Voting by Race?

The Neglected Role of Partisanship

Jon C. Rogowski University of Chicago Amir Shawn Fairdosi University of Chicago

April 10, 2012

Abstract According to the empowerment thesis and the vast amount of evidence garnered to support it, the presence of racial minority candidates increases levels of minority political participation. Furthermore, conventional wisdom in both scholarly and popular accounts suggests that black voters are more likely to support black candidates, just as Latino voters are more likely to support Latino candidates. We reinvestigate this thesis in the context of the 2010 midterm congressional elections, in which an unusually large number of black candidates won their districts Republican nomination. Using data from the 2010 CCES, we examine what happens when racial cues con ict with Black voters party allegiances. While we nd that black Democratic candidates motivated greater participation among and received higher levels of support from black Democratic voters, no such relationship exists between black Republican candidates and black Democratic voters. Our ndings suggest that the minority empowerment thesis should be amended to account for the ways in which shared partisanship is a precondition for the stimulative e ects that accompany the presence of a racial minority candidate on minority voters.

We thank Eric Oliver for thoughtful comments on earlier drafts. Corresponding author; Department of Political Science, 5828 S. University Avenue, Pick Hall, 4th Floor, Chicago, IL 60637; jrogowski@uchicago.edu. Department of Political Science, 5828 S. University Avenue, Pick Hall, 4th Floor, Chicago, IL 60637; amirfairdosi@uchicago.edu.

Inclusion means you get candidates like Michael Steele.

This should be a wake-up call. You cannot take your most loyal base for granted. You cannot assume that just because people are black they will vote Democratic. 2 I think its great that the Republican Party has discovered black people. But . . . you dont vote for somebody because of what they look like. You vote for somebody because of what they stand for. 3 For the last two decades, Republicans have repeatedly expressed interest in expanding their partys reach by appealing to larger numbers of African American voters. During their tenures as chair of Republican National Committee, Lee Atwater, Ken Mehlman, and Michael Steele each asserted the importance that the Republican Party increase its appeal to black voters.4 A key part of this strategy involved recruiting more black Republican candidates. According to Mehlman, black Republican candidates will help to show black voters that they are a part of the Republican Party, and will then be more likely to cast Republican votes.5 The 2010 midterm elections, two years after America elected its rst black president, saw a dramatic upsurge in black Republican congressional candidatesnearly three dozen in all. Of these, fourteen black candidates successfully won the Republican Party nomination and competed in the 2010 general election. The Republican candidates in 2008 in each of these districts (except two, which were uncontested in 2008) were white. Every single one of the 2010 black Republican candidates received a larger vote share than their white 2008 counterparts, with an average increase of
National Committee Chair Ken Mehlman, quoted in Perry Bacon, Jr., Can the GOP Reach Black Voters?, TIME Magazine, October 26, 2005. 2 Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, quoted in Matthew Most, Angling for Hip Hop Appeal, The Washington Post, August 25, 2006. 3 Barack Obama, speech at Bowie State University, November 3, 2006. 4 Atwater: E.J. Dionne, December 11, 1988; House and Local Seats to be Target of G.O.P.", New York Times, available at http://www.nytimes.com/1988/12/11/us/house-and-local-seats-to-be-targets-of-gop.html (accessed April 9, 2012); Mehlman: James Dao, July 1, 2005, G.O.P, Democrats in its Sights, Is Grooming Black Candidates," New York Times, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/01/politics/01repubs.html (accessed April 9, 2012); Steele: Jennifer Steinhauer, May 5, 2010, Black Hopefuls Pick This Year in GOP Races," New York Times, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/05/us/politics/05blacks.html (accessed April 9, 2012). 5 James Dao, July 1, 2005, G.O.P, Democrats in its Sights, Is Grooming Black Candidates," New York Times, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/01/politics/01repubs.html (accessed April 9, 2012).
1 Republican

nearly seven percentage points. A glance at the raw data, then, show that black Republicans fared quite well in 2010, culminating in the election of the rst Southern black Republicans since 1878. But did the increased support for black Republican candidates signal the emergence of a new crop of black Republican voters? The RNC chairs arguments are generally consistent with a large body of scholarly literature that nds that racial minority groups are mobilized by the presence of racial minority candidates, and generally grant increased support for candidates from their racial group (Banducci et al. 2004; Barreto 2007; Barreto, Segura, and Woods 2004; Bobo and Gilliam 1990; Leighley 2001; Lublin and Tate 1993; Tate 1993). However, virtually all prior research on black political behavior has examined these questions in the context of black Democratic candidates. This leaves open the question of how black voters, the majority of whom vote for and identify as Democrats (Dawson 1994), balance party identi cation and racial group membership in the presence of a black Republican candidate. This paper examines the conditions under which shared racial or ethnic group identity mobilizes racial or ethnic group members and generates higher levels of support for the partys candidate. We use the 2010 Cooperative Congressional Election Study to evaluate how con icting attachmentsto ones racial group and to ones political partya ect processes of voter participation, candidate evaluation, and vote choice. We demonstrate that while black Democrats are more likely to turn out to vote and to vote Democratic when the Democratic candidate also is black, no such associations exist for black Republican candidates. Thus, we conclude that shared racial group membership is an insu cient condition for the mobilization of minority group members, and that the e ects posited by the minority empowerment thesis (e.g., Bobo and Gilliam 1990) are conditional on shared partisanship.

