Working the Government
Public comment and public policy
Alexander Sahn
American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Is public policy responsive to demographically and ideologically unrepresentative comments given at public meetings? I investigate this possibility using a novel data set of over 40,000 comments made at the San Francisco Planning Commission between 1998 and 2021, matched to information about proposed developments discussed in hearings and administrative data on commenters. I document four stylized facts: First, commenters at public meetings are unrepresentative of the public along racial, gender, age, and homeownership lines; second, distance to the proposed development predicts commenting behavior, but only among those in opposition; third, commission votes are correlated with commenters' preferences; finally, the alignment of White commenters (vs. other racial groups) and neighborhood group representatives and the general public (vs. other interest groups) better predict project approvals.
Old Money: Campaign Finance and Gerontocracy in the United States
Adam Bonica & Jacob Grumbach
Stanford Working Paper, July 2024
Abstract:
Politicians in the United States rank among the oldest globally. This study examines how money in politics contributes to age inequality in political representation. Using record-linkage to construct a novel data set combining the ages of voters, donors, and candidates, we find that the median dollar in US elections comes from a 66-year-old -- significantly older than the median voter, candidate, or elected official. Results from within-district and within-donor analyses confirm that age proximity with candidates increases contributions on the extensive and intensive margins. Finally, we simulate counterfactual candidate fundraising by age under a hypothetical campaign finance voucher policy.
The Virtues of Optional Legislation
Jacob Bronsther & Guha Krishnamurthi
Arizona State Law Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
In this Article, we continue our work on a new solution to legislative dysfunction in Washington: optional legislation. Imagine that states could opt in to a new federal program -- say, Universal Basic Income (UBI) or Medicare for All -- on the condition that they alone foot a higher tax bill to pay for the plan. States that opt out are completely unaffected since they do not have to contribute funds. Given that each party controls its own set of states, this "optional" type of legislation enables each party to govern at the federal level with a degree of independence from the other. Optional legislation thus promises to break the legislative gridlock. However, its advantages are not merely strategic. By comparison to nationwide bills, we contend that optional legislation would better realize an array of democratic "virtues," leading to policies and debates that were more responsive, innovative, honest, and participatory. To be sure, optional legislation is not always appropriate. For instance, we should never agree to a checkerboard statute on the enforcement of civil rights. But when there is a "reasonable" policy disagreement -- say, with respect to the provision of UBI -- then optional legislation would score more highly than a nationwide bill on all four of these virtues.
Landscape of Distrust: Political Trust Across America's Urban-Rural Divide
James Kirk
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Do rural Americans trust the government less than non-rural Americans? In an era of declining trust in government and mounting geographic polarization, this research examines the relationship between geography, identity, and attitudes of political trust in the United States. Using national survey data from the 2016 and 2020 American National Election Studies time series surveys, this quantitative analysis tests hypotheses that rurality in the context of place and place-based identity is associated with lower trust in the federal government. Overall, the results show that both living in and identifying with more rural areas corresponds with decreased government trust, regardless of the political party of the incumbent president. These findings contribute to the understanding of America's urban-rural political divide and suggest significant implications for both partisan leaders and policymakers.
The process and perils of coming around: The assimilation of political appointees into bureaucratic agencies
Dan Alexander & Darrian Stacy
American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
The tendency for political appointees to assimilate into the bureaucratic agencies that they lead is a recurring source of tension between appointees and the executives who appoint them. This paper employs a formal model to explore how appointees come around to the views of the civil servants whom they oversee. We conceptualize a bureaucrat as providing a cheap-talk message about privately known, policy-relevant conditions to an appointee who uses that information to update her beliefs and set two types of policy. Though the bureaucrat's and appointee's preferences are aligned conditional on beliefs, the appointee's prior beliefs about the likelihood of various states of the world differ from the bureaucrat's. In equilibrium, truthful reporting and inducing belief convergence may be at odds and we identify when the bureaucrat will strategically choose to issue false reports. We apply the model's insights to the budget process and agency recommendations during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Navigating Slippery Slopes: A Paradox of Power in Policy and Cultural Reform
Zachary Schaller
Colorado State University Working Paper, July 2024
Abstract:
This study employs game theory to investigate how slippery slope problems drive policy impasses and sticky cultural practices. It identifies conditions under which hard-lining behavior, often perceived as fallacious, becomes rational. By endogenizing the probability of one policy leading to another, the model elucidates slippery slope equilibria, where players adamantly oppose all proposals, including those they want, in order to avoid those they hate. Aggressive negotiation tactics are ineffective against such equilibria, further exacerbating the political market failure. Notably, weaker reformers are able to avoid the slippery slope market failure and accomplish Pareto improving reform, whereas strong reformers can get stuck in a paradox of power.
Comparing Traditional Presidential Rhetoric: Trump Versus Biden
Rebecca Eissler, Annelise Russell & Sean Theriault
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Even though they both held the same office, Donald Trump and Joe Biden could not have presented themselves more differently. Biden presented himself as the restorer of tradition after Trump was the disruptor. In this research note, we examine seven sets of speeches that hold constant either the timing or the setting to see if their rhetoric contrasted as much as the way they presented themselves. We find that the words and emotions that they invoked were not nearly as systematically distinct from each other as we expected. We argue that this result demonstrates that the power of the presidency as an institution is sufficiently constraining that even the most unorthodox candidate's rhetoric mirrors that of a traditionalist. When we do uncover some distinctions between them, those that exist are, for the most part, consistent with our expectations.
