GregsOpinion.com

The vote on Proposition 12 may yet be a silver lining for Democrats in Harris County. Pitted as a battle royale of the trial lawyers on the one hand against doctors and big insurance on the other, the Constitutional amendment lost statewide, yet won in Harris county. Although turnout was inarguably sparse, it's worth anticipating the final canvas report from the county clerk to see how much can be attributed to traditional voting alliances holding (which would indicate that Democratic areas turned out better), and how much can be attributed to swing voters having a little more swing in them, afterall.

It's worth looking back at two prior elections to show how some of the swing precincts have eroded further and further from Democratic candidates. In 1998, Paul Hobby won his home county, becoming the last statewide candidate to win Harris County for the Democrats. In 2002, John Sharp ran as the highest ranking established moderate candidate, with remnants of support from his own close loss in 1998. As has been stated before, Sharp lost ground on his 1998 showing. Within Harris County, it's critical to look closer at the map to see where ... and perhaps why.

This map shows West Harris County, with a shaded region revolving primarily around the Northwest Freeway, Memorial/River Oaks, Meyerland, Bellaire/West U., the Westpark/Westheimer corridor, and Southwest Houston. The red precincts went for Carol Rylander, the blue for Paul Hobby in the statewide race for Comptroller.

In searching for a region to serve as an example of a region that went for Hobby in 1998 and was conversely lost by Sharp in 2002, this one serves as illuminating in one regard in particular. Straddling the 610 Loop on the west side of town, it is where the City of Houston meets West Houston - the GOP stronghold within Harris County.

In 1998, Paul Hobby won 51.3% of the vote to Carol Keeton Rylander's 48.7.

Moving ahead four years, we have this result from the John Sharp-David Dewhurst race for Lieutenant Governor. Time permitted me to do this map with an intensity scale - darker shades of red and blue representing higher percentages of GOP and Democratic support respectively.

In 2002, John Sharp won only 46% of the vote in the shaded area, compared to Dewhurst's 54%.

It's important to remember anytime we look at election results this way, that what we are seeing is the symptom, not the causation of any loss or win. Occassionally, geographic areas of strength can be spotted easily, but it is still up to more anectdotal evidence to shed clues on the "why" behind what we see.

Both candidates represented the moderate wing of the party. In 1998, Paul Hobby was running at a time when his family name still may have held a fair amount of resonance with voters in many of these precincts. Sharp, by contrast, is less known to Houstonians, and it should be pointed out that he did not carry Harris County in his 1998 race for Lieutenant Governor. As a result, this is not an exercise in comparing two different campaigns, instead using the two campaigns as a snapshot of the best possible outcomes for Democratic candidates in these two election cycles.

A few particular areas show some noticable erosion of support for Sharp-02 compared to Hobby-98. The biggest is the Memorial Park area, north of Westheimer and fully contained within the 610 Loop. The 1998 tally for Hobby came to a competitive 48%, whereas the outcome for Sharp in 2002 came to a less than inspiring 39%.

For now, this is just a matter of observation. Its easy enough to see where votes were lost. The why is tougher to discern. Worth noting that much of the Memorial Park area was represented in 1998 by Debra Danburg, and yet in 2002 was won by Martha Wong. Much of that race centered on Danburg attempting to translate her support from the previously mapped district into support for the new one, which favored Wong, the Republican. Similarly, Scott Hochberg's new look 134th district is fully encompassed in this region. Its as much a swing district as any could be, with a 55% Dem tilt that is not insurmountable by a well funded GOP candidate. Given the amount of focus the campaign got by the TAB as part of its statewide effort to take control of the Texas Legislature, there was an intense amount of pressure brought to get GOP voters flushed out to the voting booths. In 2002, the GOP finally caught up (and even surpassed) the Democrats at GOTV. That provides a mechanical explanation of the loss of support.

It can certainly be argued that there are deeper reasons as well - Harris County, and Texas', trend towards the GOP for instance. These things, I would argue, don't happen in a vacuum. People don't just wake up and decide their Republican. It takes two to see this sort of evaporation of support: one side to lose it and one to gain it. When both seek to gain it, more and more competitive races should be found.

More on this for Sunday's blogburst, though. For now, this is the appetizer. Democrats have to make a principled statement about our beliefs and relate them to voters better. How we get to that point, I'll elaborate on Sunday. For now, I'm still in research mode. George Strong has been kind enough to give me a good lead or two that might land me some maps used for elections in 1981-90, so I can more fully dive into this. But one doesn't have to even visualize the loss of support from 1982 to the present in order to understand that something is wrong here. Merely standing opposite the other side, without offering a better set of core principles that let voters see where we stand as a party won't win. Establishing the Democratic Party on a firmer foundation of original thought must be a priority if swing districts such as this are to be won in the future.

But for now ... enjoy the pictures. I'm working on a 1998 map that shows intensity, as the 2002 map does above. I'll switch it out with the Red/Blue image above when its done. I'm also still waiting on the official canvas report for the last election to be put online by the County Clerk - I'm more than curious how Prop 12 did in Joe Nixon's district.

EXTRA CREDIT: The full county maps for the two races can be seen here:
2002 Lt. Gov.
1998 Comptroller

The large white gaps in the 1998 map were precincts that had no votes or tied. In my clumsiness, I did not adapt that practice when I did the 2002 map, instead opting to fill in the color of surrounding precincts where applicable.

ELABORATION: The scale of intensity is set so that shades of red are diminished starting from 0-25%, to 25-40, 40-45, 45-49, and then blue starts in at 50-55, 55-60, 60-75, and then 75-100. I'll fill in more details time permitting this weekend.

UPDATE 1.0: The Canvas reports are in. (PDF).

UPDATE 2.0: In Nixon's district, Prop 12 won:
For :: 5580 - 57.4%
Against :: 4146 - 42.6%

There's still a curiosity I've got to figure out about a few missing precincts in the final canvas. My hunch is that they are just mixed in with other precincts - mine was treated similarly and it does not show up on the canvas. Two things worth noting, though: the results are under Nixon's 2002 percentage of the vote (65%), and turnout was hideously low (9,726 votes cast to over 23,000 in his 2002 race against Amadi). Further analysis to come later ...