One Reason That Democrats Are Struggling

Plenty of Baptists, Not Enough Bootleggers

Here’s an excerpt from an essay I have in The Hill, available at https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/5430065-why-democrats-keep-losing-too-many-baptists-not-enough-bootleggers/:

Democrats need alliances between Baptists and bootleggers. So do Republicans, but right now, they have plenty of those alliances, which is a key reason, and maybe the key reason, that they are riding so high.

Let me explain. In the twentieth century, the U.S. had fierce debates about laws restricting commercial activity on Sundays — above all banning the sale and purchase of alcohol. Many Americans favored those laws on moral grounds. They thought that ceasing secular work on Sunday was a way of honoring God. They believed that people should be in church on that day.

Some Americans also thought that drinking alcohol was a sin, and that it led to a host of other sins (including domestic violence). Invoking public morality, Baptists were prominent supporters of Sunday closing laws.

Then there were the bootleggers — sellers of alcohol who stood to make massive profits if Sunday alcohol sales were made unlawful, effectively giving them a monopoly on such sales. The alliance between the Baptists and the bootleggers helped lead to Sunday closing laws all over the country.

In 1983, the economist Bruce Yandle argued that Baptist-bootlegger-style alliances are often crucial to regulatory action. Yandle urged that some people are motivated by a moral concern, while others seek to promote their economic self-interest. Often they need each other. When Baptists (understood as the moralists) and bootleggers (understood as the economic interests in the background) form an alliance, they can move the regulatory state in their preferred directions.

But we can go much further than Yandle did. Baptist-bootlegger alliances extend far beyond regulation. They move modern political life.

The essay goes on to offer a lot of details. Here’s the basic problem. In the past, Democrats had plenty of such alliances. President Johnson knew all about Baptists and bootleggers. President Clinton was a Jedi Knight of Baptist-bootlegger alliances. President Obama was terrific there too, on environmental issues and on health care reform.

Right now, it’s very different. Republicans have a ton of Baptist-bootlegger alliances; think about deregulation and tax relief. Democrats have a lot of Baptists, countered effectively by Republican Baptists. (Think affirmative action and DEI.)

For the next decade: Where are the Democrats’ bootleggers?