America's college students, a voting constituency with the free time, surplus energy, and schedule flexibility to influence national politics, are becoming more conservative and more politically concerned. These trends may be accelerating. The large scale annual opinion survey, The American Freshman, directed by UCLA's Linda Sax and released today, documents these important phenomena.

Unsurprisingly, two events — the 2000 election's Florida recall and the 9/11 attacks — appear to have moved America's college freshman in the direction of stronger interest in politics. Until this inflection point, interest in politics had been in a 37 year—long secular trend downward. College student interest in following politics peaked during the Vietnam War, with its associated draft directly affecting students' immediate self interests. Today, 35% of college freshmen, down from the peak of 60% in 1966 [the annual study's first year], feel it is 'essential or very important' to keep up with domestic politics. But unlike previous years, this year's survey reveals increasing interest in politics on the part of freshmen. A corner has been turned.

Student liberalism also peaked in the Vietnam War era, with 38% of freshmen in 1973 self—identifying as liberal. Today, 24% say that they hold liberal political views. Conservatives amounted to only 14% of freshmen in 1973, but today constitute 21%. Although still slightly fewer than liberals, the long term trend lines are unmistakable, and after holding steady for several years, conservatism is once again trending upward.

What can account for the increasing conservatism of college students? One possible explanation is the probability that politically liberal women, who tend to favor abortion, may well have borne and raised fewer children than conservative women, who tend to oppose abortion, as Richard Baehr explicated on this site recently.

A second explanation is that recent events have vindicated a conservative view of the economy and international politics, as the Soviet Union crumbled due to the impracticality of socialist economics and the pressure of the hard—line defense policies of the Reagan Administration. Moreover, the muscular approach of the Bush Administration appears to have diminished the radical Islamist threat which only festered and grew during the Clinton Administration's radical drawdown of military forces. While many committed leftists and liberals have maintained their faith in high taxes, government economic intervention, and a negotiation—first approach to foreign affairs, young people may be able to evaluate the issues for themselves, lacking a strong initial predisposition one way or another.

A third, and complimentary, explanation has to do with the immediate personal environment faced by freshmen on America's campuses. More than any other sector of American society, colleges are most in the thrall of leftism, with its doctrines of political correctness, income redistribution, and America as the source of most of the world's evils.

Because college freshmen are usually about 18 years old, they are still in the midst of the explosion of hormones characteristic of adolescence, and facing the life challenge of defining themselves in opposition to the structures imposed upon them by parents/family/society. The college environment, even in these permissive times, still functions in loco parentis — the immediate extension of the parental strictures being left behind. Political correctness tells students what they can't do or say, and it is natural for late adolescents to rebel against such limits on their freedom.

Whatever validity or weight one assigns to these possible explanations, none of them appears likely to diminish in future years. The War on Terrorism promises to last decades, and the threat to the immediate survival interest of all Americans may tragically express itself in future barbarism directed at Americans. The success of low taxes in encouraging growth has not changed, and the American electorate appears to have assimilated this fact, as evidenced by the Democrats' difficulties in openly advocating their high tax impulses. And the academic establishment, though graying, shows no sign whatsoever of yielding its attachment to leftism, formed decades ago in the crucible of Vietnam politics.

The establishment media, as usual, will be the last to notice that 'student activism' is becoming increasingly conservative in nature. The elite universities and colleges, epitomized by such campuses as Brown University and Swarthmore College, tend to be far more liberal than average campuses, as they self—select more liberal candidates for admission, and conservative applicants voluntarily shun them. Elite media folk, themselves increasingly drawn from these campuses, are drawn like moths to a flame to the prestige institutions for their reporting.

The revolution in student attitudes will be a much more grass roots phenomenon. Students not blessed with affluent parents, forced to rely on their own wits and effort for their tuition, living expenses, or career prospects, naturally tend to greater pragmatism than trust—funded legacy admits to the Ivy League. But it is precisely these energetic, forceful, and self—motivated types of upwardly—mobile students who will naturally lead by both example and superior effort.

As Martha Stewart (another striver) says, 'It's a good thing.'

Posted by Thomas  01 26 04