Race and Political Behavior

According to the minority empowerment thesis, the presence of minority o ceholders increases minority participation because it demonstrates that minority groups have achieved signi cant descriptive representation and in uence in political decision making (Bobo and Gilliam 1990). Specifically, the presence of minority representatives creates macro-level cues that a ect how people perceive costs and bene ts of voting (p. 379). In other words, the presence of minority elected o cials sends a contextual cue to minority citizens that the bene ts of voting outweigh the costs of not voting" (Banducci et al. 2004, 539). Recently, Hayes and McKee (2011) found that black turnout increases when black voters are redistricted into majority-minority distrists. Descriptive representation has also been shown to increase knowledge about and contact with elected o cials, often resulting in increased electoral participation (Banducci et al. 2004). Other studies have shown that visible political leadership by members of a minority group enhances trust in government, e cacy, group pride, and participation (Gurin, Hatchett, and Jackson 1989; Tate 1991). It also appears to generate greater levels of political interest among African Americans (Vanderleeuw and Utter 1993). A sizable body of literature nds similar e ects with the presence of a black candidate on the ballot. Lublin and Tate (1992) nd that African Americans turn out to vote at higher rates in city elections when there is a black mayoral candidate on the ballot, while Washington (2006) nds that black voter turnout increases with the number of black candidates that appear on the ballot. Moreover, the presence of black candidates has been linked to lower rates of ballot roll-o among black voters (Vanderleeuw and Lin 2002) and lower uncounted vote rates (Herron and Sekhon 2005). Similar e ects have been found for other racial and ethnic groups. Barreto, Segura and Woods (2004) show that Latinos living in majority-minority districts are more likely to vote, while the presence of a Latino candidate on the ballot also increases Latino turnout (Baretto 2007). Finally, Nakanishi (1986) and Lai (2000) show that Asian Americans are more likely to engage in electoral

behavior when Asian American candidates are on the ballot. The evidence reviewed here, then, suggests that black Republican candidates may in fact motivate higher levels of behavior from black voters. Not only are racial minorities more likely to participate in politics when a member of their racial or ethnic group seeks election, but they are also more likely to grant support to that candidate. Traditional conceptions of political decision-making emphasize individual utility maximization based upon the political choices that are available to them. For instance, economic models of voting (e.g., Downs 1957) posit that citizens choose candidates by comparing the candidates issue positions, and selecting the candidate whose issue positions are most similar to their own views. Recognizing the extraordinary informational requirements that such models often assume, however, subsequent work emphasizes the importance of a variety of heuristics for enabling citizens to reach political decisions (e.g., Brady and Sniderman 1985; Lau and Sears 1986; Nisbett and Ross 1980; Simon 1985; Sniderman, Brody, and Tetlock 1991). These heuristics help citizens make political decisions by [keeping] the information processing demands of the task within bounds (Abelson and Levi 1985, 255). Voters, both black and white, use the race of candidates as a heuristic. Indeed, the evidence favoring social identity theory (Tajfel and Turner 1979), according to which group membership isa powerful basis for the development of self-identity and perceptions of individual interest (Bobo 1983, 1200), is considerable. In the political realm, if a person identi es with a particular racial group, her decision to support a particular candidate may be closely tied to her perception of which alternative is more likely to advance the groups interests. Observing whether a political candidate is a member of the same group, then, is said to in uence the voters decision as to whether to support the candidate. Dawson (1994) expands upon the social identity literature to explain the homogeneity of black politics even as class and socioeconomic heterogeneity among African Americans has increased dramatically. He posits a black utility heuristic, according to which, so long as an individuals 4

life chances are substantially shaped by race, African Americans use their perceptions of African American group interests as a proxy for their own. This sense of linked fate among black voters a ords insight into why Black voters are more likely to support black candidates: they are likely to view a Black candidates success as their own. Study after study supports the view that race matters for candidate choice, and especially for Black voters. From black voters overwhelming support for Jesse Jackson in 1984 and 1988 (Tate 1991, 1993), to Barack Obamas overwhelming 65 percentage point advantage over Hillary Clinton among blacks on Super Tuesday in 2008,6 research consistently indicates that black voters are more likely to vote for a partys candidate when that candidate is black.7

Race and Partisanship

For decades, scholars have identi ed partisanship as a keyperhaps the keypredictor of how citizens (of all races) process information, evaluate candidates, and make voting decisions. The Michigan School conception of partisanship describes it as a personal attachment which the individual feels toward the [party] of his choice (Campbell, Gurin, and Miller 1954, 89). Though Key (1966), Fiorina (1981), and many others since have argued that party identi cation involves a great deal more cogition than Michigan School adherents acknowledge, they converge upon a common view that party identi cation is strongly related to an individuals political decisions. For the most part, then, we should expect to observe Democrats voting for Democratic candidates and Republicans voting for Republican candidates. Partisanship plays an especially prominent role in contemporary congressional elections because they are generally thought to be low-information a airs. In the absence of greater information, partisanship may serve as an especially important heuristic by which citizens infer a canBest, February 6, 2008, Behind the Clinton-Obama Draw, http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-250162-3795497.html (accessed April 9, 2012). 7 See also Philpot and Walton (2007).
6 Samuel

CBS News,

available at

didates issue positions based upon the positions that the stereotypical Republican or Democrat are assumed to take (e.g., Lodge and Hamill 1986; Rahn 1993; Scha ner and Streb 2002). In contemporary American politics, then, partisanship ought to play a prominent role in how individuals evaluate and choose between political candidates. A second account of partisanship casts party a liation in similar terms as identi cation with a racial group (Green, Palmquist, and Schickler 2003). They argue that partisanship, rather than describing a psychological attachment to one of the political parties, is itself a social identity. An individuals partisanship, therefore, is based upon her perceptions of the social groups that are associated with the political parties. Like religious a liation, an individuals decision to classify herself as a Democrat or a Republican is rooted in her sense of self-identity and its relationship to the other social groups that identify as Democrats or Republicans. Supporting candidates from the political party with which a person identi es, then, provides psychic bene ts just as one would receive from supporting members of other social groups with which the person also identi es. The only thing more stable than party identi cation is black party identi cation. Using the American National Election Studies from 1972-2008, gure 1 compares levels of party identi cation and partisan voting behavior among blacks and whites. As the gure shows, black partisanship is a very stable features of contemporary American politics. Over the last four decades, African Americans have identi ed with the Democratic Party and supported Democratic presidential and congressional candidates at consistently high levels. White voters, in comparison, exhibit considerably greater variability. These observations are consistent with those of other traditional studies (Dawson 1994; Tate 1993; Walton 1985). Partisanship among blacks, then, has been relatively impervious to the signi cant social and political changes that have occurred over the last four decades. Figure 1 goes here. As such, the accounts referenced above a ord little room for the notion that a candidates descriptive characteristics will induce major changes in voter participation, vote choice, and candidate 6

