FOR SOME ELECTIVE OFFICES and PROPOSITION 14 in CALIFORNIA, 1964 and 1966 LAY JAMES Creson University of California, Los Angeles

Home , Pierre Salinger

THE SPATIAL ASSOCIATION OF THE VOTE FOR SOME ELECTIVE OFFICES AND PROPOSITION 14 IN CALIFORNIA, 1964 AND 1966 LAY JAMES CrESON University of California, Los Angeles

On November 3, 1964 the voters of California overwhelmingly passed Proposition 14, an initative measure designed to do away with the Rumford (fair housing) Act.1 In the months that preceded this vote the campaign for 1nd against Proposition 14 was heated, and there was widespread spectt lation as to the effect of this proposition on the vote for United States Senator in the same election. Proposition 14 played an important role in the campaign of Pierre Salinger, a vocal opponent, and also, if by default, in the campaign of George Murphy, who remained relatively silent on the issue. In May, 1966, the State Supreme Court ruled that Proposition 14 was unconstitutional, thus restoring the authority of the Rumford Act. The now two-year-old and legally impotent proposition was by no means dead. The State Poll, published in the Los Angeles Times in September, 1965, showed that the race relations was the issue of number one importance to the electorate of California.2 The results of a State Poll published in the Los Angeles Times in June, 1966, indicated that the race relations was the number two issue and that Proposition 14, this time mentioned specifically, was the ninth most important issue identified.3 Proposition 14 played a role in the conduct of the campaigns of many of the candidates for election in 1966 and was a common issue raised by the press in their daily appraisals of the campaigns. Following the November, 1966, elections Proposition 14 played a prominent role in the analyses of Governor Brown's defeat. An obvious question to raise at this point is "What effect did proposi tion 14 have on the outcome of the elections for the various state and national offices in California?" Qualitative speculation on this question has been widespread. The press, as one might guess, has kept the issues of Proposition 14 before the public, and the possible effects of this issue have frequently been drawn into discussions of the various campaigns

1 The Rumford Act was adopted by the California Legislature in 1963. This act makes it unlawful to discriminate on the basis of race, creed, color, religion, or na· tiona! origin in the sale or rental of all single-unit houses that are occupied by the owner which are publicly assisted, all multiple dwellings of three or more units re gardless of the source of financial assistance, and all public housing and redevelop ment housing. ("Publicly assisted" refers to housing for which financing is provided or assisted by a state or federal agency, such as FHA, VA, Cal-Vet, or which has a tax exemption.) Like the Unruh Civil Rights Act of 1959 which it compliments, the Rumford Act is enforced by the Fair Employment Practices Commission. Proposition 14 was an initiative constitutional amendment which would, in effect, repeal the Rumford Act and other related measures, and prevent further leg islation of the same type. Proposition 14 prohibits the state and its agencies from denying, limiting, or abridging, directly or indirectly, the right of anyone to decline to sell, lease, or rent his residential property to anyone he ("in his absolute discre tion") chooses. 2 Los Angeles Times, vol. LXXXIV, p. 3, col. 6, Wednesday, September 15, 1965. 3 Los Angeles Times, vol. LXXXV, p. 3, col. 2, Tuesday, June 28, 1966.

