Political Calculations : A Statistical Analysis of Open Seat and Congressional Special Elections

Political Calculations: A Statistical Analysis of Open Seat and Congressional Special ElectionsAbstractThis paper tests whether congressional special elections, and their closest counterpart, open seat elections, are leading indicators of the congressional vote share in a given district. Since special elections occur in effective isolation, they are thought to have little predictive value. Amending the candidate-constituency model advanced by Gaddie et al (1999), this project also tests if voters respond differently to the circumstances surrounding the vacancy. Since special elections and open seat elections lack incumbents they may be canaries in a coal mine, signaling trouble or tranquility for the incumbent president's party in the following congressional election. Using data collected from a variety of sources, including the House Clerkﾒs Office and the Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report on all congressional special elections and open seat elections from 1977-2008, this paper hopes to expand our understanding of special elections and tests their predictive power on congressional voting behavior