Congressional Elections

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Congressional Elections

• Part 1 Recruitment and funding

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Who becomes a candidate?

• People typically nominate themselves
• Aspirants encounter natl networks of
  parties/interests
• Recruiting begins 1.5-2 yrs before election
• To recruit new talent and keep incumbents from
  retiring
• GOPAC founded 1979, to fund candidates at state
  level
• Gingrich took over in 1980s, goal to win House
  majority
• Developed/packaged conservative issues through
  use of surveys/audiotapes/focus groups/grassroots
  mobilization/etc.
• GOPAC credited as key catalyst of Republican
  Revolution of 1994 (first GOP congress in four
  decades and record number of governorships put in
  Republican hands).
• Widely imitated DLC and Green Party

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November 16, 2003 WASHINGTON, D.C. With hopes
of winning back Congress someday, a new liberal
political action committee has been studying the
war plans of legendary conservative field marshal
Newt Gingrich. PROPAC, as the group is called,
aims to pour 2.6 million over the next year into
recruiting and training left-leaning candidates
at the grass-roots level -- the first step in a
long-range project to fill the pipeline with a
fresh supply of future winners. more
Welcome to GOPAC.org - the website for GOPAC, the
premier training organization for Republican
candidates for elected office. As GOPAC
chairman, I am committed to recruiting and
training outstanding new Republican candidates,
campaign staff, and activists nationwide - and
building a deeper farm team for our party at the
state and local levels. It's my strong belief
that by building a party for all Americans, we
will be a stronger America. Heading into the
2003 - 2004 election cycle, Republicans are
fortunate to have a Republican president in the
White House, and majorities in both houses of
congress - as well as a majority of governors in
the states read more
www.gopac.com
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Political Action Committees (PACS)

• A PAC is an account that gives interest groups a
  way to pool the resources of their members to
  support candidates for federal office, as opposed
  to supporting those candidates directly. PAC
  funds separate from groups funds.
• Corporations/contractors/labor unions cannot
  contribute directly to candidates
• Can spend unlimited amounts independently,
  without candidates cooperation or consent
• PAC can give 5000 to a candidate, 15,000 to
  party
• Political action committees were authorized by
  federal law in the 1970s
• Virtually all trade, professional and labor
  organizations have now created political action
  committees.

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Pacronym Full Name City/State ID
HALPAC Halliburton Company PAC Washington DC C00035691
HALPAC Halter Marine Group Inc. PAC Gulfport MS C00321802
HALPAC Help Americas Leaders PAC Washington DC C00376038
HALPAC Holland America Line Westours Inc. PAC Seattle WA C00287714
HAMPAC Smithfield Foods Inc. PAC Washington DC C00359075
HAPAC Health Alliance of PA PAC (American Hospital Association) Harrisburg PA C00128082
HARLEYPAC Harley-Davidson Inc. PAC Milwaukee WI C00224725
HBCU HBCU/PAC (No sponsoring/connected/affiliated organization) Washington DC C00305839
www.fec.gov
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Incumbent Advantage

• Since WWII, 93 incumbents reelected in House,
  80 in Senate
• Relatively recent phenomenon. Why?
• House members get 1m a year in perks, Senators 2m
  (staff, travel, office, franking, own subway car,
  etc.)
• 1973 estimate 476m pieces of mail, 38.1m
• The quality of challengers (direction of
  causality?)

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Incumbents electorally useful activities

• Advertising
• Brand name. Emphasize experience, knowledge,
  responsiveness, concern, sincerity, independence,
  
• Done largely at public expense (franking
  privilege)
• Credit Claiming
• Traffic in particularized benefits
• Given to specific group, by congressman
• Given in ad hoc fashion (unlike SS checks), so
  apparent congressman had direct hand in it
• Position Taking
• Public enunciation of judgmental statement on
  anything of interest
• Speaker rather than doer position itself is
  commodity

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Nominating process

• Candidates for general election usually selected
  through partisan primaries (ex. Louisiana)
• Closed primaries only voters registered with a
  party can vote in its primary
• Open primaries voters can vote in either partys
  primary (but only one)
• Blanket primaries voters can vote in primary for
  one candidate for each office, regardless of party

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California Democratic Party et. al. v. Jones
(2000)

• Democrat, Republican, Libertarian and Peace
  Freedom parties challenged blanket primary in
  court as violating 1st Amendment right to free
  association
• In no area is the political associations right
  to exclude more important than in the process of
  selecting its candidates -Scalia
• Louisiana employs nonpartisan primary, with
  runoff system

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Money

• Average Senate race 3.6m, House race 667,000
• In close House races, winners spent 1.5m on
  average
• This is not counting independent efforts of
  interest groups
• More expensive now because less party involvement
• Direct primaries whereas before candidates chosen
  by party leaders in a caucus
• Volunteers used to mobilize voters, now TV ads,
  mail, etc.

