The Changing South: A Note On Ideological Change in Congress: Party, Region, Race, And Redistricting

Southeastern Geographer Vol. XXXVIII, No. 1, May 1998, pp. 79-87 THE CHANGING SOUTH A NOTE ON IDEOLOGICAL CHANGE IN CONGRESS: PARTY, REGION, RACE, AND REDISTRICTING Gerald R. Webster The num ber o f African American members o f the U.S. House o f Representatives rose substan­ tially between the 102nd (1991-1993) and 103rd (1993-1995) Congresses due to the creation of m ajority-m inority congressional districts after the 1990 census. But the increased presence of m inorities in Congress does not necessarily result in increased influence if they are ideologi­ cally m arginalized in that body. The purpose o f this note is to consider this issue in terms o f se­ lected subdivisions o f the House o f Representatives based upon party, region, and race. National Journal’s ideological ratings o f House members from 1989 through 1996 are used for this analysis. Coefficients o f variation are calculated as measures o f ideological polarization for the selected subdivisions o f the H ouse’s membership for the four-year periods before and after redistricting. This note finds that there were ideological impacts stemming from redistricting , but that the increase in ideological polarization was minimal. The Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) was formally established in 1971 with 14 members. At that time not a single member represented a state in the former Confederacy. By 1991 the CBC’s membership had nearly doubled to 26 members and included Representatives from Louisiana, Texas, Georgia, and Mis­ sissippi. With the substantial increase in the number of predominantly African American congressional districts created prior to the 1992 elections, the CBC’s membership jumped to 40 members in the 103rd Congress (1993-1995) (Canon, 1995; Webster, 1995). In 1993, a total of 17 members of the Caucus represented districts located in the former Confederacy, including at least one House member from every state except Arkansas (Bositis, 1994). Recent Congresses have included a larger number of African American Rep­ resentatives than at any time in the history of the United States (Ingalls et al., 1997; Leib and Webster, 1998). Yet African Americans remain a decided minor­ ity among all members of the House of Representatives. While clearly the in­ crease in minority representation in Congress is beneficial, the presence of minority group members in legislative bodies does not necessarily result in de­ monstrable or effective legislative influence. Rather, the political or racial polari­ zation found in the population as a whole may manifest itself in the legislative body. If this occurs, minority legislators may be marginalized or effectively ex­ cluded from “meaningful participation” in decision making (Guinier, 1992, Dr. Webster is Professor o f Geography at the University o f Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487. 80 S o u t h e a s t e r n G e o g r a p h e r p. 287). Second, regardless of the success of minority-group candidates in pre­ dominantly minority districts, voting coalitions with other members of Congress are necessary to form House majorities if desired legislation is to be enacted. Such coalitions may be difficult to develop and maintain if African American members of Congress find themselves ideologically marginalized in legislative debate, decision-making, and voting. PURPOSE. The purpose of this research note is to assess the scope of ideological changes in Congress resulting from the redistricting process. It considers eight years ofthe NationalJournal's ideological ratings of House members’voting rec­ ords, 1989 through 1996, with a methodology used in an earlier paper on the topic (Webster, 1993b). The National Journal subdivides their ratings for each member of Congress into three policy categories—social, economic, and foreign. All Rep­ resentatives are assigned a numeric rating based upon a 100-point scale, from least liberal (or most conservative) to most liberal (or least conservative), on all three issue divisions. Using liberalism for the example, a House member receiv­ ing a score of 90 on economic issues would be evaluated as more liberal than 90% of all House members. The present paper focuses on two interrelated questions as they relate to se­ lected subdivisions delineated by the party, race, and region of the House’s mem­ bership. First, did...