Agenda 11-1-13Questions regarding articles?Congressional Elections and Apportionment Discussion

Congressional Elections and Apportionment

Who’s Running?

The Incumbent

A person already holding office and running for re-election

Incumbent House of Representatives have an 80-90% of being reelected Senate is a little lower

Why?

John Dingell 57 years, 319 da

ys

Reasons Why Incumbents WinIncumbents… stifle election competition. have an almost two-to-one advantage in

raising money over new candidates. typically have an easier time gaining the

financial support of Political Action Committees (PACs) and interest groups

While the bigger spender does not always win, more funding, especially in the primaries, is a great advantage.

Other Reasons… Free publicity

hold press conferences, making speeches in Congress, introducing bills, and junkets (trips) to their districts.

Franking Privilege Send mail postage free

Credit claiming stress their policy making record and emphasize their

stands on new policy issues. demonstrate how they have helped their constituents

by introducing bills, voting for legislation, and bringing pork-barrel legislation—federal projects, grants, and contracts—to their districts.

Last Reasonuse casework,

the direct consideration of a constituent’s problem, when trying to gain re-election. For example, an incumbent might use his or her political connections to help an individual cut through the bureaucratic red tape on a personal issue, which would then result in good word-of-mouth publicity for the incumbent

Negatives of Incumbency

• Scandals• major economic shift• A lasting change in the

arrangement of political forces

Must appeal to the voters! all congressional

candidates must appeal to the more motivated voters,

only about 37 percent of the population vote in mid-term or off-year congressional Those who do vote are

usually party regulars, political activists, or those who might be strongly affected by the outcome.

As a result, candidates must appeal to partisan voters, those loyal to a specific party.

Apply what we’ve learned…

House and Senate Elections 535 Representatives

435 House of Representatives 100 Senators

This # is not created by Constitution 1929 Congress fixed its size at 435

members 435 seats are then apportioned among the

states every ten years, depending on the population of each state.

Representatives are elected every two years and can serve an unlimited number of terms.

CALCULATING APPORTIONMENT Census – Determines population

Step 1: Automatically assign the first 50 seats Step 2: Calculate a list of priority values.

Step 3: Assign the remaining seats in ranked order The state with the largest priority value in the list is

given the 51st seat (because the first 50 seats are automatically assigned); then the state with second largest priority value is given the 52nd seat. This process is continued for each consecutively descending priority value until the last (435th) seat has been filled.

House Seats by Region

What if...

The largest state is 66 times as populous as the smallest and has 18 times as many electoral votes. This allows for Electoral College results that don't match the popular vote. To remedy this issue, the Electoral Reform Map redivides the fifty United States into 50 states of equal population. The 2010 Census records a population of 308,745,538 for the United States, which this map divides into 50 states, each with a population of about 6,175,000.

House Members

House Elections single-member districts

voters in each district elect one person to represent them.

House members represent relatively small constituencies Allows them to communicate with

residents on a regular basis.

Districts

marginal districts House districts that typically have close

elections. These are areas where the winner gets less

than 55 percent of the vote.

Safe districts House districts in which the incumbents

win with more than 55 percent of the vote are known as safe districts.

Senate Elections Continuous body

Senators serve for six years with one-third of the Senate running for re-election every two years.

In 1913, the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution required the popular election of senators. This changed the practice of state legislators appointing United States senators. 

Senate Races

Costs for Senate races can run above five million dollars per candidate in a typical election,

average successful Senate campaign costing close to seven million dollars.

Incumbents are often able to gain national support for their campaign as opposed to the state or local support given to their challengers.

Senate Members

Senate Elections

Senators are elected at-large they represent the entire state.

This gives senators more diverse constituencies, so they often know fewer of their constituents than House members do.

The combination of fewer elections and more diverse constituents results in a less personal connection between senators and their voters.

Open Seats

When there is an open seat in Congress, or the incumbent is not running for re-election, there is a great deal of competition between political parties.

If the support for each party in a district or a state is fairly even, each party will offer their strongest candidate and support that candidate with as many resources as possible. Since there is a near 50-50 split between the parties in the House and the Senate, the winner of the majority of open seats can dictate which party controls the chambers of the House and Senate