John M. Theilmann

Labor PAC contributions and labor legislation: A simultaneous logit approach

Summary and conclusionsLabor PACs are used to explore the potential congressional influence of campaign contributions from special interest groups. PACs of organized labor are particularly useful for two reasons. First, a set of labor issues are defined each year by the AFL-CIO and so ad-hoc decisions about pertinent legislation are not made by the researcher. Secondly, there are measurable traits of representatives and constitutents that may lead to a predisposition of labor support. By combining these two attributes, a model is developed to investigate the question of congressional influence.A wider set of PAC strategies is allowed to operate in this formulation than previous studies. A series of roll-call votes is used to construct an index reflecting the probability that a representative will vote in favor of labor legislation. Therefore, labor PACs may contribute money to various members of congress hoping to sway their vote on a specific issue, a variety of issues, or they may simply want to increase their chances of obtaining access when issues of interest arise. The latter access-oriented strategy may affect the general trend in legislation even though its influence on specific bills is uncertain a priori. Because the dependent variable is a fraction based on samples from binomial populations, a quantal choice model is required. The simultaneous-logit formulation used here allows for the joint determination of PAC dollars and voting probabilities while exploring this discreet choice.The results of this study provide evidence that labor PACs are able to affect legislation. In both congressional terms studies, the tendency of a representative to support labor issues was directly related to the size of campaign contributions from labor PACs. Furthermore, these results suggest that the interaction between funds and legislation ran in both directions, i.e., additional labor funds increased pro-labor votes and at the same time representatives with a predisposition to vote for labor also receive more funds from labor PACs.Further hypothesized relationships were also tested. Representatives are more likely to support labor legislation when their constituents are unionized and less likely when constituents are conservative. Members of the Democratic Party lean towards labor, while congressmen and congress-women from states with right-to-work laws tend to oppose labor issues. With all of these characteristics included in the regression model, PAC money is still important.The determinants of labor PAC contributions include ideological measures, the Representatives of political clout, and measures of the need for funds in addition to the simultaneous interaction with labor voting probabilities. Democrats and members of House committees of importance to labor received greater funds while incumbents facing a strong challenger also increased their PAC receipts. These results are consistent with previous works.Labor PACs appear to have the ability to influence legislation through the manipulation of campaign contributions. Whether PACs are able to directly purchase a particular vote probably depends on the issue i.e., some studies have founds evidence of vote-buying while others have not. But if a broader spectrum of PAC concerns are considered, the evidence appears to be more convincing. PACs seem to have an impact.

A Plague of Plagues: The Problem of Plague Diagnosis in Medieval England

Recent works by historians and biologists have called into doubt whether the great epidemic of 1348/49 in England was the plague. Examination of the biological evidence, however, shows their arguments to be faulty. The great epidemic of 1348/49 may have included other diseases, but it was clearly yersinia pestis.

Unions, corporations, and political campaign contributions: The 1982 house elections

Because legislation affects so many aspects of the labor market, unions have long considered the political arena to be a major battleground. This paper investigates fund raising, a primary ingredient of this political activity. Specifically, the pattern of campaign contributions from labor PACs (and corporate PACs) is explained as an interaction of supply and demand. The results suggest that the demand for funds depends on the tightness of the race, the tenure of the incumbent, and ideology. Contributors are more willing to support ideological allies, expected winners, and powerful candidates.