evaluation among citizens who identify with the opposite political party. The enduring quality of party attachments suggests that black Republican candidates are unlikely to recon gure black voters political choices. Thus, conceptualizing party identi cation in the same way that we think of racial identities generates the possibility that these identities sometimes compete. In particular, they may compete when partisan loyalties encourage a person to support one candidate, while racial identity implies that the person should support a di erent candidate. The 2010 congressional elections provide a nearly ideal context in which to investigate this possibility in greater detail, and enable us to better distinguish the ways in which descriptive characteristics and partisanship in uence voter participation and vote choice. We investigate two sets of hypotheses, corresponding with two sets of dependent variables. First, consistent with the minority empowerment thesis, we examine whether black voters are more likely to participate when a black candidate is on the ballot. Second, consistent with the e orts of Republicans to attact black voters, we examine whether black voters are more likely to support a partys candidate when that candidate is also black. Our alternative hypotheses, re ecting the partisan logic we have sketched in this section, implies that both of these relationships are conditional upon shared partisanship. That is, black Democratic voters are mobilized by black Democratic candidates, but not by black Republican candidates; and black Democratic voters are more likely to cast Democratic votes when the Democratic candidate is black, but not when the Republican candidate is black. We now describe the context in which we examine these hypotheses.

Black Republican Candidates and the 2010 Midterm Election

Republican leaders machinations to the contrary, the number of Black Republican candidates decreased during the 2000s. In 2008, no Black Republicans were on the general election ballot for any state or federal o ce. But in 2010, Republicans successfully recruited a substantial number of

black congressional candidatesnearly three dozen in allin an attempt to liberate black voters from what black Republican candidate Allen West called the 21st-Century plantation. Of these, fourteen black candidates successfully won the Republican Party nomination and competed in the 2010 general election, as table 1 shows below. There is considerable geographic and contextual variation across these fourteen districts. Half of them are in the South, whereas the remaining half are distributed across the northeast (NY), the Mid-Atlantic (MD), the mid-west (IN and IL), the west (CO), and the Paci c coast (CA). Seven of the districts are majority-minority districts; a plurality of the populations in NY-15 and TX-30 are Latino, while a majority of residents of IL-2, MD-4, MS2, TN-9, and VA-3 are black. In addition, four of these black RepublicansRobert Broadus, Ryan Frazier, Bill Randall, and Allen Westcompeted against white Democratic candidates. All but two of these races were also contested by Republicans in 2008. The 2008 Republican candidates in these districts were white. All of the 2010 Republican candidates received a larger vote share, however, than the 2008 Republican candidates. The average increase was 6.95 percentage points,
8

which is about one percentage point better than the increase that Republicans received

nationwide. A rst glance at the raw data, then, show that black Republicans fared quite well in 2010, culminating in the election of the rst Southern black Republicans since 1878. We now describe our survey data and empirical approach in greater detail. Table 1 goes here.

Data and Methods

To test the hypotheses outlined above, we rely primarily upon the 2010 Cooperative Congressional Election Study (CCES). Due to the presence of a relatively large number of black Republican candidates, as noted above, the 2010 congressional elections provide the rst opportunity to systematically assess the relationship between candidate race and voter behavior. The CCES contains
8 The

increase is statistically signi cant at p < .001.

pre- and post-election modules that were administered to 55,400 respondents just before and after the 2010 congressional midterm election. The surveys were conducted over the internet by YouGov/Polimetrix, and uses sample matching to create a respondent pool that is representative of the U.S. population. The sampling frame is U.S. citizens aged 18 and older. Though the survey is not intended to be representative of states or congressional districts, respondents from all 435 congressional districts are included in the survey. On average, 104 respondents per district are included, ranging from a minimum of 35 to a maximum of 297. Because of its wide coverage across districts and the large number of respondents within districts, the CCES is a nearly ideal data source. For our primary analyses, we include only the CCES respondents who identify as black or African American. We further restrict our attention to districts in which both major parties elded candidates. This produces a sample size of 5,951. Of these, 9% lived in one of the 14 districts with a black Republican congressional candidate, and 34% lived in a district with a black Democratic candidate.9 Our analyses contain two sets of dependent variables. The rst concerns political behavior. Speci cally, we analyze the role of candidate race for voter turnout and campaign activity. Voter turnout is self-reported by the CCES respondents in the post-election wave of the survey. To assess campaign activity, we create a composite variable that indicates whether respondents reported doing at least one of the following four activities: donating to a candidate, working for a campaign, attending a political meeting, or displaying a political sign. Crucially, we analyze whether respondents indicated that they performed these behaviors for one of the candidates in their local House race. This enables us to directly connect the candidates characteristics with citizen behavior. Our second set of dependent variables addresses candidate evaluations. We analyze vote choice using dichotomous measures that indicate support for the Democratic or Republican congressional candidate. We also examine respondents ideological and character evaluations of the candidates. We evaluate ideological congruence, the extent to which a respondent perceives that a candidate shares her policy views, by comparing the respondents ideological self-placements and their place9 All

descriptive statistics can be found in table A-1 in the appendix.

ments of the candidates along a seven-point scale.10 Ideological congruence is the absolute value of the di erence between these measures, where smaller values indicate greater congruence. Finally, we evaluate respondents assessments of the candidates competence, which is measured along a seven-point scale, where smaller values indicate greater competence. Our hypotheses require us to compare the e ects of candidate race based on the partisan afliation of the candidate. Thus, our primary independent variables are indicators for whether the respondent lives in a district where the Democratic [Republican] candidate is black. To the extent that the coe cients for these variables di er while analyzing the same independent variable provides support for our hypotheses. Finally, our focus on how partisanship conditions the e ect of candidate race also requires us to account for the respondents partisanship. In an ideal scenario, we would compare the e ects of candidate party and race across respondents of di erent parties. Unfortunately, though, very few black respondentsfewer than one per congressional districtin the CCES identi ed as Republicans. Rather than compare results from this very small subsample of black Republicans with a signi cantly larger sample of black Democrats, we conduct our analysis by including just those respondents who identify as Democrats (76%) or Independents (20%). By comparing the ways these respondents react to black candidates of di erent parties, our evidence still allows us to directly assess our hypotheses.

