Uncovering the Hidden Effect of Party

Abstract

Some recent scholarship affords political parties little role in explaining patterns of legislative outcomes. Policy preferences, rather than partisanship, are said to provide the superior account of legislative behavior. In this paper, we challenge one recent such account of legislative outcomes. We show that the likelihood of finding a party effect depends on where we look for it and with what measures we use to test for it. Party effects, we find, are amply visible in the 1994 "A to Z" discharge petition campaign in the U.S. House of Representatives, a case where party has been termed inconsequential.