Legislative Effectiveness, Progressive Ambition, and Electoral Success May 01, 2023 By Craig Volden Legislative Effectiveness, Progressive Ambition, and Electoral Success Presented at the 2022 Annual Meetings of the American Political Science Association in Montreal, Canada. In May, 2023, this paper received the State Politics and Policy Quarterly Best Paper Award from the American Political Science Association. Authors are: Danielle Thomsen, Sarah A. Treul, Craig Volden and Alan E. Wiseman. Are effective state lawmakers more likely than ineffective state lawmakers to be elected to Congress? We draw on a new dataset of state legislative effectiveness scores for nearly 60,000 state legislators from 1993 to 2018 to examine the relationship between lawmaker effectiveness and the decision to run for, and ultimately be elected to, the U.S. House of Representatives. We find that more- effective state lawmakers are more likely to ultimately enter Congress. This pattern is due more to the progressive ambition of candidates than to voter decisions. Specifically, more-effective lawmakers are much more likely to run for U.S. House seats than are their less-effective counterparts. However, there is essentially no relationship between a state legislator’s lawmaking effectiveness and the likelihood that she wins her primary or general House election upon deciding to run. Our findings offer important insights into how American federalism contributes to representation by effective lawmakers. Volden-APSA-best-paper-2023.pdf (502.42 KB) Areas of focus Domestic Policy & Politics Political Science UVA partners Center for Effective Lawmaking Craig Volden Craig Volden is a professor of public policy and politics at the University of Virginia, with appointments in the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy and the Department of Politics. He studies the politics of public policy, with a focus on what policy choices arise within legislative institutions and within American federalism. He is founder and co-director of the Center for Effective Lawmaking. Read full bio Related Content Craig Volden The Primary Path for Turning Legislative Effectiveness into Electoral Success Research Effective lawmakers are the workhorses of the US Congress, yet we know little about the electoral payoffs of their efforts. Are effective lawmakers better at warding off challengers in the next election? Do they win at a greater rate? Spatial Models of Legislative Effectiveness Research Spatial models of policymaking have evolved from the median voter theorem through the inclusion of institutional considerations such as political parties, committees, and various voting and amendment rules. Such models, however, implicitly assume that no policy is more effective than another at solving public policy problems and that all proposers are equally capable of advancing proposals. How Effective are America’s State Legislators? News The Center for Effective Lawmaking has compiled a massive database to measure the effectiveness of nearly every state legislator in the U.S. Based on the center's trusted methodology developed a decade ago to rank the effectiveness of members of Congress, the project is the first to collect this kind of data at the state level in a comprehensive fashion. Batten Hosts Back-to-Back Political Science Conferences News The UVA Batten School is excited to co-host the national State Politics and Policy Conference this weekend, bringing together some 140 political science researchers from across the country to share their recent findings on a wide range of topics. Immediately following, Batten hosts the annual conference of the Center for Effective Lawmaking, a joint project with Vanderbilt University.
Craig Volden Craig Volden is a professor of public policy and politics at the University of Virginia, with appointments in the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy and the Department of Politics. He studies the politics of public policy, with a focus on what policy choices arise within legislative institutions and within American federalism. He is founder and co-director of the Center for Effective Lawmaking. Read full bio
The Primary Path for Turning Legislative Effectiveness into Electoral Success Research Effective lawmakers are the workhorses of the US Congress, yet we know little about the electoral payoffs of their efforts. Are effective lawmakers better at warding off challengers in the next election? Do they win at a greater rate?
Spatial Models of Legislative Effectiveness Research Spatial models of policymaking have evolved from the median voter theorem through the inclusion of institutional considerations such as political parties, committees, and various voting and amendment rules. Such models, however, implicitly assume that no policy is more effective than another at solving public policy problems and that all proposers are equally capable of advancing proposals.
How Effective are America’s State Legislators? News The Center for Effective Lawmaking has compiled a massive database to measure the effectiveness of nearly every state legislator in the U.S. Based on the center's trusted methodology developed a decade ago to rank the effectiveness of members of Congress, the project is the first to collect this kind of data at the state level in a comprehensive fashion.
Batten Hosts Back-to-Back Political Science Conferences News The UVA Batten School is excited to co-host the national State Politics and Policy Conference this weekend, bringing together some 140 political science researchers from across the country to share their recent findings on a wide range of topics. Immediately following, Batten hosts the annual conference of the Center for Effective Lawmaking, a joint project with Vanderbilt University.