The Thicket at State Legislatures

Does Using Twitter Benefit Candidates?

by Gene Rose

Republicans, and in particular those identfied as being with the Tea Party, were more effective in using the social media juggernaut Twitter during the 2010 election cycle, according to a study released a couple of weeks ago by the University of Michigan.

The study looked at more than 460,000 tweets by 687 candiates running for Congressional or gubernatorial seats over a three-year period leading up to 2010 elections. Researchers from the university's School of Information and College of Engineering found that conservatives--who coincidentally made major gains across the country in 2010--were more focused on their election message. The tweeted an average of 723 times, but those with the Tea Party averaged more than 900 messages.

“The conservative candidates---Republicans and Tea Party members---definitely used  Twitter more visibly and showed a more coherent set of messages and topics,” said Eytan Adar, assistant professor in the School of Information and the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, in a press release. “They also followed each other much more closely. I think it’s fair to say they were much more cohesive in a lot of ways and at the end of the day that makes for a stronger campaign.”

Democrats, researchers said, posted less frequently (averaging 551 tweets) and their topics varied more widely.

The study also examined whether a candidate using Twitter had a better chance of being elected. Researchers said posting a massive number of tweets didn't guarantee results.

"We found that candidates who are close to the middle of the network, and the middle of what is being discussed by everyone are more likely to be elected," said Lada Adamic, associate professor in the School of Information and the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, in a press release.

Adamic says the work also sheds light on how a candidate's positions correspond to his or her likelihood of being elected.

"This has been attempted in the past by looking at, for example, a candidate's past voting record or their responses to standardized surveys," Adamic said. "However, this data was frequently incomplete. It is interesting to see how candidate's activity on Twitter is connected with election outcomes."

 

Legislators Bring Civics to Life

by Jan Goehring

Each year an estimated 1,200 state lawmakers visit classrooms and bring civics to life for students all across the country through the America's Legislators Back to School Program. The program, sponsored by NCSL's Trust for Representative Democracy, encourages legislators to meet with students and talk with them about the legislative process and what it is like to be a lawmaker. Young people also get the chance to share their ideas and learn that they have a voice in government.

Every year the Trust compiles information about legislator participation in each state. Utah had the most members participating with 90 percent of the legislature involved this past school year. Virginia and then Mississippi were next. The Massachusetts and Virginia senate chambers both had 100 percent participation.  

In Louisiana, the Legislative Youth Advisory Council made the Back to School program a priority project. Thirteen members of the council invited lawmakers to their classrooms. This gave them a further opportunity to get to know their legislators and demonstrate civic leadership among their peers. For photos and more, see the Louisiana Senate Back to School report.

The Trust kicks off the program the third week of September and it runs throughout the school year. 

Forward (and Backward) Leapfrogging of 2012 Presidential Primary Elections

Today's New York Times has an interesting story about the changing scene of 2012 presidential primaries and their possible effects on Republican nomination politics.

...[T]he first ballots are once again likely to be cast in January as Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina move up the dates of their contests to protect their franchises as the early voting states.

At the same time, the rush toward the front of the calendar by Florida, Michigan, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia and Missouri is accompanied by another trend: several states are pushing back their presidential primaries — or canceling them entirely — because of tight state budgets.

The outcome is a sharply scaled-back set of contests in the weeks after the initial flurry — with Super Tuesday in particular diminished in importance — followed by a stretch of primaries lasting until summer.

The story emphasizes the variability in timing, rules and procedures that presidential campaigns have to deal with:

For all of the precision that presidential campaigns require, the process of selecting a nominee is dictated by a haphazard set of rules that vary by state. Some states conduct closed primaries (registered Republicans only), and others have open primaries (independents and Democrats can vote, too).

Devotees of the presidential primary calendar know to follow the blog of Davidson College Prof. Josh Putnam, Frontloading HQ, who tracks this issue on a daily basis and provides this graphic among many interesting maps on the site:

New Study of Term Limits in California

The Sacramento Bee reports on a new study of term limits that shows that term-limited legislators are likely to continue in government or politics after their service in the California Legislature:

California's legislative term limits have failed to create a class of "citizen legislators" who serve briefly and then return home to resume private careers, a new study says.

