TruthBook Religious News Blog

Most traditional barriers to religion in presidential elections have toppled, a new Los Angeles Times / Bloomberg poll has found. In particular, the survey to be released today showed that anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism are fading as voter taboos.

But uneasiness about some religions persists. Thirty-seven percent of those questioned said they would not vote for a Mormon presidential candidate - and 54 percent said no to the prospect of a Muslim in the White House.

In addition, 21 percent said they could not vote for an evangelical Christian. Only 15 percent replied that they would not vote for a Jewish presidential candidate. Just 10 percent of those polled were unwilling to cast ballots for a Catholic chief executive.

"This clearly shows that the old Protestant / Catholic / Jewish distinction has largely eroded in American politics," said David Campbell, a professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame. "That doesn't mean that candidates from religious groups that might be considered to be exotic, in the way that Catholics once were thought to be exotic, wouldn't necessarily be confronted with challenges."

The nationwide survey of 1,321 adults was conducted June 24-27. The poll has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points, poll director Susan Pinkus said.

With no likely Muslim candidate on the presidential horizon, the poll numbers present the greatest threat to a potential contender from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (as the Mormon Church is formally known). Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney is a Mormon who is exploring a run for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

"It is something he will have to address," said Merle Black, a professor of politics at Emory University. "It will be a challenge. It doesn't necessarily kill him as a candidate, but he may have to talk in more detail than he ever has before about his faith."

His religion apparently was no detriment in Massachusetts in 2002, when he easily won election as governor. Massachusetts is one of the most heavily Catholic states in the country, and also one of the most Democratic.

In a Roper poll from June 1960, 35 percent of respondents said either that it might be better not to have a Catholic president, or that they would be against it. Then-Sen. John F. Kennedy addressed the Southern Leadership Conference on the subject of his religion that September, and was elected president two months later.

But Emory University political scientist Black rejected the comparison to earlier political biases against Catholic or Jewish candidates. "I don't think it is of the same status, because Mormonism has never been seen as a mainstream religion," Black said.

According to Campbell, "The question facing Mitt Romney is, will he be the Mormons' Al Smith - who was the first Catholic ever to run for president in 1928, and went down in flames. Or will he be the Mormons' John F. Kennedy?"

LOS ANGELES TIMES