49 and election results. The candidates themselves, have kept the issue alive. Mr. Reagan's support of Proposition 14 as opposed to Governor Brown's stand in favor of the Rumford Act and Thomas Lynch's approval of the anti-Proposition 14 court action in 1966 illustrate the candidate's concern in the months preceding the November, 1966, election. Following his defeat, Mr. Brown pointed to his unpopular stand on Proposition 14 as a significant deterrent to his reelection.4 A more academic discussion of the proposition and its effect on the 1964 elections in California has been advanced by Totton J. Anderson and Eugene C. Lee in the June 1965, are aimed largely at the Murphy-Salinger Senatorial contest. Anderson issue of the Western Political Quarterly.5 Their comments, in this regard, and Lee point out that both the pre-election results of the California Poll and post-election vote analyses showed a general pattern of support for Salinger that tended to increase in area of relatively great opposition to Proposition 14. In this investigation the areal association between the "No" vote on proposition 14 and the vote for certain elective offices will be analyzed. It should be noted that a "No" vote was a vote against Proposition 14, and, therefore, was in effect a vote in favor of retention of the Rumford Act. While the results may not reflect a cause and effect situation the significant correlations suggest that meaningful insights into the behavior of the electorate may be gained by the analysis of the spatial covariation between the vote on Proposition 14 and the vote for the various candidates. In general, this investigation proceeds empirically by means of correlation analysis and other statistical techniques to generalize on the functional relationship between two variables. The independent variable is Proposition 14 or, more specifically, the "No" vote. The dependent variable in each correlation is the vote for Pierre Salinger, Edmund Brown, and Thomas Lynch. Pierre Salinger was the un successful opponent of George Murphy in the 1964 California Senatorial race and Edmund Brown failed in his 1966 bid for a third term as gover nor. Attorney General Lynch, on the other hand, was the sole Democrat to win a state-wide constitutional elective partisan office. Thought was given to the inclusion of State Supreme Court Justices Traynor, Burke, McComb, and Peek on the list of dependent variables. Traynor, Burke, and Peek were with the majority in the Supreme Court's decision against Proposition 14 in May, 1966. Justice McComb was one of two dissenters in this case. These four men were excluded from the final analysis for · several reasons. Their names were fairly far down on the ballot and these men, running unopposed, needed only a vote of approval. Since their po sitions as Court Justices are generally of little public concern and there was no competition there ·was, quite possibly, a tendency on the part of many voters to simply vote "Yes" without really being concerned with -vvhat these men stood for. Because of the stand taken on Proposition 14 by Salinger, Brown, and Lynch, it is hypothesized that the correlation between a "No" vote will be accompanied by some increase in the candidates' vote.

4 Los Angeles Times. vol. LXXXV, p. 3, coL 5, Thursday, November 10, 1966. 5 Anderson Totton J., and Eugene C. Lee, "The 1964 Election in California." The Westem Political Quarte1·ly, vol. XVIII, no. 2, Part 2, June, 1965. pp. 45 1-474.

50 In the case of each variable the vote received in each county was calculated as a percentage of the total vote in the county, the percentage " o" in the case of Proposition 14 the percentage of the two-party vote cast for Salinger, Brown, and Lynch. In addition the "Democratic ratio, which is the percentage of the two-party vote cast for a Democrat divided by the Democratic percentage of the two-party registration, is used in this study as the dependent variable measuring party loyalty to Salinger, Brown, or Lynch (Table 1). Although the Democratic Ratio is based upon the rather heroic assumption that the registration of a county is an indication of the vote getting potential of that party, it is used as the "best measure" of a person voting for a particular candidate in a general election.