The Impact of Black Candidates

We begin by rst presenting results without disaggregating black candidates by party. Instead, we simply use an indicator for whether at least one of the candidates in the congressional race is black. We evaluate our three main independent variables: campaign activity, voter turnout,
use the pre-election responses to minimize the probable impact of candidates electoral success or failure on respondents evaluations of them, though we acknowledge that the use of respondent perceptions likely are also a ected by respondents levels of support for them.
10 We

10

and vote choice. In addition to candidate race, we include a series of standard demographic and contextual control variables.11 The standard errors are clustered by congressional district to account for any local correlation in the error term that does not apply to other districts.12 We also estimated these models with the inclusion of state xed-e ects to account for statewide variation in electoral contexts or election administration that may also a ect political behavior. The results are shown in table 2 below. Consistent with prior research, we nd that candidate race has a signi cant e ect on political participation and vote choice. Respondents reported signi cantly higher rates of voter turnout in districts in which a black candidate appeared on the ballot. They also reported higher levels of campaign activity in districts with black candidates. Finally, individuals living in districts with black candidates are signi cantly more likely to report support for the Democratic candidate, which is notable given that black citizens already provide high levels of support for Democratic candidates. On the basis of results much like these, previous scholars have claimed that minority candidates have a mobilizing or empowering e ect on minority voters. As we discussed above, however, these results cannot distinguish whether candidate race itself has a mobilizing e ect on voters, or whether some other attribute that is associated with minority candidates also a ects voter response. Table 2 goes here. In addition, note that the inclusion of state xed-e ects has no substantive impact on the estimated coe cients. Though their inclusion does likely provide improved estimates of the e ects of candidate race, they also reduce the number of districts (and thus clusters) that can be analyzed.
indicates a race in which there was no incumbent; Mobilized indicates whether the respondent reported contact from a party or candidate; Competitiveness re ects the closeness of the election, coded in reverse (such that larger values indicate less competitive elections); Education is whether the respondent has a four-year college degree; Ideology is the respondents self-placement; and Registered indicates whether the respondent reported being registered to vote. 12 Green and Vavreck (2008) raise concerns that standard errors are biased downward when there are too few clusters. This is unlikely to be a concern in these analyses because, as Arceneaux and Nickerson (2009, 188) argue, If the number of clusters is plentiful (i.e., above 20), clustered [standard errors], random e ects, and [hierarchical linear models] are equally adequate for precise estimates of group-level e ects.
11 Open

11

Thus, all subsequent models reported here are estimated without state xed-e ects, though we note that including them does not change any of our substantive conclusions.

Candidate Race, Partisanship, and Political Participation

We now disaggregate the e ects of candidate race by candidate partisanship. Here we focus on the e ects of candidate race on campaign activity. We estimate the same models shown above in table 2, but separate them by Democratic and Republican candidates. The results are shown in table 3 below. The rst column shows the results when evaluating the race of Democratic candidates, and the second column shows the results when looking at Republican candidates. The results in the rst column suggest that black citizens are more likely to participate in a campaign when a Democratic candidate seeks o ce. The coe cient is signi cant at p < 0.09, and indicates that the presence of a black Democratic candidate increases the probability of participating campaign activity by nearly ten percentage points. When evaluating the e ects of a black Republican candidate, the co cient for candidate race is also positive, but it is not statistically signi cant. Moreover, the magnitude is much smaller (0.11) compared to the coe cient for black Democratic candidates (0.38). More importantly, when comparing the results from the two models, the coe cient for Democratic candidates is di erent from the coe cient for Republican candidates at p < 0.24. Though the statistical di erences between these estimates are not especially robust, the magnitudes of the di erences in e ect sizes suggest that there are important and meaningful di erences between the impacts of black Democrats and black Republicans on the participation decisions of black voters. Table 3 goes here. We nd similar results when evaluating the e ects of candidate race on voter turnout, as table 4 demonstrates. The coe cients for candidate race among Democratic and Republican candidates are 12

nearly identical to those obtained in table 3 above. Respondents were much more likely to report voting when the Democratic candidate was black, while the e ect of candidate race among Republican candidates is again not statistically signi cant. Moreover, these coe cients are statistically distinct at p < 0.03. Table 4 goes here. In combination, tables 3 and 4 demonstrate that partisanship conditions the mobilizing e ect of candidate race. Citizens who share the partisanship of a candidate that also shares their race are much more likely to exhibit participatory behaviors as a result. Black Republican candidates, however, do not mobilize black voters to nearly the same degree as black Democratic candidates. On the whole, however, these results provide limited support for the claim that black Republican candidates receive increased levels of support from black voters. To the extent that black voters are more likely to support black Republicans than white Republicans, the e ects appear to be concentrated among black Republican voters. This nding reinforces the dominance of partisanship in political decision-making, but also demonstrates that candidate race can help mobilize support among the candidates copartisans.

Race and Candidate Evaluations

We now investigate whether candidate race has an impact on several correlates of respondents preferences over candidates. In particular, we examine whether black voters perceive greater issue commonality with black candidates than with white candidates, whether black candidates are perceived as more competent than white candidates, and whether respondents are more likely to spport black candidates than white candidates. We start with ideological proximity, and examine whether respondents perceive that black candidates better represent their policy views than white candidates. We estimate linear regressions of

