Black-Latino Political Relationships: Policy Voting in the U.S. House of Representatives

Abstract

Political relations between racial/ethnic groups in America have (a) been commonly examined in terms of the degree of “cooperation” or “conflict” and (b) have most frequently been studied in the arena of urban politics; this has been especially so in the case of Hispanics/Latinos and African Americans. This article represents the first effort to pose and to systematically assess the question of inter—minority group relations in Congress by examining roll call behavior in the U.S. House of Representatives. Using Black and Latino interest group ratings and associated roll call votes from the 104th to 108th Congresses as indicators of Black and Latino interests, we show that Black representatives have voting records very supportive of the most salient concerns of Latinos and that Latino representatives have voting records at least modestly supportive of the most salient concerns of Blacks. At minimum, the findings suggest that Black and Latino representatives support the “other” group at the same level (or higher) than party affiliation alone would suggest and also indicate an absence of conflict that is found in local-level studies.