scholarly journals Institutional Variation and Political Career Patterns: A Look at the Influence of Chamber Size in State Legislatures

2008 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 49-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Winburn
Keyword(s):  
State Legislatures ◽  
Term Limits ◽  
The State ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Ambition ◽  
Conventional View ◽  
Institutional Variation ◽  
State Legislative ◽  
Chamber Size

State legislators routinely run for the state Senate after having served in the state House; however, this rarely occurs in the other order. Do members simply look to move up based on the conventional view of the political ambition ladder? Alternatively, do institutional reasons exist that make the Senate the preferred chamber? I examine the differences between the state legislative chambers and discuss institutional reasons why members may prefer the Senate to the House. Overall, I find chamber size is an important intra-institutional variable in explaining this variation along with the professionalism of the legislatures and term limits.

State Conformity with Federal Tax Changes

2010 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 27-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michaele Morrow ◽  
Robert Ricketts
Keyword(s):  
Federal Government ◽  
Generalized Estimating Equations ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
Estimating Equations ◽  
The State ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
Factors Associated ◽  
Tax Legislation ◽  
Tax Changes ◽  
State Legislative

ABSTRACT: We examine the decisions by state legislatures to conform to or decouple from federal tax legislation. We use a generalized estimating equations (GEE) approach to estimate the parameters of a model of factors associated with the state legislative decisions to conform their own tax systems to accommodate 11 federal tax reductions implemented between 2002 and 2008. Our model predicts that state legislators consider political, budgetary, and ease of compliance factors when considering whether to adopt federal tax changes into their own states’ tax codes. Our results are generally consistent with expectations, identifying several factors that are associated with the probability that a state will incorporate revenue-reducing tax changes implemented by the federal government. Our results also suggest that although state legislators appear to value conformity with the tax initiatives of the federal government, given rising budgetary pressures, state conformity with such legislation is likely to decrease in coming years.

Part III Structure of State Government, 9 The State Legislative Branch

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Williams Robert F
Keyword(s):  
State Government ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
The State ◽  
State Constitutions ◽  
The People ◽  
Legislative Branch ◽  
State Legislative

This chapter discusses the fact that state constitutions create a legislative branch that is substantially different from the federal Congress. Most importantly, state legislatures exercise reserved, plenary power subject only to limitations in the state or federal Constitutions. The federal Congress, by contrast, exercises enumerated, delegated power. In addition, the state legislatures are subject to a variety of limitations on the process of lawmaking that are contained in state constitutions. The chapter discusses the variety of approaches to judicial enforcement of these procedural limitations. Finally, in a number of states, the state legislature's lawmaking power is shared with the people, who can enact or defeat laws through direct democracy, or the initiative and referendum processes.

scholarly journals Lifetime Term Limits: The Impact on Four State Legislatures

2005 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 305-320 ◽  
Author(s):  
Priscilla L. Southwell ◽  
Eric A. Lindgren ◽  
Ryan A. Smith
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
The United States ◽  
Term Limits ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
Logit Analysis ◽  
Roll Call ◽  
Party Leadership ◽  
Full Effect ◽  
The Impact

This research examines the roll call voting record of state legislators in Arkansas, California, Michigan, and Missouri in order to assess if there are any substantive differences between those legislators who are nearing retirement due to term limits (“last term” legislators) and those legislators who are at an earlier stage of their legislative careers. These are the only four states in the United States that have lifetime term limits in full effect. Binomial logit analysis of key roll call votes suggests that these “last term” legislators stand apart from their other colleagues on certain issues. This characteristic arises from the increased tendency of last-term legislators to defy the party leadership, albeit on a limited number of bills. This “independent streak” of last-term legislators is even more pronounced among Republican legislators, although this effect is not present in the state of California. Therefore, term limits appear to have a modest, but potentially significant effect on the policy preferences of legislators.

Sub-constituencies and Legislative Responsiveness: Evidence from the States

2018 ◽  
Vol 72 (2) ◽  
pp. 473-487
Author(s):  
Jillian Jaeger
Keyword(s):  
Political Party ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
State Level ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Legislative Behavior ◽  
Roll Call ◽  
Level Data ◽  
Congressional Behavior ◽  
Level Of Analysis

This article tests whether theories of congressional behavior that link legislative responsiveness to the preferences of sub-constituencies at the expense of party preferences apply to the state level. Using ten years of state-level data and roll-call data from nearly 4,000 individual votes on E-Verify legislation, I examine the competing influences of party and constituency preferences on legislative behavior. The results confirm that state legislatures/legislators are responsive to sub-constituencies, but find that responsiveness plays out in different ways depending on the level of analysis and the political party and constituents in question. These results have important implications for our understanding of legislative representation: because responsiveness to sub-constituencies can yield policy results that are antithetical to stated party goals, what appears to be collective irresponsibility from a party may actually be individual legislators striving to be responsive to those constituents that they anticipate will hold them accountable.

