Many on the left, meanwhile, are
convinced that by opening up the Democratic Party’s tent to include people who
are not totally aligned with the party’s views on civil rights or guns or
fossil fuels we will compromise our movement’s fight for abortion rights,
sexual and gender equality, gun safety, and climate policy. I understand this
fear, especially in a party that has become accustomed to using these issues as
litmus tests for membership and therefore has little experience managing a
bigger, more diverse collective of voices.
But the consequence of this decision
is to sacrifice a stable governing majority. Currently, the Democrats’
coalition is never robust enough to command, even in good electoral years, more
than 53 percent of Americans. Thirty seven percent of Americans identify their
political views as moderate, 36 percent as conservative, and only 25 percent
describe themselves as liberal, according to a 2022
Gallup poll. In 2019, Gallup
calculated there are 25 states that are “more conservative than average,”
including 19 states in which conservatives outnumber liberals by at least 20
percentage points. There are only six states in which more residents identify
as liberal than conservative, which means that to win the Senate with a
filibuster-proof majority, Democrats need to be a bigger tent.
Compare this to the 1960s and 1970s,
when Democrats had a much more diverse coalition, especially on issues like
abortion, guns, and the environment, and were able to hold sizable majorities
in Congress and state legislatures. During that time, not only did Democrats
pass historic landmark economic legislation like Medicare, Medicaid, and
regular increases in the minimum wage, but steady progress was also made on
social issues, civil rights, and the environment. For instance, the big
Democratic congressional majorities of the 1970s allowed Congress to pass
environmental protection measures like the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act,
and the Endangered Species Act, even though inside that big majority coalition
were members of Congress who opposed those measures. Are Democrats sure that a
return to big-tent politics would threaten our ability to protect and expand
access to abortion or pass an assault weapons ban? Or might a new, more
capacious coalition be the key to making progress on these kind of priorities,
even if that coalition included some dissenting voices?