The Nationalization of Congressional Turnout

• Published date: 01 September 1987
• Date: 01 September 1987
• DOI: 10.1177/106591298704000310
• Author: William Claggett
• Subject Matter: Articles

THE

NATIONALIZATION

OF

CONGRESSIONAL

TURNOUT:

A

Research

Note

WILLIAM

CLAGGETT

Florida

State

University

T

IS

commonly

asserted

that

the

distinctiveness

of

local

and

regional

t

cultures

in

the

United

States

has

diminished

over

time

due

to

internal

migration

and

the

development

of

a

national

economy

and

communi-

cation

networks.

An

alleged

political

consequence

of

this

increasing

homogenization

of

society

is

an

ever

more

nationalized

electorate

in

which

not

only

do

national

events,

issues,

and

personality

increasingly

dominate

the

calculus

of

voters,

but

also

the

voters’

reaction

to,

and

evaluation

of,

these

national

forces

becomes

increasingly

independent

of

geography.

Donald

Stokes

(1965,

1967)

provided

the

principal

empirical

evidence

supporting

the

thesis

of

an

increasingly

nationalized

American

electorate.

Stokes

reasoned

that

electoral

change

in

a

more

nationalized

electorate

should

be

more

uniform

across

geographical

subunits.

To

determine

if

the

response

of

geographical

subunits

of

the

electorate

to

political

forces

had

become

more

similar

over

time,

Stokes

partitioned

the

variation

of

congressional

turnout

and

vote

choice

across

congressional

districts

into

national,

state,

and

constituency

components

by

means

of

a

nested

analysis

of

variance

procedure

for

each

decade

between

1872

and

1960.

The

national

compo-

nent

was

indexed

by

the

election

sum

of

squares

which

measures

the

unifor-

mity

of

movement

across

districts.

The

state

component

was

equated

to

the

election-state

interaction

sum

of

squares

which

captures

any

unifor-

mity

of

change

across

districts

within

states

-

a

uniformity

presumably

arising

out

of

similar

reactions

to

state-level

political

forces.

The

consituency

component

was

indexed

by

the

election-constituency

(within

state)

inter-

action

sum

of

squares

which

essentially

measures

the

idiosyncratic

varia-

tion

of

districts

due

to

local

political

forces.

For

the

1950s

Stokes

found

that

turnout

variation

was

dominated

by

national

forces,

i.e.,

the

national

component

was

substantially

larger

than

either

the

state

or

constituency

component,

while

the

constituency

compo-

nent

accounted

for

the

largest

share

of

the

variance

in

partisan

vote

choice

during

the

same

decade.

He

therefore

concluded

that

congressional

turn-

out

was

more

nationalized

than

vote

choice.

He

also

concluded

that

both

congressional

turnout

and

partisan

choice

had

become

more

nationalized

between

1872

and

1960.

Received:

February

19,

1986

Revision

Received:

July

1,

1986

Accepted

for

Publication:

July

10,

1986

NOTE:

I

would

like

to

thank

William

Flanigan

and

Nancy

Zingale

for

their

extensive

and

helpful

comments

on

this

paper.