political scientists Edward
G.Carmines and James A. Stimson. After a close look at American National Election Studies for 1980 and 1988, Abramowitz, a political scientist at Emory University, sees other causes.
Abramowitz agrees that the 1964 presiden- tial election was a watershed, as Carmines and Stimson argue. President Lyndon B. Johnson, champion of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, trounced conservative Republican Senator Barry M. Goldwater, who had opposed it. Democratic leaders and activists then...