The Myth of the Elite Cue: Influence of Voters' Preferences on the US Congress

Abstract

While various scholars of public opinion in the United States explain that the ideology of partisan legislators influences the preferences of partisan voters, the literature within the paradigm of represen tational politics maintains the reverse�that partisan voters� ideology affects legislators� voting preferences. By employing Vector Autoregression analysis, this article examines whether changes in the preferences of US Congress members lead to changes in the ideology of partisan voters, or vice versa. The findings indicate that the legislators� ideology in the House or Senate has no impact on the preferences of partisan voters as measured by the ANES seven-point ideology scale. Rather, Democratic voters� ideological shift influences the change in Democratic members� preferences in both the Senate and the House. However, Republican voters do not exert equivalent influence on GOP legislators.