Policy and Performance in the New Deal Realignment: Evidence from Old Data and New Methods
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707305.pdf
Description
Published version
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831.62 KB
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Adobe PDF
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Author(s)
Caughey, Devin
Dougal, Michael C.
Schickler, Eric
Date Issued
April 2020
Journal
Journal of Politics
Publisher
University of Chicago Press
Citation
Caughey, Devin et al. "Policy and Performance in the New Deal Realignment: Evidence from Old Data and New Methods." Journal of Politics 82, 2 (April 2020): 494-508 © 2020 Southern Political Science Association
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Recent research has challenged the policy bases of the New Deal realignment, arguing that it was instead driven by retrospective evaluations of the economy. Using a comprehensive analysis of opinion polls conducted in 1936–52, we argue that policy preferences were far from irrelevant. At the individual level, presidential Republicans who became Democrats were much more supportive of New Deal policies than those who remained loyal (vice versa for Democrats). At the state level, both public support for the New Deal—as measured by a group-level item response model—and income growth predict pro-Democratic shifts in presidential elections. In short, the realignment was rooted in both policy preferences and economic retrospection. Moreover, mass support for the New Deal, unlike partisan identification, was a leading indicator of long-term electoral trends, predicting presidential elections decades in the future even better than it does contemporaneous elections.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Political Science
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Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use.
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1086/707305