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Campaign Finance

• Federal Election Campaign Amendments of 1974
• Limits on individual contributions, group
  contributions, reporting requirements
• Buckley v. Valeo (1976) ruled that Congress may
  not limit expenditures by candidates themselves,
  campaign committees, or independent groups
• Treated spending as protected free speech

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Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002McConnell
v. Federal Election CommissionUpheld 5-4 on Dec
10, 2003

• Hard Money
• Individuals may contribute 2000 per candidate
  per election (primaries and general) totaling
  lt37.500. Can give lt57,000 to parties and PACS.
• PACS can give 5000 per candidate per election
  and 15,000 to a political party.
• Soft Money (for party building purposes, not
  supporting a specific candidate)
• New carpeting, office furniture
• Advertising urging voters to vote for that party
• Under bill, party committees cant accept or
  spend soft money

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More on BCRA

• State and local party organizations cant spend
  soft money on federal campaigns. May spend it on
  voter registration/mobilization
• Independent coordinated expenditures FEC must
  issue new rules to regulate spending by outside
  groups (rules not requiring formal evidence of
  coordination w. candidate)
• Tax-Exempt groups Natl parties cant solicit
  from or contribute to any nonprofit that spends
  money on federal elections
• Electioneering communications Ads now covered
  under campaign finance limits and disclosure
  requirements if aired 60 days before general
  election or 30 days before primary election.

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Interesting Point

• Court rejected the narrow justification for
  campaign finance laws used by opponents of
  finance reform that campaign finance
  regulations are only justifiable to curtail
  corruption that causes a change in legislative
  votes.
• Court argued soft money leads not only to a
  change in legislative votes, but to
  manipulations of the legislative calendar,
  leading to Congress' failure to enact, among
  other things generic drug legislation, tort
  reform, and tobacco legislation.
• To claim that such legislative scheduling
  actions do not change legislative outcomes, says
  the court, surely misunderstands the legislative
  process.

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Distinction between voting and agenda-setting

• Similar debate concerning whether political
  parties actually affect legislative outcomes
• No statistical difference between whether
  legislators vote according to preferences or out
  of party loyalty
• Distinction is not between how they vote, but
  what they vote on
• Court argued that soft money didnt influence
  votes in the House, but affected legislative
  scheduling, i.e. the type legislation brought to
  the floor

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Congress and ElectionsPart II Elections
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Elections as principal-agent problem

• Principal, or individual with authority,
  delegates some of that authority to agent to act
  on their behalf
• Division of labor
• Representative democracy type of delegation
• Problems arise because each agent motivated by
  self-interest
• Electoral systems can be assessed by their
  ability to mitigate these problems

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Types of problems facing voters

• Adverse selection Incomplete information
• Solution Openness and transparency, the media,
  political opposition
• Moral Hazard Imperfect monitoring
• Solution Same, and possibility of reelection,
  suffrage
• Problems with current system?
• Low turnout, inaccurate ballots, electoral
  college (in Pres. elections), special interest
  money

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Turnout

• Turnout extremely low in US, comparatively
• 50 Presidential elections, 30-40 Midterm
• Why?
• Demographic increases in Latinos, young people
• Citizens must initiate registration process
• We must vote more often
• Disaffection
• Rational abstention
• Levels actually exaggerated by VAP inaccuracies
  (actual estimate 52.7-60 )

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Riker Ordeshook (1968)

• Turnout explained by cost-benefit analysis
• Return (Benefit X Pivotal) - Cost
• Since pivotal term infinitesimally small,
  voting is irrational
• Civic duty? (RO later added to equation)
• Aldrich Candidates can share costs by helping
  citizens register and get to the polls explains
  higher turnout in close races

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The Midterm Effect

• Turnout 10-20 lower in midterm elections, and
  Presidents party has lost seats in all but 4
  since Civil War. Why?
• Surge and Decline (Campbell 1960)
• Coattails vanish in midterm (fewer moderate
  voters)
• Referendum hypothesis (Tufte 1975)
• Midterm a referendum on Pres. performance, and
  approval typically poor at midterm
• Part historical accident, partisan macroeconomics
• Not generally accepted

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• Presidential penalty (Erikson 1988)
• Voters more demanding of Presidents party,
  inclined to punish
• Negative voting (Kernell 1977)
• People more motivated to vote against than for,
  and Pres. party most salient
• Balancing (Erikson 1988, Alesina Rosenthal
  1988)
• Voters try to bring policy back to center
• Loss Aversion (Patty 2004)
• Negative turnout
• Turnout ? among those who like current
  administration