Most lawmakers who left the Assembly and Senate in 2008 kept working in the public sector, mirroring results from 1990, when term limits were imposed, the Center for Governmental Studies found.

"A majority of state legislators stay in government and simply move to other elected offices," said Tracy Westen, head of the nonprofit, nonpartisan Los Angeles group....

Sixty percent of Assembly members and 40 percent of senators termed out in 2008 were appointed or elected to another public-sector job. For lawmakers leaving between 1980 and 1990, the numbers were similar – 60 percent and 30 percent, respectively.

Praying for a Balanced Budget

by Karl Kurtz

The Brookings Institution's Tom Mann, speaking at a workshop for teachers on representative democracy yesterday, said that he favored a balanced budget amendment like the one that Herbert Stein, the late conservative economist, had proposed: To require school children to pray for a balanced budget.

This line amused me enough to search for a reference to it on the web. I found a 1996 New York Times story:

At a recent weekend retreat, the senior staff at the American Enterprise Institute spent hours debating political issues of the day.

When particpants reached the topic of legalized prayer in public schools, Herbert Stein, who was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Nixon and Ford Administrations and is now a senior fellow at the Institute, sat quietly and let the others carry the discussion.

Eventually, someone said, ''Herb, what do you think of children praying at school?''

Mr. Stein, who is known for quick wit as well as traditional conservative economic views, replied: ''I don't care if the little tykes pray as long as they pray for a balanced budget.''

A little bit different from Tom's formulation but nonetheless consistent. And still funny, regardless of your position on a balanced budget--or school prayer, for that matter.

Sen. Bob Stenehjem, North Dakota

by Bruce Feustel

Senator Bob Stenehjem, the Senate majority leader in North Dakota, died in a traffic accident while on vacation in Alaska yesterday.  The news came as a shock to his colleagues and to me, as Bob has always connected with people with his humor, blunt speech and political insights. Bob had been a member of the North Dakota Legislature since 1992 and the Republican majority leader of the Senate since 2001. He also served several years as an officer of NCSL's Legislative Effectiveness Committee.

As a former NCSL liaison to North Dakota, visits in Bismarck with Bob were a highlight.  He was genuine, gracious, wickedly funny and a great judge of character.  A true citizen legislator--he was also the director of public works for the city of Bismarck--Bob moved effortlessly between the demands of his jobs.  Mostly, though, I think of Bob with pride as an example of the good people who lead and serve state legislatures in this country.  He made my life and many others better with his decency, leadership and his love for the Legislature.

Photo credit: Associated Press

Good Stories

The New York Times has had four stories of interest to The Thicket over the last couple of days. They include:

• A reasonably balanced profile of Alabama state Senator Scott Beason: "Outside of college football, Mr. Beason has become just about the most divisive topic in Alabama."
• A rundown on on Amazon.com's plans to launch an initiative in California to overturn that state's law requiring online retailers to collect sales taxes and its implications for other states
• A story on the declining influence of rural legislators featuring Washington Senate minority leader Mark Schoesler, the only farmer left in that state's Senate, with other references to the roles of rural legislators in Virginia, Oregon and Idaho.

Like other longtime lawmakers, representatives of rural areas in states without term limits tend to hold on longer. Those with the most longevity, and power, are mostly white men and often from states in the South, Midwest and West that have strong rural traditions, even if their populations are now more urban. They succeed in part because experienced hands are still in demand, even amid calls for change in state capitols. There can be a paradox in their power: the regions they come from are often in decline, so their seats may not be hotly contested.

“Generally, as a rule of thumb, you don’t see senior leadership coming from embattled districts,” Mr. Schoesler said. “Leaders have to do unpopular things, so you tend to see both parties look for safe seats to groom leadership in.”

• A story about a movement to establish a separate state of South California that has this nice short explanation of the history of breakaway states in California and elsewhere:

Declining Use of Multi-Member Districts

by Karl Kurtz

Stateline's Josh Goodman has written a first-rate article on "The Disappearance of Multi-Member Districts." Focusing on Vermont's unusual six-member Senate district in Chittenden County (Burlington) and New Hampshire's large number of multi-member districts (MMDs), he does a nice job of outlining the reasons for creating MMDs (the representation of entire communities in the legislature) and why they have declined in number over time (court decisions finding that they cause racial discrimination).

