Rationalist Explanations for Legislative Impasse

• In Event: Legislative Process (Or Lack Thereof)

Abstract

At both state and federal levels, stalemate is a common feature of U.S. policymaking. Often, an impasse simply leaves an existing policy in place. In some cases, however, the status quo no longer applies, and failure to enact legislation by a pre-established deadline can lead to serious negative consequences. Common examples of critical deadlines involve the need to pass a budget or continuing resolution to forestall a government shutdown, and other cases include legislation to raise the debt ceiling, to avoid budget sequestration, or to reauthorize funding for expiring programs. Given the costliness of such delay for all involved, questions persist around the rationality of these standoffs. If an agreement must eventually be reached, and if delays are costly, one or both sides ought to be willing to make concessions earlier in the process. We note the similarity of this question to those about the emergence of war in the international relations literature (Fearon 1995) and draw upon insights from that literature to shed light on legislative delay. Specifically, we adapt Fearon’s (1994) model of domestic audience costs and conflict escalation. We validate the assumptions of this model using novel survey data of state legislative candidates, and we test the implications with data on the timing of state budget adoption. Among the model’s predictions, we expect the probability of a late budget to increase with increases in the benefit of one’s opponent making concessions before the deadline and, less intuitively, with increases in the length of the budgeting process.

Authors

• Dan Alexander, University of Rochester

• Patricia Kirkland, Princeton University

• Justin Phillips, Columbia University