On November 27, an Economist/YouGov Poll released, revealing what respondents think about Congress. Only 6% approve. That includes 10% of the Democrats, 7% of the Republicans, and 3% of the independents. That is the lowest approval rating for Congress since the poll has been conducted. Here is the link. Thanks to PoliticalWire for the link.
Paul Zukerberg, a candidate for the Democratic nomination for District of Columbia Attorney General, says he has been ordered by the D.C. Office of Campaign Finance not to spend any money campaigning. See this story. The D.C. Government argues that even though the voters amended the charter to elect the Attorney General starting in 2014, the government does not intend to hold such an election. Zukerberg has been in federal court and is about to go to the district’s own court to force the election to be held. Thanks to Political Activity Law for the link.
At the November 5, 2013 election, Constitution Party member Steven W. Johnson was elected to one of the two city council seats in Enoch, Utah. Enoch is in Iron County in southwest Utah and has non-partisan elections. Here are the official election returns. Thanks to Frank Fluckiger for this news.
Colbert King, deputy editor of the Washington Post’s editorial page, has this column, suggesting that 2014 might see the election of an independent candidate for Mayor of Washington, D.C. Thanks to Doug McNeil for the link.
Two political science professors and one law professor have posted a preliminary copy of their article “Sore Loser Laws and Congressional Polarization” on the Social Science Research Network. The Network permits anyone to read the article free of charge, using this link. The authors are Barry C. Burden, Bradley Jones, and Michael S. Kang. The article will eventually be published in Legislative Studies Quarterly.
The article documents the increase of polarization in Congress, discusses various theories that explain the increased polarization, and then makes the case that one ignored cause of polarization is that almost all states now have “sore loser” laws. As the study explains, these laws were almost unheard of a century ago. The article has a chart, giving the year each state passed its sore loser law. Thanks to Rick Hasen for the link.
