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Sore Loser Laws and Congressional Polarization
Author(s) -
Burden Barry C.,
Jones Bradley M.,
Kang Michael S.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
legislative studies quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.728
H-Index - 54
eISSN - 1939-9162
pISSN - 0362-9805
DOI - 10.1111/lsq.12047
Subject(s) - legislator , ballot , political science , ideology , polarization (electrochemistry) , law , law and economics , sociology , legislation , politics , voting , chemistry
To enhance explanations for party polarization in the U.S. Congress, we focus on an unappreciated legal structure known as the sore loser law. By restricting candidates who lose partisan primaries from subsequently appearing on the general election ballot as independents or as nominees of other parties, these laws give greater control over ballot access to the party bases, thus producing more extreme major party nominees. Using several different measures of candidate and legislator ideology, we find that sore loser laws account for as much as a tenth of the ideological divide between the major parties.