Legislative Partisanship, Constituency and Malapportionment: The Case of California

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Two principal problems were analyzed in the study: (1) the impact of malapportionment on party voting, and (2) the influence of constituency on legislative partisanship. The California Senate was used as a test case because it was generally considered to deviate from the pattern of party voting found in other two-party states, and because it was the most poorly apportioned upper chamber in the nation. It was found that the proportion of party votes in the Senate increased significantly after reapportionment, and gross malapportionment may have inhibited a trend toward more party voting. It was also found that there was a much stronger association between political and socioeconomic constituency variables and an index of partisan voting following elections in reapportioned districts.