Congressional Roll-call Voting Research Articles

Decentralizing Pork: Congressional Roll-Call Voting, Decentralized Administration, and Distributive Politics

Congress packages pork-barrel spending in complicated proposals that belie theories of distributive politics. We theorize that roll-call voting on such bills depends on grant programs’ administrative centralization, party ties with presidents or home-state governors, and differences in geographic representation between chambers. Analyzing votes between 1973-2010 using a within-legislator strategy reveals that House members are less likely to support decentralized spending when they are co-partisans with presidents, while senators support decentralization regardless of such party ties. When House members or senators share affiliation with only governors or with neither chief executive, the likelihood of support rises with decentralization.

The two faces of congressional roll-call voting

Most analyses of congressional voting, whether theoretical or empirical, treat all roll-call votes in the same way. We argue that such approaches mask considerable variation in voting behaviour across different types of votes. In examining all roll-call votes in the U.S. House of Representatives from the 93rd to the 110th Congresses (1973–2008), we find that the forces affecting legislators’ voting on procedural and final passage matters have exhibited important changes over time, with differences between these two vote types becoming larger, particularly in recent congresses. These trends have important implications not only on how we study congressional voting behaviour, but also in how we evaluate representation and polarization in the modern Congress.

Protest and Congressional Behavior: Assessing Racial and Ethnic Minority Protests in the District

Although minority protest is often characterized as an effective form of political participation, previous research has been unsuccessful in establishing a direct link between protest activity and congressional support for minority interests. However, the shortcoming of the existing literature is related to an analytical focus at the aggregate level, where only the passage of congressional legislation and national-level protest events are considered. By linking district-level minority protest actions to individual roll-call votes on race, I hypothesize that minority activism can indicate constituency preferences and inform legislators’ votes. This analytical approach provides a more nuanced understanding of the influence that citizens’ behavior has on congressional policy. Using protest data and congressional roll-call votes from the 87th to the 101st Congress, the empirical analysis demonstrates that representatives are attuned to the social conditions of their district and use minority protest as an informative cue that shapes their congressional voting behavior.

A Sparse Factor Analytic Probit Model for Congressional Voting Patterns

Summary The paper adapts sparse factor models for exploring covariation in multivariate binary data, with an application to measuring latent factors in US Congressional roll-call voting patterns. This straightforward modification provides two advantages over traditional factor analysis of binary data. First, a sparsity prior can be used to assess the evidence that a given factor loading may be exactly 0, realizing a principled unification of exploratory and confirmatory factory analysis. Second, incorporating sparsity into existing factor analytic probit models effects a favourable bias–variance trade-off in estimating the covariance matrix of the multivariate Gaussian latent variables. Posterior summaries from this model applied to the roll-call data provide novel metrics of partisanship of a given Senate.

Environmental Constituent Interest, Green Electricity Policies, and Legislative Voting

Research in political economy has traditionally sought to disentangle the effects of legislative ideology and constituent interest in explaining policy decisions. Frequently, proxy variables are used to measure constituent interest. However, these measures do not adequately reflect true constituent interest, which is based upon the costs and benefits of the policies under consideration, incorporating the scope of the policies. Using Haiku, a detailed model of the US electricity sector, and TAF, an integrated assessment model of pollution pathways and valuation, I construct economic measures of constituent interest at the state level as well as for federal policy. I then use these measures to analyze state adoption of more stringent green electricity policies and congressional roll-call voting on federal environmental policy. Previous studies that use proxy measures of constituent interest typically find that the legislator ideology matters more, while my study shows that both ideology and constituent interest are significant factors.

What Drives US Immigration Policy? Evidence from Congressional Roll Call Votes

Immigration is one of the most hotly debated policy issues in the United States today. Despite marked divergence of opinions within political parties, several important immigration reforms were introduced in the post 1965 era. The purpose of this paper is to systematically analyze the drivers of congressional voting behavior on immigration policy during the period 1970-2006, and in particular, to assess the role of economic factors at the district level. Our findings provide robust evidence that representatives of more skilled labor abundant constituencies are more likely to support an open immigration policy concerning unskilled labor. Thus, a simple factor-proportions-analysis model provides useful insights regarding the policy making process on one of the most controversial facets of globalization.

