God Bless America

(AP)

With Independence Day looming, CBS News director of surveys Kathleen Frankovic ponders that question, and more:

So are Americans patriotic? Absolutely! Last summer, on the eve of the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, 62 percent of Americans in a CBS News/New York Times poll described themselves as "very patriotic." Another 33 percent said they were somewhat patriotic. That left only 5 percent who admitted to anything less.

Threats, wars and crises make the public more willing to "rally round" the President and the country, so it's no surprise that the 9/11 attacks increased the "very patriotic" group. The percentage was as high as 72 percent just after the attacks. In a CBS News/New York Times poll conducted ten years before that, it was 55 percent, significantly lower than in 2001, and lower than in the most recent poll.

Although pretty much everyone claims to be patriotic, there are differences. According to last year's poll, patriotism increases with age, and was higher in the Midwest and South than in the Northeast and West. By self-report, Republicans are more patriotic – last year, 76 percent of them said they were very patriotic, compared with 53 percent of Democrats. Self-described conservatives were 24 points more likely than liberals to describe themselves that way.

Conservatives were more likely than liberals to see differences in patriotism between the two groups. A quarter of conservatives believed liberals were less patriotic than they themselves were, a percentage nearly four times as large as the percentage of liberals who felt conservatives were less patriotic.