13

ideological congruence on the same covariates included in table 2, and again separate the models by candidate party. The results are shown in table 5 below. When looking at the e ect of candidate race among Democratic candidates, the coe cient for race is negative, large in magnitude, and statistically signi cant, indicating that black voters perceive signi cant more policy agreement with black Democrats than they do with white Democrats. While our data cannot fully explicate why this is so, one possibility is that race serves as a shortcut by which voters evaluate the ideological positioning of candidates. Black respondents self-identify themselves as considerably more ideologically liberal than do white respondents, and perhaps black respondents infer that black candidates are more likely to share those liberal views than are white candidates. The coe cient among black Republican candidates is also negative, but it is half the magnitude of the coe cient shown for black Democratic candidates, nor is it statistically signi cant. Moreover, the di erence between these coe cients is signi cant at p < 0.002. Once again, this provides strong evidence that the e ects of candidate race are strongly conditioned by the candidates partisanship. Table 5 goes here. Similar results are found for respondents evaluations of the candidates competence. The coe cient for race when evaluating Democratic candidates is again negative and statistically signi cant, indicating higher assessments of competence of black Democrats by black voters. When evaluating Republican candidates, however, the coe cient for race is positive, though not statistically significant. More importantly, though, these coe cients are statistically distinguishable at p < 0.002. Thus, black candidates generate better evaluations from black voters, but only when the candidate shares the voters partisanship. Table 6 goes here. Finally, we evaluate the e ects of candidate race for candidate preference. We estimate two logistic regressions, where the dependent variables are supporting the Democratic candidate and 14

supporting the Republican candidate. The main independent variables are whether the Democratic candidate is black and whether the Republican candidate is black, respectively. The results are shown in table 7. Black voters are signi cantly more likelyabout twelve percentage points more likelyto support a Democratic House candidate when the Democratic candidate is black. But the race of the Republican candidate has virtually no e ect on vote choice: the coe cient is small (-0.03) and negative. These coe cients also are statistically distinguishable at p < 0.03. These di erences are even greater when limiting the analysis to only those respondents who reported having voted. Table 7 goes here. Thus, here we have shown that claims about the e ects of candidate race for political behavior have overlooked the important ways in which partisanship conditions these relationships. While citizens are responsive to the race of candidates who share their party a liation, their behavior is marginally responsive, if at all, to the race of candidates whose partisanship di ers from their own.

Partisan Tides and Black Republican Success in the 2010 Elections

Thus far we have unearthed precious little evidence to support the claim that black Republican candidates attract greater success among black voters than do white Republican candidates. This paper, however, begins with the observation that the 2010 midterm congressional elections were marked by the election of the rst two Southern black Republicans to Congress since Reconstruction. All told, fourteen of the Republican candidates for Congress were black, which stands in stark contrast to 2008, in which no black Republicans ran for the House. Furthermore, as table 1 details, all of the black Republican candidates received signi cantly larger electoral vote shares in 2010 relative to their white Republican counterparts in 2008. We now examine whether this increase in Republican success in districts with black Republican candidates is attributable to the candidates race. In particular, the counterfactual that we wish 15

to consider is whether Republicans in these fourteen congressional races would have received the level of support they did in 2010 if the Republican candidates had been white rather than black. On the individual-level, the quantity of interest is the probability of supporting the Republican candidate, conditional on the candidates race and the individuals race and partisanship. If this quantity is greater for black Republicans, for instance, than for white Republicans, we can conclude that the degree of support for Republican candidates that is attributable to the candidates race is the di erence between these gures. The ideal way to test this claim would be to randomly assign voters to congressional districts with white and black Republicans. Lacking such an experiment, the second-best approach would be to use panel data to compare the same respondents willingness to support black and white Republicans in successive elections. Unfortunately, these data, too, are simply not available. Thus, we rely on the next best approach, which is to compare support for Republican House candidates in 2008 with support for Republicans in 2010 among di erent samples of voters living in the districts in which black Republicans ran in 2010. Our claim is that increased black Republican success in 2010 is attributable to nationwide partisan tides, rather than increased levels of support from minority voters. We test this hypothesis by estimating the probability of Republican support in 2008 and comparing it with 2010. Speci cally, for both election years we estimate the quantity Pr(Yi j | racei , race j , party id j ), where i and j index individuals and districts, respectively; Y is the probability of Republican support from an individual i in district j; and race {black, white} and party id {Democrat, Republican, Independent}. If our hypothesis is correct, we expect to nd that the Republican candidates in these fourteen congressional districts received a greater increase in support from white voters in 2010 over 2008, compared with black voters. For instance, we expect that Pr(Yi j | white, black, Republican) - Pr(Yi j | black, black, Republican) > Pr(Yi j | black, black, Republican) - Pr(Yi j | black, black, Republican), which would indicate that white Republican voters increased their support for Republicans in these districts at a higher rate than black Republican voters in these districts, and implies that the 2010 16

black Republican House candidates received more support than their white predecessor candidates due to nationwide partisan tides, and not because of increased support from minority populations. To do so, we merge the 2008 and 2010 CCES surveys, and include both black and white respondents residing in one of the fourteen congressional districts in which a black Republican candidate ran in 2010. This generates a sample of 2,077 respondents, 762 from the 2008 CCES and 1,315 from the 2010 CCES. Fortunately, just like the 2010 CCES, the 2008 CCES also asks respondents to indicate a preference for House candidates prior to the election, and asks them for which candidate they voted in the post-election survey. We estimate a model of voter turnout in which the dependent variable is whether the respondent reported voting for the Republican congressional candidate. After estimating these two regressions, we generate predicted probabilities by party identi cation and race, again holding other variables at their mean (modal) values. Tables 8 and 9 display the results. The columns labeled 2008 and 2010 are the predicted probability of voting for the 2008 and 2010 Republican House candidates, and the columns labeled Di erence shows the extent to which support for Republican candidates increased more among white respondents compared to black respondents. Table 8 shows the predicted probability of expressing a preference for the Republican House candidates. Across both race and party identi cation, we see that respondents were more likely to express a preference for the 2010 Republican House candidate (all of whom were black) than for the 2008 Republican House candidate (all of whom were white). Most importantly, however, we see that, across all three categories of partisanship, support among white respondents increased at substantially higher rates than among black respondents. The same pattern is also found in table 9. White respondents support for Republican House candidate increased at substantially higher rates among Democrats and Independents, and at more comparable (but still higher) rates among Republican identi ers. Across both tables, we nd the greatest contrast among black and white Independents in the increased propensity to support Republican House candidates. The results in these tables, then, provide strong and consistent evidence that black House candidates increased 17

rates of success in the 2010 midterm elections were due largely to the conversion of white Independents to Republican candidates, rather than because they received increased levels of support from minority populations. Tables 8 and 9 go here.