Stubbs, Shakespeare, and Recent Historians of Richard II

Richard II, one of the most puzzling kings of late medieval England, has been the subject of controversy ever since his forced abdication in 1399. He often has been portrayed as a tyrant or, at times, as a madman by historians. Recently the trend is toward a reassessment of Richards reign free from the biased Whig interpretation of the past. R. H. Jones took a first step in that direction in 1968 with the publication of The Royal Policy of Richard II: Absolutism in the Middle Ages . Jones viewed Richard as a king inclined toward absolutism but lacking the taint of rancorousness or despotism ascribed to him by historians since Stubbs. Subsequently two books, a Festschrift , and several articles have appeared, delineating more aspects of the reign. Since May McKisacks volume in the Oxford History of England series appeared in 1959, the number of works concerning the reign has been steadily growing. The recent publication of Anthony Tucks Richard II and the English Nobility offers an opportunity to reexamine the place of Richard II in history. The divergence of scholarship since 1959 from the traditional interpretations will be seen as the major constitutional problems of the reign are scrutinized. After first examining the influence of William Shakespeare and William Stubbs in shaping the historiography of the reign a chronological discussion of the period from 1377 to 1399 will follow.

Food and Health in Early Modern Europe: Gentilcore, David. London: Bloomsbury Academic 264 pp.,

is as entertaining as it is scurrilous, and historians have taken one of two approaches in dealing with it: either cherry picking it for the bits that best suit their views, or swallowing Procopius’s shallow invective as fact. Potter’s choices reflect the first method—he allows certain of the more seemingly plausible facts and discards the rest, usually on sound grounds. In doing so, he tries to remove the focus from Theodora’s allegedly colorful youth and to refix our gaze on Theodora as a compelling person and historical figure. Unfortunately, one can never separate Theodora the empress from Theodora the actress and concubine. After the premature death of her father Acacius, bear keeper for the Green Faction, Theodora’s family was eventually taken in by the Blue Faction. Potter’s discussion of the role of the circus factions is well handled, and he provides a window into these organizations that were entertainer guilds, social-aid networks, and tinderboxes of populist resentment. Among the major issues of the day were the Christological controversies that harrowed the empire throughout the sixth and seventh centuries. Ideas, major events, and figures of the controversies, such as Severus, the anti-Chalcedonian bishop of Antioch (d. 538), are important foci. Theodora played more than a minor role in these affairs, backing those who opposed the formula of the Council of Chalcedon (AD 451) and helping to ensure the survival of the Jacobite Church in Syria, especially. In creating a book about Theodora and her times, Potter deftly weaves into his history major internal and external religious and political conflicts, and he generally approaches his subjects with due caution. Many of his reconstructions of the empress’s networks and how she managed the levers of power are plausible and probably even correct. Yet there are other ways in which Potter’s choices may raise an eyebrow or two, as when he states that Procopius was “a bit hung up on sex,” then accuses him of rape (26). Such a claim is based more on Procopius’ obvious misogyny (misanthropism is perhaps a better description) than on a reading of the text and borders on the bizarre. Indeed, the whole subject of sex and how one’s choices reflect on his or her character is a central muddle in the first fifty pages of the work, where Potter cannot quite seem to decide whether Theodora was only an actress (a profession impugned by Roman male-dominated society), a prostitute, or both, or if the detailed account of her youth is simply one more of Procopius’s many embellishments. In the end, Potter that decides Theodora “had been an actress, and she had had relationships with men who paid her to sleep with them” (47; original emphasis). Whatever the case, the precise nature of her youthful life does not seem to matter, as these details are lost in a rather convoluted section that flits from exploring the nature of acting to murder, the image of royals, abortion and contemporary medical practice, and then goes back to Theodora in the train of the Roman official Hecebolus. Nonetheless, there is much of use in this book, which is more a close reading of the age of Justinian than mere biography and is certainly worthwhile for its exploration of the imperial court and its personalities.

34.95 ISBN 1-4725-3497-2 Publication Date: November 2015

historians have managed. This book is part of a growing literature on the poor, but it adds a unique element in the way it intensely personalizes the subject, although some will find this a weakness as it involves creative interpretation of the available sources. It will also be of interest to historians working in the history of the metropolis, the Poor Law, and the criminal justice system. The book is accessible to historians, students, and general readers alike.

Defining Acts: Drama and the Politics of Interpretation in Late Medieval England: Nisse, Ruth: Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 226 pp., Publication Date: April 2005

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