Who Punishes More? Partisanship, Punitive Policies, and the Puzzle of Democratic Governors

• Author: Anna Gunderson
• DOI: 10.1177/1065912920987078
• Published date: 01 March 2022
• Date: 01 March 2022

2022, Vol. 75(1) 3 –19

https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912920987078

Political Research Quarterly

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DOI: 10.1177/1065912920987078

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People say to me, “well Ann, what does that say about

Texas that we’ve got the largest prison system in the

world?” . . . And I say, it says if you commit a crime in

Texas we’ve got a place to lock you up. . . . If you do the

crime, you’re going to do the time.

—Ann Richards (D-TX) campaign ad1, 1994

I can be nicked on a lot, but no one can say I’m soft on crime.

—Bill Clinton2 (D-AR), 1992

In 1992, then-Governor of Arkansas Bill Clinton ran for

president. Throughout the race, he was determined to

seem tough-on-crime, a strategy that culminated in him

flying back to oversee the execution of a mentally dis-

abled man in Arkansas during the campaign (Mauer

2016). Clinton was not alone: across the country,

Democratic governors like Ann Richards of Texas and

Mario Cuomo of New York presided over vast expan-

sions of the prison system and extensions of punitive

laws (Ambar 2018; Perkinson 2010). An example of

Democrats moving to the right on crime is illustrated

poignantly by the tough Violent Crime Control and Law

Enforcement Act of 1994 and its strident Democratic

supporters, especially Bill Clinton and Joe Biden (Mauer

2016). However, despite this anecdotal evidence of

Democratic support of more punitive policy, we do not

yet know the extent of this support and how distinct

Republicans and Democrats were and are in their prefer-

ences on criminal justice in the states.

This question — how punitive were and are Democratic

governors? — is especially important because of the vast

expansion of our criminal legal system. In the past few

decades, few institutions in the United States have grown

faster than the carceral state: in 2016, over 6.5 million

Americans were under some form of correctional control,

in prison, jail, on parole or probation, up from 2 million

only three decades ago (Kaeble and Cowhig 2018; The

Pew Center on the States 2009). This massive rise in the

number of adults under correctional control has been

matched with commensurate increases in the money

shifted to this priority, as corrections is now the fifth-larg-

est category of state spending, after education, public

welfare, health and hospitals, and highways (Kyckelhahn

2014). States have prioritized criminal justice in both

their policy and their budgets, as the public became more

987078PRQXXX10.1177/1065912920987078Political Research QuarterlyGunderson

research-article2020

1Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, USA

Corresponding Author:

Anna Gunderson, Department of Political Science, Louisiana State

University, 208-B Stubbs Hall, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA.

Email: agunderson@lsu.edu

Anna Gunderson1

Abstract

The growth of the carceral state over the last few decades has been remarkable, with millions of Americans in

prison, jail, on parole or probation. Political science explanations of this phenomenon identify partisanship as a key

explanatory variable in the adoption of punitive policies; by this theory, Republicans are the driving force behind

growing incarceration. This article argues this explanation is incomplete and instead emphasizes the bipartisan coalition

that constructed the carceral state. I argue Democratic governors are incentivized to pursue more punitive policies

to compete with Republicans when those Democrats are electorally vulnerable. I test this proposition using a series

of regression discontinuity designs and find causal evidence for Democrats’ complicity in the expansion of the carceral

state. Democratic governors who barely win their elections outspend and outincarcerate their Republican counterparts.

This article highlights Democrats’ role as key architects in the creation of vast criminal justice institutions in the states

when those Democrats are electorally vulnerable.

Keywords

Democrats, governors, criminal justice, state politics and policy, incarceration

Who Punishes More?

Puzzle of Democratic Governors

Partisanship, Punitive Policies, and the

TRENDS:

Article

4 Political Research Quarterly 75(1)

2 Political Research Quarterly 00(0)

punitive and demanded more punitive policy action as a

result (Beckett 1997; Enns 2016; Scheingold 1995).

