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Voting Cues in Nonpartisan Trial Court Elections: A Multivariate Assessment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

Philip L. Dubois
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Abstract

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Despite a number of valuable scholarly contributions made in recent years, we still lack a precise understanding of the determinants of voter choice in low salience nonpartisan judicial elections. Utilizing a multivariate technique that controls for the varying numbers of candidates frequently found in judicial elections, this analysis examines the contributions of incumbency, occupational ballot labels, campaign spending, newspaper and bar association endorsements, voter information pamphlets, and the ethnic and sexual voting cues provided by candidate surnames to the outcomes of the 123 contested primary and run-off elections held for California's major trial court from 1976 to 1980.

The results suggest that the determinants of voter choice are quite different in the relatively well-publicized run-off elections than they are in the low visibility primary races. Additionally, judicial voters in the less populated California counties were found to rely upon different guides to voting than voters in California's metropolitan counties. The reasons for and implications of these differences are explored.

Type
Research Article
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 18 , Issue 3 , 1984 , pp. 395 - 436
Copyright
Copyright © 1984 The Law and Society Association

Footnotes

*

Financial support for this research was provided by the Committee on Research and the Institute of Governmental Affairs at the University of California, Davis, and the California Policy Seminar Project study, “Maintaining Judicial Excellence in an Era of Increased Public Demand for Judicial Accountability,” directed by Professors Raymond I. Parnas and Floyd Feeney of the U.C. Davis School of Law. Laura Van Horst provided excellent research and computer assistance for all phases of this work. Dr. Paul F. Dubois of Lawrence Livermore Laboratory served as a statistical consultant and, as usual, a valuable source of brotherly advice. Susan Wilcox of the Social Science Data Service at U.C. Davis wrote the programs necessary to conduct the multivariate analyses reported here. I am also grateful to Professors Larry Baum, Kermit Hall, Gordon Bakken, and Richard Lempert for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of the manuscript.

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Statutes Cited

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