bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Women in State Legislatures and State Legislative Research: Beyond Sameness and Difference
Authors: Cammisa Anne Marie , Reingold Beth 
Published: January 2011

AbstractThe literature on women in state legislatures has grown dramatically over the last few decades, examining in detail their personal characteristics, behavior, and the impact they have had on state legislatures. Highlighted throughout this body of work are the many ways in which these female officials differ from their male colleagues. While it may once have been necessary to identify and categorize women legislators, we now need to broaden our research to examine both the diversity among women state legislators and the contexts in which they may or may not make a difference. This broader focus should include analyses of state-level forces, such as legislative professionalism and state political culture, and it should also investigate more thoroughly policy outcomes and processes. Interactions between gender and other social forces, such as race, ethnicity, and class, should also be explored in greater depth. This new direction would build on the richness of the existing literature and allow the two fields of women in politics and state politics to better inform and contribute to each other.
On California's 1920 Alien Land Law: The Psychology and Economics of Racial Discrimination
Authors: Gaines Brian J. , Cho Wendy K. Tam 
Published: January 2011

AbstractScholars have recently highlighted a critical, but previously neglected, facet of racially discriminatory public policies—such policies may be motivated by either economic or psychological forces. That is, racially discriminatory policy may be the result of self-interest and competition in the face of scarcity or prejudices and affects based on group identities. We test if these motivations were behind the passage of an important, openly discriminatory public policy: California's Alien Land Law of 1920. We find that neither motivation alone accounts for the initiative vote that passed this law; both played a role. Our analysis also illustrates how racially discriminatory policies in the early 20th century fit into the ordinary politics of the day.
Voting in Initiative Elections: Does the Context of Racial and Ethnic Diversity Matter?
Authors: Branton Regina P. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractDoes the racial and ethnic diversity of the area in which a voter lives affect his or her political behavior? Scholars have suggested a range of such effects, but these conclusions have questionable generalizability because the behavior they typically examine is racially charged. In this article, I test more general affects of racial and ethnic context by examining political behavior on a range of issues, both racially relevant and racially neutral. Specifically, I examine the impact of the racial and ethnic context on individual-level voting by whites in initiative elections. Merging 1996 and 1998 Voter News Service state exit poll survey data and United States Census Bureau contextual data, I find that there is a distinct relationship between racial and ethnic diversity and white voting behavior on racially relevant ballot initiatives, but that racial diversity does not have a consistent impact on voting on race-neutral initiatives.
A Comparative Analysis of Redistricting Institutions in the United States, 2001-02
Authors: McDonald Michael P. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractLegislative redistricting is among the most intensely fought battles in American politics. Through redistricting, political parties seek to control government, incumbents seek job security, and minority groups seek representation. I explore how the various United States redistricting institutions, and the political actors who operate within them, determined the outcomes of the 2001-02 redistricting cycle. I categorize these institutions into two types: redistricting that follows the normal legislative process and that which takes place through a commission. For those states that use the legislative process, when one party controls state government, redistricting results in a partisan gerrymander. When there is divided state government, a bipartisan compromise results from the legislative process. Commission systems differ on membership and voting rules, suggesting two types of commissions: partisan and bipartisan. A partisan commission reliably produces a partisan map, while a bipartisan commission results in a bipartisan compromise.
Static Ambition in a Changing World: Legislators' Preparations for, and Responses to, Redistricting
Authors: Boatright Robert G. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractHow do members of Congress anticipate and prepare for redistricting? I present data from the 1992 redistricting cycle that indicate that one reason why we rarely see changes in representation after redistricting is that incumbents change both their legislative activities and their campaigning prior to the first post-redistricting election. To examine incumbents' behavioral anticipation of redistricting in more detail, I also present a case study of incumbents' activities prior to the 1998 court-ordered congressional redistricting in North Carolina. I find that these incumbents participated actively in the redistricting process and made behavioral adjustments before they began to represent their new districts officially. These types of adjustments were often subtle, including changes in casework, local projects, and the allocation of staff and campaign resources.
The Effect of State Redistricting Methods on Electoral Competition in United States House of Representatives Races
Authors: Carson Jamie L. , Crespin Michael H. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractLegislative redistricting in the states is highly contentious due, at least in part, to its partisan implications. But does the method by which states draw legislative districts affect partisan competition in the elections that are held in these districts? We examine the effects of three methods used by states to draw district boundaries on competition in congressional elections. Specifically, we evaluate the effects on competition of legislative, judicial, and commission redistricting plans enacted prior to the 1992 and 2002 congressional elections. We find that more competitive elections occur when courts and commissions are directly involved in the redistricting process, as opposed to when redistricting is handled only in the state legislative process.
The Electoral Allure of Direct Democracy: The Effect of Initiative Salience on Voting, 1990-96
Authors: Lacey Robert J. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractDo salient ballot initiatives stimulate voting? Recent studies have shown that initiatives increase voter turnout, but some methodological concerns still linger. These studies have either relied solely on aggregate data to make inferences about individual-level behavior or used a flawed measure of initiative salience. Using individual-level data from the National Election Studies, I find that ballot question salience indeed stimulated voting in the midterm elections of 1990 and 1994. In an election with moderately salient ballot questions, a person's likelihood of voting can increase by as much as 30 percent in a midterm election. On the other hand, consistent with most prior research, I find no statistically significant relationship between ballot question salience and voting in presidential elections.
Measuring the Stringency of State Campaign Finance Regulation
Authors: Witko Christopher 
Published: January 2011

