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Objective.The purpose of this research is to examine why some states have embraced digital government more extensively than others.Methods.Multivariate regression analysis is used to empirically test explanations for state innovation in e‐government. The primary dependent variable is the percent of state‐level government websites offering online services to citizens.Results.Republican‐controlled legislatures are more likely to embrace e‐government, implying that efficiency concerns may drive reliance on digital government. Innovators in e‐government were states with fewer households with Internet access and less use of the initiative process, indicating that citizen demand was not a factor. More extensive use of e‐government is also associated with legislative professionalization and professional networks—factors that may be useful for explaining the diffusion of other administrative reforms, and technical issues lacking political salience.Conclusions.These data suggest e‐government implementation is driven by legislative professionalism and, to a lesser extent, state professional networks, rather than citizen demand. These indicators fitLowi's (1972)conception of "constituent policy" as a top‐down process, confined to administrative or legislative circles, compared to distributive, regulatory, and redistributive policy. We hypothesize that other administrative reforms, particularly those lacking political salience, may exhibit similar relationships with legislative professionalization and professional networks.

The 2008 election marked an end to the longstanding gap in the level of black and white voter turnout, offering further evidence that minority empowerment affects voter turnout. In this article, the authors move beyond a dyadic conceptualization of empowerment and argue that the level of descriptive representation within the legislative body as a whole is crucial to understanding how context affects voter turnout. They find African Americans and Latinos are more likely to vote when residing in states with increased descriptive representation in the state legislature measured by the percentage of black or Latino lawmakers.