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Bicameral Distinctiveness in American State Legislatures.
- Source :
-
State Politics & Policy Quarterly . Sep2022, Vol. 22 Issue 3, p270-288. 19p. - Publication Year :
- 2022
-
Abstract
- Many important traits of state legislatures vary across chambers within a state. Yet according to existing typologies in the comparative study of bicameralism, the 49 bicameral American state legislatures would be deemed quite homogeneous. To resolve this disjuncture, I identify a novel dimension of bicameralism that distinguishes among state legislatures by capturing the extent to which the two chambers serve as meaningfully different venues for influence. Based on this framework, I develop an index of bicameral "distinctiveness" rooted in three traits that speak to policy influence across chambers: the ratio of seats, bipartisan representation, and constituency dissimilarity. This measure reveals sizable variation across states and a conspicuous geographic pattern, with considerably greater bicameral distinctiveness in the Eastern United States. In turn, I assess the construct validity of this measure, showing how patterns of second chamber bill amendment vary systematically with the level of bicameral distinctiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Subjects :
- *LEGISLATIVE bodies
*TEST validity
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 15324400
- Volume :
- 22
- Issue :
- 3
- Database :
- Academic Search Index
- Journal :
- State Politics & Policy Quarterly
- Publication Type :
- Periodical
- Accession number :
- 160322058
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1017/spq.2022.3