Daniel A. Smith

THE EFFECTS OF BALLOT INITIATIVES ON VOTER TURNOUT IN THE AMERICAN STATES

With few exceptions, voter turnout continues to decline in the United States. Although normative theorists, journalists, and defenders of participatory democracy frequently suggest that citizen-initiated ballot measures can increase voter turnout, previous research has not supported this claim. Yet, in the past 25 years, usage of direct democracy has exploded in the United States. Using pooled time series data for the 50 states over a 26-year period (1970-1996), we find that the presence and usage of the initiative process is associated with higher voter turnout in both presidential and midterm elections. The disparity in turnout rates between initiative and noninitiative states has been increasing over time, estimated at 7% to 9% higher in midterm and 3% to 4.5% higher in presidential elections in the 1990s. Our analysis suggests that the initiative process can and does play a positive role in increasing electoral participation.

The Educative Effects of Ballot Initiatives on Voter Turnout

Scholars have begun examining what Progressive reformers called the educative effects of direct democracy, especially the effect ballot initiatives have on voter turnout. Research based on aggregate-level voter age population (VAP) turnout data indicates that ballot measures increase turnout in low-information midterm elections but not in presidential elections. We analyze the impact of ballot initiative use on voter turnout from 1980 through 2002 using voter eligible population (VEP) turnout rates. Cross-sectional time-series analysis reveals that (a) ballot initiatives increase turnout in midterm as well as presidential elections and (b) the turnout effect in midterm and especially presidential elections is considerably larger than previously thought. On average, turnout in presidential elections increases by 0.70% with each initiative on the ballot, whereas turnout in midterm elections increases by 1.7%, all else equal. Given the closeness of the Electoral College contests, it is possible that the mobilizing effects of statewide ballot questions could be the determining factor in future presidential elections.

Same-Sex Marriage Ballot Measures and the 2004 Presidential Election

Did ballot measures banning samesex marriage swing the 2004 general election to George W. Bush? In 2004, activists and state legislators placed anti-gay marriage questions on the general election ballots of 11 states. All of the ballot measures passed easily, receiving on average roughly 70 percent support.1 Pundits argued that the marriage measures on the November ballot would be a major motivating factor in the election and would help ensure Bush’s reelection. The measures, so the logic went, would receive broad support from social conservatives who would be mobilized to go to the polls primed to vote for Bush, who was fi rmly aligned with the issue. Merging county-level religious, socioeconomic, and political data with the 2004 election results, this article examines the electoral effects of same-sex marriage ballot measures in two key neighboring presidential battleground states, Michigan and Ohio. In both states, the anti-gay marriage measures passed easily, and overall statewide turnout increased from the 2000 election. However, Bush prevailed only in Ohio. To test the impact of the anti-gay marriage measures in both states, the analysis proceeds in three stages, examining fi rst the county-level voting patterns on the gay marriage bans, then patterns of countylevel turnout in 2004, and fi nally the countylevel support for President Bush in 2004.

Delegating Direct Democracy: Interparty Legislative Competition and the Adoption of the Initiative in the American States

Between 1898 and 1918, voters in 20 American states adopted constitutional amendments granting citizens the power of the initiative. The embrace of direct democracy by voters invites inquiry into why some state legislatures opted to delegate to citizens the power of the initiative, while others did not. Drawing on an original data set, this article uses Event History Analysis hazard models to explain the puzzle of why legislatures might devolve institutional power to citizens. Our longitudinal, macrolevel analysis of socioeconomic and political forces reveals that political considerations—interparty legislative competition, party organizational strength, and third parties—are the most powerful predictors of a legislatures decision to refer the initiative to the ballot. Although several of our findings comport with the conventional wisdom explaining the adoption of the initiative during the Progressive Era, others are surprising, offering us new theoretical insights into why and when legislative bodies might be willing to divest themselves of their institutional power.

Priming Presidential Votes by Direct Democracy

We demonstrate that direct democracy can affect the issues voters consider when evaluating presidential candidates. Priming theory assumes that some voters have latent attitudes or predispositions that can be primed to affect evaluations of political candidates. We demonstrate that: (1) state ballot measures on same sex marriage increased the salience of marriage as an issue that voters used when evaluating presidential candidates in 2004, particularly those voters less interested in the campaign and those likely to be less attentive to the issue prior to the election; and (2) that the primed issue (gay marriage) was a more important factor affecting candidate choice in states where marriage was on the ballot.

