Poll: Most Texans are Pretty Reasonable Folks

Daron Shaw, a Government professor at the University of Texas at Austin, recently asked the question: Do Texans hold the same extreme opinions on certain hot-button issues as many of our state representatives and senators would have us believe? Are the polarizing stances on issues like, say, immigration, gay rights, abortion and religious expression taken by our state lawmakers actually reflective of the voters that they represent? Or are Texas politicians just creating fault lines between us where they shouldn't really exist?

Professor Shaw, with the help of The Lyceum, a Dallas-based nonprofit public policy organization, created a poll to find out the answer. What they found, interestingly enough, is that we Texans are actually far more reasonable than our lawmakers would have us believe. Shaw and The Lyceum polled about a thousand adults between April 26 and May 7 of this year. Here are some of the results that have been released so far...

- Respondents who regularly attend religious services: 75%
- Respondents who believe that the Bible is the "literal word of God": 70%
- Respondents who approve of displaying the Ten Commandments on public property: 60%

So, since most Texans are religious, that means that most Texans want to impose these values on others, right? Nope. Here's how they responded to questions about religious expression in schools, for example:

- Respondents who approve of a denominational prayer in school: 16%
- Respondents who approve of a nondenominational prayer in school: 22%
- Respondents who believe that time should be "set aside" for "personal reflection": 45%
- Respondents who wanted no prayer at all in schools: 14%

More of the poll results will be released later this week, but, according to Professor Shaw, the results of the poll plainly show that most Texans are unwilling to impose their beliefs on others who may not share those beliefs. Assuming the results of the Lyceum-sponsored poll are accurate, this information may provide quantitative evidence that many of our elected officials are just not representing their voters' interests in an accurate manner.

So, the question then becomes: Who the hell did we actually vote for?

We'll post more of the results once they're released.

[Austin-American Statesman article]

*Image of faultline from Wikipedia. Photo of girl with sign by Matt Wright on flickr.