What Drives U.S. Immigration Policy? Evidence from Congressional Roll Call Votes

Immigration is one of the most hotly debated policy issues in the United States today. Despite marked divergence of opinions within political parties, several important immigration reforms were introduced in the post 1965 era. The purpose of this paper is to systematically analyze the drivers of congressional voting behavior on immigration policy during the period 1970-2006, and in particular, to assess the role of economic factors at the district level. Our findings provide robust evidence that representatives of more skilled labor abundant constituencies are more likely to support an open immigration policy concerning unskilled labor. Thus, a simple factor-proportions-analysis model provides useful insights regarding the policy making process on one of the most controversial facets of globalization.

Commentary on Welch's Early and Important Work Separating Out the Effects of Constituency and Campaign Contributions on Congressional Roll-Call Votes

Writing mote than 20 years ago, W. P. Welch used a probit model to attempt to isolate the effect of campaign contributions on roll-call from other influences like the legislator's constituency, party, and ideology. The literature on the relationship between campaign contributions and legislative votes is extensive, with often-inconsistent findings. It is typically the case contributions from interested groups are correlated with roll-call favorable to the contributor's interests. Studies include a wider range of variables find this relationship is so simple. Interest groups contribute to members who are already often predisposed to support their position. If the group has a local presence, then members may be with the group because of constituency pressures. Party and ideology also must be factored into the analysis (Ansolabehere, Figueiredo, and Snyder 2003; Chin 2005; Roscoe and Jenkins 2005; Wawro 2001). Welch's (1982) article presents a conceptual framework in which to consider the of campaign contributions from an interested group votes by legislators on past or future legislation. Welch links this transaction to what he labels exchange theory. His framework includes assumptions were well grounded in the understanding of congressional elections and campaign finance at the time. His overall conclusion was although contributions are significant, they were the least important determinant of legislative voting (Welch 1982, 493). What other determinants were more important? He finds variables like dairy production (a measure of constituency interest), ideology, and party are all stronger predictors of the vote on milk price supports than campaign contributions. Welch's article is cited in sociology, economics, and political science journals. While this essay will explain its central argument about the relative influence of campaign contributions on roll-call votes and vice versa, it is also the case Welch is frequently cited in studies of legislative behavior, interest groups (especially agricultural groups), and, more broadly, about campaign finance. Context of Welch's Article The conventional wisdom that interest groups 'buy' influence by contributing to political motivates Welch's analysis (Welch 1982,487). At the time of publication, the issue of campaign contributions from interest groups had become more salient because of the Watergate investigation of a botched burglary of the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate Complex in Washington, D.C. The investigation had uncovered large illegal contributions to the Committee to Reelect the President (CREP) during the 1972 election cycle (Corrado and Mann et al. 1997,283). Watergate galvanized Congress to reform the way federal elections are financed. New regulations in the form of a set of 1974 amendments to the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) imposed contribution and spending limitations, mandated disclosure, and established an enforcement agency, the Federal Election Commission (FEC), to over see the new regulations. Welch indirectly mentions FECA in his opening paragraph when he states the public belief interest groups buy influence is a reason for Congress either publicly to finance congressional campaigns or to place a limit on the amount of monies a candidate may receive from political action committees (Welch 1982, 178). While Welch finds only modest independent effects campaign contributions, in his words not a major influence, he does find those who received contributions in the 1974 election cycle were more likely to vote higher milk-price supports in 1975. Similarly, those who voted with the milk producers in 1975 were more likely to receive contributions from the Dairy PAC during the 1976 election cycle. Consistent with what we know about legislative specialization and interest-group behavior, he finds contributions to the Agriculture Committee members were higher, other things being equal. …

Interest group PAC contributions and the 1992 regulation of cable television

The literature concerning political action committee (PAC) influence over congressional roll-call decisions offers mixed findings. Some studies find strong effects, others weak effects, while some detect no PAC impact on congressional roll-call voting. These mixed results imply that PAC influence might vary across contexts and perhaps interact with other variables. In this paper, we suggest that PAC influence might vary with two contexts. First, we hypothesize that PAC influence will vary with chamber, and in particular, PAC effects will be stronger in the House than in the Senate. Second, we hypothesize that PAC effects will be stronger in policy subsystems than at the macropolitical level. We test these hypotheses with the votes on the 1992 Cable Television Reregulation Act. The fact that both chambers twice voted upon identically worded bills, once for passage, once to override President Bush’s veto, allows us to construct a quasi-experimental design. Results of the analysis generally support our hypotheses. We conclude with some suggestions for future research on the linkage between interest groups, PAC contributions, and congressional policy making.