AbstractScholars are beginning to consider how state campaign finance regulation influences political behavior and elections, but they lack the systematic measure of these regulations needed to do so. This article describes a simple measure of state campaign finance regulation stringency that is based on state statutes in 2002. Further, this article explains the construction of the measure and assesses its validity and reliability. The index generally confirms qualitative assessments of state campaign finance regulation, and it is correlated with measures of related aspects of state campaign finance regulation, campaign spending, and fundraising.
Politics, Race, and American State Electoral Reforms after Election 2000
Authors: Bali Valentina A. , Silver Brian D. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractThe controversial presidential election of 2000 triggered a wide variety of electoral reforms in many states. We examine the impact of a state's politics, ethnicity, and fiscal health on the passage of these reforms. Using state-level data from 2001 and 2002, we find that the partisan make-up of state government frequently influenced the fate of these reforms. States with a divided government or high party competition tended not to adopt several key electoral reforms, while partisanship and the interaction of partisanship and minority representation influenced the adoption of others. Fiscal constraints and institutional arrangements had less impact on reform adoption. Overall, our findings suggest that electoral reforms were shaped more by political factors than by fiscal concerns or any objective need for reform.
Term Limits' Multiple Effects on State Legislators' Career Decisions
Authors: Lazarus Jeffrey 
Published: January 2011

AbstractMost studies of the effects of term limits on state legislators' careers have focused solely on their propensity to seek other offices. An expected-utility analysis of the decision to run for office indicates that term limits reduce the benefits of seeking reelection, even for state legislators who are eligible to run, and reduce the opportunity cost of running for other offices. From this analysis, I develop a series of hypotheses about the probability that state legislators—term-limited or not—will seek re-election or other offices under a term limits regime, the value of the offices they seek, and the probability with which they will win these contests. I test these hypotheses using data on the career choices of state legislators in states with and without term limits in 2000-02. My empirical analysis supports the rational entry model and indicates that term limits have had a much richer effect on state legislative careers than previously understood.
Modeling the Outcomes of State Abortion Funding Referenda: Morality or Redistributive Policy, or Both?
Authors: Roh Jongho , Berry Frances S. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractWhile Lowi (1964) claims that policies can be classified as one of three types, distributive, redistributive, or regulatory, his work has been criticized as incomplete. Policies are frequently multidimensional, and his categories are neither comprehensive nor mutually exclusive. A fourth policy type, morality policy, has now been well-established as distinct from the other three types (e.g., Meier 1994; Mooney 2001). Evidence suggests that some policies can be framed as multidimensional policy types. Abortion funding is one such policy issue that has aspects of both morality policy and redistributive policy in its politics. In this study, we develop models of government abortion funding based on abortion as a morality and a redistributive policy. We estimate these models using weighted least squares to explain the voting outcomes of county-level votes in six state referenda elections for government funding of abortions. Then, we test a combined model and find clear evidence that the combined model, and variables from both perspectives, provide a stronger case than a single policy typology model alone. A practical implication is that policy advocates may purposely emphasize different values and results of the policies. Thus, testing policy theories may need to include more complex views of policies based on policy types.
The Political Manipulation of U.S. State Rainy Day Funds Under Rules Versus Discretion
Authors: Rose Shanna 
Published: January 2011

