Are Women More Likely to Vote for Women's Issue Bills than Their Male Colleagues?

Abstract

votes indicate that gender exerts a significant and independent effect on voting for women's issues in the face of controls for other major influences on congressional voting. These influences include constituency factors, party, personal characteristics, and ideology. Interaction terms for gender by party indicate that much of the impact of gender is due to the influence of Republican women. Logit analysis of the individual votes demonstrates that the gender of the representative was most significant on votes that dealt with abortion and women's health. The influence of gender was overwhelmed by other factors such as party, ideology, and constituency concerns on votes that were less directly related to women, such as education.