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Leading the Senate in the 110th Congress

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 January 2008

Scott A. Frisch  and
Sean Q Kelly
Scott A. Frisch
Affiliation:
California State University, Channel Islands
Sean Q Kelly
Affiliation:
California State University, Channel Islands
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Extract

The 2006 midterm elections were nothing short of stunning. Republicans lost control of both chambers of Congress. More surprising than Democratic gains in the House were their gains in the Senate. In order to achieve a majority in the Senate the Democrats needed to reelect all of their incumbents and elect Democrats in three out of four competitive states, all of which had supported George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential elections (Missouri, Montana, Tennessee, and Virginia). Riding a wave of public discontent associated with the president's Iraq War policy, Democrats beat incumbents in Missouri, Montana, and Virginia to take a slim one-seat majority in the Senate. Democrats organized the Senate in the 110th Congress, with the support of two independents—Bernie Sanders (VT) and Independent Democrat Joseph Lieberman (CT).The authors thank Doug Harris for encouraging us to pursue this project and including it in the forum. Our analysis benefits from our separate experiences as participant-observers in the Senate. While a Presidential Management Intern, Frisch served in the Senate Office of Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ); Kelly was an APSA Congressional Fellow and worked for the Senate Democratic Leadership in the Democratic Policy Committee. nominate data used in this paper are made available by Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal at www.voteview.com. Data on campaign contributions were supplied by Jamie Pimlott to whom we owe a debt of gratitude.

Type
SYMPOSIUM
Information
PS: Political Science & Politics , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , January 2008 , pp. 69 - 75
Copyright
© 2008 The American Political Science Association

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