Do Democrats and Republicans Pay the Same Price for Seats in U.S. State Lower House Elections? An Analysis of "Cheap Seats" in Forty-four States

Authors

  • Kenneth E. Wink
  • Ronald E. Weber

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15763/issn.2374-7781.2005.26.0.305-322

Abstract

We apply Campbell’s Cheap Seats approach to measuring partisan bias in U.S. House races to elections in forty-four state lower houses from 1968 to 1999. We find that using partisan voter turnout differences as the basis for calculating partisan bias reveals generally pro-Democratic Party biases and that in many states the size of these biases is growing. States with a large number of contested seats and with a large number of marginal districts had higher levels of turnout bias than their counterparts in the 1970s. Partisan turnout bias may, on some occasions, affect party control of the house. We discuss possible efforts to alleviate these biases.

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Published

2005-11-01

Issue

Vol. 26: Fall 2005

Section

Articles

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