The Traceability of Presidential Policymaking in the Face of Congressional Sanctioning
Meredith McLain
Political Research Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
Do presidents freely issue unilateral directives to evade an obstructionist Congress, or are they constrained by their legislative opponents? Though conventional wisdom purports evasion, scholars actually find consistent evidence of presidential restraint. However, this literature almost exclusively focuses on executive orders, rather than the myriad of other unilateral directives at the president's disposal, and thus offers an incomplete picture of how effective Congress is at constraining unilateral policymaking. Accordingly, I develop a theory of how presidents adjudicate between different types of directives based on trade-offs related to their traceability, presidential incentives, and Congress's ability to retaliate based on available information. I argue that presidents rely on more traceable unilateral directives, specifically executive orders, and published memoranda, when facing ideologically aligned congresses that are less likely to retaliate. However, they use less traceable directives, like unpublished memoranda, to evade legislative opponents, but at the expense of credit claiming opportunities. Using an original dataset of executive orders, published memoranda, and unpublished memoranda issued between 1981 and 2020, I find empirical support for the theory. Overall, this study demonstrates how presidents can overcome legislative checks by controlling the traceability of their unilateral activities.
Race, legislative speech, and symbolic representation in Congress
Arjun Vishwanath
American Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
We know little about the extent to which racial minorities are symbolically represented by members of Congress. This stands in contrast to a wealth of research analyzing the extent to which minorities are substantively and descriptively represented. This article provides the most comprehensive analysis of symbolic representation to date. Using data on legislators' speech from 105,875 newsletters and 620,838 floor speeches, I find that White legislators of both parties are more likely to symbolically represent Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians if those groups are more populous in their constituency. However, these effects only hold cross-sectionally; using a difference-in-differences setup from redistricting shocks, I find that there is little within-legislator variation in speech patterns as their constituencies change. Lastly, I show that, unlike on the symbolic dimension, legislators' substantive representation is not influenced by group size. I conclude that White legislators are symbolically responsive to their constituents' identities in their speech patterns.
The Partisan Vote: Shared Partisanship and Constituent Service in the U.S. Congress
Rochelle Snyder
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
The theory of the "personal vote" assumes that constituent service, or the process by which members of Congress help their constituents navigate the federal bureaucracy, is a component of representation that transcends partisanship. However, recent research suggests that affective polarization and negative partisanship may discourage constituents from reaching out to ask for help from cross-partisan legislators. Using a conjoint experiment, I show that shared partisanship has a strong effect on constituents' decisions about which of their legislators to contact for assistance. However, positive in-party affect is unrelated to these preferences, suggesting that negative partisanship is responsible for this result. Gender and seniority also matter for constituents' preferences even when accounting for shared partisanship. The results suggest that legislators' ability to build a "personal vote" by performing constituent service may be weakened in an era of strong partisanship.
Do Local Roots Impact Washington Behaviors? District Connections and Representation in the U.S. Congress
Jesse Crosson & Jaclyn Kaslovsky
American Political Science Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
Although commentators often point to the political value of legislators' geographic ties, less is known about the influence of such connections once in office. Given recent scholarship underscoring the importance of geography as a dimension of identity, we argue that local legislators should behave as descriptive representatives. We collect the hometowns of all members of Congress with known birth locations from 1789 to 2020 to analyze how being born near one's district impacts legislator behavior. We connect these data to information on a series of behaviors, finding that local legislators emphasize constituency work over policymaking and party-building. Moreover, while local legislators do not demonstrate substantively less partisan unity in roll-call voting, they attract a higher percentage of out-party cosponsors to their bills. Together, our results point to important representational implications regarding the geographic roots of legislators and the role of local connections in the contemporary Congress.
Reconsidering the "Southern Veto": The Two-Thirds Rule at Democratic National Conventions, 1832-1936
Boris Heersink
Studies in American Political Development, April 2024, Pages 84-102
Abstract:
Beginning from 1832, the Democratic Party required a two-thirds majority at national conventions for the nomination of presidential candidates. Despite assessments that this "two-thirds rule" produced excessively long and disruptive nomination battles and low-quality presidential candidates, the rule survived until 1936. The rule's longevity is generally attributed to it functioning as a "Southern veto": while the Democratic Party performed strongest electorally in the South in this period, the region's representation at conventions was small in comparison. By setting the bar for presidential nominations high, the South was given the ability to block unacceptable candidates. However, while the "Southern veto" argument is pervasive, there are little data and few concrete examples of Southern delegates blocking Democratic nominations through the two-thirds rule. In this paper, I reassess the two-thirds rule's history and appliance and show that Southern states barely had enough votes to block nominations and generally would need to vote against a candidate at a rate of nearly 90 percent to do so. As a result, the South almost never vetoed candidates: in only one case (Martin Van Buren in 1844) was Southern opposition pivotal in preventing a candidate with majority support from winning the nomination. Additionally, the two-thirds rule was generally accepted by broad majorities in the party (both Southern and non-Southern) and, while Southerners were among the defenders of the rule, representatives of the region were also among those opposing it. These findings suggest that the two-thirds rule rarely functioned as a Southern veto -- not because the South had no power in the Democratic Party but because the necessity of maintaining intraparty consensus applied regardless of the existence of the two-thirds rule.