%NO %of Democratic 0/o of Democratic %of Democratic on Two Party Vote/Reg. Two Party Vote/Reg. Two Party Vote/Reg. Country Prop. Vote- Ratio- Vote- Ratio- Vote- Ratio- 14 Brown Brown Lynch Lynch Salinger Salinger Alameda 39.4 50:3 78.0 58:9 91.3 ""'5'5:5 � Amador 35.4 41.7 61.9 60.3 89.5 53.7 79.8 Bulle 30.7 32.5 61.6 44.9 85.0 42.8 77.3 Calaveras 28.8 32.2 54.7 52.8 89.6 44.6 74.8 Colusa 38.6 37.9 63:9 54.3 91.6 49.0 79.9 Contra Costa 35.4 44.9 75.5 57.2 96.1 50.4 81.3 Del Norte 37.3 36.0 57.7 56.3 90.2 54.9 85.8 ElDorado 30.7 36.9 61.5 52.8 88.0 48.5 78.2 Fresno 34.6 46.0 69.4 58.1 87.6 56.0 81.9 Glenn 33.4 33.7 58.5 48.2 83.7 45.0 76.8 Humboldt 42.7 42.8 69.7 57.1 93.0 56.9 91.2 Imperial 31.5 37.1 61.2 53.7 88.6 46.4 74.6 In yo 29.2 33.8 59.7 50.7 89.6 42.3 73.4 Kern 28.2 37.3 59.8 48.4 77.6 48.8 75.8 Kings 38.4 44.2 64.6 60.6 88.6 60.7 87.6 Loke 28.9 36.9 66.7 49.3 89.2 46.0 81.4 lassen 41.9 46.1 67.5 61.1 89.5 56.0 80.1 Los Angeles 32.6 42.7 71.2 53.9 89.8 47.2 78.3 Madera 32.1 45.8 68.8 56.4 84.7 56.7 81.2 Marin 47.8 42.8 89.5 53.5 111.9 45.0 90.7 Mariposa 32.6 38.5 69.1 50.7 91.0 48.0 85 7 Mendocino 42.1 40.2 66.8 55.5 92.2 53.1 85.8 Merced 39.2 47.0 69.8 62.7 93.2 58.3 85.2 Modoc 50.2 37.3 62.1 56.1 93.3 49.7 82.4 Mono 21.8 22.3 47.2 41.4 87.7 34.0 72.0 Monterey 42.0 38.9 69.2 57.4 102.1 48.5 84.6 Napa 27.0 40.4 69.0 56.2 95.7 50.2 84.5 Nevada 30.3 34.2 65.8 46.5 89.4 44.1 81.7 Orange 22.2 27.8 60.3 41.5 90.0 35.1 72.5 Placer 37.0 45.4 71.6 59.3 93.5 55.3 84.2 Plumas 42.0 50.8 75.0 64.4 95.1 58.3 83.2 Riverside 31.4 37.2 68.9 50.9 94.3 47.0 85.1 Sacramento 38.4 49.1 77.6 61.0 96.4 52.2 79.9 San Benito 44.7 39.0 65.2 53.0 88.6 50.8 83.3 San Bernardino 28.4 37.8 65.2 49.2 84.8 46.4 77.6 San Diego 29.6 36.2 71.1 44.1 86.6 43.5 82.4 San Francisco 47.1 58.9 88.8 68.6 103.5 58.5 88.0 San Joaquin 34.9 39.2 64.7 54.8 90.4 48.9 78.7 Son luis Obispo 35.2 37.5 68.6 48.9 89.4 50.6 85.9 San Mateo 39.8 46.3 81.8 61.1 108.0 49.3 85.7 Santa Barbara 37.8 36.5 71.3 48.1 93.9 45.8 86.3 Santa Clara 46.9 44.6 80.2 51.4 92.4 51.2 89.4 Santa Cruz 41.5 38.5 75.1 48.6 94.7 48.3 92.9 Shasta 47.6 45.2 69.4 60.2 92.5 58.4 86.4 Sierra 40.2 44.7 72.8 58.2 94.8 51.7 84.8 Siskiyou 47.7 45.8 70.6 60.7 93.5 53.6 81.6 Solano 30.3 49.9 71.5 64.9 93.0 57.7 81.0 Sonoma 38.2 39.3 70.6 52.8 94.8 48.8 85.3 Stanislaus 37.4 45.6 74.3 58.1 94.6 55.2 88.0 Sutter 26.6 29.6 55.5 43.5 81.6 38.3 69.3 Tehama 42.3 37.0 61.9 51.6 86.3 51.7 82.9 Trinity 45.3 37.7 56.9 55.1 83.1 47.4 69.4 Tulare 34.3 40.1 65.3 56.6 92.2 51.5 82.3 Tuolumne 35.5 41.8 68.2 59.0 96.2 52.0 82.7 Ventura 34.0 39.1 68.6 52.6 92.3 47.1 78.4 Yolo 43.6 49.9 78.7 62.6 98.7 56.3 86.9 Yuba 28.0 39.5 61.8 53.4 83.6 48.9 74.9 TABLE 1

51 Map comparisons of the independent variable with each of the dependent variables gives some notion of spatial covariation. but the large number of cases makes generalization about the patterns difficult. To improve the generalizations as to relationships between the variables they were first tested for normalitv and then the coefficent of correlation was · calculated for each of the six pairs of variables (Table 2).

