CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS
– POLITICS
May 17, 2009 – 11:30 a.m.
Iowa Marriage Issue Weighed for 2010 Impact
By Anne L. Kim, CQ Staff
While Iowa’s recession-ridden economy undoubtedly will be the central focus when first-term Democrat Chet Culver runs for re-election next year, same-sex marriage has emerged as a possible “wild card” issue in the governor’s race.
An April 3 ruling by the state Supreme Court overturned a 10-year-long ban on such unions, and elevated the issue in the state’s political picture.
David Redlawsk, a political science professor at the University of Iowa and director of its Hawkeye Poll, said how much the marriage issue matters will depend on how fired up Iowans are about it when they go to the polls for a general election — 19 months after the ruling.
There has been sparring over the weeks since the court determined that an existing ban on same-sex marriage violated the state constitution. The Iowa Family Policy Center, a conservative activist group, has called for an amendment to the state constitution that would define marriage only as a union between a man and a woman. A gay and lesbian advocacy group called One Iowa aired a statewide television ad supporting the court ruling.
Some conservative Republicans are airing the marriage controversy as a campaign issue, targeting the Democratic Party — generally seen as more sympathetic to gay rights than the GOP — and Culver, who has said he opposes same-sex marriage in principle but is loath to challenge the state Supreme Court ruling.
“It will definitely be a big-game play for the Republicans in terms of 2010,” said Steffen Schmidt, a political science professor at Iowa State University and chief political correspondent for InsiderIowa.com.
Steve King — the four-term Republican representative of Iowa’s strongly conservative-leaning 5th District — is mulling a challenge to Culver. And King, a supporter of a constitutional amendment to define marriage as only between a man and a woman, said the same-sex marriage issue could be a factor in his decision on whether he runs.
The issue already has been adopted by one virtually certain Republican candidate, Bob Vander Plaats, a socially conservative Iowa businessman who lost as a candidate for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in 2002 and as the party’s nominee for lieutenant governor in 2006.
Vander Plaats, who has formed a campaign committee and has a campaign Web site, contends Iowans are frustrated that marriage was redefined for them by judges without their vote, adding, “This will be a keystone issue without question.”
Vander Plaats raised some eyebrows in state political and legal circles, though, when he criticized Culver for not issuing an executive order to stay the ruling until a constitutional amendment barring same-sex marriages could be put to a vote. “I have worked with a team of attorneys who understand the Iowa Constitution and the end product is an executive order that defends our constitution and defends the will of the people,” he said in a statement.
Culver has pushed back hard. “Basic Government 101 has a separation of powers between three co-equal branches of government. So Mr. Vander Plaats is suggesting we do something that we don’t have the authority under the constitution to do,” he said, according to Radio Iowa, a network of stations across the state.
“Hopefully he’ll learn something about this and not continue to suggest we do things in the executive branch that we don’t have the authority to do,” Culver added.
Randall Bezanson, a professor at the University of Iowa College of Law, said Culver has it right on the law: an executive order would be flatly unconstitutional and the Iowa Supreme Court’s ruling is final. He also said it would be inappropriate for a governor to try to override it by executive order.
Dennis Goldford, a professor of politics at Drake University in Des Moines, agreed, but added that statements such as Vander Platts’ fire up the crowds.
In the Middle on Marriage
The key to whether the marriage issue has staying power in the 2010 campaign is in the hands of the large constituency of centrist voters who have for years made Iowa one of the most hotly contested battleground states.
Voters who strongly oppose gay marriage are mainly conservatives inclined to favor Republicans on a range of issues, while activist supporters of gay marriage tend to be liberals who lean strongly Democratic.
But Redlawsk noted a significant group of Iowans say they oppose gay marriage, but support civil unions for same-sex couples — and whose intensity of feeling about the ruling will largely determine how and whether it plays out as a campaign issue.
“That’s the group that’s up for grabs,” he said.
According to a Hawkeye Poll coordinated by Redlawsk and released April 2, the group that opposed gay marriage but supported civil unions made up a substantial 27.9 percent of those surveyed. That exceeded the 26.2 percent who said they supported gay marriage, and not too far behind the 36.7 percent who said they opposed both gay marriage and civil unions. The remaining 9.2 percent either didn’t know or refused to answer.
How Blue is Iowa?
Recent election results suggest that the GOP will need more than a wedge issue such as gay marriage to turn the recent trend toward the Democrats in Iowa politics. After eight years as Iowa’s secretary of state, Culver won for governor in 2006 by a comfortable 10 percentage-point margin over eight-term Republican Rep. Jim Nussle , then the House Budget Committee chairman. Democrats picked up two U.S. House seats that year to take a 3-2 edge in the state’s delegation; Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin was easily re-elected to a fifth term in a 2008 campaign capped by Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama ’s 10-point win over John McCain ; and Democrats control both chambers of the state legislature.
But Culver isn’t expected to sail easily into a second term: His handling of the economy will likely weigh heavily on his outlook. “The danger is that you’re gonna get blamed for those shortfalls,” Schmidt said of the state’s budget problems. “When things are tough, the incumbent does have to fight a harder battle.”
Culver’s approval rating has dipped over the past few months, according to a Des Moines Register Iowa Poll. He posted an approval rating was of 55 percent in March/April, a decline from the 60 percent he had in January. His disapproval rate rose from 32 percent in January to 36 percent.
When asked whether they would vote to re-elect Culver, 35 percent of those surveyed said they definitely would, while 28 percent said they’d consider an alternative and 18 percent said they would definitely vote for someone else.
Survey USA showed grimmer numbers for Culver in a poll taken April 24-26. His approval rating was at 42 percent and his disapproval rating at 50 percent — comparing unfavorably to the firm’s January poll that showed his 50 percent approval exceeding his 38 percent disapproval.
Nonetheless, incumbency may be a net advantage for Culver, said lawyer Doug Gross, who can cite his personal experience: his loss in 2002 as Democratic Gov. Tom Vilsack ’s Republican challenger. Vilsack, who did not seek re-election in 2006 to test the waters for a 2008 presidential bid, now serves as Agriculture secretary in the Obama administration.
Culver also had a big head start in raising money for the upcoming campaign, disclosing nearly $1.5 million in campaign funds at the beginning of the year in a finance report.
Comments
In addition to incumbency population dispersal favours Culver and Democrats in general; the west of the state -represented by King- now is at best a slow-growth region, where any R must pile up a sufficient margin to counter the votes of Des Moines and east in order to prevail statewide.
POST A COMMENT
Oops! The following errors must be addressed: