Do legislators' votes reflect constituency preference? A simple way to evaluate the Senate

U.S. senators frequently vote against the preference of their constituency, assuming that such a preference exists. Both of a state's senators represent the same constituency. Whenever they split their votes, one or the other is necessarily going against the constituency preference. For the sample of defense-related votes analyzed above, misrepresentation — either observable vote splitting or unobservable vote matches that go against the constituency preference — occurred at least 37 percent of the time, at least 46 percent on one vote. Although party differences accounted for more than two-thirds of the vote splitting, a substantial number of splits remained. Besides, a party difference for a state's senatorial pair is itself problematical.The method employed here can be applied easily to any data whatever on senatorial voting. Its application will show that, quite often, many senators depart from constituency preference. This finding refutes the hypothesis, popular in certain circles, that ours is a more or less perfect political market with little or no scope for ideologically driven voting by legislators.     

Introduction

The Federal Republic of Germany celebrated its fortieth anniversaryin May 1989. In spite of the devastation brought by World WarII, the division of the country between East and West, and theloss of one-fourth of its territory, the Bonn Republic was foundedunder more propitious circumstances than was its democraticpredecessa after World War I, the Weimar Republic. Togetherwith an "economic miracle" that brought about economic growthand a high standard of living. West Germany experienced a "politicalmirracle" that led to governmental stability and a system asdemocratic as any other in Europe. Federalism has contributedto this miracle, and, in contrast to the nineteenth century,is now identified closely with democracy in Germany. The articlescontained in this volume provide a broad overview of postwarfederalism in Germany, from its origins, organization, strengths,and weaknesses, to interpretations and assessments of currenttrends and developments.     

A precise method for evaluating election schemes

A previously published paper evaluated election schemes under a wide variety of election circumstances. This paper improves upon the previous work by refining the measures used to rate the election schemes and increasing the statistical significance of those ratings. With these modifications, we can now draw some new conclusions:

1. In general circumstances, the Borda System outperforms the Copeland System which outperforms Approval which outperforms Majority Rule.
2. The Maximin Rule — strongly supported by Rawls's — turns out to be a reasonable election rule if the number of election alternatives is large relative to the number of voters.
3. With two exceptions, all our election systems performed quite well given a society with highly correlated utilities.
4. Given a polarized society, a serial dictatorship was better than every other election system except Borda.

Perhaps even more importantly, we now have the possibility of conducting some cost/benefit analyses of different proposals for electoral changes.     

Reviews

Rajan Menon, Soviet Power and the Third World. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1986, ix + 261 pp. £18.50.

Georgi Arbatov, Cold War or Detente? The Soviet Viewpoint. London: Zed Books, 1983. xviii + 219 pp. £16.95, $30.00 h/b; £4.95, $8.95 p/b.

Jonathan Steele, World Power: Soviet Foreign Policy under Brezhnev and Andropov. London: Michael Joseph, 1983, xii + 287 pp. £14.95.

Imre Vincze, The International Payments and Monetary System in the Integration of the Socialist Countries, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1984, ix + 185 pp. £20.50, $32.00.

M. M. Kostecki ed. The Soviet Impact on Commodity Markets, London: Macmillan, 1984, xl + 271 pp. £25.00.

Gerhard Fink ed. East‐West Economic Relations Now and in the Future: Die Ost‐West‐Wirtschaftsbeziehungen heute und morgen, Vienna: Springer‐Verlag, 1985, 100 pp. DM 34,00.

András Köves, The CMEA Countries in the World Economy: Turning Inwards or Turning Outwards, Budapest, Akadémiai Kiadó, 1985, 248 pp. £18.25.

Ger P. van den Berg, The Soviet System of Justice: Figures and Policy, Martinus Nijhoff, Dordrecht, Boston, Lancaster (series Law in Eastern Europe No. 29) 1985, xiii + 374 pp incl appendices, indices and references, £56.95, $71.50.

Eugene Huskey, Russian Lawyers and the Soviet State. The Origins and Development of the Soviet Bar, 1917–1939. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986, xii + 247 pp. £19.00.

David Lane, Labour and Employment in the USSR. Brighton: Wheatsheaf Books (distributed by Harvester Press), 1986, 280 pp. £28.50.

Martin McCauley and Stephen Carter, eds. Leadership and Succession in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China. London: Macmillan, 1986, xiii + 256 pp. £27.50 h/b, £8.95 p/b.

Leslie Holmes, Politics in the Communist World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986, xi + 457 pp. £25–00 h/b, £9.95 p/b.

Peter Kenez, The Birth of the Propaganda State: Soviet Methods of Mass Mobilization, 1917–1929. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. xi + 308 pp. £27.50, $39.50 h/b, £9.95, $12.95 p/b.

Joseph J. Collins, The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan: a Study in the Use of Force in Soviet Foreign Policy. Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1986, xv + 197 pp. £22.50, $31.25.

Leszek Buszynski, Soviet Foreign Policy and Southeast Asia. London: Croom Helm, 1986, 303 pp. £25.00.

William J. Kelly, Hugh L. Shaffer and I. Kenneth Thompson, Energy Research and Development in the USSR: Preparations for the Twenty‐First Century. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1986, xvi + 417 pp. £62.50.

Gregory D. Andrusz, Housing and Urban Development in the USSR, London: Macmillan in association with CREES, University of Birmingham, 1985, xix + 354 pp. £30.00.

Jane Ellis, The Russian Orthodox Church: a Contemporary History, London & Sydney: Croom Helm, 1986. 531 pp. £27.50.

Edward Acton, Russia: The Present and the Past, London and New York: Longman, 1986, xiii + 342 pp. £17.50 h/b, £8.95 p/b.

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Josef Garlinski, Poland in the Second World War, London: Macmillan, 1985, xxi + 387 pp., £25.00

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Soviet Armed Forces Review Annual. Vol. 9 (1984–1985). Edited by David R. Jones. Gulf Breeze, Florida: Academic International Press, 1986. x + 313 pp., $69–50.     

An unusual shotgun injury pattern produced by an intermediate target

Discharge of a shotgun with a shotgun casing in its muzzle as a "dust cover" produced a pattern of injuries suggestive of combined intermediate- and distant-range wounds.     

Spleen and portal lymphnode pathology in fatal drug addiction

Spleen and portal lymphnode sections from 86 drug addicts submitted for medico-legal autopsy at the Institute of Forensic Medicine in Copenhagen in the year 1979 were studied together with tissue sections from 24 "normal" persons. In 70% of the drug addicts the spleen weight was more than 200 g, and in 71% portal lymphnode hyperplasia was found. Birefringent foreign material was found in spleen tissue of drug addicts in 72% and in portal lymphnode tissue in 44%. Signs of antigen stimulation in both spleen and portal lymphnode tissue evaluated by the number of germinal centre and plasma cells were found in more than 80% of the drug addicts compared with about 20% of the "normal" persons. The results were related to anamnestic information of duration of drug abuse, to the spleen weight, to the occurrence of birefringent material and to the liver changes. Examination of lysozyme and immunoglobulin containing cells using the indirect preoxidase technique was performed in a total of 72 cases of spleen tissue, 59 cases of portal lymphnode tissue from drug addicts, 24 cases of spleen tissue and 18 of portal lymphnode tissue from "normal" persons. Lysozyme, IgM and IgG containing cells were found significantly more often among drug addicts than "normal" persons. The results indicate that the splenomegalia and the portal lymphnode hyperplasia often found in drug addicts are caused by continuous antigen stimulation due to repeated injections of various antigens.