Strategic Challenger Entry in a Federal System: The Role of Economic and Political Conditions in State Legislative Competition

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lsq.12088
• Author: Steven Rogers
• Published date: 01 November 2015
• Date: 01 November 2015

STEVEN ROGERS

Saint Louis University

Strategic Challenger Entry in a

Federal System: The Role of

Economic and Political Conditions

in State Legislative Competition

Over a third of state legislators do not face challengers when seeking reelection.

Existing analyses of state legislative contestation almost exclusively focus on the stable

institutional features surrounding elections and ignore conditions that change between

elections. I remedy this oversight by investigating how political contexts influence chal-

lenger entry. State legislators—particularly members of the governor’s party—more

often face opposition during weak state economies, but the president’s copartisans are

even more likely to receive a challenger when the president is unpopular. My findings

suggest that both national- and state-level political conditions have an important impact

on challengers’ entry strategies.

The threat of being thrown out of off‌ice is intended to pressure law-

makers to govern responsibly, but voters can only replace their

representatives if there are alternatives to the incumbents on the ballot.

American voters are nearly always provided an alternative choice to

reelecting their president, governor, or member of Congress and there-

fore have the ability to remove these off‌icials from power. However in

2012, Republicans reclaimed control of the South Carolina state house

before a single vote was cast, as not enough Democratic candidates ran

to secure a Democratic majority. Similarly in Rhode Island, 53% of state

legislative seats only had a Democratic candidate, thereby deciding

which party controlled the state legislature without any elections taking

place.

With so few Democrats deciding to run for the state legislature in

South Carolina and fewer Republicans in Rhode Island, it becomes diff‌i-

cult for voters to hold state legislators accountable for their

policymaking. State legislatures pass 75 times as many laws as Congress,

and to induce representative policymaking, median voter theories require

at least a meaningful threat of a challenger (Downs 1957). Without

LEGISLATIVE STUDIES QUARTERLY, 40, 4, November 2015 539

DOI: 10.1111 /lsq.12088

V

C2015 The Comparative Legislative Research Center of The University of Iowa

competition, legislators have less electoral incentive to take their constit-

uents’ interests into account as they consider legalizing gay marriage or

enacting gun control reforms. Challengers play a critical role in the

accountability process not only by providing alternatives to ineffective

governments but also by bringing unrepresentative policymaking to the

attention of voters (Arnold 1992). Understanding electoral accountability

in American legislatures requires identifying the conditions under which

incumbent state legislators face competition.

Political scientists know relatively little about how state legislative

candidates take advantage of changing electoral circumstances. Prior

work on state legislative competition almost exclusively focuses on

cross-state differences and ignores the inf‌luence of changing conditions

within a state. I know of no analysis that considers whether the strength

of the economy relates to state legislative candidates’ entry decisions

despite f‌indings regarding strategic challengers in congressional elec-

tions (Jacobson 1989). Neither federal nor state-level challengers enjoy

losing, so it would seem plausible that state legislative candidates are

more likely to enter races when the anticipated reactions of the electorate

are conducive to winning. If candidates take advantage of favorable

political conditions, the actual opportunities voters have to hold their rep-

resentatives accountable will systematically differ as the contexts

surrounding elections change.

To assess the extent to which these opportunities differ, I study

how institutional and political contexts inf‌luence challenger entry in state

legislative elections. I show that major party challengers are most likely

to emerge during bad economies, and the relationship between economic

growth and challenger entry is strongest for incumbents aff‌iliated with

the governor, particularly in professionalized legislatures. During eco-

nomic downturns in less partisan districts, incumbents also more

frequently face politically experienced opposition. State legislators aff‌ili-

ated with the president’s party, meanwhile, are overall the most likely to

face competition, especially during unpopular presidencies. State legisla-

tive challengers, therefore, appear to take advantage of both state and

national political conditions for their personal electoral gain when decid-

ing to enter a race, ultimately inf‌luencing voters’ opportunities to hold

state governments accountable on Election Day.

Challengers’ Strategies in State Legislative Elections

Ideally, every incumbent would be challenged to give voters an

opportunity to hold their legislators accountable for poor representation

(Key 1966). The threat of a challenger can motivate legislators’ behavior

540 Steven Rogers

(Arnold 1992), but citizens can only remove their representative from

off‌ice if there is an alternative to the incumbent on the ballot. Voters

however have relatively few opportunities to vote against their incum-

bent state legislator. Figure 1 presents the levels of competition in US

House and state legislative races from 1992 to 2010. Rarely did more

than 60% of state legislators face major party opposition (black solid

line), a rate over 20% lower than that in US House elections (grey solid

line). From 2002 to 2010, fewer than 20% of state legislators faced an

in-party primary opponent (black dashed line), resulting in over a third

of incumbents not facing a challenger in either the primary or general

election.

1

In fact, Emile Bruneau, Jr. was “reelected” to the Louisiana

state house without any competition for over 18 years. Voters in the 94th

Louisiana state house district, therefore, had little chance to cast a ballot

against their representative or Republican legislative party because no

one decided to challenge Bruneau.

Bruneau is an extreme example, and the rates of challenger entry

vary across the United States. Figure 2 illustrates the levels of contesta-

tion in states that exclusively have single-member state house districts.

Every election year, over 90% of Minnesota state representatives face

FIGURE 1

Challenge Rates to Incumbents in the US House

and State Legislatures

Note: Solid lines represent the proportion of US House (grey) and state legislative (black)

incumbents who faced a major party challenger in elections from 1992 to 2010. The difference

in rates in challenger entry in general elections is consistently greater than 20%. Dotted lines

illustrate the rates in which state legislators face competition in the primary election. Over a

third of incumbents did not face a challenger in either the primary or general election from

2002 to 2010.

541State Legislative Competition