Republicans, Black Voters, and the Future of Minority Representation

Though black representation in Congress has increased rather dramatically in recent decades, for the most part, these gains have not been achieved by electing black Republicans. Indeed, since the beginning of the twentieth century, only ve African Americans that have served in the House have been RepublicansOscar DePriest, Gary Franks, J.C. Watts, Tim Scott, and Allen West. Though DePriest represented a majority-black district, all of the black Republicans that have served in the contemporary era hailed from majority white districts. For the most part, then, strategies to increase representation of black interests have not included recruiting and electing black Republican candidates. Though political gures from Jesse Jackson to Donna Brazile have expressed the concern that the Democratic Party must not forsake the interests of its black supporters, scholars disagree about whether black support of Republicans is a viable alternative to continued black support for Democrats. Pinderhughes (1986) argues that the only other opportunity for blacks to exert real impact on political outcomes is by forming a third party. Tate (1993, 73), meanwhile, writes that no real growth in the percentage of black Republicans is possible without some modi cation of the Republican partys conservative stance toward racial policies and civil rights. Carol Swain, on the other hand, sees the rise of black Republicans as a way to reduce the dependency of blacks on the Democratic party for their congressional in uence (1993, 224). Absent larger-scale changes in the

18

alignment of Republican policy priorities with black voters interests, though, it seems unlikely that large numbers of black voters will abandon the Democratic party to support Republican candidates. It seems unlikely, though, that black representation in Congress will increase through the creation of additional majority-minority districts. Many of these districts have highly irregular borders, and most scholars argue that such districts have the net impact of diluting minority in uence in policymaking (e.g., Cameron, Epstein, and OHalloran 1996). Thus, black voters in other districts are faced with a quandry that is quite similar to the central research question investigated in this paper: to what extent are black Republicans likely to advance black interests, and are they more or less reliable than white Democrats? To be sure, not everything about Republicans is antithetical to black interests. Many blacks have relatively socially conservative views on several key cultural issues, including gay marriage, and are, on the whole, less liberal than in previous generations (Tate 2010). Even with these opportunities, though, we are unlikely to see mass defections among blacks to Republican candidates so long as Barack Obama inhabits the White House and until we are able to better evaluate the extent to which black Republicans like Tim Scott and Allen West represent the interests of their black constituents.

Conclusion
This paper investigates the e cacy of Republican strategy to appeal to black voters by running black candidates. Though Republican leaders have expressed the desire to increase their support among minority populationsand among black voters in particularwe currently know little about how partisan and racial group identities interact to a ect political decision-making when these identities suggest that voters should support competing candidates. The results in this paper, however, provide little support for the proposition that the Republican party can increase its vote share among black voters simply by running black candidates. Instead, we nd that racial and partisan identities interact in important ways to mobilize support among black voters. In particular, black

19

Republican candidates receive greater support from black Republican voters than among black voters that identify with other political parties. While partisanship is the prime determinant of vote choice, it interacts in important ways with race and recruits additional support among the candidates copartisans. Why are black voters no more likely to defect from the Democratic Party for a black Republican candidate than for a white Republican candidate? One possible explanation, in V.O. Keys words, is that voters are not fools (1966, 7). In other words, black voters will support candidates who most accurately re ect their interests, and black Republicans do as poor a job of representing those interests as their white counterparts. This explanation suggests that African Americans loyalty to the Democratic Party will remain, at least to the extent that (1) issue concerns drive African American political behavior, and (2) Democrats remain more in line with said issue concerns. A second possible explanation, not incompatible with the rst, maintains the centrality of heuristics for voter decision making but focuses instead on party rather than race. The idea that party-based heuristics might override race-based heuristics seems supported by the nding that party identi cation may serve as a social identity, on par with religion. That is, rather than viewing partisanship as a running tally of ones retrospective evaluations (Fiorina 1981), party identi cation should be viewed as a social identity in the ranks of religion, whereby one remains a member as long as the partys overarching ideology remains in line with ones own. People do not choose their party based on evaluating platforms or performances or considering if a candidates preferences ally with their own. Rather, like religion, people become attached to parties at a young age and stick with them unless the party radically changes its ideology (Green, Palmquist, and Schickler 2002). Our ndings raise questions, however, about the use and role of identity politics in American elections. Consistent with the argument presented by Green, Palmquist, and Schickler (2002, 3), our results demonstrate that the in uence of race on electoral choice is mediated largely through partisan a liation. In general elections, then, high levels of black support for black candidates 20

are largely due to the partisanship of the black candidate, rather than because the candidates have made successful racial appeals. Republicans entree into these identity-based appeals is unlikely to be successful because only a small minority of black voters identify as Republicans, and Democratic identi ers do not appear to make di erent electoral choices depending on the race of the Republican candidate. But additional questions remain. Future work should leverage other opportunities to examine the interaction between partisanship and other salient social identities. Other work could also examine whether black Republicans make explicit appeals to black voters in ways that contrast with white Republican campaign strategies. In addition, little is known about whether and how race affects the relationship between constituents and elected o cials; for instance, are black constituents more likely to contact Republican elected o cials when the o cial is black? How does the race and partisanship interact to a ect constituents perceptions of the performance of their elected o cials? These questions can be addressed through a variety of methodologies, and provide an opportunity to better understand the dynamics of race in electoral politics.

21

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Terkildsen, Nayda. 1993. When White Voters Evaluate Black Candidates: The Processing Implications of Candidate Skin Color, Prejudice, and Self-Monitoring. American Journal of Political Science 37: 10321053. Walton, Hanes. 1985. Invisible Politics: Black Political Behavior. Albany: State University of Albany Press. Williams, Linda. 1989. White/Black Perceptions of the Electability of Black Political Candidates. National Political Science Review 2: 4564.