Selection and Influence: Interest Groups and Congressional Voting on Trade Policy

Studies of the effects of interest groups on congressional roll-call voting typically view party and ideology as competing factors and rely on a factoral model of interests or a sectoral model including only interest groups with a direct stake in the vote. We depart from that strategy in several ways. We define interest groups at the level of Standard Industrial Classification two-digit codes and observe the universe of interests. For 1979–90, we use measures of geographically and nongeographically based economic interests to estimate the representative's party and ideology. We also consider the factor endowments of individuals within a district to examine their impact on floor votes. We then investigate the influence of these interests on members' party affiliation and ideology, as well as a pool of five floor votes on foreign trade, using instrumental variables for party and ideology. Economic interests account for a substantial portion of the variance in all cases, and models that also include other explanatory variables are highly accurate in estimating floor votes.

Issue Evolution, Political Parties, and the Culture Wars

Using the issue evolution framework, our research examines partisan polarization on several culture war issues, including pornography, environment, gun control, and gay civil rights. We look for evidence of partisan polarization among political elites and citizens, as well as examine top-down versus bottom-up paths of influence among Republicans and Democrats. Data from the General Social Survey and congressional rollcall votes between 1970-1999 are analyzed. Our results suggest that although partisan elites have become increasingly polarized on culture war issues, mass partisans have not followed suit across all issues. Only on environmental and gun control issues do we find significant evidence of issue evolution, including a linkage between elite and mass opinion. We conclude that culture war issues may not be as prone to issue evolution as previous research has indicated, in part because these issues are not all equally salient to the mass public.

Southern Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives

This book focuses on southern Democratic behavior in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1973. During this period, southern Democratic Representatives have contributed substantially to the rise of partisanship in congressional policy making. Basing his analysis primarily on data from surveys and congressional roll-call votes, Stanley P. Berard compares the voting behaviors of southern Democratic House members to those of their constituents across many issues.Berard argues that the increasing similarity between southern and northern Democratic constituencies is not strictly the result of southern districts becoming more like northern districts. Rather, southern district electorates who support Democratic candidates and are politically active on their behalf have become more like activist northern Democratic constituents because the most conservative southerners support Democratic congressional candidates with diminishing frequency. Through this analysis, the book expands the theory of conditional party government, an important approach to the study of partisan behavior in the House.

The Effects of Party and Preferences on Congressional Roll-Call Voting

We assess the importance of parties in Congress by comparing roll-call voting behavior against the preferences of members of the House as expressed in surveys conducted during the 1996 and 1998 elections. The surveys were conducted by Project Vote Smart. Our findings support two key conclusions. First, both and preferences mattered in predicting roll-call behavior in the 103d, 104th, and 105th Congresses. Second, the independent effects of were present in only about 40% of roll calls. The incidence of effects was highest on close votes, procedural votes, and key party issues. It was lowest on matters of conscience, such as abortion, and off-the-first-dimension issues, such as affirmative action and gun control.

Concordance and Projection in Citizen Perceptions of Congressional Roll-Call Voting

Research on political cognition suggests that individuals absorb and retain more information consistent with their political predispositions than they do information at odds with those predispositions. When citizens view a member of Congress favorably, they should thus be more likely to recall that member's vote on a bill if it is in agreement with their own positions; additionally, if they do not recall, they will tend to assume that the member voted in accordance with their own preferences. When citizens view a representative negatively, the opposite patterns should obtain. Here, we find considerable evidence for both of these effects-concordance and projection. Attitude toward the representative and agreement on the issue substantially drive citizen perceptions of congressional roll-call voting.

A Further Look at Universalism and Partisanship in Congressional Roll Call Voting

This note extends Melissa P. Collie's “Universalism and the Parties in the U.S. House of Representatives, 1921–80,” American Journal of Political Science 32, 4 (November 1988): 865–883. Detecting a strongly negative correlation between the time series of universalism and partisanship in roll call votes for the 67th through 96th U.S. Houses, Collie concluded that consensus and partisanship are alternative, rival means of organizing legislative activity. If robust, this finding ought not to be time- or chamber-specific: it should be in evidence over the whole (partisan) histories of both House and Senate, session by session. Moreover, the inverse relationship should persist under alternative operationalizations of both partisanship and universalism. Using several measures of partisanship and universalism, mostly based on roll call votes tabulated for sessions of Congress, we reassess this relationship for the 43rd through 105th Congresses. Collie's core finding persists for both chambers over the longer time span provided that one uses her measures. But results are weaker when sessions of Congress rather than Congresses are used as units of observation, and alternative operationalizations of partisanship and universalism do not strongly replicate the original finding.

