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The Role of Connections in Congressional Lawmaking

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  • Garro, Haritz

Abstract

Understanding what makes legislators effective is a central problem in the congressional literature. However, estimating how connections impact legislative effectiveness is challenging, as unobserved factors influence lawmakers’ effectiveness and connections. I investigate the role of connections in congressional lawmaking by studying how legislators’ deaths impact their peers’ capacity to sponsor and advance bills in the U.S. House of Representatives. I focus on legislators who represent the same states as deceased legislators: these lawmakers collaborated with the deceased more closely, but otherwise they are comparable to all other lawmakers. Following the death of a legislator from the same state, lawmakers suffer a 16% decrease in their effectiveness. The impacts are concentrated in the initial stages of lawmaking when the support of key lawmakers is crucial to ensure a bill is considered in committee. Moreover, same-state legislators experience a larger decrease in effectiveness after the death of a committee chair.

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  • Garro, Haritz, 2020. "The Role of Connections in Congressional Lawmaking," SocArXiv efnrq, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:efnrq
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/efnrq
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Marco Battaglini & Eleonora Patacchini, 2018. "Influencing Connected Legislators," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(6), pages 2277-2322.
    2. Nikolaj Harmon & Raymond Fisman & Emir Kamenica, 2019. "Peer Effects in Legislative Voting," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 11(4), pages 156-180, October.
    3. Berry, Christopher R. & Fowler, Anthony, 2018. "Congressional committees, legislative influence, and the hegemony of chairs," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 1-11.
    4. Rogowski, Jon C. & Sinclair, Betsy, 2012. "Estimating the Causal Effects of Social Interaction with Endogenous Networks," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(3), pages 316-328, July.
    5. Janet M. Box‐Steffensmeier & Dino P. Christenson & Alison W. Craig, 2019. "Cue‐Taking in Congress: Interest Group Signals from Dear Colleague Letters," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 63(1), pages 163-180, January.
    6. Masket, Seth E., 2008. "Where You Sit is Where You Stand: The Impact of Seating Proximity on Legislative Cue-Taking," Quarterly Journal of Political Science, now publishers, vol. 3(3), pages 301-311, October.
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    Cited by:

    1. James Rockey & Nadia Zakir, 2021. "Power and the money, money and the power: A network analysis of donations from American corporate to political leaders," Discussion Papers 21-03, Department of Economics, University of Birmingham.

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