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AbstractBy placing lawmaking power directly in the hands of citizens, Progressive movement reformers hoped to undercut the ability of political parties to pursue their policy objectives. This article tests the expectations of reformers by examining whether direct democracy alters the ability of partisan legislative majorities and governors to shape the size of the U.S. state public sector. Using a large dataset, I estimate the determinants of state tax effort and compare across jurisdictions the effects of variables that measure the partisan control of government. The results demonstrate that while the partisanship of elected officials is an important predictor of tax effort in pure representative jurisdictions, the relationship between party and policy disappears among initiative states. This analysis not only adds to our understanding of U.S. state budgeting, but also suggests the widespread adoption of direct democracy as a possible explanation for the weak party effects observed in studies of state fiscal policy.

By placing lawmaking power directly in the hands of citizens, Progressive movement reformers hoped to undercut the ability of political parties to pursue their policy objectives. This article tests the expectations of reformers by examining whether direct democracy alters the ability of partisan legislative majorities and governors to shape the size of the U.S. state public sector. Using a large dataset, I estimate the determinants of state tax effort and compare across jurisdictions the effects of variables that measure the partisan control of government. The results demonstrate that while the partisanship of elected officials is an important predictor of tax effort in pure representative jurisdictions, the relationship between party and policy disappears among initiative states. This analysis not only adds to our understanding of U.S. state budgeting, but also suggests the widespread adoption of direct democracy as a possible explanation for the weak party effects observed in studies of state fiscal policy. Adapted from the source document.

AbstractThe regression discontinuity design (RDD) is a valuable tool for identifying causal effects with observational data. However, applying the traditional electoral RDD to the study of divided government is challenging. Because assignment to treatment in this case is the result of elections to multiple institutions, there is no obvious single forcing variable. Here, we use simulations in which we apply shocks to real-world election results in order to generate two measures of the likelihood of divided government, both of which can be used for causal analysis. The first captures the electoral distance to divided government and can easily be utilized in conjunction with the standard sharp RDD toolkit. The second is a simulated probability of divided government. This measure does not easily fit into a sharp RDD framework, so we develop a probability restricted design (PRD) which relies upon the underlying logic of an RDD. This design incorporates common regression techniques but limits the sample to those observations for which assignment to treatment approaches "as-if random." To illustrate both of our approaches, we reevaluate the link between divided government and the size of budget deficits.

When legislators and governors clash over the size of American state government, what strategic factors determine who wins? Efforts to address this question have traditionally relied upon setter models borrowed from the congressional literature and have predicted legislative dominance. We offer an alternative simplification of state budget negotiations that follows the "staring match" logic captured by divide‐the‐dollar games. Our model predicts that governors will often be powerful but that professional legislatures can stand up to the executives when long legislative sessions give them the patience to endure a protracted battle over the size of the budget. In this article, we present our analysis of an original dataset comprising gubernatorial budget proposals and legislative enactments in the states from 1989 through 2004. The results indicate strong empirical support for our predictions.

AbstractWe assess the conditions under which majority status generates benefits for incumbent legislators and how these benefits are distributed among members of the majority party. We argue that majority status is valuable only in procedurally partisan chambers; that is, when the majority party monopolizes chamber leadership positions and control of the legislative agenda. Contrary to the existing literature, we also posit that these rewards should be distributed broadly across the majority party. To test our expectations, we utilize 10 recent transitions in the partisan control of U.S. state legislatures and data on campaign contributions. Consistent with our expectations, majority status is valuable, but only in procedurally partisan chambers. Furthermore, the premium in campaign contributions enjoyed by the majority party is primarily distributed to backbenchers, although top party leaders also benefit. These results provide important insights into the distribution of power and influence in U.S. state legislatures.

We study how well states translate public opinion into policy. Using national surveys and advances in subnational opinion estimation, we estimate state-level support for 39 policies across eight issue areas, including abortion, law enforcement, health care, and education. We show that policy is highly responsive to policy-specific opinion, even controlling for other influences. But we also uncover a striking "democratic deficit": policy is congruent with majority will only half the time. The analysis considers the influence of institutions, salience, partisan control of government, and interest groups on the magnitude and ideological direction of this democratic deficit. We find the largest influences to be legislative professionalization, term limits, and issue salience. Partisanship and interest groups affect the ideological balance of incongruence more than the aggregate degree thereof. Finally, policy is overresponsive to ideology and party-leading policy to be polarized relative to state electorates. Adapted from the source document.

We study the effects of policy-specific public opinion on state adoption of policies affecting gays and lesbians, and the factors that condition this relationship. Using national surveys and advances in opinion estimation, we create new estimates of state-level support for eight policies, including civil unions and nondiscrimination laws. We differentiate between responsiveness to opinion and congruence with opinion majorities. We find a high degree of responsiveness, controlling for interest group pressure and the ideology of voters and elected officials. Policy salience strongly increases the influence of policy-specific opinion (directly and relative to general voter ideology). There is, however, a surprising amount of noncongruence—for some policies, even clear supermajority support seems insufficient for adoption. When noncongruent, policy tends to be more conservative than desired by voters; that is, there is little progay policy bias. We find little to no evidence that state political institutions affect policy responsiveness or congruence.

We compare two approaches for estimating state‐level public opinion: disaggregation by state of national surveys and a simulation approach using multilevel modeling of individual opinion and poststratification by population share. We present the first systematic assessment of the predictive accuracy of each and give practical advice about when and how each method should be used. To do so, we use an original data set of over 100 surveys on gay rights issues as well as 1988 presidential election data. Under optimal conditions, both methods work well, but multilevel modeling performs better generally. Compared to baseline opinion measures, it yields smaller errors, higher correlations, and more reliable estimates. Multilevel modeling is clearly superior when samples are smaller—indeed, one can accurately estimate state opinion using only a single large national survey. This greatly expands the scope of issues for which researchers can study subnational opinion directly or as an influence on policymaking.