Stephan: I came across this study the day it was released on 1 July and have been thinking about it for three days now. This being the 4th perhaps it would be a good time to consider not only why faith in the U.S. government is almost down to single digits, and now this Gallup poll about pride in being an American shows the lowest level in pride in the country in almost two decades. It is very clear to me that with a few exceptions the American political class is almost entirely non-tangent in its views with the population as a whole. And as I have thought about it the most alarming aspect of all in this survey is the age differential. Millennials are significantly less likely to be proud of their country which augurs for still greater decreases in patriotism in the future.
Part of it I think is that being a patriot has become conflated with racism, nativism, opposition to abortion, fundamentalist religion, and a fanatical obsession with guns. Just as Christian has come to mean something very different than it did a century, or even 50 years ago, so being a patriot has come to mean something very different from what the Founders or I myself understood the term to mean when I was a young man.
The day after the 4th of July is perhaps is a good day to ask yourself: Where do I stand?
PRINCETON, N.J. — As the nation prepares to celebrate Independence Day, 52% of U.S. adults say they are “extremely proud” to be Americans, a new low in Gallup’s 16
-year trend. Americans’ patriotism spiked after 9/11, peaking at 70% in 2003, but has declined since, including an eight-percentage-point drop in early 2005 and a five-point drop since 2013.
Americans’ declining patriotism is likely related to broader dissatisfaction with the way things are going in the U.S. In January 2004, when 69% were extremely proud to be an American, 55% of Americans were satisfied with the way things were going in the U.S. That was the last time satisfaction has been at the majority level, and the percentage satisfied has mostly held below 30% since 2007, including the 29% in Gallup’s most recent update.
Americans’ patriotism stayed relatively flat from 2006 through 2013, a period that spanned the Great Recession and Barack Obama’s election and first term as president. But over the last three years, Americans’ willingness to say they are extremely proud to […]