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Tables
Table 1: African American Republican Candidates for Congress, 2010 Candidate Star Parker Ryan Frazier Allen West Isaac Hayes Marvin Scott Robert Broadus Charles Lollar Bill Marcy Bill Randall Michael Faulkner Tim Scott Charlotte Bergmann Steven Broden Chuck Smith State CA CO FL IL IN MD MD MS NC NY SC TN TX VA District 37 7 22 2 7 4 5 2 13 15 1 9 30 3 Republican vote share, 2008
24.6 36.5 45.3 10.6 34.9 13.0 24.6 30.1 34.1 8.1 52.0 16.1

Republican vote share, 2010

25.4 43.9 54.3 14.7 39.1 16.4 35.0 38.0 44.5 10.4 69.5 25.4 22.2 30.0

2010 African American Republican nominees for the U.S. House of Representatives. Election gures are the two-party Republican share of the vote. denotes an open seat; * indicates no Republican candidate sought o ce.

26

Table 2: Candidate Race, Political Participation, and Vote Choice

Campaign Activity Independent Variables Black candidate Mobilized Open contest Total spending (logged) Democratic spending (logged) Competitiveness Income Age College education Female Ideology Registered (Constant) N Log-pseudolikelihood AUC Clusters State xed e ects
0.01 (0.02) 0.09 (0.03) 0.03 (0.01) 0.50 (0.22) 1.05 (0.21) 0.10 (0.13) 1.32 (0.98) 9.95 (2.41) 0.02 (0.02) 0.09 (0.03) 0.03 (0.01) 0.50 (0.24) 1.09 (0.21) 0.08 (0.13) 1.26 (1.01) 8.78 (2.58) 0.00 (0.01) 0.07 (0.02) 0.04 (0.01) 0.26 (0.11) 0.31 (0.11) 0.12 (0.05) 1.52 (0.36) 3.11 (1.01) 0.00 (0.01) 0.08 (0.02) 0.04 (0.01) 0.31 (0.11) 0.30 (0.11) 0.12 (0.05) 1.53 (0.38) 2.77 (1.22) 2.44 (0.82) 1.71 (1.50) 0.04 (0.02) 0.00 (0.01) 0.32 (0.14) 1.08 (0.15) 1.13 (0.10) 0.04 (0.02) 0.01 (0.01) 0.28 (0.16) 1.09 (0.15) 1.17 (0.10) 0.27 (0.21) 1.05 (0.32) 0.02 (0.39) 0.08 (0.07) 0.47 (0.26) 1.07 (0.33) 0.03 (0.41) 0.05 (0.07) 0.38 (0.13) 0.97 (0.10) 0.27 (0.19) 0.01 (0.03) 0.38 (0.13) 1.00 (0.10) 0.33 (0.23) 0.02 (0.05) 0.23 (0.05) 0.26 (0.05) 0.26 (0.28) 0.49 (0.33) 0.50 (0.19) 0.37 (0.20)

Voter Turnout

Vote Choice

3413 -411.74 0.77 335 No

3119 -392.15 0.79 287 Yes

3247 -1429.60 0.75 339 No

3211 -1388.67 0.77 319 Yes

3528 -837.25 0.85 352 No

3508 -803.89 0.86 339 Yes

Data: 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Study (black respondents only). Entries are logistic regression coe cient estimates and standard errors, clustered by House race. The dependent variable for the rst two columns is whether respondents reported in engaging in a form of campaign activity (donating money, working for a candidate, etc.) in their local House race. The dependent variable for the middle two columns is whether respondents reported turning out to vote. The dependent variable for the nal two columns is whether respondents reported voting for the Democratic House candidate. State xed e ects were estimated where indicated.

27

Table 3: Candidate Race and Political Participation: Campaign Activity

Independent Variables Black candidate Mobilized Open contest Total spending (logged) Competitiveness Ideology Female Education Age Income Ideology Registered (Constant) N Log-pseudolikelihood AUC Clusters Democratic candidate
0.38 (0.23) 0.95 (0.34) 0.02 (0.38) 0.05 (0.07) 0.02 (0.02) 0.05 (0.15) 1.01 (0.22) 0.68 (0.24) 0.03 (0.01) 0.09 (0.06) 0.05 (0.15) 1.08 (0.98) 8.31 (2.41)

Republican candidate
0.11 (0.37) 0.96 (0.34) 0.02 (0.38) 0.04 (0.07) 0.01 (0.02) 0.08 (0.15) 1.00 (0.22) 0.69 (0.24) 0.03 (0.01) 0.08 (0.04) 0.08 (0.15) 1.09 (0.97) 8.06 (2.41)

3259 -362.76 0.76 331

3259 -363.54 0.76 331

Data: 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Study (black respondents only). Entries are logistic regression coe cient estimates and standard errors, clustered by House race. The dependent variable is whether respondents reported in engaging in a form of campaign activity (donating money, working for a candidate, etc.) in their local House race. The rst column of entries shows results based upon the race of the Democratic candidate, and the second column shows results based upon the race of the Republican candidate.

28

Table 4: Candidate Race and Political Participation: Voter Turnout

Independent Variables Black candidate Mobilized Open contest Total spending (logged) Competitiveness Ideology Female Education Age Income Ideology Registered (Constant) N Log-pseudolikelihood AUC Clusters Democratic candidate
0.39 (0.14) 0.98 (0.10) 0.31 (0.19) 0.01 (0.03) 0.00 (0.01) 0.17 (0.05) 0.28 (0.11) 0.27 (0.11) 0.04 (0.01) 0.07 (0.02) 0.17 (0.05) 1.57 (0.39) 2.92 (1.03)

Republican candidate
0.09 (0.10) 0.98 (0.10) 0.27 (0.19) 0.01 (0.03) 0.01 (0.01) 0.17 (0.05) 0.26 (0.11) 0.26 (0.11) 0.04 (0.01) 0.07 (0.02) 0.17 (0.05) 1.55 (0.39) 2.88 (1.04)

3096 -1376.24 0.75 327

3096 -1380.94 0.75 327

Data: 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Study (black respondents only). Entries are logistic regression coe cient estimates and standard errors, clustered by House race. The dependent variable is whether respondents reported turning out to vote. The rst column of entries shows results based upon the race of the Democratic candidate, and the second column shows results based upon the race of the Republican candidate.

