A voting bloc is a group of voters that are strongly motivated by a specific common concern or group of concerns to the point that such specific concerns tend to dominate their voting patterns, causing them vote together in elections. For example, Beliefnet identifies 12 main religious blocs in American politics, including e.g. the "Religious Right", whose concerns are dominated by religious and sociocultural issues and "White Bread Protestants", who, while also conservative, tend to care more about economic issues. The result is that each of these groups votes en bloc in elections.
The divisions between voting blocs are known as cleavage. A voting bloc can be longstanding and institutionalized, such as support for business or labor, or it can be created from scratch as the result of the saliency of a new public issue, such as a war or the potential resumption of a military draft. Ethnic groups are sometimes considered to be voting blocs, but it is unwise to simply assume that a majority of a given ethnic group will vote in one particular way, as economic status and religious beliefs also play an important role. Voting blocs grow and wane according to the development of issues and personalities. These blocs can often disappear and reappear with time and are not necessarily motivated by one single issue.
Famous quotes containing the words voting and/or bloc:
“Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. It is only expressing feebly your desire that it should prevail. A wise man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to prevail through the power of the majority.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Unpleasant questions are being raised about Mother’s Day. Is this day necessary? . . . Isn’t it bad public policy? . . . No politician with half his senses, which a majority of politicians have, is likely to vote for its abolition, however. As a class, mothers are tender and loving, but as a voting bloc they would not hesitate for an instant to pull the seat out from under any Congressman who suggests that Mother is not entitled to a box of chocolates each year in the middle of May.”
—Russell Baker (20th century)