20th Annual Student Research Conference
Social Science
Party Loyalty and Appointment to Committee Chairmanships in Term-Limited Legislatures
Ryan B. Hart*, Elizabeth A. Andrew, and Kyle G. Tracy
Dr. Candy Young, Faculty Mentor
In the study of legislative bodies, scholars often debate whether party loyalty or seniority is more important in determining who gets appointed to committee chairmanships. Ronald Hedlund (1996) and Keith Hamm (1992) have used Jewell’s Strong Party Model to test which factor is more influential but what has received very little attention is whether the presence of term limits in a system alters the relative importance of these two factors. This study will examine party loyalty, as measured by the percentage of the time that committee chairs in the Missouri House voted with the Speaker prior to their appointment, to see if it explains more of the variance than seniority. This is done pre-term limits and post-term limits, to determine if there is a difference between the two. We expect to find that party loyalty is more influential than seniority in gaining a committee chairmanship in a term limited legislature.
Keywords: Legislature, Term-Limits, Committee Chair, Party Loyalty, Missouri House, Seniority
Topic(s):Political Science
Presentation Type: Poster
Session: 9-5
Location: OP Lobby
Time: 4:15 pm