The Big Sort
Column 7 of Journey in Search of Bridges
After looking at inner qualities of curiosity and respect to help individuals bridge divides in personal conversation, I realized that to begin building political bridges, I needed to understand U.S. history and what causes our divides. I remembered the political discussions of my childhood and adolescence as much less toxic. Did the same polarization exist, or was I unaware of it when younger? If our divide is growing, what is the cause?
As I read, I discovered that once upon a time, just 75 years ago, there lived a faction of Democrats more conservative than some Republicans. That’s no fairy tale! In the U.S. during the 1950s, Southern Democrats were more conservative than Rockefeller Republicans, many of whom lived in northeastern cities. Southern Democrats championed states’ rights (and the protection of segregation that came with them). Rockefeller Republicans, however, advocated for stronger federal legislation for civil rights. They also supported President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal with its robust federal government, social insurance and welfare programs.
In Congress, Southern Democrats often joined Republicans to oppose liberal priorities such as pro‑labor or urban initiatives. Together, they formed the conservative coalition.
Several decades later, the coalition was swept away by a huge cultural shift. Journalist Bill Bishop named this shift “The Big Sort” in the title of his landmark 2008 book tracing how Americans have realigned themselves politically, socially and geographically since the 1970s.
Bishop discovered this quiet sorting had been underway for decades. In the 1950s, Americans were loyal to broad, locally active institutions such as the AFL‑CIO, the Freemasons, the American Legion and the Farm Bureau. Groups like these united people across class, occupation and even political affiliation. In the late 1960s, membership in those groups plummeted.
According to Bishop, the mid‑1960s marked a cultural turning point. The civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, the rise of militant feminism and the sprawling counterculture fractured the consensus. In their place grew new organizations — narrower in focus, tightly controlled and agenda‑driven.
Left-leaning Common Cause, which began in 1970, sought to curb big money’s influence in politics and strengthen government accountability. The Children’s Defense Fund, founded in 1973 by progressives, advocates for a healthy and fair start for U.S. children. That same year, conservatives created the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which brings together corporate leaders and state legislators to draft model bills. Each organization remains active today, along with a growing number of other advocacy networks on both sides of the aisle.
The overlap between the two major parties has steadily shrunk. Journalist Mónica Guzmán notes that between 1972 and 2000, Republican identification with conservatism rose by 35%, while Democratic identification with liberalism rose by 24%. Racial and religious sorting increased as well. Today, online algorithms for both social and news media record our clicks and then feed each of us information tailored to our existing beliefs.
A 2021 Harvard study analyzing location data for 180 million voters found that 98% to 99% of Americans live in areas where Democrats and Republicans rarely interact — whether in cities, suburbs or rural towns. We’ve sorted ourselves all the way down to the neighborhood level, where sometimes 90% of residents belong to the same political party.
The urban‑rural divide has deepened since the 1980s. Highly educated workers have flocked to thriving cities while rural areas have often lagged in education and income. Urban centers have tilted more Democratic; rural and small‑town America leaned more Republican. Today, in our churches, neighborhoods and organizations, we most often rub shoulders with people who look and think like us. U.S. citizens have become extremely sorted.
Religious life has also changed. Trust in religious institutions declined sharply during and after the 1970s. Back then, religious differences tracked loosely with party identity— Catholics leaning Democratic, Protestants leaning Republican. I remember my own mother worried aloud when John F. Kennedy, a Catholic, ran for president. After he won, her fears quickly faded, and she mourned his assassination with deep sadness. Today there is a different “God gap.” In 2024 64% of regular worshipers, both Catholics and Protestants voted Republican, and 56% percent of those who said they rarely attended worship voted Democratic.
Sociologists tell us our tendency to sort ourselves into social categories is normal. Indeed, birds of a feather flock together. We drift toward groups of people who feel familiar — those who think, believe and live in ways similar to our own. We find connection and comfort in these groups. We think of them as our people; we help each other make sense of the world.
According to Mónica Guzmán, after we sort ourselves we go two steps further. In “I Never Thought of It That Way,” she assigns the acronym SOS to our process: sorting, othering and siloing. It is, appropriately, the same signal used globally for a distress call. Our othering and siloing endanger the way our political system works.
In the next two columns, we will spend time on our othering and then our siloing, which Guzmán says deepen, widen and harden our divisions.
Carol Van Klompenburg is a columnist, author and speaker from Pella, Iowa. More information about her work is at www.carolvanklompenburg.com. Readers can email her at info@carolvanklompenburg.com.