AbstractAnecdotal evidence suggests that U.S. state politicians manipulate rainy day funds for political purposes, but such claims remain untested in the literature. This article finds that lawmakers withdraw nearly three times more funds in response to a deficit shock of a given size if it occurs in an election year rather than in a non-election year; this occurs despite the fact that the magnitude of shocks does not vary over the electoral cycle. This effect is stronger when incumbents are eligible for re-election than when they are term-limited. When it comes to preventing political manipulation of funds, rainy day fund rules that increase the number of veto players who must approve of withdrawals seem to be more effective than rules that specify the economic conditions under which funds may be withdrawn.
For Whom the TEL Tolls: Can State Tax and Expenditure Limits Effectively Reduce Spending?
Authors: Kousser Thad , McCubbins Mathew D. , Moule Ellen 
Published: January 2011

AbstractCan voters stop state governments from spending at high rates through the enactment of tax and expenditure limits (TELs), or do these laws become dead letters? We draw upon the principal-agent literature to theorize that TELs—one of the most frequent uses of the initiative process across the country—might be circumvented by the sorts of elected officials who would inspire their passage. We test for the effectiveness of TELs across states using a differences-in-differences model. Second, we decompose our treatment variable using different legal provisions of the limits to test whether there is a uniform effect across different types of TELs. Finally, we compare state fiscal patterns before and after adoption on a state-by-state basis. Using these approaches and other methods, we show that TELs are largely ineffective and that state officials can circumvent them by raising money through fees. Our finding is consistent with recent studies showing that policies passed through direct democracy can often be thwarted by the politicians charged with implementing them.
Paying the Price for a Seat on the Bench: Campaign Spending in Contested State Intermediate Appellate Court Elections
Authors: Frederick Brian , Streb Matthew J. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractThe subject of judicial elections has garnered an increasing amount of attention by scholars over the past decade. Campaign spending in judicial elections has occupied a central focus of this research, but most of this scholarship has examined campaign finance at the state supreme court level. Our study departs from that tradition by examining what factors predict campaign expenditures in 172 contested state intermediate appellate court (IAC) races from 2000–06. The results indicate that the characteristics of the race, institutional factors, and the context of the campaign all influence how much money is spent in IAC elections. Although similar in some respects to state legislative and supreme court elections, notable differences exist as well.
Explaining Major and Third Party Candidate Entry in U.S. Gubernatorial Elections, 1980–2005
Authors: Dowling Conor M. , Lem Steve B. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractWhile much scholarly research has focused on the quality of candidates in U.S. elections, the quantity of candidate participation has received much less attention. Consequently, there is little systematic evidence on what factors stimulate or dampen candidate entry into electoral contests, especially at the state level. In this article, we examine the effects of electoral laws, states' social and political climates, and incumbency on gubernatorial candidacies. We test our claims using an event-count model with the number of candidates contesting each gubernatorial election from 1980 to 2005 as the outcome of interest. We divide total candidate participation into major and third party candidates to observe whether the factors affect neither, one, or both types of candidacies. We find that electoral laws and incumbency play an important role in determining the number of candidacies in these elections, but the effect of these factors varies for the two types of candidates.
Canons of Ethics and Accountability in State Supreme Court Elections
Authors: Peters C. Scott 
Published: January 2011

AbstractThis article examines the influence of several canons within state codes of judicial ethics aimed at constraining the campaigning of candidates running for U.S. state judicial office. These canons have been much debated since 2002, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that one of them, the announce clause, unconstitutionally restricted the free speech rights of candidates. Based on their likely influence on the availability of information in judicial contests, I hypothesize that the primary effect of these canons is to make incumbents less accountable to the public. Looking at U.S. state supreme court contests from 1998 to 2006 where incumbents are seeking re-election, I find strong evidence that four of the five canons make it less likely for challengers to arise, and I also find evidence that restrictions on candidate solicitation of funds favor incumbents in the general election.
Getting on the Rolls: Analyzing the Effects of Lowered Barriers on Voter Registration
Authors: Rugeley Cynthia , Jackson Robert A. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractStates and the federal government have initiated reforms designed to increase voting participation. Research has focused on the effects of these reforms—specifically, the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA)—on voter turnout, but little research has focused directly on voter registration. Moving beyond the question of whether the NVRA increased registration, we ask: Did its implementation diminish the influence of core demographic variables on registration, producing a more representative pool of registered citizens? Relying on data from Current Population Surveys, our analyses provide limited affirmative support. The NVRA attenuated the influence of income in the states with no previous Motor Voter laws. It also reduced the on-year influence of age and the off-year influence of residential stability in these states and those that had prior passive Motor Voter laws. It did not have a similar effect on the influence of other core characteristics.
Dividing the Spoils of Power: How Are the Benefits of Majority Party Status Distributed in U.S. State Legislatures?
Authors: Kim Henry A. , Phillips Justin H. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractWe assess the conditions under which majority status generates benefits for incumbent legislators and how these benefits are distributed among members of the majority party. We argue that majority status is valuable only in procedurally partisan chambers; that is, when the majority party monopolizes chamber leadership positions and control of the legislative agenda. Contrary to the existing literature, we also posit that these rewards should be distributed broadly across the majority party. To test our expectations, we utilize 10 recent transitions in the partisan control of U.S. state legislatures and data on campaign contributions. Consistent with our expectations, majority status is valuable, but only in procedurally partisan chambers. Furthermore, the premium in campaign contributions enjoyed by the majority party is primarily distributed to backbenchers, although top party leaders also benefit. These results provide important insights into the distribution of power and influence in U.S. state legislatures.
The Pendulum of Precedent: U.S. State Legislative Response to Supreme Court Decisions on Minimum Wage Legislation for Women
Authors: Hoekstra Valerie 
Published: January 2011