The expansion of carceral institutions has not escaped

scholarly attention, with studies examining distinct out-

comes like incarceration rates, reentry programs, and

felon disenfranchisement laws, among many others

(Behrens, Uggen, and Manza 2003; Jacobs and

Carmichael 2001; Percival 2016; Smith 2004). Within

these studies, partisanship is often the focus, as

Republicans are theorized to contribute to the growth and

expansion of the carceral state (Beckett 1997; Smith

2004). However, growing attention has been paid to the

presence of strange bedfellows in encouraging the devel-

opment of punitive institutions, like women’s advocacy

groups (Gottschalk 2006) and Democrats (Hinton 2016;

Murakawa 2014). The bipartisan consensus that gave rise

to a variety of carceral institutions at all levels of govern-

ment is the focus of some studies chronicling the expan-

sion of the carceral state (e.g., Gottschalk 2008; Hinton

2016; Kohler-Hausmann 2015; Murakawa 2014), but it is

not clear how complicit Democrats were in the expansion

of punitive institutions at the state level. I argue Democrats

are key architects of the carceral state in those election-

years in which Democrats barely win, and that electoral

competition is an essential conditioning factor in whether

and how partisanship influences punitive outcomes.

I look to the states for variation in carceral policies and

argue electorally vulnerable Democratic governors will be

more punitive than their Republican counterparts to com-

pete for voters, as crime is a popular electoral issue. I spe-

cifically analyze three outcomes of the carceral state

— corrections budgets, incarceration rates, and prison

admission rates — to examine whether Democratic states

outspend and outincarcerate Republican states. I use

regression discontinuity (RD) designs to test this claim

using election returns from 1982 to 2016. I find Democratic

gubernatorial candidates who barely win increase correc-

tions spending by approximately $15 per capita and find

some tentative evidence they increase both incarceration

and prison admissions rates as well. These results high-

light the bipartisan coalition that created the carceral state.

Electorally vulnerable Democrats were at the forefront of

cementing corrections as a key policy priority for the

states in the last three decades. How should we evaluate

punitive policy adoptions knowing Democrats were key

architects of the carceral state? This is especially impor-

tant considering one in thirteen Americans is now under

some form of correctional control (The Pew Center on the

States 2009): how did we get here?

Carceral State Expansion and

Electoral Competition

Social scientists studying the growth of the carceral state

over the last four decades offer a variety of explanations,

including the punitive impulses toward the racially and

economically marginalized and the strength of conserva-

tive politicians (Beckett 1997; Caldeira and Cowart 1980;

Garland 2002; Greenberg and West 2001; Jacobs and

Helms 1999; Smith 2004; Stucky, Heimer, and Lang

2007; Wacquant 2009). However, empirical evidence

around these theories has been mixed, with inconsistent

evidence that either economic or racial inequality — or

Republican political power — has expanded the carceral

state (Jacobs and Carmichael 2001; Smith 2004).

This study takes on a different mechanism to explain

the rise of punitive policies, concentrating on the interac-

tion between partisanship and electoral competition. I

argue Democratic governors are incentivized to prioritize

punitive crime policy in an effort to win over voters. I

focus on Democratic governors specifically as they are

the state leaders of their parties and possess significant

autonomy in the creation and administration of policy

(Barrilleaux and Berkman 2003; Beland and Oloomi

2017; Fredriksson, Wang, and Warren 2013; List and

Sturm 2006). This is not to suggest that state legislators3

do not face similar pressures, but that governors may be

uniquely sensitive to those pressures from their position

of party leadership.

Existing research suggests electoral competition has

two key effects on politicians’ behavior. First, electoral

competition is theorized to produce more liberal policy

outcomes, as individuals in lower socioeconomic classes

become a larger part of the electoral constituency and

demand policies in line with their interests (Barrilleaux

and Berkman 2003; Holbrook and Van Dunk 1993; Key

1949). Officials will seek growth-promoting policies to

appeal to swing voters when they are electorally vulner-

able (Besley, Persson, and Sturm 2010; Griffin 2006).

Second, beyond liberal policies, electoral competition

broadens the kinds of constituents politicians must cater

to. Closer races force politicians to forge broader coali-

tions of support and promise higher rewards to their

supporters (Barrilleaux, Holbrook, and Langer 2002).

Similarly, electoral pressures encourage politicians to

be more responsive4 to constituent interests to maintain

their winning margin (Griffin 2006). This article bridges

the gap between economics, state politics, and the poli-

tics of punishment, to propose a significant policy gov-

ernors have both the means and the motivation to

influence: crime.

Crime

Over the last few decades, the amount of citizen and

media attention paid to crime has skyrocketed as politi-

cians harnessed punitive public attitudes toward crime to

pursue a variety of carceral policies (Beckett 1997).

Indeed, most troubling is the association between

decreasing crime rates and increased public attention and