3ELECTORAL CONSEQUENCES OF SCANDAL AND REAPPORTIONMENT IN THE 1992 HOUSE ELECTIONS

The authors examine the electoral effects of political scandal and redistricting, two conventional wisdom explanations for 1992’s higher than usual House turnover. They use the strategic politician theory as a basis for their analysis to examine retirements, primary outcomes, and general election outcomes. The theory assumes that politicians (both incumbents and challeng-ers) behave strategically and will run or not run based on the prevailing political climate. The authors find support for the theory with regard to retirements; embattled incumbents are more likely to retire. Their analysis of the primary and general election outcomes, however, finds mixed support for the theory. Nevertheless, the check scandal and redistricting had a direct impact on the incumbent’s vote margin, making the elections more competitive. Reapportionment and revelations of scandal made it apparent that 1992 was not going to be a grand year for incumbents. The House bank and post office scandals reinforced in the electorate a growing sense of mistrust and anger with the Washington establishment. Operating under federal mandates, some state legislatures had to alter district lines drastically. Reapportionment and the House bank scandal coin-cided with what was predicted to be one of the largest turnovers in the House of Representatives since 1948. As it turned out, most of the turnover in the House of Representatives was the result of an unusually high number of incumbents choosing to retire and a record number of incumbents losing their party’s primary. Primary losses in 1992 were almost twice as high as in any previous year in the last two decades