Agency Problems, the 17th Amendment, and Representation in the Senate

Gailmard, Sean; Jenkins, Jeffery A.

doi:10.1111/j.1540-5907.2009.00373.x

Cited by 46 publications

(50 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…Regardless of their original patterns, senators in the immediate post-Seventeenth Amendment period expressed more party loyalty in roll-call voting as their state's support for their party increased. This result augments existing findings on ideological responsiveness (Bernhard and Sala 2006;Gailmard and Jenkins 2006), suggesting heightened responsiveness to mass preferences after direct election. (7) 68.00 (7) Prob.…”

Section: Party Unitysupporting

confidence: 88%

Institutional Change and the Electoral Connection in the Senate

Meinke

2007

Political Research Quarterly

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The author argues that direct election intensified existing electoral incentives in the early-twentieth-century Senate, shifting the audience for senators' reelection efforts with measurable behavioral consequences. The author examines patterns of bill sponsorship, roll-call participation, and party voting in the decades surrounding the Seventeenth Amendment's ratification, a time when originally elected and originally selected senators served side by side. The author finds evidence of increased sponsorship and participation among originally elected senators. Comparing behavioral patterns before and after the constitutional amendment also reveals other important behavioral shifts toward a mass audience in the postamendment period, including a tendency to increase constituency bill sponsorship immediately before reelection and a strengthening of the link between state partisanship and senators' party support voting.

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Section: Party Unitysupporting

confidence: 88%

Institutional Change and the Electoral Connection in the Senate

Meinke

2007

Political Research Quarterly

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“…To explore this issue we turn our gaze away from our data concerning the electoral contest in 1868 A similar question is asked in recent work done on a different context by Gailmard and Jenkins (2009). They analyze roll-call behavior of US senators prior to and after the introduction of the 17th Amendment.…”

Section: Long Run Effects Of the Reformmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Political Consequences of Franchise Extension: Evidence from the Second Reform Act

Berlinski

Dewan

2011

QJPS

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Abstract. We use evidence from the Second Reform Act, introduced in the United Kingdom in 1867, to analyze the impact on electoral outcomes of extending the vote to the unskilled urban population. Exploiting the sharp change in the electorate caused by franchise extension, we separate the effect of reform from that of underlying constituency level traits correlated with the voting population. Although we find that the franchise affected electoral competition and candidate selection, there is no evidence relating Liberal electoral support to changes in the franchise rules. Our results are robust to various sources of endogeneity. 4 From a political science perspective, however, a critical element of the link between franchise extension and policy outcomes is missing. In particular we know little about the political mechanism that relates changes in the franchise to the growth of government. In principle, policy changes caused by franchise extension could arise due to several 4 At the same time the link between franchise reform and fiscal policy appears not to be direct: show a non-monotonic relationship between franchise extension and the probability of adopting income tax; Lindert (1994), assesses the impact of variation in electoral rules across countries and finds little evidence that social spending increased before 1920; Scheve and Stasavage (2008) show tax rates were flat during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, rising sharply as countries mobilized for war; and Aidt and Jensen (2009) and Husted and Kenny (1997) show that institutional tax raising capacity is an important conditioning variable.

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“…Still, prior to the XVII Amendment in 1913, after which all Senators were directly elected, such electoral pressures were muted (Gailmard and Jenkins 2009;Lapinski 2004;Meinke 2008). Senators had greater cause to expand congressional power back then.…”

Section: Figure 1 Cases Of Congressional Assertiveness 1789-2001mentioning

confidence: 96%

When Congress Asserts Itself: Examining Legislative Challenges to Executive Power

Taylor¹

2012

The Forum

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This article presents a unique dataset of 72 cases from across American history in which Congress asserts itself in its relationship with the executive. Patterns suggest that assertiveness occurs in clusters pulled together by a unifying theme, such as Congress' response to the Civil War and Cold War. Much of this is in direct response to executive antagonism and perceived abuse of power. The House tends to be the more assertive body in the early part of American history, the Senate more so today. Quantitative analyses show divided party control to best explain House assertiveness. By contrast, the Senate is generally assertive when member policy preferences are homogeneous and turnover is low. It also frequently pushes back against popular presidents. Both bodies assert themselves when their legislative workload is high.

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Agency Problems, the 17th Amendment, and Representation in the Senate

Cited by 46 publications

References 36 publications

Institutional Change and the Electoral Connection in the Senate

Institutional Change and the Electoral Connection in the Senate

The Political Consequences of Franchise Extension: Evidence from the Second Reform Act

When Congress Asserts Itself: Examining Legislative Challenges to Executive Power

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