The proliferation of state and local elections in the United States, 1776-1900
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Circa 1787, Americans elected very few state and local officials. Yet, by 1950 they elected far more such officials than any other country. This dissertation presents original data on the nineteenth century reforms that proliferated public offices at the state and county levels. To explain this historical sea change, I present a model of a bargaining problem, faced by all governments, in which leaders must simultaneously fill public offices and fully fund the government's budget. Applying the model to the early American states, I argue that the growth of elective offices at the state and county levels stemmed from elite fears that unitary executive power would fall into the hands of the newly-enfranchised poor. Thus, the main driver of office proliferation was neither Jacksonian Democrats' desire to expand spoils, nor western states' desire to attract labor. I support my thesis mainly using difference-in-difference analyses that compare the timing of "electoralization" to the timing of suffrage expansion from 1776 to 1900.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic resource; remote; computer; online resource |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Place | California |
| Place | [Stanford, California] |
| Publisher | [Stanford University] |
| Copyright date | 2020; ©2020 |
| Publication date | 2020; 2020 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | DeHart, Cameron Gregory |
|---|---|
| Degree supervisor | Cox, Gary W |
| Thesis advisor | Cox, Gary W |
| Thesis advisor | Brady, David W |
| Thesis advisor | Cain, Bruce E |
| Degree committee member | Brady, David W |
| Degree committee member | Cain, Bruce E |
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Political Science. |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|---|
| Genre | Text |
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Cameron DeHart. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Political Science. |
| Thesis | Thesis Ph.D. Stanford University 2020. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2020 by Cameron Gregory DeHart
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license (CC BY).
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