COEFFICIENTS OF CORRELATION AND DETERMINATION

r r' r, = .577* .333 r13= .511* .261 r,.= .573* .328 r15 = .398* .158

'" = .562* .316 rn = .524* .275 *Significant at the .01 level.

THE VARIABLES 1. Percentage "No" of the "Yes1'-11No" vote (by county). 2. Brown's percentage of the Brown-Reagan vote (by county). 3. The Democratic ratio calculated using the Brown vote (by county). 4. Lynch's percentage of the Lynch-Williams vote (by county). 5. The Democratic ratio calculated using the Lynch vote (by county). 6. Salinger's percentage of the Salinger-Murphy vote (by county). 7. The Democratic ratio calculated using the Salinger vote (by county).

TABLE 2

It can be seen that all of the coefficients of correlation are posltlve and significant at the .01 confidence level. The significant coefficients of correlation allow us to accept our first hypothesis of a positive association between voter rejection of Proposition 14 and candidates' opposition to Proposition 14. The coefficient of determination (r2) indicates the pro portion of the variation in the dependent variable that is associated with the variation in the independent variable. Using the example of the Brown vote with Proposition 14 it can be seen that r12 = .577 and that r\2 = .333. This suggests that .333 or 33.3% of the variation in the vote for Brown can be "explained" by variation in the "No" vote on Proposi tion 14. In conclusion it can be seen that opposition to Proposition 14 is associated with the vote for the Democratic candidate. This is illustrated by the significant correlations between a "No" vote on Proposition 14 and the Democratic ratio. The counties with a relatively great Democratic party loyalty were also often the counties with a relatively high percentage of "No" votes on Proposition 14. This is also true of the overall perform ance of a candidate which is expressed as the candidates' percentage of the two-party vote. The existence of a probably significant functional relationship does not prove that one event, e.g. the vote for Brovvn, was caused by some other event, in this case negative voter reaction to Proposition 14, but it does, in a quantitatively verifiable manner, establish a base from which we may more confidently examine the qualitative assertions of the effect of Proposition 14 on the vote for various candidates for elective office.

52 2o%-3o% IIIII/IIIII 3o%-4o% 11111111111r.::·::·: .. . II ..:-::�:::::: 4o%- so% v.:..(:" ;:::.\·l 5o%-6o% 1 r 60%-70% ��-

O()C'

•

Figure 1. The "No" vote on Proposition 14, 1964.

53 20%-30%111111111111 30%-40%11111111111111 40%- 50%[:�)�_:;{.\\�j 50%-60%

60%-70%

Figure 2. Percentage of the Two Party Vote For Brown, 1966.

54 .45- .60

.60- .75

.75- .90

.90- 1. 05

1.05- 1.20

Figure 3. Democratic (Brown) VoteiRegistrolion Rctio, 1'?66.

55 20%-30% 111111111111 3o%-4o% UIIIIIIIIIII:-:: :·.::.=:::·:.·.j · 40%-50% 1:.:..;:·:·:;:·:·::: .:::-J 50%- 60%

6 ct>lo-7Cf>fo

Figure 4. Percentage of the Two Party Vote For Lynch, 1966.

56 .45 - .60 �

.60- .75

.75- .9 0

.90- I .05

1.05- 1,20

figure 5. Democratic (Lynch) Vote/Registration Ralio, 1966.

57 20%-30% 111111111111 30%-40% 1111111111111. 400/-500// /0 A··:""·:.:::::::==:::. ...••· ... • ·: ... •0... • 0 r : ·:1 50%-60%

Figure 6. Percentage of the Two Party Vote For Salinger, 1964.

58 .45- .60 �

.60- .75

.75- .9 0

.90- 1.05

1.05- 1.20

Figure 7. Democratic (Salinger) Vote/ Registration Ratio, 1964.