The Role of Connections in Congressional Lawmaking

Haritz Garro

No efnrq, SocArXiv from Center for Open Science

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.

Date: 2020-09-15
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:osf:socarx:efnrq

DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/efnrq

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