Kids voting in Mehlville school district

2002 election lesson:
St. Louis doesn't always win

Youngsters taking part in Kids Voting 2002 learned a good lesson on election day Nov. 5. That is: St. Louis area voters don't always win in statewide elections.

The race for U.S. senator between Jim Talent and Sen. Jean Carnahan was an example. In the adult vote in St. Louis City and County, Carnahan held a lead of nearly 69,000 votes.

Kids voting in school districts in St. Louis City and County also had Carnahan leading Talent. The margin was nearly 18,000 votes.

In fact, among adult voters in metro St. Louis and metro Kansas City, Carnahan was well ahead. In those two metro areas, Carnahan had a 100,000 margin in the adult vote.

In the City of St. Louis, Carnahan got 91% of the adult vote. Her 73,300 total was nearly 54,000 more than for Talent.

Kids voting in Ritenour school district

In St. Louis Public School voting, kids gave Carnahan 15,273 votes. Talent got just 3,762. She got 72 per cent of the total kids vote to just 18% for Talent. The other 10% went to the Libertarian and Green Party candidates.

But, there are a lot of people in Missouri who don't live in the two largest cities.

And, when all Missouri adult votes were counted, Talent captured the U.S. Senate seat, 934,093-911,507. His victory was a key factor in the Republicans recapturing the majority in the whole U.S. Senate.

Kids in 20 Missouri school districts took part in this year's Kids Voting program. Over two-thirds of the students in the program were in St. Louis metro area schools.

The 11 metro area districts involved were Clayton, Ferguson-Florissant, Fox C-6, Francis Howell, Jennings, Mehlville, Normandy, Parkway, Ritenour, University City and the St. Louis Public Schools.

In the St. Louis area's kids votes, Carnahan got 40,791 votes to just 24,539 for Talent. The incumbent senator got 55% of the total kid vote to just 33% for Talent. The other 12% of the vote was split between the minority candidates.

Kids voting in Ritenour school district

Generally, St. Louis area kids voted pretty much like adults in most races on election day. (For a detailed look at kids voting in individual school districts, click here.)

St. Louis kids made up most of those in the statewide program. Therefore, Carnahan's lead carried over into the state totals. She had 48,613 kid votes to just 33,175 for Talent.

But, Talent finished ahead of Carnahan in Kansas City, central Missouri and southwest Missouri areas. Talent led Carnahan in kids votes in those other three areas, 8,485-6,933.

Five Kansas City districts were involved. They were Lee's Summit, Raytown, Hickman Mills, Liberty and Platte districts.

In central Missouri, the Jefferson City and Fayette districts participated. In southwest Missouri, the districts were in Springfield and Marshfield.

In the statewide adult vote, Talent made the best showing in the 24-county southwest district. He polled over 70,000 votes more than Carnahan. Talent also came out ahead in northeast, central, southeast and northwest Missouri.

Kids voting in Mehlville school district

Talent got an adult majority in Cole County, which is Missouri's capitol city. He got 17,178 votes to just 10,860 for Carnahan. That's despite the fact that Senator Carnahan's late husband, Mel, was a popular governor. Also, Talent lost in the 2000 election in his run for the governor's post.

Another unusual thing is that Talent did poorly in the big cities but he and his family live in suburban St. Louis. Carnahan did poorly in smaller areas although she lives in the small city of Rolla.

In kids voting in the Jefferson City school district, Talent was ahead, 715-527.

Another interesting big-city/small-town result in adult voting involved Proposition A. That was the proposal to raise the tobacco tax by 55 cents on a pack of cigarettes.

The tax proposal did well in the St. Louis and Kansas City metro areas. But, it was voted down in just about every other county in the state.

The Kids Voting 2002 program didn't have young people vote on that issue.

But, kids can add that cigarette tax vote to a list of examples of where big city voters didn't get their way in statewide votes in Missouri.

If you'd like a complete report on the Kids Voting 2002 results, you can go to the Kids Voting 2002 website at http://kidsvoting.usml.edu.

For complete Missouri adult voting results, go to the Secretary of State's website at http://mosl.sos.state.mo.us and click on elections.