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The Dynamics of Legislative Gridlock, 1947–96

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2014

Sarah A. Binder
Sarah A. Binder*
Affiliation:
The Brookings Institution and, George Washington University
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Abstract

David Mayhew's Divided We Govern(1991) sparked an industry of scholars who alternately challenge or confirm the work on theoretical and empirical grounds. Still, we lack a definitive account of the proportions and causes of legislative gridlock. I revisit the effects of elections and institutions on policy outcomes to propose an alternative theory of gridlock: The distribution of policy preferences within the parties, between the two chambers, and across Congress more broadly is central to explaining the dynamics of gridlock. To test the model, I construct a measure that assesses legislative output in proportion to the policy agenda. Using newspaper editorials to identify every salient legislative issue between 1947 and 1996, I generate Congress-by-Congress gridlock scores and use them to test competing explanations. The results suggest that intrabranch conflict—perhaps more than interbranch rivalry—is critical in shaping deadlock in American politics.

Type
Articles
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 93 , Issue 3 , September 1999 , pp. 519 - 533
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1999

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