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Ballots and Ballot Reform

• Currently use the Australian Ballot, which lists
  all candidates for any office on each ballot
  (1890s)
• Replaced partisan ballots, printed by the parties
• Little secrecy in voting, since ballots
  distinctive
• Intimidation and bribery
• Format prevented split-ticket voting
• Ticket-splitting led to divided control of
  government

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Ballots from late 19th Century California
Republican
Taxpayers Union
Prohibition
Union
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Regular Republican
Regular Workingmens
Regular Cactus
Regular Democratic
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Ballot Reform

• Why doesn't everyone in the U.S. vote using the
  same technology?
• Constitutionally, elections in the United States
  are under the jurisdiction of state and local
  governments.
• Some states moving towards more uniformity in
  their voting systems
• Georgia implemented same touchscreen voting
  system in 2002 throughout the state.
• Not likely a single voting system will be used
  by all Americans in the near future.
• State decides which systems are certified,
  local governments pick from list of certified
  systems

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Which systems work best?

• Residual vote measure of voting system accuracy
• Ballots cast total - Ballots cast in
  particular race
• Residual vote captures overvotes and undervotes
• A good measure of accuracy?
• Exit polls show .5-1 voters didnt vote for
  president, while residual vote typically 2-2.5
• Massachusetts, Maryland residual lt1
• New Mexico, Illinois, SC residual gt3
• In some counties as high as 20-30

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Different Systems

• Punchcard
• Pre-scored and non-scored
• Most prone to high residual votes (_at_2.5)
• Optical Character Recognition (OCR)
• Centralized optical scanning
• Precinct-based optical scanning (better)
• Direct Recording Electronic (DRE)
• Touchscreen
• Both DRE and Touch. had residual rates of 2.3 in
  1998-2000

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Ballot Designs

• Example of Primacy Effect June 2001 Compton
  Mayoral runoff
• Clerk randomized names in primary, used same
  ranking in runoff
• Perrodin (listed 1st) beat Bradley (the
  incmubent) by 261 votes
• On basis of expert testimony, Court threw out
  runoff results and reinstated Bradley as mayor
• In CA Each election cycle S.O.S issues
  randomized alphabet
• Stateside, rotation occurs across 80 districts
• Legislative, list utilized for whole district
  (unless it cuts across county lines)

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Voting Instructions

• Instructions developed mostly by election
  administrators and system vendors
• 2001 L.A. mayoral election Got Chad?
• Votomatic punchcard public service announcement
• Residuals decreased dramatically, esp. in
  nonwhite precincts
• Pictorial images?

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• Lost votes non-technology-related factors, such
  as problems with registration and polling place
  practices, making voters unable to cast ballots
• 4-6m votes estimated lost in 2000
• Provisional voting allows voters whose names are
  not on precinct registered voter roster to cast a
  ballot
• Ballot is sealed in an envelope, and voters
  information placed on envelope
• Information examined after the election and if
  mistake was made, ballot included in final
  tabulation
• After the 2002 passage of the Help America Vote
  Act' all states required to provide provisional
  voting

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Congress and Elections Part III Redistricting

• Gerrymander Conscious district line-drawing,
  done in order to maximize the number of
  legislative seats won by a party or group.
• Origin In 1811 Governor Elbridge Gerry of
  Massachusetts created a salamander-shaped
  district to help Democrats.

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• Techniques
• Packing Lines encompass as many friendly voters
  as possible -gt safe districts
• Cracking Dilutes partisan strength across
  districts to maximize seats won
• Types
• Partisan gerrymandering
• Pro-incumbent gerrymandering
• Racial gerrymanderingRacial gerrymandering and
  the VRA
• Racial Gerrymandering Drawing lines to help
  racial/ethnic minorities win legislative seats.

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• Voting Rights Act enacted in 1965
• Prohibited any voting qualifications or
  prerequisites
• Suspended any test or other device as a
  prerequisite
• Required 16 states to submit all changes in
  electoral laws to the Department of Justice
• Authorized appointment of federal registrars if
  local registrars continued to discriminate
• Amendments to the VRA in 1982 explicitly
  encouraged states to create majority-minority
  districts (to pack districts in order to elect
  minorities)

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• Packing -gt Democratic loss of South in 1990's.
• Paradox of Representation more minority
  lawmakers, but a more conservative House.Shaw v
  Reno (1993)
• After 1990 census, NC created two
  majority-minority districts that were
  approved by the DOJ. Whites sued.
• Court ruled non-minority citizens could sue over
  racial gerrymandering if district lines were so
  bizarre.

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• Miller v Johnson (1995)
• Court ruled race can't be predominant factor in
  drawing a district.
• Hunt v Cromartie (1999)
• Court ruled political gerrymandering is OK, even
  if most Democrats happen to be black. A district
  with a supermajority of blacks not evidence
  enough to prove race was main motivation.