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Although we prefer to think of congressional turnover as being electorally driven and based on the choices of voters, in recent decades retirements/resignations have been a larger contributor to change in the composition of both chambers of Congress than have electoral defeats of incumbents. In this article, we consider the impact of retirements (and other forms of non-electoral exits) on the 2018 congressional midterms, focusing primarily on the House of Representatives. After reviewing the relevant (and limited) literature, we provide a descriptive overview of congressional retirements (including the unusual retirement of a comparatively young speaker of the House and almost two dozen GOP committee and subcommittee chairs) then examine the extent of voluntary retirements in this electoral cycle against historical patterns, and explore the effects of different retirements (i.e., progressive ambition versus retirement from public life). Using multivariate models, we examine which factors correlate significantly with retirement decisions, test for a partisan differential in retirement rates, and compare the rates at which the parties are capable of replacing retirees with co-partisans. Our analysis allows us to consider the ongoing importance of members' career decisions for the composition of and the partisan balance of power in the U. S. Congress. Within the context of 2018 specifically, these career decisions had substantial implications for partisan control of the House, experience and leadership within the House Republican conference, and entrance of female members into Congress and toward higher office. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evolving roles of women in Congress have received appreciable attention from legislative scholars. In this research note, we seek to couple research on departures from Congress and women in Congress by examining what happens in Senate seats vacated by electoral defeat, death, resignation, and retirement. Using data from 1919 through 2019, we analyze the circumstances under which women are appointed Senate successors and particularly on the ability of female senators to be replaced by other women once they leave office. This article builds on previous work on women's accession to high political office, particularly "political widowhood," but to the best of our knowledge is the first to focus on female successors in the US Senate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although retirements are a major source of legislative turnover, research on the topic has been limited, especially outside of the US House of Representatives. In this article, we address this shortcoming by examining retirements in two countries with similar electoral systems yet different legislative environments and party systems: Canada and the United Kingdom. In particular, we extend analysis on the Congress that has consistently shown Republican members retire at higher rates than their Democratic counterparts to examine whether this finding is generalizable to legislators from other parties of the right and/or favouring devolution in other parliamentary settings. In presenting data that support many of these hypotheses, we explore an important normative implication: because their partisan predispositions make them less willing to serve, politicians from parties favouring limited government and/or devolution may be less able to translate their vision of politics into policy because they face systemic problems maintaining legislative seats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although retirements account for a significant percentage of turnover in a good many legislatures around the world, they have received little scholarly attention outside of legislative institutions of advanced democracies, particularly the United States Congress. In this paper, we address this shortcoming in the literature by exploring retirement dynamics in Turkey, a transitional democracy and an ideologically polarised political system. Using a unique dataset of parliamentarians who served in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (GNAT) between 2007 and 2015, we show significantly higher rates of non-electoral departure among members of opposition parties and especially among those representing Kurdish regions of the country. We supplement this analysis in two ways to delve further into potential factors behind retirement decisions. First, we examine data on government answers to parliamentary questions in the period 2007–2015. Second, we analyse a survey of Turkish parliamentarians serving in the early 2000s regarding career plans. These data permit us to examine the roles of system inclusiveness and parliamentary socialisation on decisions not to stand for reelection. Our results imply that perceived legislative influence may help explain some of the variation in retirement decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The most recent addition to the U.S. Constitution is also one of the first proposed amendments. The 27th Amendment restricts change to congressional salaries until after the next election. First drafted by James Madison and approved by Congress in 1789, the proposal was among a package of 12 items sent to the states. Ten of those proposed amendments were ratified and became known as the Bill of Rights. The others languished with only occasional attention by constitutional scholars. In the early 1980s, an undergraduate student at the University of Texas wrote a term paper arguing for adoption of the limits on congressional pay raises. After receiving a C grade from his teaching assistant and instructor, the student rejected the opinions of his teachers and independently pursued the adoption of Madison's proposal. Gregory Watson single-handedly mounted a letter-writing and lobbying campaign that caused state legislators to redirect their attention to the proposed amendment. In 1992, following a most unusual ratification process—including certification by the Archivist of the United States—the measure became the 27th Amendment. In this article, we trace the history of the amendment, demonstrate that its impact has been more symbolic than substantive, and argue that Congress needs to reassert its authority over the amendment process in line with the letter and spirit of Article V. The 27th Amendment has a peculiar constitutional history, and there are lessons we should learn from that experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although there is a large literature on the career decisions of House members, there is a dearth of critical scholarship examining retirement decisions in the Senate. This study aims to address this under-explored topic and identify the key factors in Senate retirement decisions. With a less demanding election schedule, greater power afforded to individual senators, more prestige attached to the office, and fewer attractive options for progressive ambition, we find that Senate retirement decisions differ substantially from patterns observed in the House. Among other things, the partisan retirement differential that is so obvious and persistent in the House (with Republican MCs retiring at higher rates than Democrats) is markedly absent in the Senate. We explore this and other inter-chamber differences, discussing both their empirical and normative ramifications, and noting their importance for our understanding not only of the two chambers but also of the two parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In trying to understand the effects of political parties on shaping the voting behaviour of legislators, research has attempted the difficult task of separating the effects of preferences from rules used by party leaders to enforce discipline. However, little research has explored the prospect that party labels also reflect a social identity that is independent of legislators’ preferences and the rules used by party leaders to enforce discipline. In this study we examine that possibility, employing a data set that permits us to control both for leadership-based effects and legislator preferences on a 2000 free vote dealing with stem cell research. Using the British Representation Studies 1997 – which interviewed Members of Parliament regarding their preferences on several key issues related to the bill – we find significant evidence that party-as-identification plays a role in shaping how legislators vote, even after preferences and discipline are accounted for. