This week let’s look at the changing political face of Utah. On a plane ride home over the weekend I picked up a copy of Newsweek. The March 16 issue has a grim and ominous picture of Rush Limbaugh on the cover with the headline, “Enough! A Conservative’s Case Against Limbaugh.” An associated article that caught my eye was titled “You Can’t Go Home Again” with this sub-head, “Reagan called it the place where good Republicans go to die. But has the very idea of Orange County expired?”
The Orange County cited is Orange County, California. For ten years I worked for two congressmen from there. I knew the old Orange County and I saw its changing face over time. Throughout the 1960s and 70s, Orange County was home to the most politically conservative…and politically active…businessmen in America. It’s five district congressional delegation was the most conservative in America…way more conservative in those days than even Utah or Idaho.
By the time I joined that team in the 80s, things started to change. The once-lily white area was growing increasingly Hispanic and Vietnamese. A Democrat actually won a congressional seat in the 90s. And, after Ronald Reagan passed away, the local Republican Party became increasingly moderate. What was once the last bastion of real conservatism in California began to give way to changing times and politics throughout the state and the country.
In one day last year, candidate Obama raised $1.2 million dollars and, on election day, he took 48% of the popular vote. Orange County is now “The OC.” What used to be recognized as the home of Walt Disney, the Knotts Berry Farm family, and Karl Karcher (the owner of Karl’s Junior…a ridiculously wealthy and conservative Republican Catholic), is now recognized for its divorce, family dysfunction, and television shows like Laguna Beach and The Real Housewives of Orange County.
What was once the home to people who packed the Crystal Cathedral to listen to sermons about personal responsibility and what made America great, has become home to a melting pot of self-indulgence and self-importance. My old congressional bosses must be shaking their heads in disbelief. I know I am.
But, now living in Utah, I’m beginning to see the same sorts of changes.
There are rumblings that things political are changing in Utah. Our demographics are changing just as they did in Orange County. Lily white is giving way to brown and, unfortunately, in my opinion, a similar political pattern is taking hold here as it did there: the Republican Party is alienating the influx of new Hispanic voters. You can see what a mistake that’s been in Orange County. It would be an equally terrible mistake here.
I also see the same sort of selfish indulgence and gross materialism grabbing hold of the imaginations of Utahns as it has in the OC. I could go to a political meeting in Orange County as late as the early 1990s and see the all of the money sitting there and know that those good people were still the salt of the Earth. They weren’t selfish. They were interested in making their neighborhoods safe, truly helping people into prosperity, and celebrating America.
Just the other day, my wife, Sally, and I took a couple of our kids to the open house of the LDS Draper Temple just down the road from where we live. One thing that struck me forcefully was that it was hard to tell the Temple from all of the massive homes around it. The LDS Temple is a symbol of holiness and everything that Utah’s pioneer legacy recognizes in its people. The homes around the Draper site only symbolize indulgence. It’s sad to look at.
As the face of Utah continues to change, we have a choice. Either we work tirelessly to teach newcomers what values have made this state great, or we can ignore or even alienate them. Either we will teach our children to hold onto their rich heritage or we will indulge them and spoil them and turn them into a Utah episode of the OC. There is a quiet war ongoing. What happened to Orange County should give all Utahns something to think about.
In recent decades, Utah has become the place where good Republicans go to die. And so I’ll ask the similar question to the one that Newsweek asked of Orange County: Is the very idea of Utah expiring?
I’m Paul Mero. Thanks for listening.
