Presidential Politics: More Educated Vote Republican
Contrary to Liberal Mantra, Bush (2004) and McCain (2008) Received the More Educated Vote

J.C. Grant
J.C. Grant, Yahoo! Contributor Network


Based on data from the United States Census and renowned Cook Partisan Voting Index (CPVI), congressional districts with more educated residents are more likely to pledge their electoral votes to Republican presidential candidates. Conversely, congressional districts with less educated residents are more likely to pledge their electoral votes to Democratic presidential candidates.

As demonstrated below, there is a statistically significant positive correlation between the percentage of residents in each congressional district who are high school graduates (or higher) and support by those districts for Republican presidential candidates. Comparatively, there is a statistically significant negative correlation between the percentage of residents in each congressional district who are high school graduates (or higher) and support by those districts for Democratic presidential candidates.

As a point of probable interest, seven of the ten most educated congressional districts are partisan Republican districts and three are partisan Democratic districts. All ten of the least educated congressional districts are partisan Democratic districts. As a preliminary matter, the following is a list of these twenty congressional districts, their general geographic areas, high school (or higher) graduation percentages, and their Cook Partisan Voting Index (CPVI) values:

Most Educated

1. Colorado-6 (Littleton-Castle Rock, 96%, CPVI Republican +8);
2. Minnesota-3 (Edina-Maple Grove, 94.7%, CPVI Republican +0);
3. California-30 (Beverly Hills-Malibu, 94.2%, CPVI Democrat +18 );
4. Washington-1 (Redmond-Edmonds, 94.1%, CPVI Democrat +9);
5. Wisconsin-5 (Waukesha-West Bend, 93.6%, CPVI Republican +12);
6. Minnesota-2 (Apple Valley-Lakeville, 93.6%, CPVI Republican +4);
7. Massachusetts-10 (Cape Cod, 93.6%, CPVI Democrat +5);
8. Georgia-6 (Dunwoody-Canton, 93.5% CPVI Republican +19);
9. Minnesota-6 (Woodbury-St. Cloud, 93.4%, CPVI Republican +7);
10. Illinois-13 (Downers Grove-Orland Park, 93.4%, CPVI Republican +1)