What Is so Special about Special Elections?

Gaddie, Ronald Keith; Bullock, Charles S.; Buchanan, Scott

doi:10.2307/440302

Cited by 11 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 4 publications

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“…In reference to contests for the U.S. House of Representatives, Gaddie, Bullock, and Buchanan (1999) posed the question, What Is So Special About Special Elections? The answer appears to be "little," as their analysis demonstrates that special election outcomes are affected by the same factors that influence the results of open-seat contests held on the normal election calendar.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Running on Their Own

King

1999

American Politics Quarterly

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Senators who first reach office by gubernatorial appointment are successful at the polls at half the rate of incumbents in general. Outcomes of elections featuring appointed senators are affected by the incumbent's voting record in the Senate, the divisiveness of the primary, state partisanship, the size of the state, national political conditions, and the quality of the challenger. This last factor is the key to understanding the anomaly, as appointed senators face higher quality challengers than do senators who first gain office through the electoral process.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Running on Their Own

King

1999

American Politics Quarterly

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“…This indirect effect is greater for economic performance because it is less volatile than presidential approval. Several studies have found candidate quality helps explain U.S. legislative election outcomes (Ban, Llaudet, and Snyder 2016; Carson, Engstrom, and Roberts 2007; Carson and Sievert 2017; Gaddie, Bullock, and Buchanan 1999; Geras 2018).…”

Section: Midterm Election Seat Lossmentioning

confidence: 99%

Party does not matter: Unified government and midterm elections

Holt

2022

Social Science Quarterly

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Objective: This article seeks to understand the effect unified government has on seat loss in midterm elections. Methods: Using data from the 1950 to 2018 midterm elections, I use Ordinary Least Squares regression models to determine the effect of unified government on seat loss. Results: I find that unified government increases the number of seats a president's party loses during a midterm election. In addition, unified government reduces the number of seats saved by presidential approval and increases surge and decline effects. Conclusion: Unified government explains why Democrats have traditionally performed worse during midterm elections. The results also indicate that rather than a surge and decline, midterm elections are a counter-surge to the surge in support the president's party receives in the previous presidential election.

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“…Could endogeneity pose a problem for our analysis? Politicians are strategic (Fenno 1978;hall and van houweling 1995;Jacobson 1989;Jacobson and Kernell 1983;mayhew 1974), and Cox and Katz (2002) have documented that both incumbents and would-be challengers strategically enter and exit the electoral arena. thus, many special elections could arise because legislators strategically resign, anticipating loss in the next general election.…”

Section: Data and Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Special Elections to the U.S. House of Representatives: A General Election Barometer?

Smith¹,

Brunell

2010

Legislative Studies Qtrly

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Vacancies in the U.S. House of Representatives are filled using special elections. These elections occur off the usual American electoral cycle, and their results are routinely portrayed by the American mass media as indications of what to expect in the next general election. We examined the predictive power of special elections results with respect to the general election outcomes for the U.S. House of Representatives from 1900 to 2008. We found that special elections that yield a change in partisan control do have predictive power regarding general election results.

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What Is so Special about Special Elections?

Cited by 11 publications

References 4 publications

Running on Their Own

Running on Their Own

Party does not matter: Unified government and midterm elections

Special Elections to the U.S. House of Representatives: A General Election Barometer?

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