Analyzing the Impact of the Earmark Moratorium on U.S. Congressional Coalition Building

Though significant research has been done on earmarks, little has been done on the impact of the moratorium itself. Previous scholars have analyzed the role earmarks play within the act of passing legislation and have suggested that earmarks help facilitate Congressional action and majority coalition building by providing lawmakers with an easily-exchanged carrot to secure members’ votes. Given their documented role within lawmaking, this research seeks to investigate whether the earmark moratorium had the expected negative effect on majority coalition building given that MCs lost one of the tools at their disposal. My results show that the loss of earmarks did indeed negatively impact coalition building, though not precisely as I expected. The magnitude of majority party support in the House was statistically unchanged by the earmark ban, and though House minority support became markedly smaller under the ban, this change was likely not due to the ban. Appropriations bills are, however, passed later on average in both chambers of Congress under the moratorium. The Senate also secured a smaller proportion of majority and minority party support without earmarks. Finally, there were also fewer appropriations bills passed that fund the government for the entire fiscal year under the ban, meaning there were fewer regular spending bills and more omnibus and continuing resolutions, which indicate an increased use of alternative methods of passing appropriations bills, potentially to compensate for the loss of earmarks.Bachelor of Art