The collar counties are the five counties of Illinois that border on Chicago's Cook County. After Cook County, they are also the next five most populous counties in the state. The collar counties (DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry, and Will) are tied to Chicago economically, but like many other suburban areas in the United States, they have very different political leanings from the core city. Chicago has long been a Democratic stronghold, but the collar counties are known for being historically Republican strongholds, although they have recently become more politically diverse.
While the demographics of these suburban Chicago counties are fairly typical for American metropolitan areas, the term is apparently unique to this area. Also, because Cook County is so firmly entrenched in the Democratic column, and rural Downstate is overwhelmingly Republican, the collar counties are routinely cited as being the key to any statewide election. However, that conventional wisdom was challenged by in 2010 Democrat Pat Quinn election as governor while only winning Cook, St. Clair, Jackson and Alexander counties. All five collar counties went Republican, so the key to winning that gubernatorial election was simply winning Cook County, but by a wide enough margin to overwhelm the rest of the state.
While the term is often employed in political discussions, that is not its exclusive use. Barack Obama used the term in his speech before the Democratic National Convention in 2004.
As of 2010 there are 3,143,257 people residing in the collar counties, nearly 25% of the population of Illinois.
Video Collar counties
See also
- Lake County, Indiana
- Hamilton County, Indiana
- Chicago metropolitan area
- The St. Louis, Missouri Metro-East region of Illinois (Madison County, Illinois, St. Clair County, Illinois, Montgomery County, Illinois, Macoupin County, Illinois, Jersey County, Illinois, Bond County, Illinois, and Adams County, Illinois)
- Orange County, California
- Long Island
Maps Collar counties
References
Source of article : Wikipedia
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