IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jothpo/v28y2016i2p192-224.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Distributive politics, the electoral connection, and the antebellum US Congress: The case of military service pensions

Author

Listed:
  • Charles J Finocchiaro

    (Department of Political Science, University of South Carolina, USA)

  • Jeffery A Jenkins

    (Woodrow Wilson Department of Politics, University of Virginia, USA)

Abstract

We investigate the rise of federal military pensions in the antebellum US Congress to examine whether key aspects of the contemporary electoral connection were present in earlier historical eras. Overall, the political responses of members of Congress to pressures for military service pensions reveal that the quest for credit-claiming opportunities significantly shaped the adoption and evolution of this type of distributive legislation. Analyzing key legislative activity from 1818 to 1832, we find that members’ electoral interests gave rise to a particularistic and often inefficient system of benefits. Specifically, what began as a relatively simple program to provide for disabled Revolutionary War veterans grew into a broader entitlement-style program based on military service that legislators carefully cultivated in order to maximize their prospects for subsequent political advantage. Our analysis thus reveals that crucial features of the electoral connection were indeed present in the antebellum-era Congress, a finding that broadens our collective understanding of the early foundations of American political development.

Suggested Citation

  • Charles J Finocchiaro & Jeffery A Jenkins, 2016. "Distributive politics, the electoral connection, and the antebellum US Congress: The case of military service pensions," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 28(2), pages 192-224, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:28:y:2016:i:2:p:192-224
    DOI: 10.1177/0951629815586875
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0951629815586875
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0951629815586875?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gilligan, Thomas W & Marshall, William J & Weingast, Barry R, 1989. "Regulation and the Theory of Legislative Choice: The Interstate Commerce Act of 1887," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(1), pages 35-61, April.
    2. Polsby, Nelson W., 1968. "The Institutionalization of the U.S. House of Representatives," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 62(1), pages 144-168, March.
    3. Allen Hicken & Joel W. Simmons, 2008. "The Personal Vote and the Efficacy of Education Spending," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(1), pages 109-124, January.
    4. Formisano, Ronald P., 1974. "Deferential-Participant Politics: The Early Republic's Political Culture, 1789–1840," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 68(2), pages 473-487, June.
    5. Polsby, Nelson W., 1968. "The Institutionalization of the U.S. House of Representatives," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 62(1), pages 144-168, March.
    6. Carmines, Edward G. & Stimson, James A., 1980. "The Two Faces of Issue Voting," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(1), pages 78-91, March.
    7. Jamie L. Carson & Erik J. Engstrom, 2005. "Assessing the Electoral Connection: Evidence from the Early United States," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 49(4), pages 746-757, October.
    8. Pincus, J J, 1975. "Pressure Groups and the Pattern of Tariffs," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 83(4), pages 757-778, August.
    9. Weingast, Barry R & Shepsle, Kenneth A & Johnsen, Christopher, 1981. "The Political Economy of Benefits and Costs: A Neoclassical Approach to Distributive Politics," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(4), pages 642-664, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sean Gailmard & Jeffery A. Jenkins, 2018. "Distributive politics and congressional voting: public lands reform in the Jacksonian era," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 175(3), pages 259-275, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Scott H. Ainsworth, 1997. "Representation and Institutional Stability," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 9(2), pages 147-165, April.
    2. Nikoleta Yordanova, 2011. "The European Parliament: In need of a theory," European Union Politics, , vol. 12(4), pages 597-617, December.
    3. P. Hägg, 1997. "Theories on the Economics of Regulation: A Survey of the Literature from a European Perspective," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 4(4), pages 337-370, December.
    4. Kroszner, Randall S & Stratmann, Thomas, 1998. "Interest-Group Competition and the Organization of Congress: Theory and Evidence from Financial Services' Political Action Committees," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(5), pages 1163-1187, December.
    5. Sarah Binder, 2020. "How we (should?) study Congress and history," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 185(3), pages 415-427, December.
    6. Ndlovu, Nicholas. P. & Borrass, Lars, 2021. "Promises and potentials do not grow trees and crops. A review of institutional and policy research in agroforestry for the Southern African region," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    7. Denis Rey & Joshua Ozymy, 2019. "A political–institutional explanation of environmental performance in Latin America," International Area Studies Review, Center for International Area Studies, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, vol. 22(4), pages 295-311, December.
    8. Byung‐Jae Lee & Tae Wan Kim & Jaekwon Suh & O. Fiona Yap, 2021. "Local government performance and democratic consolidation: Explaining ordinance proposal in Busan Metropolitan Council," Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 8(1), pages 15-41, January.
    9. Bradbury, John Charles & Crain, W. Mark, 2001. "Legislative organization and government spending: cross-country evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(3), pages 309-325, December.
    10. Matsusaka, John G, 1995. "Fiscal Effects of the Voter Initiative: Evidence from the Last 30 Years," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(3), pages 587-623, June.
    11. Dongwon Lee, 2016. "Supermajority rule and bicameral bargaining," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 169(1), pages 53-75, October.
    12. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 2002. "Political economics and public finance," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 24, pages 1549-1659, Elsevier.
    13. Hahn Robert, 2010. "Designing Smarter Regulation with Improved Benefit-Cost Analysis," Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis, De Gruyter, vol. 1(1), pages 1-19, July.
    14. Bin, Sheng, 2000. "The Political Economy of Trade Policy in China," Working Papers 10/2000, Copenhagen Business School, Department of Management, Politics & Philosophy.
    15. Akai, Nobuo & Sato, Motohiro, 2008. "Too big or too small? A synthetic view of the commitment problem of interregional transfers," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(3), pages 551-559, November.
    16. Dalle Nogare, Chiara & Kauder, Björn, 2017. "Term limits for mayors and intergovernmental grants: Evidence from Italian cities," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 1-11.
    17. Giorgio Brosio, 2018. "Coercion and equity with centralization of government: how the unification of Italy impacted the southern regions," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 177(3), pages 235-264, December.
    18. Timothy Besley & Rohini Pande & Vijayendra Rao, 2012. "Just Rewards? Local Politics and Public Resource Allocation in South India," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 26(2), pages 191-216.
    19. Dörrenberg Philipp & Heinemann Friedrich & Khayal Nuri, 2015. "Reformoptionen für den deutschen Finanzföderalismus," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, De Gruyter, vol. 16(1), pages 26-43, March.
    20. Jan K. Brueckner & Steven G. Craig & Kangoh Lee, 2019. "Samuelson Meets Federalism: Local Production of a National Public Good," CESifo Working Paper Series 7709, CESifo.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Congress; elections; pensions;
    All these keywords.

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:28:y:2016:i:2:p:192-224. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.