Committee Assignments and the Cost of Party Loyalty

Dilatory or anticipatory? Voting on the Journal in the House of Representatives

“…22 In particular, the evidence presented here suggests that we should estimate two separate models: one for votes on Journal 20 Recent works considering the implications of selective pursuit of party discipline in Congress include Sinclair (1998Sinclair ( , 2000, Rohde (2000, 2004), Roberts (2003), Burden and Frisby (2004), Schickler and Wawro (2006), Lebo et al (2007), and Patty (2008). 21 A few examples that have been studied include committee assignments (Leighton and Lopez 2002), staff (Sinclair 1981), opportunities for promotion within the party organization (Loomis 1984), preferential recognition of legislation (Woon 2008), and the opportunity to offer amendments (Sinclair 1983;Bach and Smith 1988;Roberts 2003). 22 For example, consider Groseclose (2000, 2001), Ansolabehere et al (2001), McCarty et al (2001), Roberts (2003Roberts ( , 2007, Krehbiel (2003), and Krehbiel et al (2005), among others.…”

Going once, going twice, sold! The committee assignment process as an all-pay auction

“…In addition to the evidence presented by Cox and McCubbins, Heberlig (2003) finds that greater financial contributions to other party candidates and party election committees by an incumbent increases the likelihood that she will transfer to a prestige committee. Leighton and López (2002) find some evidence that increases in party loyalty lead to increases in a member's committee portfolio value.…”

A “gathering of enthusiastic expense account tourists”?

“…Fortunately, a number of ideas on committee assignments in U.S. American research on legislative organization exist. Although committee assignments seem to represent a rather narrow empirical subject, they address the heart of broader theoretical debates because committee assignment patterns indicate what general rationale guides the organization of parliaments (Leighton & Lopez, 2002, p 60).…”