Party as Gatekeeper

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wendy J. Schiller ◽  
Charles Stewart
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
State Legislature ◽  
Washington State ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
The Political ◽  
Senate Elections ◽  
Party Leaders ◽  
Pressure State

This chapter analyzes the role of the party as a gatekeeper to running for U.S. Senate and delves more deeply into the role of the political party as an organization in the state legislature. It measures the function of partisanship in structuring the organization of state legislatures as well as examines how partisanship influenced the dynamics of Senate elections. It explains the role of party caucuses in the nomination and election stages of indirect elections; shows how party leaders identified and rallied around Senate candidates; and identifies the set of incentives that party leaders used to pressure state legislators to back their preferred Senate candidate. Furthermore, it discusses how candidates for U.S. Senate tried to consolidate support among key party leaders, and how regional party factionalism made that task more difficult. To illustrate these behaviors, the chapter includes case studies from a range of years and states, including New York, Kentucky, Washington State, Florida, and Illinois.

Redemption and Exile

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Harper
Keyword(s):  
North Carolina ◽  
Political Power ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
The Political ◽  
Racial Justice ◽  
Organized Violence ◽  
Biblical Narratives ◽  
Self Defense

This chapter offers a in-depth case study to describe how black southerners reconciled their hopes forged at emancipation with the collapse of Reconstruction. After a brief moment of political power and progress, black leaders in North Carolina watched as their political enemies regained control of state legislatures and used organized violence to suppress black voting and education. Across the South, black Protestants turned to different biblical narratives to make sense of these setbacks while still maintaining a belief that emancipation foreshadowed God’s plans for a coming era of racial justice. In 1870, North Carolina’s black state legislators used Queen Esther’s story of Jewish persecution in exile to interpret their setbacks as temporary and to suggest specific strategies, including armed self-defense, for living as a minority in a hostile land. Without paying attention to the particulars of these exile stories, historians misinterpret the political aims of black leaders.

Do Term Limits Affect Legislative Roll Call Voting? Representation, Polarization, and Participation

2007 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 256-280 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald C. Wright
Keyword(s):  
Nationwide Survey ◽  
Term Limits ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
Roll Call ◽  
Roll Call Voting ◽  
Party Polarization ◽  
Legislative Activity ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Direct Measures ◽  
State Legislative

In a nationwide survey Carey, Niemi, Powell, and Moncrief (2006) found that term-limited state legislators feel less constrained by their constituencies. I use direct measures of legislative activity to examine how this “Burkean shift” in attitudes is manifested in roll-call behavior. With a new dataset consisting of all competitive state legislative roll calls for the 1999–2000 sessions and a new measure of district constituency preferences, I examine three hypotheses: that term-limited legislators are less representative of their constituents, are more polarized, and participate less in roll-call voting. I find no evidence that term-limited legislators are any less representative, and no differences in levels of party polarization appear associated with the term limits reform. I find that the impact of term limits on roll-call voting is manifested in decreased legislative effort, but this effect only appears in the more demanding legislatures. The results are consistent with the sorting model in which elections are reasonably efficient at selecting leaders whose preferences align with those of their districts, but the prospect of re-election has little role in achieving representation of constituents' ideological preferences.

State Legislative Process

2022 ◽  
pp. 24-51
Keyword(s):  
State Legislatures ◽  
The United States ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
Legislative Behavior ◽  
Legislative Process ◽  
Social Differences ◽  
Party Control ◽  
Urban Rural ◽  
Change State ◽  
State Legislative

This chapter explores the history and operation of state legislatures. The urban-rural divide characterizes stark political and social differences that fuel legislative behavior. The content of public policies across the United States is influenced by these divisions and contributes to either the support of or opposition to social change. State legislators are on the front lines of these geographic ideological divides. These variations by region contribute to the increase in single-party control and have generated pronounced policy differences.

A Theory of Indirect Election

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wendy J. Schiller ◽  
Charles Stewart
Keyword(s):  
Voter Turnout ◽  
State Legislatures ◽  
State Legislators ◽  
Policy Outcomes ◽  
Four Dimensions ◽  
Business Interests ◽  
Party Organizations ◽  
Legislative Choice ◽  
Key Participants ◽  
State Legislative

This chapter analyzes the indirect elections of U.S. senators in state legislatures within a broader theoretical framework of how parties interact with institutional and electoral settings to affect electoral and policy outcomes. It identifies key participants in Senate campaigns during this period—candidates for U.S. Senate, business interests, political party organizations, and state legislators—and constructs a model for how these stakeholders interacted with each other within the structure of legislative choice for U.S. senator along four dimensions—candidate identification, candidate nomination, election criteria, and system responsiveness. It also discusses how an anticipated indirect Senate election might have affected voter turnout in the preceding state legislative election.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wendy J. Schiller ◽  
Charles Stewart
Keyword(s):  
State Legislatures ◽  
The State ◽  
Political Ambition ◽  
Seventeenth Amendment ◽  
Direct Elections

This introductory chapter sets out the book's purpose, which is to examine the dynamics of indirect elections and assess the consequences of the switch to direct elections with the adoption of the Seventeenth Amendment. In the broadest terms, it aims to assess the extent to which the goals of the Seventeenth Amendment—empowering voters in the choice of U.S. senators, and reducing the corrosive effects of money and party machine power—have been met. In so doing, it provides a new opportunity to understand electoral design, legislatures, parties, and political ambition. In particular, the book examines the election of U.S. senators from 1871 to 1913 based on where those elections occurred: the state legislatures. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.

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