AbstractThe impact of U.S. Supreme Court decisions is contingent on the willingness of other political actors to implement those decisions. One important group of implementers is the U.S. state legislatures. However, in the pursuit of policy, state legislators must consider multiple goals when choosing among alternative policy options. In addition to considering the likelihood of review by state high courts and the U.S. Supreme Court, state legislators have their own ideas about good policy and must also face reelection. When are legislators likely to follow precedent and when are they likely to ignore it in pursuit of these other goals? In this article, I examine the enactment of state minimum wage legislation for women in the first half of the twentieth century. The results show that even after controlling for legislative and constituent preferences, legislators heed the preferences of the U.S. Supreme Court—but not necessarily their own high courts—when deciding to pass minimum wage legislation. The results point to the need for scholars of state politics to pay greater attention to the role of judicial actors when studying policy adoption and legislative behavior.
Assessing U.S. State Susceptibility to Environmental Regulatory Competition
Authors: Konisky David M. 
Published: January 2011

AbstractIn this article, I examine the environmental race-to-the-bottom argument by studying whether state susceptibility to interstate economic competition helps explain which U.S. states engage in environmental regulatory competition. Specifically, I create a susceptibility index using four state economic attributes: overall growth, unemployment, manufacturing growth, and manufacturing employment. Studying state enforcement of federal environmental programs, I find little evidence that states, which are theoretically more susceptible to interstate economic competition are more likely to respond strategically to the regulatory behavior of economic competitor states. These results cast doubt on the idea that the environmental regulatory competition predicted by race-to-the-bottom theory is mediated by intrastate economic conditions.
Lobbying in the New Millennium: Evidence of Continuity and Change in Three States
Authors: Nownes Anthony J. , DeAlejandro Krissy Walker 
Published: January 2011

AbstractWe report the results of a survey of over 300 lobbyists in three states—Colorado, Ohio, and West Virginia. In the first half of this article, we provide a comprehensive portrait of state lobbyists' attempts to affect state government decisions. In the second half, we address the following research question: What factors affect the lobbying behavior of state lobbyists? Our results suggest a number of conclusions about lobbying in the new millennium, including the following: (1) state lobbyists target the governor's office more than most previous studies suggest; (2) state lobbyists aim their grassroots lobbying efforts at the governor and executive agency bureaucrats as well as legislators; (3) state lobbying remains an intensely personal game, as techniques involving face-to-face contact with government officials remain the most effective; and (4) several variables affect a lobbyist's decisions regarding which techniques to use and where to aim his or her efforts, including the receptivity of potential targets and the type of group for which the lobbyist works.
An Integrated Model of U.S. State Attorney General Behavior in Multi-State Litigation
Authors: Provost Colin 
Published: January 2011

AbstractMulti-state lawsuits, filed by U.S. state attorneys general (AGs), have become an important method by which state consumer protection laws are enforced. Patterns of participation in these lawsuits vary tremendously across the states, yet little is known about the factors driving this variation. I argue that state AGs are primarily concerned with achieving electoral and policymaking goals. Consequently, I expect AGs to be responsive to strong consumer interests and to participate in cases with severe infractions. Additionally, whether it is for public interest or electoral goals, AGs should be attracted to cases that promise bigger settlements. My analysis of each state's decision to join each of 172 multi-state lawsuits filed and settled between 1989 and 2002 provides support for each of these hypotheses.