Constituency Response To Congressional Behavior: the Impact of the House Judiciary Committee Impeachment Votes

Abstract

T HE EVENTS of Watergate and Richard Nixon's unprecedented resignation from the presidency in the face of impeachment constitutes one of the true high points in American political drama. With the media now attending current but less explosive events, and with Nixon cloistered in San Clemente working on his memoirs, political scientists and historians are beginning to assess some of the less apparent theoretical and practical consequences of these tumultuous events. Studies have already shown, for example, that Watergate significantly tarnished children's previously benign images of political authorities, and we can be fairly certain that exposure of Nixon's strategems has accelerated the rise in public political cynicism.1 Watergate also focused public attention on Congress through sustained media coverage of the Senate and House Committee hearings on the cover-up, dirty tricks, plumbers, and Nixon's involvement with these and related events. This paper assesses one of the consequences of public exposure to the workings of Congress during this period: the electoral fate of members of the House Judiciary Committee after they were cast into national limelight during their deliberations and votes on impeachment. Never before has a committee of the House of Representatives received such national exposure. The intense media coverage of the hearings ought to have greatly increased constituency awareness of the Committee members and their positions on the nationally salient issue of impeachment. Our purpose here is to determine whether voters use such issue information about candidates when it is clearly available. That is, do the issue positions taken by candidates in this case proand anti-impeachment standssystematically influence House members' reelection chances?2