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While complementary in many ways, the cartel and the conditional party government (CPG) theories of legislative party power have disparate expectations for the stability of the majority party’s negative agenda control. Cartel theorists contend that negative agenda control is relatively constant over time, while CPG proponents suggest that this type of veto power varies with intra-party preference cohesion and inter-party preference distinction. In this article, we enter this debate by considering an alternative and under-explored indicator of negative agenda control: participation in discharge petition efforts. Our findings demonstrate the instability of the majority party’s ability to control discharge efforts, with majority party (co)sponsors showing a significantly greater likelihood of ‘waffling’ during periods of stronger party unity and more vigorous leadership power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the summer of 2005, with the passage of the Civil Marriage Act, Canada became the third country to extend full rights to same-sex marriages. This article explores passage of the CMA, focusing on parliamentary voting behavior on the free vote used in the House of Commons. Using multivariate empirical analysis we find unusually strong evidence of constituency characteristics influencing the voting behavior of MPs, a rare outcome given the existing scholarly literature on free votes. In a concluding section, we discuss what these findings imply about the increasingly important debate in Canada about parliamentary accountability. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This research examines two referenda in the Deep South, both of which can be categorized as antiblack. Specifically, we analyze a 2001 Mississippi flag referendum (in which the electorate rejected a new flag and retained the old state flag containing a Confederate insignia) and a 2004 referendum in Alabama (in which citizens voted to retain unenforceable constitutional language requiring separate educational facilities for black and white students, and a poll tax on voting). Using state election returns and census data, we employ weighted least squares regression to analyze voting patterns. The results reveal that across both states, white voters displayed significantly greater 'antiblack' voting behavior in those areas with larger black populations and more urbanized environments. Our findings pose a direct challenge to both those who insist that the 'racial threat' perceived by whites is diminishing and those who hold that urbanization will ultimately be corrosive of racist attitudes and behavior. Esta investigación examina dos referendos en el sur de Estados Unidos, cada uno de ellos puede ser categorizado como anti afroamericano. Específicamente, se analizó el referendo en 2001 a la bandera de Mississippi (en el que el electorado rechazó una nueva bandera y decidieron conservar la bandera anterior que contenía una insignia del ejército confederado) y un referendo en 2004 en Alabama (en el que los ciudadanos votaron para conservar un lenguaje constitucional imposible de aplicar que requería separar las instalaciones educativas para blancos y afroamericanos, y un impuesto al voto).Usando los resultados de las elecciones estatales e información estadística, empleamos un modelo de regresión de cuadrados mínimos comunes para analizar patrones electorales. Los resultados revelan que a través de ambos estados los votantes blancos mostraron un comportamiento electoral 'anti afroamericano' significativamente mayor en áreas con una gran población afroamericana y entornos más urbanizados. Nuestros hallazgos plantean un desafío directo a quienes insisten que la 'amenaza racial' percibida por la población blanca está disminuyendo, y aquellos que afirman que la urbanización eliminará actitudes y comportamiento racista. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although discharge petitions lie at the confluence of personal preferences, committee prerogatives, and party leadership in Congress, these procedures have received little scholarly scrutiny. We capitalize on the public nature of petition signatures since 1993 to examine the behavior of the most cross-pressured members in discharge battles: bill sponsors and cosponsors belonging to the majority party who personally prefer the bills they have sponsored but who face party pressure not to sign the petitions that threaten the leadership's control of the legislative agenda. After controlling for personal preferences, we find a statistically significant partisan effect in the U.S. House, which further illuminates the "Where's the party?" debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the United States, public support can play a crucial role in the decisions to initiate and terminate military action. Some scholars argue that the public holds "prudent" opinions regarding the use of the military—supporting efforts to stop aggression but not to engage in nation building. We argue that what seems like a "prudent" opinion may be driven more by the White House's rhetoric. Experimental tests show that the rhetorical complexity has a more powerful impact on the respondent's support for military action than the actual policy goal, although this result is substantially tempered by political awareness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we extend recent work on exposure to campaign advertisements, comparing the effects of television ads, radio ads, and campaign-related e-mails using an unusual panel data set that provides information on multiple media sources. Our findings, which control for the endogeneity problem that has plagued much work in political communications, confirm that media exposure does affect citizen attitudes. We also find additional evidence that the medium matters, with exposure to television ads tending to undermine system-supporting attitudes, whereas exposure to radio ads has an overall positive effect; contrary to expectations, the “new medium” of campaign e-mails had no discernible effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data from an unusual survey, we gauge factors influencing support for a state anti-gay rights referendum. After controlling for other powerful predictors of attitudes, we find personal contact (especially relevant and voluntary contact) has an important impact on public support, although community context does not. These findings support an integrated notion of interactions with "out" groups, grounded in social categorization theory, that sees community context and interpersonal contact as concentric circles, moving from abstract, detached forms of contact to more pronounced, personal forms. However, even among those with substantial interpersonal contact, support for the referendum was still widespread. