Dartblog

It is often said that colleges and universities are some of the most liberal places in America, a claim that certainly does not become any weaker when discussing the Ivy League. If political giving is any indication, Ivy League schools are very liberal indeed. In the 2008 giving cycle (as of about 2 weeks ago), dollars donated to Democratic candidates outnumbered those given to Republicans at about 9 to 1 at every school.

Harvard contributed the most to Democratic candidates in general ($646,724) and Barack Obama in particular ($253,258), though Yale edged out the highest percentage of dollars donated to Democrats at 94.35%. Columbia proved to be the ‘most conservative’ Ivy by this measure, giving the most total dollars to Republicans ($102,351) and John McCain ($29,550), and the highest percentage to the GOP as well (18.41%)

In the chart above, ‘Misc’ Democrats or Republicans refers to donations to congressional and senatorial campaigns as well as candidates in the party primaries other than McCain and Obama, and donations to the DNC, RNC, and other explicitly partisans Political Action Committees. Donations to third parties were generally negligible with only a few scattered donations to the Green Party, and the few thousand dollars contributed to Ron Paul are included in the Republican totals.

A few words of explanation: figures represent giving by all employees of the universities, including support services, professors, and administrators, though members of the latter two groups compromise almost 100% of the donations. Included in these numbers are professors and administrators of law, medical, business, and other graduate programs at the various institutions.

Follow the jump for a breakdown of the total dollars donated by each Ivy League institution, including percentage given to each party, ordered from most conservative to most liberal.