Why Do Governors Issue Vetoes? The Impact of Individual and Institutional Influences

• Date: 01 December 2008
• Published date: 01 December 2008
• DOI: 10.1177/1065912908314200
• Author: Carl E. Klarner,Andrew Karch
• Subject Matter: Articles

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Political Research Quarterly

Volume 61 Number 4

December 2008 574-584

© 2008 University of Utah

10.1177/1065912908314200

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Why Do Governors Issue Vetoes?

The Impact of Individual and Institutional Influences

Carl E. Klarner

Indiana State University

Andrew Karch

University of Texas at Austin

Studies of presidential veto use advance two competing theoretical perspectives: the “president-centered” approach and

the “presidency-centered” approach. We assess the applicability of these approaches to gubernatorial veto activity. Our

analysis of forty-eight states between 1971 and 2002 provides strong support for the institutional perspective and less

support for the individual perspective. The governor’s formal powers, the partisan alignment of the legislature, and the

electoral cycle all contribute to veto activity. The results suggest that conflict between the legislature and the governor is

a product of systematic forces and that governors who face similar institutional constraints will behave in similar ways.

Keywords: legislative-executive relations; state politics; governors; vetoes; divided government; formal powers;

electoral cycle

The American political system distributes institu-

tional authority to a wide array of actors. At the

national level, nothing better illustrates this complex

interaction than the relationship between Congress and

the president. Each institution possesses prerogatives

that infringe on the primary domain of the other and

can foster conflict. The presidential veto power is a

good example. Use of the veto is an especially impor-

tant instance of direct conflict between the legislature

and the chief executive and therefore ranks among the

most potent powers that the chief executive has at his

or her disposal. Examining the root causes of veto

activity provides scholars with a deeper understanding

of interbranch conflict in the American political sys-

tem and sheds light on questions of institutional

design, power, and decision-making authority.

Presidential vetoes have received considerable

scholarly attention. In attempting to explain why

presidents veto legislation, political scientists

advance two contrasting theoretical approaches. The

first is the “president-centered” approach, which

stresses the importance of “individual behavior as an

influence on veto behavior” (Gilmour 2002, 199).

The president-centered approach highlights the per-

sonality traits and veto strategies of individual pres-

idents as key precipitating factors. The second

theoretical perspective is the “presidency-centered”

approach, which emphasizes the “institutional structures

and societal conditions that constrain presidential

behavior” (Shields and Huang 1997, 436). This

approach emphasizes factors such as minority party

opposition and the electoral cycle. Recent studies of

presidential vetoes (Gilmour 2002) and of presiden-

tial behavior more generally (Hager and Sullivan

1994) provide empirical support for both the presi-

dent- and presidency-centered perspectives.

This article assesses the applicability of these com-

peting perspectives in the context of the fifty American

states, examining the impact of individual and institu-

tional factors on governors’ veto activity. By examin-

ing gubernatorial veto use, this article assesses the

external validity of existing research on presidential

veto behavior. The fifty states represent an ideal venue

in which to analyze political phenomena, including the

relationship between the legislature and the executive

branch, because they possess broadly similar political

structures and cultures as well as significant variation

across a range of politically relevant attributes.

Analyzing gubernatorial veto use possesses two addi-

tional analytical advantages. First, presidential research

Carl E. Klarner, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Indiana

State University; e-mail: cklarner@indstate.edu.

Andrew Karch, Assistant Professor of Government,University of

Texas; e-mail: akarch@mail.utexas.edu.

Authors’Note: The authors wish to thank Kim Quaile Hill, Thad

Kousser, and three anonymous reviewers for their constructive

comments on an earlier version of this article.