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. In this article, we explore whether African-American state legislators have been able to translate election to office into positions of power, particularly as committee chairs. Methods. We cull data from all state legislative chambers that contained a black legislator during two time periods, 1989 and 1999. In doing so, we compare the observed numbers of African-American chairs with their expected numbers. We also examine each state's percentage of black chairs using multiple regression to determine what factors—political, partisan, institutional, cultural—influence the selection of black committee chairs. Results. Overall, our descriptive analysis reveals that blacks are underrepresented as chairs. They are not, however, significantly underrepresented as chairs of the most important committees and they are generally overrepresented as chairs of committees with jurisdiction over social services. Our multivariate analyses show that the prevalence of black chairs is driven primarily by factors related to partisan control of legislative chambers and size of the black legislative delegation, and that these dynamics have changed over time. Conclusion. Although the increase in African-American state legislators has led to an increase in substantive leadership roles, these positions have been limited almost entirely to chambers where the black caucus is a critical element of a Democratic majority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although much research has been done on advertising in American political campaigns, virtually all has focused on the use of television. The dearth of work on radio advertising limits our ability to fully understand American electoral dynamics. More campaigns use radio than television, and there is reason to suspect that the narrowcasting that is possible with highly targeted radio ads may be substantively different from the campaign messages that are broadcast over the television airwaves. In this article, we use data from a survey of registered voters in Arkansas and Missouri during the 2002 election season to explore the dynamics of political advertising on the radio. We focus in particular on factors that influence exposure to radio ads, the public's perceptions of the importance of these ads, and the impacts of exposure on the public's perceptions of the quality of the democratic process in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research on demographic innumeracy has consistently shown that Americans have grossly inflated perceptions of minority population sizes at the national level. We present data from a survey indicating that Americans have significantly more reasonable estimations of homosexuals populations in their local communities. We argue that such findings serve as a needed corrective to the view that Americans are hopelessly ignorant about minority communities, speculate on some of the reasons for the disparate results at the national and local levels, and— after examining some of the correlates of the local estimates—discuss what these findings imply about the differing types and levels of ‘threat’ the public views on the part of different minority groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using data from a 1996 pre-election survey, the causes and consequences of public approval of Republican congressional leaders in the 1990s are examined. Specifically, this article explores the extent of opinion formation regarding House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, and then attempts to account for the sources of these attitudes using multivariate models. Comparing and contrasting these findings as appropriate with what is known regarding public attitudes toward other political entities, the article reveals in particular that economic evaluations work differently for congressional leaders than for either the president or Congress as an institution. In a second section, the electoral ramifications of public attitudes toward Speaker Gingrich in the1996 elections are examined, determining that even in the presence of a host of powerful controls public evaluations of the speaker exercised a significant influence on respondents' vote choice, not just in congressional races also far down-ticket, a finding that supports a party-oriented model of legislative organisation. The paper concludes with some thoughts on the ability of these results to be generalised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies of the impact of black elite electoral success on the system-supporting attitudes of black citizens have yielded mixed, but generally unimpressive, empirical results. We extend this limited research by examining the effects of the presence of black judicial officials on public attitudes toward a state judicial system.We employ data from a telephone survey of citizens in Mississippi and develop multivariate models to test for the effects of black judges on citizens' evaluations of the fairness of judges, equity in sentences, and overall impartiality of the state judicial system.We find no systematic evidence that the election of black judicial officials ameliorates the suspicions of the black public regarding the fairness of the state courts.Our findings are in line with other recent studies on the limited effects of black elite electoral success on the attitudes of the black public and generally support a“political reality” model of political trust rather than an“empowerment model.” [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes to the growing empirical literature on filibusters by examining the factors that are associated with individual-level filibustering behavior. We focus particularly on the behavior of senators in the latter part of their careers, using impending retirement as analytical leverage to determine whether decisions to engage or not in dilatory parliamentary practices are driven more by narrowly drawn considerations of instrumental utility or by compliance with institutional norms of deference and cooperation. Using data from 1975 to 1993 and employing multivariate models that allow us to control for other relevant factors, we find only limited support for a narrowly rational model of Senate “followership.” In the course of our enquiry, we clarify the notion of legislative norms, integrate our study with recent interdisciplinary scholarship on the evolution of cooperative behavior and consider how leadership can be exercised in environments largely bereft of formal leadership resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on committee outliers in State Legislatures. This paper focuses on recent work exploring the prevalence of outlying committees in The U.S. state legislatures. Using an expanded sample of 45 states and measures of legislator preferences generated by a single, federated group, it has been found that most legislative committees are representative of the parent chambers from which their members are selected. Furthermore, multivariate models designed to account for theoretically relevant patterns in variations in outlier percentages among control and non-control committees have been tested

