Racial Redistricting and Ideological Polarization in Southern U.S. House Delegations

Abstract

This study consists of an analysis of representation from southern states to determine if the creation of majority‐minority districts resulted in more ideologically polarized southern U.S. House delegations. Descriptive statistics and regression analysis of Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) scores indicate that the standard deviation of ADA scores are larger in the eight states that engaged in racial redistricting. The influx of conservative Republicans and African‐American Democrats in 1992 created the more polarized patterns. Polarization was still present after the 1996 elections, although the redistricting effect was muted as other southern states picked up Republican representatives after both the 1994 election and Louisiana's substantial modification of one of its black majority districts prior to the 1996 election. Racial redistricting would seem to make centrist coalition building more difficult, but in some states it also weakens the increasingly conservative voting patterns experienced by most of the South in the 1990s.