How can more rural states in America become more liberal like those in New England?

[Hardkill]

I know that it’s already been mentioned here on this forum that rural areas generally are more conservative than urban or even suburban areas. The reasons for this have already been mentioned in both this forum and in some articles out there online.

One of the reasons this is the case is because rural dominant states have less cultural and racial/ethnic diversity than Urban/Suburban dominant states do.

Another reason for this is because folks in rural states have a lower level of education per capita than urban/suburban states do.

However, there are three New England states in America, that are mainly rural and lack cultural and racial/ethnic diversity. 

New Hampshire is a fairly rural dominant state and is one of the least diverse states culturally and racially/ethnically in the US.

Vermont and Maine have been arguably considered to be the two most rural and the two least culturally and racially/ethnically diverse states in the entire country.

Yet, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine have been liberal if not very liberal states for about 3 decades. Plus, the states have been continuing to trend more towards liberalism as time goes on.

They say that there are two reasons for this.

One reason is that each of these three states have become mainly liberal is because the overall level of education in those states is actually grater than in most other rural states in America.

In fact, Maine is considered to have a higher level of education than a majority of US states, Vermont is ranked as the fifth most educated state in the country, and New Hampshire is ranked as the 8th most educated state in the US.

Another reason is that these states are much less religious and traditional than all of the other rural states in the US are.

But why have those states had a higher overall level of education and less tradition oriented environments than all of the other rural states?

How can other rural states like Montana, Iowa, Montana, Idaho, etc. transition from being conservative to being liberal like the rural and white New England states have been?

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by Hardkill

[Ramu]

Maine is liberal in Portland mostly.  The rest is rural and VERY conservative.

 

[Raze]

They need to have a solid stage blue and stage orange phase for stage green to emerge. Mostly through economic development.

Unfortunately in some ways this is actually getting worse, the social structure of communities and the family have been dissolving in those areas for a variety of reasons (see coming apart by Charles Murray, Bowling alone by Robert Putnam, as well as the opioid crisis) and stage orange people move away to pursue economic opportunities elsewhere.

Edited May 17, 2022 by Raze

[Hardkill]

1 hour ago, Ramu said:

Maine is liberal in Portland mostly.  The rest is rural and VERY conservative.

 

Then, why has that state always voted for a Democratic presidential candidate soccer 1992, has had moderate Republicans US Senators since the late 70s (Susan Collins has been arguably the most centrist Republican in Congress for several years), currently has a liberal leaning independent US Senator, currently has a Democratic governor, and has had mostly liberal or Democratic governors since the mid 1990s (except from 2011 to 2019)?

[Ramu]

Like anything else they got sick of Gov LePages bullheaded approach to politics and then we elected an ultra liberal for governor who enacts all these short sited liberal policies and raises taxes stifling business.  So we either have extreme conservativatism or extreme liberals and no happy medium.  Maine needs to modernize its infrastructure (for example Portland Maine still unbelievably doesn't have a synchronized traffic light system and we are nearly paralyzed with new construction projects that choke up traffic and frustrate everyone that last for YEARS with no end in site and zero explanations for the delays).  Moreover Maine needs to encourage businesses to move here and stop punishing the little guy with crushing taxes.

[Gidiot]

I’m from maine as well, it’s very conservative in the rural areas and very liberal in the urban areas. Just from my experience all around the state, I wouldn’t call our governor janet mills extremely liberal, she’s more of a Biden than a Bernie.

Edited May 19, 2022 by Gidiot

[Hardkill]

1 hour ago, Gidiot said:

I’m from maine as well, it’s very conservative in the rural areas and very liberal in the urban areas. Just from my experience all around the state, I wouldn’t call our governor janet mills extremely liberal, she’s more of a Biden than a Bernie.

I figured that she was more of a moderate Democrat. Also, it looks like the state legislature of Maine is also controlled by Democrats.

Would you happen to know why your state has almost always been lead by moderate to liberal leaning politicians despite it being the most rural and the most white state in the country?

Like why does Angus King, a current US senator and former governor of Maine, and the voters he represents are definitely in favor of eliminating the filibuster to pass better voting rights for black and brown people in America, whereas someone like Senator Manchin, who is a Democrat, comes from West Virginia, a state that is almost as white and as rural as Maine, has always represented people in his state who probably don't care much about voting rights for minorities?

Edited May 19, 2022 by Hardkill

[Gidiot]

I’m not too much of a maine history buff, but West Virginia and maine are vastly different, yes they are both white, although maine is heavily influenced by New England politics, is more coastal, therefore there are more Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey transplants and also different industries with more farming I’d say and fishing. The average Mainer I’d say is slightly left leaning, it’s a relatively safe state where there is a lot of tourism which effects opinions and also a history of democratic leaning presidents having influence, jfk, fdr had a house in maine. 
 

it might have something to do as well as that maine was part of the union in the civil war and was always a freedom state and part of the Underground Railroad was started here, these are all just guesses but New England is more developed, the education is pretty good per capita, costs of living is relatively low so people arent so stuck in survival, maine was hit hard by the opioid crisis and be no means is it all peaches up here, and I must point out that once and a while there is an election of a republican ie lepage (trump lite) it’ll be interesting to see if lepage or mills wins in November. It’ll be close but I think mills will win re-election,

most of the population of Maine lives in cities too so that might have something to do with it. Aroostook county is still largely forest and that’s where most of the deep red voters are, if I’m not mistaken in the last presidential election maine split it’s electoral votes and voted for Biden over Bernie in the primaries so again it’s not entirely fair to call it very liberal and angus king did vote against raising the federal minimum wage.

troy Jackson our #1 state dem did campaign for Bernie though and I’m a big fan of him and mills is okay in my eyes, I respect her politics much more than lepage.

Edited May 20, 2022 by Gidiot