I liked his paragraph about the need to consider the philosophy of representation in thinking about proposals to eliminate MMDs:

In Vermont, and in West Virginia as well, these proposals have prompted something rare: a debate about representation itself. Is it better that legislators have to appeal to a broad, diverse group of people, or should they represent a narrow, cohesive constituency? Are citizens better served by having a single representative who’s close to them or several different ones to whom they can voice concerns? While conventional redistricting politics is in play in these debates -- critics say, for example, that the multi-member Chittenden Senate seat has benefited Democrats -- the more serious philosophical questions are at least part of the conversation.

The article quotes my colleague Tim Storey about when the decline of MMDs began. His off-the-top-of-his-head statement that the steepest decline was in the 1980s is right on the mark, but it subsequently inspired the two of us to see if we could come up with the actual data on the number of chambers and states using MMDs. Here's what we found:

 

Does anybody have data from the 1960s?

The states that currently have MMDs are Vermont and West Virginia in both the house and the senate, Nevada in the Senate only, and Arizona, Idaho, Maryland, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Washington in their houses of representatives only. Among the state houses that use MMDs, only Maryland, New Hampshire and West Virginia use it in some districts and not others with varying numbers of represenatives. In the others all representatives run from two-member districts, usually nested inside of state senate districts. (NCSL, Redistricting Law 2010, p. 137)

Peverill Squire and Gary Moncrief in State Legislatures Today: Politics Under the Domes (p. 27) summarize differences that political scientists have found in behavior between legislators in multi-member districts compared to those who represent single-member districts. Legislators in MMDs are more likely to:

• Regard themselves as "trustees" acting on the basis of what they think is best for their state and district, not necessarily the expressed views of their constituents
• Spend more time on constituent service
• Obtain more government funding for their districts.

Read below the jump for a 7/14/2011 update with more historical data on the number of chambers with MMDs.

Even the Bored Deserve Representation

by Karl Kurtz

Matthias Poehm, founder of the Anti-PowerPoint Party (APPP) in Switzerland, estimates that 11 percent of the Swiss population has to endure two PowerPoint presentations per week and claims that this loss of productivity costs Switzerland $2.4 billion annually. These unsubstantiated claims have drawn a lot of chatter and laughter on the Web, no doubt striking a chord because all of us have been subjected to bad, even terrible, PowerPoint presentations.

What I like the best, though, is this statement on the party's web site, reported in The Envoy:

"The APPP regards itself as the advocate of approximately 250 million world citizens (500 000 in Switzerland) who, every month, are obliged to be present at boring presentations in companies, at universities or at schools and who, up to now, have not found a political representation in politics," the party website states.

It's a reminder that in a representative democracy virtually every interest, no matter how small or narrow, has an advocate in the form of a political party or group.

Microsoft, a powerful advocate on the oher side, has chosen not to comment according to the Wall Street Journal, other than to say that Poehm is using a guerilla marketing tactic to sell his book--join his party and you get a discount on his book.

Bar Opens in Ohio Statehouse

by Karl Kurtz

Earlier this month, the Columbus Dispatch reported that a cafe in the basement of the Ohio Statehouse will begin serving alcoholic beverages today.

The first full-service bar will appear at the Statehouse on July 11 when the reinvented Capitol Cafe reopens in the lower level of the landmark state building. The cafe is closed for 10 days to accommodate a change in operators, to Milo's Catering and Banquet Services from Catering by Design.

The big change will be the addition of a full-service bar, "complete with flat screen televisions," according to the Capitol Square Review and Advisory Board, the state agency responsible for the Statehouse and grounds. The bar will host special events and "private happy hours," but it also will be open to the public at times to be designated....

The reinvented Capitol Cafe by Milo's also will feature "a classic deli and diner flair." For those with a sweet tooth, Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream will be on the menu.

As far as we know at NCSL, this is the only capitol that allows liquor to be served in a restaurant open to the public. There are several state capitols where alcohol is banned altoghether, some that allow it for special events only, and a remaining few where unofficial bars in leaders' offices still lubricate the legislative process behind closed doors.

Next time I'm in Columbus, I'll stop by the Capitol Cafe for some Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream--perhaps with some Bailey's Irish Cream on top.