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First published January 2004

The Costs of Reform: Consequences of Limiting Legislative Terms of Service

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to discern more explicitly how electoral reforms that limit terms of service impact on intra-party competition and campaign expenditures in US state legislative contests. Particularly, we are interested in whether term limits have differential effects across political parties, given the increasing number of open seats. Contrary to the conventional argument that term limits will invigorate competition, we find that increasing the number of candidates does not translate into more competitive races. In fact, the implementation of term limits results in a decrease in the level of electoral competition in open races, particularly for Democratic candidates. Moreover, this decrease in electoral competition is typically related to a dramatic increase in campaign expenditures in districts with open races.

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References

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Article first published: January 2004
Issue published: January 2004

Keywords

  1. competition
  2. term limits
  3. US states

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© 2004.
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Authors

Affiliations

Neil Pinney
Department of Political Science, Western Michigan University,Kalamazoo, Michigan 49008-5012, USA [email protected]
George Serra
Political Science Department, Bridgewater State College, 180 Summer Street, Bridgewater, MA 02325, USA [email protected]
Dalene Sprick
Department of Political Science, Western Michigan University,Kalamazoo, Michigan 49008-5012, USA [email protected]

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