29

Table 5: Candidate Race and Ideological Congruence

Independent Variables Democratic candidates Black candidate Incumbent Female Education Age Income Ideology (Constant) N MSE Clusters
0.32 (0.05) 0.24 (0.07) 0.09 (0.05) 0.12 (0.06) 0.01 (0.01) 0.01 (0.01) 0.10 (0.02) 1.58 (0.17)

Republican candidates
0.13 (0.16) 0.21 (0.09) 0.25 (0.08) 0.15 (0.08) 0.01 (0.01) 0.02 (0.01) 0.41 (0.03) 2.88 (0.22)

3052 1.33 340

1899 1.56 334

Data: 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Study (black respondents only). Entries are linear regression coe cient estimates and standard errors, clustered by House race. The dependent variable is the respondents ratings of the level of congruence between their policy views and the candidates chosen policu platforms, where lower values indicate increased congruence. The rst column of entries shows results based upon the race of the Democratic candidate, and the second column shows results based upon the race of the Republican candidate.

30

Table 6: Candidate Race and Evaluations of Competence

Independent Variables Black candidate Candidate spending (logged) Candidate ideology Female Education Age Income Ideology (Constant) N MSE Clusters Democratic candidates
0.22 (0.08) 0.09 (0.03) 0.04 (0.02) 0.19 (0.06) 0.04 (0.05) 0.01 (0.01) 0.01 (0.01) 0.12 (0.02) 4.49 (0.46)

Republican candidates
0.04 (0.16) 0.09 (0.03) 0.12 (0.03) 0.13 (0.10) 0.16 (0.09) 0.01 (0.01) 0.01 (0.01) 0.14 (0.03) 1.94 (0.45)

2763 1.38 320

1539 1.66 308

Data: 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Study (black respondents only). Entries are linear regression coe cient estimates and standard errors, clustered by House race. The dependent variable is the respondents ratings of the candidates competence, where lower ratings indicate more favorable assessments. The rst column of entries shows results based upon the race of the Democratic candidate, and the second column shows results based upon the race of the Republican candidate.

31

Table 7: Candidate Race and Vote Choice

Independent Variables Black candidate Open contest Candidate spending (logged) Ideology Female Education Age Income Ideology (Constant) N Log-pseudolikelihood AUC Clusters Voted Democratic Voted Republican
0.49 (0.24) 0.31 (0.34) 0.29 (0.05) 0.85 (0.10) 1.01 (0.18) 0.31 (0.20) 0.00 (0.01) 0.02 (0.03) 0.85 (0.10) 1.15 (0.88) 0.03 (0.26) 0.00 (0.33) 0.26 (0.06) 0.81 (0.09) 0.88 (0.17) 0.21 (0.18) 0.00 (0.01) 0.02 (0.02) 0.81 (0.09) 8.50 (0.97)

3365 -617.64 0.79 343

3150 -656.77 0.77 344

Data: 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Study (black respondents only). Entries are logistic regression coe cient estimates and standard errors, clustered by House race. The dependent variable is whether respondents reported voting for the Democratic (Republican) candidate. The rst column of entries shows results based upon the race of the Democratic candidate, and the second column shows results based upon the race of the Republican candidate.

32

Table 8: Prefer Republican Candidate

Race White Black White Black White Black Party Dem. Dem. Ind. Ind. Rep. Rep. 2008 3.06 0.47 22.89 4.26 2010 5.68 0.80 36.14 7.05 Increase Di erence +2.62 +0.33 +13.25 +2.79 +14.19 +9.23 +2.29 +10.46 +4.96 Race White Black White Black White Black

Table 9: Voted for Republican

Party Dem. Dem. Ind. Ind. Rep. Rep. 2008 7.16 0.71 2010 14.86 1.98 Increase Di erence +7.70 +1.27 +17.88 +4.97 +17.22 +16.10 +6.43 +12.91 +1.12

24.65 42.53 2.93 7.90 60.07 77.29 12.20 28.30

59.51 73.70 18.06 27.29

Data: 2008 and 2010 Cooperation Congressional Election Studies (black and white respondents from the fourteen congressional districts with a black Republican candidate in 2010). Numerical entries are the predicted probabilities of expressing a preference for the Republican House candidate (pre-election) and reporting a vote for the Republican House candidate (post-election). Columns labeled Increase report the increase in the probability of Republican support between 2008 and 2010. The nal column in each table displays the level of increased white support for Republicans compared to increases in black support for Republicans.

33

Figures
Figure 1: Partisanship and Race, 1972-2008
White Respondents
100 Party identification Presidential vote Congressional vote 80
q

Black Respondents
100 Party identification Presidential vote Congressional vote 80

Percent Republican

60
q q q q q q q q q q

q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q

Percent Republican

60

40
q

q q q

40

20

20
q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q q

0 1972 1976 1980 1984 1988 Year 1992 1996 2000 2004 2008

0 1972 1976 1980 1984 1988 Year 1992

1996

2000

2004

2008

Data: American National Election Studies, 1972-2008. Plots display the weighted percentages of respondents who identify as Republicans (including leaners) and report voting for Republican presidential and congressional candidates. Note: No time series study was conducted in 2006.

34

Appendix
Table A-1: Summary Statistics N Republican Democrat Independent Black Republican candidate Black Democratic candidate Any black candidate Ideology College education Income Age Female Voted for Democratic candidate Voter turnout Attended political meeting Displayed political sign Worked for a candidate Donated to a campaign Ideological distance from Republican Ideological distance from Democrat Republican candidate, competent Democratic candidate, competent 5951 5951 5951 5945 5945 5945 5463 5945 5493 Mean
0.04 0.76 0.20 0.09 0.34 0.37 3.88 0.15 6.21

SD
(0.20) (0.43) (0.40) (0.29) (0.37) (0.48) (1.66) (0.36) (3.50)

Min 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 18 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1

Max 1 1 1 1 1 1 7 1 16 89 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 6 6 7 7

5945 41.97 (15.27) 5945 4090 4250 4559 4559 4559 4559 2170 3417 2681 2681
0.53 0.91 0.71 0.09 0.10 0.06 0.13 2.00 1.28 4.12 2.90 (0.50) (0.29) (0.46) (0.29) (0.30) (0.23) (0.34) (1.62) (1.41) (1.71) (1.53)

35