Wednesday, June 19, 2002

GREAT ARTICLE

Here's the meat of it :

Last spring I organized college students to investigate the voting registrations of university professors at more than a dozen institutions of higher learning. The students used primary registrations to determine party affiliation. Here is a representative sample:

• At the University of Colorado—a public university in a Republican state—94% of the liberal arts faculty whose party registrations could be established were Democrats and only 4% percent Republicans. Out of 85 professors of English who registered to vote, zero were Republicans. Out of 39 professors of history—one. Out of 28 political scientists—two.

How Republican is Colorado? Its governor, two Senators and four out of six congressmen are Republican. There are 200,000 more registered Republicans in Colorado than there are Democrats. But at the state-funded, University of Colorado, Republicans are a fringe group.

• At Brown University, 94.7% of the professors whose political affiliations showed up in primary registrations last year were Democrats, only 5.3% were Republicans. Only three Republicans could be found on the Brown liberal arts faculty. Zero in the English Department, zero in the History Department, zero in the Political Science Department, zero in the Africana Studies Department, and zero in the Sociology Department.

• At the University of New Mexico, 89% of the professors were Democrats, 7% Republicans and 4% Greens. Of 200 professors, ten were Republicans, but zero in the Political Science Department, zero in the History Department, zero in the Journalism Department and only one each in the Sociology, English, Women’s Studies and African American Studies Departments.

• At the University of California, Santa Barbara, 97% of the professors were Democrats. 1.5% Greens and an equal 1.5% Republicans. Only one Republican professor could be found.

• At the University of California, Berkeley, of the 195 professors whose affiliations showed up, 85% were Democrats, 8% Republicans, 4% Greens and 3% American Independent Party, Peace and Freedom Party and Reform Party voters. Out of 54 professors in the History Department, only one Republican could be found, out of 28 Sociology professors zero, out of 57 English professors zero, out of 16 Women’s Studies professors zero, out of nine African American Studies professors zero, out of six Journalism professors zero.

• At the University of California, Los Angeles, of the 157 professors whose political affiliations showed up 93% were Democrats, only 6.5% were Republicans.

• At the University of North Carolina, the Daily Tar Heel conducted its own survey of eight departments and found that, of the professors registered with a major political party, 91% were Democrats while only 9% were Republicans.

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