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West Virginia’s right lean

As anyone who has spent any time in West Virginia can tell you, this is a pretty conservative place.

A new Metronews West Virginia Poll finds that 46 percent of adult voters in West Virginia describe themselves as somewhat or very conservative, while just 26 percent say they are somewhat or very liberal.   Twenty-eight percent say they are moderate.

Those numbers represent some shifting from a year ago, when 18 percent said they were very or somewhat liberal while 38 percent identified themselves as conservative.  The biggest change came in moderates, where 28 percent identified themselves as ideologically middle-of-the-road, compared with 44 percent last year.

As you would expect, most Republicans (73 percent) consider themselves conservative, but that philosophy also reaches into Democratic territory. The Poll found that 34 percent of Democrats identify as conservative, compared with 39 percent who lean to the liberal side.

West Virginia Independents are far less likely than members of the two major parties to identify with conservative or liberal politics.  Fifty-two percent of Independents say they are moderate, while 27 percent say they are conservative and 21 percent are liberal.

That is a significant data point because Independents represent the fastest growing political group in the state.  Figures from the Secretary of State’s office show 238,000 of the state’s 1.2 million registered voters are Independents.

Still, conservatism dominates in nearly all education and income levels.  For example, a voter with a college degree is twice as likely to identify as a conservative than a liberal.  Forty-two percent of West Virginians in the $25,000 to $49,000 income range say they are conservative, while 21 percent are liberal.

Labor households even lean to the right.  Forty-seven percent of West Virginia voters who come from a union home fall into the very or somewhat conservative category, while only 28 percent are very or somewhat liberal.

Despite these numbers, West Virginia is not the most conservative state.  A Gallup Poll from earlier this year found that Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana are the most right-leaning states. West Virginia came in 16th, tied with Missouri. (Massachusetts, Vermont and Hawaii were the most liberal states.)

And we also don’t have the most church-going folks.  According to Gallup that is Utah, where 51 percent say they attend church weekly.  Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana are next.   West Virginia comes in tied with Idaho for 20th, with one in three adults saying they attend church weekly, but 47 percent that seldom, if ever, go to church.

So West Virginia may not be the most conservative state, but as the Metronews West Virginia Poll shows again this year, it remains the most significant ideology here.

 





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