Not the Party Faithful Anymore

If local unions had remained robust, county voters might have stuck with the national Democratic Party. Union members gave 59 percent of their votes to Clinton in 1996 and the same percentage to Al Gore in 2000. But the unions' disintegration has loosened Casey Democrats' ties to the national party.

Moving into the unions' place is the church. Take a drive through downtown Greensburg, the county seat. When I arrived one Saturday afternoon in late 2006, the sound of an announcer calling a football game at Seton Hill University, a small Catholic liberal arts school in town, blared from several streets away. A few blocks from the football field is the headquarters of the Westmoreland County archdiocese. Half a mile away, at the top of North Main Street, stands a Knights of Columbus hall. Not far away is the Aquinas Academy, an elementary school run by the Sisters of Charity. Next door is Blessed Sacrament Cathedral; at the packed Sunday Mass I attended, seniors stood elbow to elbow with young married couples, most with small children.

In August 2004, only months after being installed, Greensburg Bishop Lawrence E. Brandt declared that pro-abortion rights Catholic politicians should refrain from receiving Holy Communion -- a not-so-subtle reference to presidential candidate Kerry. Because the church plays such a major role in local life, it's highly likely that some Catholic voters were influenced by Brandt. With the Catholic Church in alliance with the GOP and the National Rifle Association, "it's a powerful combination" against Democrats, says county Democratic chairwoman Rosemary Trump.

In dealing with Casey Democrats, the national party faces two temptations. One is to ignore them. The party had planned to target voters in more libertarian Mountain West states this fall. But with Arizona Sen. John McCain the presumptive GOP nominee, Democrats are less likely to flip states such as Nevada and Colorado. The second temptation is to assume that Casey Democrats will support the Democratic ticket because Obama has been endorsed by figures such as Sen. Bob Casey Jr., the late Pennsylvania governor's son. But Casey's endorsement failed to prevent Obama's nine-point loss to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Pennsylvania primary last month.

The bottom line is clear: The party must woo Casey Democrats in Rust Belt and border states -- Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Michigan, Missouri, Kentucky. To win them over, it won't be enough for Democrats to hammer the GOP over the economy and the war in Iraq, as Kerry and his running mate, John Edwards, did in 2004, or merely to use inclusive language and support partial-birth abortion, as Obama and Clinton have done. Instead, Democrats must address voters' real concerns about protecting families and human life, as Gov. Casey did. "Catholic voters have emerged more pro-life," pollster Greenberg wrote in a 2005 memo, "but they are very responsive to a broad initiative to reduce unwanted pregnancies and the number of abortions."

As the front-runner for his party's nomination, Obama can start to win over Casey Democrats by endorsing the Pregnant Women Support Act, co-sponsored by Sen. Casey. This legislation would, among other things, provide adoption information to pregnant women, give lower-income women free sonograms and require abortion clinics to obtain informed consent from women seeking to end a pregnancy.

Endorsing it is sure to alienate many cultural liberals. But supporting it could help win over many Casey Democrats -- and possibly a few key swing states this fall.

stricherz2@yahoo.com

Mark Stricherz is the author of "Why the Democrats Are Blue: Secular Liberalism and the Decline of the People's Party."