Estimating Party Influence in Congressional Roll-Call Voting

This article develops and implements a simple procedure to estimate the extent to which party influences roll-call voting in the U.S. Congress. We find strong evidence of party influence in both the House and the Senate, in virtually all congresses over the period 1871-1998. We do not find any large, systematic differences in influence between the House and Senate. Over the post-war period, party influence in the House occurs especially often on key procedural votes-the rule on a bill, motions to cut off debate, and motions to recommit. In terms of substantive issues, party influence appears most frequently on budget resolutions, tax policy, social security, social welfare policy, and the national debt limit, while it is relatively rare on moral and religious issues and civil rights, and entirely absent on issues such as gun control. On some issues, such as agriculture, public works, and nuclear energy, party influence has varied dramatically over the period we study.

Examining the Bonding Effects of Party: A Comparative Analysis of Roll-Call Voting in the U.S. and Confederate Houses

This paper examines whether political parties influence Congressional roll-call voting. Rather than focusing on contemporary evidence, my approach is historical: analyzing voting behavior in the U.S. and Confederate Houses during the Civil War. The U.S. and Confederate cases provide a unique opportunity for a comparative analysis because the two legislative systems were nearly identical in all facets, except that a strong two-party system was in place in the U.S. while a party system did not exist in the Confederacy. Thus, using vote-scaling techniques developed by Poole and Rosenthal (1985, 1991, 1997), I examine how roll-call voting in a party system (the U.S. House) differs from roll-call voting in a similar nonparty system (the Confederate House). My results indicate that voting in the U.S. House was considerably more predictable than voting in the Confederate House. Moreover, from additional tests, I conclude that these voting differences were due not to differences in the structure of preferences, but rather to the existence (or nonexistence) of political parties. In the U.S. House, party had a significant, independent effect on vote choice, after controlling for members' personal preferences. No such effect existed in the party-less Confederate House.

Ideology, economic interests, and congressional roll-call voting: Partisan instability and Bank of the United States legislation, 1811-1816

We introduce a wrinkle into the study of Congressional roll-call voting by focusing on a period of partisan instability in American History: the Era of Good Feelings. During deviations from normal periods of two-party rule, the dominant model of voting behavior, the ideological model, loses precision in correctly classifying individual votes. We contend that a “pooled” voting model – comprised of both ideological and economic variables – performs better than the basic ideological model during these unstable periods. When party mechanisms no longer constrain or structure actions, we believe the “electoral connection” is especially important, and, thus, economic-based constituency factors must be included in models of vote choice. To explore this belief, we focus on a particularly contentious issue – the rechartering of the Bank of the United States (BUS) – which was dealt with before and after a partisan decomposition occurred in the House. Using measures developed by Poole and Rosenthal (1985, 1997), we find that the vote on the First BUS in 1811, during a stable partisan period, is organized along ideological lines. By 1816, the two-party system collapsed, and we do not find the vote on the Second BUS to exhibit much ideological structure. Conversely, we find that our pooled model predicts the vote on the Second BUS quite well, providing a substantial improvement in fit over the basic ideological classification.

Possession is Nine Points of the Law: The Political Economy of Early Public Land Disposal

Early federal policies for disposal of public lands underwent significant changes in the first 40 years of their existence. Though the first policies established around 1800 called for sales of public lands based on competitive auction bidding, by the 1830s this system had been importantly supplanted by the policy of preemption, which legitimated the claims of squatters and freed them from competition for their lands. This paper examines the political economy of public land disposal from 1789 to 1830 and documents how squatters helped bring about this policy change: both by disrupting the operation of the auction system and by applying political pressure for favorable land policies. The paper also reports the results of an econometric analysis of congressional roll-call voting which provides insight into the nature of the political coalitions that formed in support of passage of the first general preemption act of 1830.

WHAT CAN WE LEARN ABOUT CONGRESSIONAL POLITICS FROM DIMENSIONAL STUDIES OF ROLL-CALL VOTING?

How many dimensions are there in Congressional roll-call votes? What do dimensions tell us about Congressional politics? Poole and Rosenthal have found one or a very few dimensions. Earlier work has identified problems with Poole and Rosenthal's dimensional fitting method. This paper finds additional problems, showing that when legislators’relative intensity of preferences varies across issues, the Poole and Rosenthal approach will fail. Specifically, while redistributive issues fit their model, distributive and regulative issues allow gains from trade, and thus vote-trading and coalition-building. Roll-call data show voting patterns inconsistent with the Poole and Rosenthal model.