Rosner's Domain: David Paul on Jewish political influence in Congressional districts

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 Not very long ago, I linked from this page to David Paul's new study: Jewish Population Survey of Congressional Districts: 2000 and 2006.Now it's time to discuss it with the author.

David Paul is the Associate Dean for Student Services and Instruction for the Whidbey Island Campus of Skagit Valley College.  He earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2001. He taught for six years for Ohio State University-Newark, and he was given the 2005 Teaching Excellence Award.  He and his wife, Rachel Anderson Paul, recently finished a project which analyzes the effect of ethnic interest groups in the foreign policy, as well as intermestic policies such as trade, agriculture, and immigration. Their book, Ethnic Lobbies and U.S. Foreign Policy, was published in October 2008 by Lynne Rienner Publishers.

Here we go...

1. What is it exactly that we didn't know prior to your study and do know now?

We simply did not know the degree to which Jewish Americans were concentrated or dispersed across U.S. congressional districts before this study. And, while knew that there were large populations of Jews in some districts, we had no way to accurately gauge their numbers. In contrast, because of US Census data, we knew the populations of other ethnic groups across all congressional districts (although there are concerns that some ethnic groups are undercounted by the Census). 

Whenever possible, I relied on survey data that were collected by local Jewish federations and other community groups. Many Jewish federations have conducted careful, in-depth studies of the Jewish population in their community, and this provided me with very good data at the level of ZIP (postal) codes. While this cannot account for every Jew in every district, collectively these surveys provide a very good foundation for estimating the Jewish populations across the United States. Aside from census data collected on racial groups (such as on African Americans, Asian Americans, and Hispanic Americans), we probably have better data for the actual number of Jewish Americans than we do for any other ethnic group in the United States.

What I found most surprising was the number of suburban districts with significant Jewish populations. While Jewish Americans still tend to live in concentrated areas, there have been significant shifts in some Jewish communities. For example, there are much larger Jewish populations living in some suburban congressional districts around Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Washington DC than there were 20 years ago. There is also strong growth in the suburban congressional districts of many Western cities with expanding Jewish populations like San Francisco, Denver, and Phoenix.

It's no surprise that districts with large Jewish populations are often represented by Jews. We see that with other groups as well. However, Jews are also elected to Congress in districts without significant Jewish populations. That's a testament to the degree to which many Jewish Americans are active in the U.S. political system. As is true with most members of Congress, most Jewish representatives have held other political offices (such as serving as a city councilmember, mayor, or state representative), which allows them to build name recognition, political skills, and fundraising capabilities. Doing so gives them a better chance of running a successful congressional campaign, even if there are not large numbers of Jewish voters in their district.

Most of the changes between 2000 and 2006 were marginal and due to redistricting. The 2008 election failed to shift Jewish voters away from the Democratic Party; in fact, Obama did very well among Jews. Because of this, I don't think we will see any major changes in the 2010 election cycle. States will redistrict after the 2010 Census, and we could see shifts in Jewish populations across congressional districts in 2012 as a result. Of course, we are likely to continue to see a growth in Jews in some areas, especially in the Western United States.

Why Jews tend to congregate is a difficult question for me to answer, because I am not a Jewish scholar or a sociologist. From a political perspective, these concentrated populations have allowed Jews to have more political power because they command the attention of elected leaders. Further, although there are divisions among Jewish Americans, there are fundamental issues (such as supporting the creation and protection of Israel) that nearly all Jews support.

There is no magic number for Jews to make an impact. In other research my wife and I conducted, we interviewed members of Congress who represent districts with only a few hundred or thousand Jewish voters reported having active Jewish constituents who were passionate about promoting Israel and other issues important to the Jewish community. Of course, have a bigger population is usually helpful, since elected officials tend to court or try to appease larger blocs of voters. 

We also examined the effect of ethnic groups have significant populations across a number of congressional districts. It's intuitive that ethnic groups that have large populations across many districts will have more political clout (and we certainly found evidence of that). But we also found evidence that having a population of at least one percent or 2.5 percent across a number of congressional districts can increase the influence of an ethnic group.