David C. W. Parker

Divided We Quarrel: The Politics of Congressional Investigations, 1947–2004

Are congressional committee investigations into alleged executive-branch wrongdoing more common during periods of divided government? We analyze original data tracking congressional committee investigations into alleged fraud, waste, and abuse by the executive branch between 1947 and 2004. Countering David Mayhews (1991) empirical finding, we show that divided government generates more and more-intensive congressional investigations, but this relationship is contingent on partisan and temporal factors. Our findings shed new light on the shifting dynamic between partisan institutional politics and congressional oversight.

Rooting Out Waste, Fraud, and Abuse The Politics of House Committee Investigations, 1947 to 2004

Scholars have long bemoaned congressional disinterest in oversight. We explain varied congressional attention to oversight by advancing the contingent oversight theory. We show how the structure of congressional committees, partisan majorities, and theories of delegation together explain when, why, and for how long Congress investigated executive branch malfeasance between 1947 and 2004. Divided government, partisan committees, and committees characterized by broad statutory discretion generate more investigations, whereas distributive committees and unified government dampen Congress’ investigatory vigor. The conduct of oversight depends on more than a desire to produce good government or the incentive structures faced by individual members of Congress.

Who Franks? Explaining the Allocation of Official Resources

All members of Congress utilize their official resources, even if the electoral effect is minimal. Congressional reforms in 1995 created the Members Representational Allowance, providing members with more flexibility in deploying their official resources. However, these reforms also created a zero-sum game where a dollar spent on travel is a dollar not available for sending mass mail or paying staff salaries. Using a newly created dataset, we argue and find evidence that members allocate resources to support their particular representational goals, which change throughout the course of a members career (Fenno 1973; 1978). We conclude that the re-election motive alone cannot explain how members run their offices and technological changes increasingly make the district-Washington dichotomy a false one.

The Weaponization of Congressional Oversight

During the 2006 election cycle, Democrats campaigned on the promise of returning managerial competence to Washington.1 Congressional Republicans had been wracked by a series of ethics scandals, while the Bush administration had to deal with charges of maladministration in the handling of Hurricane Katrina’s aftermath and the postwar reconstruction of Iraq. Democrats complained loudly that congressional Republicans, serving as handmaidens for the administration and leery of possible political fallout, turned a blind eye to the serious allegations of administrative failings. Not only was the one hundred and ninth Congress notable for its relative lack of legislative productivity, it paid scant attention to executive oversight.2 House committees held only 960 hearings during the two year session—200 less than Democrats held during unified government under President Bill Clinton between 1993 and 1994. Senate Democrats, frustrated with Republican unwillingness to examine seriously the Bush Administration’s policy in Iraq, resorted to holding their own hearings on prewar intelligence (Pincus 2006). Democrats campaigned throughout the summer and fall on the promise to exercise increased oversight of the executive branch, with Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi notably pledging to “drain the Republican swamp” if voters threw out Republicans and gave them the majority (Espo 2006). Voters threw Republicans out, and the Democratic majority made good on their promise: At the conclusion of the one hundred and tenth Congress, the House conducted more than 1,400 hearings. Congressman Henry Waxman (D-CA), the new chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, alone held 203 hearings during the last two years of the Bush administration (Sherman and Cohen 2010).

Our State’s Never Had Better Friends: Resource Allocation, Home Styles, and Dual Representation in the Senate

We demonstrate that senators use office allowances to create positive constituent service and policy expert impressions among voters, but the effects depend on the representational expectations of constituents and the nature of dual representation. Whether a senator shares the same party and represents a densely populated state in part determines the effectiveness of constituent service activities and efforts to establish policy expertise. The representational challenge faced by senators is more complicated than those faced by House members and more nuanced than the existing literature suggests. We conclude by examining the different challenges senators and representatives face in building representational relationships.

Back from Holyrood: How mixed-member proportional representation and ballot structure shape the personal vote

Research on mixed-member legislatures demonstrates that members face different incentive structures when cultivating a personal vote. In this article, we examine how Scotland’s adoption of a mixed-member proportional system (MMP) and a change in ballot structure affect the legislative activities undertaken and emphasised by Members of Scottish Parliament (MSPs). Utilising a range of measures of legislative behaviour, we find that MSPs representing constituencies spend less time legislating and more time engaged in constituent service work. Regional members, conversely, lodge more parliamentary motions when not listed on the ballot and sponsor more members’ bills than constituency-based colleagues when on the ballot. We conclude that electoral structures directly affect the representational styles MSPs adopt, while calling for conceptual reconsideration of the personal vote.

Leaving on a Jet Plane: Polarization, Foreign Travel, and Comity in Congress

No political observer, politician, or political scientist doubts that party polarization has weakened the social fabric of Congress. Measuring that effect, however, is exceedingly difficult. In this article, we operationalize the congressional social fabric by examining the foreign travel behavior of members of Congress over time. We evaluate the social disintegration in Congress by examining if and whether changes in member travel can explain why the social connectedness of members has waned. Using a unique dataset of foreign travel for House members from 1977 to 2012, we find that Republican House members, in particular, have altered their foreign travel patterns. Ideologically extreme members have always been less likely to take foreign trips, but extremely conservative Republican have become much more likely to travel only with co-partisans as polarization has increased in Congress. Ideologically moderate Republicans, while still traveling as members of bipartisan delegations, have also increased their willingness to travel only with fellow Republicans. Our results suggest that bipartisan foreign travel is a victim of the partisan war waging in Congress.

A Review of “Sharing the Wealth: Member Contributions and the Exchange Theory of Party Influence in the U.S. House of Representatives”

In a series of scholarly works, Keith Krehbiel asserted that, at best, the effects of parties in the legislative process had been exaggerated. The alleged power of political parties does not match ...