Dynamics of Cosponsorship

Electoral-connection theories of legislative politics view bill cosponsorship as low-cost position taking by rational legislators who communicate with target audiences (e.g., constituents) external to the legislature. Legislative signaling games suggest a view of bill cosponsorship in which early co...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The American political science review 1996-09, Vol.90 (3), p.555-566
Main Authors: Kessler, Daniel, Krehbiel, Keith
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis
Bills
Bills, Legislative
Calculus
Candidates
Comparative Testing
Conditional probabilities
Congress
Conservatism
Decision Making
Elections
Electoral campaign financing
Electoral campaigning
Endorsements
Evaluation
Expertise
Extremism
Federal legislation
House of Representatives
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES (ALL NATIONS)
Ideology
Legislation
LEGISLATIVE BODIES
Legislative procedure
Legislators
Legislatures
Liberalism
Null hypothesis
POLITICAL AND POWER PROCESS
Political Attitudes
Political extremism
Political science
Political support
Political theory
Politics
Preferences
Principals
Public officials
Sponsorship
Standard error
Statistical data
Statistical significance
United States
Voting
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Summary:Electoral-connection theories of legislative politics view bill cosponsorship as low-cost position taking by rational legislators who communicate with target audiences (e.g., constituents) external to the legislature. Legislative signaling games suggest a view of bill cosponsorship in which early cosponsors attempt to communicate to target audiences (e.g., the median voter) within the legislature. Using data from the 103rd U.S. House of Representatives, we show that the timing of legislators' cosponsorship decisions are more supportive of cosponsorship as intralegislative signaling than as extralegislative position taking. First, policy extremists on both sides of the political spectrum are more likely than moderates to be initial endorsers of legislative initiatives. Second, extremist-moderate differences diminish over the course of bill histories.
ISSN:0003-0554
1537-5943
DOI:10.2307/2082608