POSC 225 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Pork Barrel, Institutional Memory, Gerrymandering
Gerrymandering
• Redrawing electoral district lines to give an advantage to a particular party or candidate
• Cracking and packing
o Spread one parties vote among many districts, so they never have the majority
vote to win
o Places all one party into a single district, diluting those around it
• Controversy
o Fairness concerns, independent commissions, polarization
• Majority-minority districts
o Congressional districts drawn to ensure that a racial minority makes up the
majority of voters (packing)
• The incumbency factors
o Advantage
▪ Name recognition
▪ Franking (free mail)
▪ Retrospective
▪ Fundraising
▪ Pork barrel
▪ Constituency service or casework
• Rewarded for help; relationship
• This Is Us, we owe him our lives
• Term limits
o History (usually only one or two
o Arguments for and against
o No limit for congress
o Institutional memory
o Large partisan shirts uncommon
• Leadership in the House and Senate
o Speaker of the House
o Majority and minority leaders in both chambers
o Whips: counting votes, organizing party members
• Parties and party line voting in Congress
o Reasons why on the rise
o Look at vote
How a Bill Becomes a Law
• So many obstacles, few survive
o 6%
• Introduction of bill
• Committee stage
o Standing committee
o Hearings
o Mark-up (add/subtract language)