Examines the contact theory, community context, and public attitudes toward gay men and lesbians in the U.S. Alleviation of the problems by reconceptualization of the notion of contact; Effect of community context on citizen attitudes to homosexuals; Importance of public policies and group strategies on openness in sexual orientation.

Presents information on a study which examined the prevalence of committee outliers in the lower houses of a sample of 12 states in the United States. Methodology of the study; Results and discussion on the study; Conclusions.

Explores the impact of constituency preferences on senators' voting behavior by using a logistical regression model to examine the impacts of African-American constituency size and the proximity of reelection on the roll call behavior of senators on the Clarence Thomas confirmation vote. Previous research; Models and analysis; Conclusions.

Discusses the impact of African-American constituency preferences on the roll-call behavior of senators during Supreme Court confirmations by examining the 1967 vote on Thurgood Marshall. Previous research; Supreme Court nomination of Thurgood Marshall; Models and analyses.

Focuses on the redistricting of Congressional districts in the United States on the basis of racial composition of election districts. Voting behavior of white incumbent representatives; Background on the study.

Analyzes the confirmation vote by the United States Senate for the appointment of Justice Clarence Thomas using factors of ideological, demographic, and electoral measures of constituent pressures. Significance of racial and ideology variables; Development of mathematical models to analyze variable results; Future implications on the selection process for minority government figures.

Tests the hypothesis that members of the United States Congress are socialized into certain attitudes concerning interbranch comity or rivalry early during their tenures in office. Use of a multivariate regression model; Members of Congress' `socialized to opposition' mentality; Congress members as more amenable to leadership from presidents of their own party.

Discusses reelection constituencies and the politics of Supreme Court confirmation votes in the United States. Conceptualization of constituency; Impact of geographic and reelection racial race; Insights on cross pressures facing senators as they decide for Clarence Thomas confirmation.

Examines the impact of various constituencies on the struggle over the confirmation of Afro-American Clarence Thomas to the US Supreme Court. Arguments on the trumping of gender constituency concerns by racial constituency concerns; African-American and female constituencies; Late airing of Anita Hill's allegations of sexual harassment.

Objective: In this article, we explore the deaths in office of U.S. senators between 1919 and 2015, examining both historical trends at the aggregate level and at the individual level searching for partisan and other patterns in mortality rates. Methods: We employ Cox proportional hazard models to examine the effects of factors such as age, tenure in office, electoral factors, and legislative engagement, as well as partisanship and ideology. Results: Notably, we find no significant partisan or ideological effects. When we examine the parties separately, we find that other institutional factors (tenure in office, vote share, bill sponsorship) matter for Democrats, while expectation of who would replace them in office matters for Republicans. Conclusion: Our findings contribute to previous work on legislative turnover in Congress by taking the first step to analyze deaths among U.S. senators from almost the entire history of the elected Senate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]