Giving credit when credit is due: credit giving to the president in the United States Congress

ABSTRACT

How do members of the US Congress give credit when credit is due for political achievements? Focusing on an important credit giving scenario – credit giving to the president of the United States – this research suggests that credit giving is a form of non-roll call position taking and members give credit in a way that is reflective of individual, institutional, and constituency factors. Using an original data set composed of the official congressional statements concerning the death of Osama bin Laden, findings suggest the proximate decision to issue a statement is related to individual and institutional factors. Within the issued statements, however, credit giving is primarily driven by presidential popularity in the constituency. In addition to being less predictable in their credit giving behaviour, members of the Senate are less likely to give credit than their colleagues in the House of Representatives. Finally, Republican women in the House of Representatives are less likely to give the president credit than other members.

KEYWORDS:

• Congress
• position taking
• legislative behaviour
• credit giving

Note on Authors

Mileah Kromer is an Assistant Professor of Political Science and the Director of the Sarah T. Hughes Field Politics Centre at Goucher College, email: [email protected]

Laura Roselle is a Professor of Political Science and Policy Studies at Elon University and Visiting Professor of Public Policy at Duke University, email: [email protected]

Notes

1. Barack Obama, ‘Full text of Obama's speech on bin Laden's death', CBS News, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20058783-503544.html

2. Frank Newport, ‘Americans back bin Laden mission; credit military, CIA most’, Gallup Politics, http://www.gallup.com/poll/147395/Americans-Back-Bin-Laden-Mission-Credit-Military-CIA.aspx

3. See Cox and McCubbins (2007) for a full discussion of committee self-selection.

4. ‘Obama's real opposition’, The Wall Street Journal, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122593259568103473.html

5. More recently, some scholars have argued that the majority party in the Senate is more powerful than previous research has suggested (see Campbell, Cox, & McCubbins, 2002; Cox & McCubbins, 2005; Patty, 2006) but with the caveat that because of individualistic norms the Senate agenda is still far more open than the House agenda.

6. Jesse Holcomb, ‘Osama bin Laden's death continues to dominate the news’, Journalism.org, http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1988/news-coverage-bin-laden-death

7. For example, August of 2011 – an entire year after the end of combat operations – was the first month without a US military causality. See Green, Richard and Allen, ‘No U.S. troops killed in Iraq for first month since invasion', CNN, http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/meast/09/01/iraq.us.casualties/index.html

8. The following are considered ‘foreign policy or international relations committees’: Armed Services (House), Foreign Affairs (House), Homeland Security (House), Veterans Affairs (House), Intelligence (House), Foreign Relations (Senate), Veterans Affairs (Senate), Homeland Security and Government Affairs (Senate), and Armed Services (Senate).

9. Party/chamber leadership for the 112th Congress as follows: President pro tempore (Patrick Leahy – D), Senate majority leader (Harry Reid – D), Senate majority whip (Dick Durbin – D), Senate minority leader (Mitch McConnell – R), Senate minority whip (Jon Kyl – R), Speaker of the House (John Boehner – R), House majority leader (Eric Cantor – R), House majority whip (Kevin McCarthy – R), House minority leader (Nancy Pelosi – D) and House minority whip (Steny Hoyer – D).

10. As a point of comparison, about 95 per cent of House members gave explicit credit to the military, 13 per cent of members of Congress gave credit to former President Bush, and 73 per cent gave credit to the intelligence community.

11. While not included in Model 4, a variable to further account for potential electoral effects specific to the Senate electoral cycle (coded ‘1' if the Senator was up for re-election in the coming electoral cycle and ‘0' otherwise) was tested; results were insignificant.