacerbate the partisan divide in American politics.

Scholars have long debated the individual‐level relationship between partisanship and policy preferences. We argue that partisanship and issue attitudes cause changes in each other, but the pattern of influence varies systematically. Issue‐based change in party identification should occur among individuals who are aware of party differences on an issue and find that issue to be salient. Individuals who are aware of party differences, but do not attach importance to the issue, should evidence party‐based issue change. Those lacking awareness of party differences on an issue should show neither effect. We test our account by examining individuals' party identifications and their attitudes on abortion, government spending and provision of services, and government help for African Americans using the 1992‐94‐96 National Election Study panel study, finding strong support for our argument. We discuss the implications of our findings both for the microlevel study of party identification and the macrolevel analysis of partisan change.

A heated scholarly debate rages over the 'culture wars thesis' in American politics. Drawing on the literature on mass opinion constraint & its sources, we propose a resolution to this debate: the culture wars influence mass political behavior in special religious, policy & political contexts where logical, psychological, social & electoral sources of opinion constraint are in effect. Using data pooled from the 1992, 1996 & 2000 American National Election Studies, we find strong support for our argument. We conclude that the cultural wars are waged by limited religious troops on narrow policy fronts under special political leadership, & a broader cultural conflagration is largely a rumor.

A heated scholarly debate rages over the 'culture wars thesis' in American politics. Drawing on the literature on mass opinion constraint and its sources, we propose a resolution to this debate: the culture wars influence mass political behaviour in special religious, policy and political contexts where logical, psychological, social and electoral sources of opinion constraint are in effect. Using data pooled from the 1992, 1996 and 2000 American National Election Studies, we find strong support for our argument. We conclude that the cultural wars are waged by limited religious troops on narrow policy fronts under special political leadership, and a broader cultural conflagration is largely a rumour.