With the political passions and election fever that swept the nation now receding, political pundits, including those at the University, are beginning to take a closer look at how college students voted in the 2004 presidential election.
A recent survey conducted by the Chronicle of Higher Education revealed that a majority of 40,000 college students between the ages of 18-19 voted for the Democratic presidential hopeful, Sen. John Kerry.
The Chronicle's findings were based on surveys conducted at 12 college campuses across the nation. It reported that Kerry enjoyed a 20 percentage-point lead over President Bush in nine of the 12 college campuses surveyed compared to the national average among 18-19 year olds, whose vote Kerry won by 9 percentage points.
According to the Chronicle, another survey conducted by the bipartisan group known as Declare Yourself found similar results, with 59 percent of full time students in a survey of 1,200 students between the ages of 18 and 29, preferring Kerry over Bush.
At the University, both the College Republicans and University Democrats, and specifically Cavs '04 Kerry, did a great deal of campaigning and canvassing. Both groups made trips to Pennsylvania and conducted phone banking.
College Republicans Vice Chairman of Events Jeremy Williams said he viewed the Chronicles' findings to be "an indication of the liberal bias in today's colleges among professors."
University Democrats Secretary Amanda LeTard said she felt that the results could be explained by the fact that "college students are generally more liberal than conservative, and that they are more conscious of issues such as the environment as opposed to fiscal policy."
Politics Prof. Larry J. Sabato made it clear that the findings had to be taken with a grain of salt.
"Really, we don't know," Sabato said. "We don't have enough data to conclude anything. The national exit poll conducted by the television networks showed that the only age group that John Kerry won was the age cohort 18-29."
Sabato added that this only indicates that Kerry may have won college students' votes.
"You can't conclude that the students voted for Kerry based on one data point," he said. "There were problems with the exit poll and some are questioning the final results. I'm not sure that I trust it myself."
Sabato also made it clear that if Kerry did win the college student vote it does not mean that these students will vote for the Democratic candidate in the next presidential election.
"Just because the students may have supported Kerry, that doesn't mean that they will automatically support the Democratic nominees in the future," he said. "It will depend upon the conditions of the election year and the identities of those nominees. Every election year is different."
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