Consolidating democracy? The structural underpinnings of Ghana's 2000 elections

In 2000, Ghana’s landmark elections ushered in a new era of democracy. Scholars, however, have yet to scrutinise the structural underpinnings of the country’s electoral system. This article oers a detailed assessment of Ghana’s bloated voters’ register, patterns of voter turnout and the lingering accusation of electoral irregularities in the Volta and Ashanti Regions in the 2000 elections. Most significantly, it critically analyses the severe malapportionment of the country’s 200 parliamentary seats. While the 2000 elections helped to consolidate the democratic process in Ghana, structural inequalities continue to plague the country’s electoral system.

A Principle or a Strategy? Voter Identification Laws and Partisan Competition in the American States

We undertake a comprehensive examination of restrictive voter ID legislation in the American states from 2001 through 2012. With a dataset containing approximately one thousand introduced and nearly one hundred adopted voter ID laws, we evaluate the likelihood that a state legislature introduces a restrictive voter ID bill, as well as the likelihood that a state government adopts such a law. Voter ID laws have evolved from a valence issue into a partisan battle, where Republicans defend them as a safeguard against fraud while Democrats indict them as a mechanism of voter suppression. However, voter ID legislation is not uniform across the states; not all Republican-controlled legislatures have pushed for more restrictive voter ID laws. Instead, our findings show it is a combination of partisan control and the electoral context that drives enactment of such measures. While the prevalence of Republican lawmakers strongly and positively influences the adoption of voter ID laws in electorally competitive states, its effect is significantly weaker in electorally uncompetitive states. Republicans preside over an electoral coalition that is declining in size; where elections are competitive, the furtherance of restrictive voter ID laws is a means of maintaining Republican support while curtailing Democratic electoral gains.

Homeward Bound?: Micro-Level Legislative Responsiveness to Ballot Initiatives

Recent macro-level studies examining the indirect effects of direct legislation on public policy in the American states are decidedly mixed. This study tests whether the macro-level logic of legislative behavior in response to ballot initiatives holds true at the micro-level for individual legislators. I examined the determinants of legislative votes on “counter-majoritarian” legislation—bills that directly challenge the outcomes of earlier statewide ballot initiatives. In 1999, the Colorado state legislature tried to overturn the outcomes of three previous ballot contests. I find that in two of the three cases, a legislators vote on these bills was related to the vote in his or her district on the respective ballot initiative. This helps explain why many legislators will vote contrary to the outcome of a statewide initiative vote.

Strategic Voting and Legislative Redistricting Reform District and Statewide Representational Winners and Losers

Political elites are generally reluctant to alter the status quo unless a change will benefit them. Scholars have found that institutions, and the rules governing them, tend to evolve in ways that maintain equilibrium, preserving the status of winners. Are voters—when presented the opportunity—more likely than elites to alter political institutions? Using survey data, the authors explore mass support in the American states for changing how legislative districts are drawn. They find evidence that representational losers at statewide and district levels are more likely to vote for reforms to create nonpartisan redistricting in ballot issue contests, while electoral winners oppose reform. They argue that ordinary voters—like elected officials—may exhibit a similar instrumental rationale, using a self-interested calculus when serving as policy makers for a day. Beyond theorizing about conditions under which the mass public might engage in strategic voting, the analysis has implications for practical election reform efforts in the American states.

Java type inference is broken: can we fix it?

Java 5, the most recent major update to the Java Programming Language, introduced a number of sophisticated features, including a major extension to the type system. While the technical details of these new features are complex, much of this complexity is hidden from the typical Java developer by an ambitious type inference mechanism. Unfortunately, the extensions to the Java 5 type system were so novel that their technical details had not yet been thoroughly investigated in the research literature. As a result, the Java 5 compiler includes a pragmatic but flawed type inference algorithm that is, by design, neither sound nor locally complete. The language specification points out that neither of these failures is catastrophic: the correctness of potentially-unsound results must be verified during type checking; and incompleteness can usually be worked around by manually providing the method type parameter bindings for a given call site. This paper dissects the type inference algorithm of Java 5 and proposes a signficant revision that is sound and able to calculate correct results where the Java 5 algorithm fails. The new algorithm is locally complete with the exception of a difficult corner case. Moreover, the new algorithm demonstrates that several arbitrary restrictions in the Java type system---most notably the ban on lower-bounded type parameter declarations and the limited expressibility of intersection types---are unnecessary. We hope that this work will spur the evolution of a more coherent, more comprehensive generic type system for Java.