The Seventeenth Amendment, Senate ideology and the growth of government

Abstract

The Seventeenth Amendment disturbed the existing electoral system in the United States by requiring direct elections for state Senators. Scholars have argued this made the Senate more populist and contributed to the growth of government in the US post-1913. We employ econometric tools to investigate whether the mean ideology of the Senate and its winning policies experienced a structural change around the time of the enactment. We find no compelling evidence of a structural break at that time but do find some evidence for a change in the mid-to-late 1890s.

Keywords:

• Seventeenth Amendment
• structural break
• Senate ideology

JEL Classification:

• D72
• H19

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Edward J. Lopez and participants at the 2012 Southern Economic Association meetings in New Orleans for helpful comments and suggestions. Part of this research was conducted while Hall and Tarabar were at Beloit College and general research funding from the Elbert H. Neese, Jr Chair and Charles Koch Charitable Foundation are gratefully acknowledged.