2. The Clarence Thomas hearings elevated the personal over the political in a new way. This has led to a still-ongoing cycle of “gotcha politics.” Republicans, having been forced to admit that a person who did what Thomas was accused of should be disqualified from high office, insisted on applying that same rule to Clinton, “exposing” the fact that Democrats didn’t care about the principle, but only about opposing Thomas. Democrats, having listened to months of rhetoric about whether lying is a grounds for impeachment, want to “expose” the hypocrisy of Republicans who will oppose impeachment of Bush.

Many comments explain things as follows.

1. Incumbents are safe where a seat is safe for a party because parties prevent challenges within the party.

2. There are many seats safe for parties because people who agree on party tend to live together plus gerrymandering isolates them even more.

I’m not sure which of these 2 points you don’t agree with.

In post 10 you say that people who have become annoyed with the ruling party should switch.

I think you are counting on 2 things: first that there are a lot of people annoyed at a ruling party that they voted for. And second that they are annoyed in such a way that they think the other party would better suit them.

This is why people mention the various wedge issues used by the parties to protect their brand loyalty. You have red state people (say 65-35, republican) and blue state people (65-35 democrat). Just because the red state people are annoyed with their Republican government, why is it in their interest to vote with the opposite party, which is far from politcal brand that they started out liking.

A bad analogy would be the sunni and shia in Iraq; they have become increasingly partisan. If the Shia don’t like their current government are you surprised when they don’t vote for a Sunni?

For about 2/3’s of the populace and a higher percentage of voters, their party is part of their
identity,that is only changed under great stress and strain.

Gerrymandering and self-selection have put the independents is districts with people that tend to vote like them.

At root, I just wonder why you think increased partisanship would mean that the populace should/would be more willing to switch parties or representatives?

Alas, we haven’t been rid of him that long: he supported Bush—very flamboyantly and very obnoxiously—at the 04 convention.

I end up with the conclusion that the strength of incumbents is a relic of bipartisanship which made things like seniority count for more than party/factional affiliation.

The important fact is that until the 1970’s the Republicans and Democrats were not genuinely national parties. They were coalitions of regional parties.

The Democrats were a coalition of Northern urban immigrants (Irish, Italians, Jews), western farmers, and southern white racists of all economic and social classes. Right up to 1972, white Southerners would not vote Republican under any circumstances because the Republicans were the party of Lincoln. But after the New Deal, white Southern Democrats were far more conservative than Northern Democrats on every issue.

Republicans were also a coalition party: Northern industrialists and professionals; mid-western country club, main street businessmen; western resource owners (oil, mining, ranching); Southern blacks.

Because party organization was on the state level, not the national level, each state Democratic or Republican party got along quite well on its own, coming together only once every four years in a loose coalition that held just long enough to run a presidential election campaign.

So once in Congress, legislators found that their party affiliations had little to do with their political inclinations. Region and class made more of a difference. So “bipartisanship” flourished.

But then came Lyndon Johnson and the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act. The Democrats unequivocally declared that to be a Democrat, you had to accept that Black people are human beings. White Southerners wouldn’t accept that, so they left the Democratic party, voting first for George Wallace in 1968 and then for Nixon in 1972.

It took 30 years to purge every last conservative Democrat out of the South, but it’s happened- the last to go was Zell Miller, who famously supported GW Bush at the 2000 Republican convention.

The Republican embrace of the racist, fundamentalist South has had the effect of driving the former liberal and moderate Republicans of the northeast into the Democratic party.

So the parties have realigned along ideological lines, and partisanship is now the natural order of things.

But I also don’t see the puzzle. Partisanship makes people loyal to their party’s candidate, and so the voters in 55-45 districts stick with their incumbent. Increased partisanship reinforces the advantages of incumbency, which are institutional not personalistic. Partisanship serves to prevent side-switching. The majority of voters are not independents even where independents are the plurality among Reps and Dems.

The most concensus election in terms of electoral vote was Nixon in 1972 520 to 17 and in terms of percent of the popular vote Reagan in 1984 at 58.8%.

The increased partisanship from this point of view is California changing the type of governors it will support. The country has become less republican in presidential elections leading to more partisanship.

The key point is “good” incumbents. In Virginia, as in most states, it is fairly clear who the reasonable challengers for legislative seats are. Quite often, district line-drawing is is done to keep possible challengers out of incumbents’ districts—BUT that is only done for “good” (e.g. partisan) incumbents. If you are Republican and buck the leadership too much, they will redistrict a strong challenger into your district. (The Democrats did the same when they controlled the GA). Thus, partisan legislators are rewarded by partisan districts in their favor—the parties use gerrymandering to increase their number of seats, but also, crucially, to keep their own members aligned with the party.

Another factor in increasing partisanship is that there is a change in the political power balance; the people who used to win everything (liberals) are now losing sometimes, and are extremely unhappy about it. They are in the same position as conservatives in the 1930’s (another era of intense partisan rancour).

Of course, mentioning these groups simply pushes back the original question: why did these long-established segments of the electorate starts to evaporate when they did, leading to the more polarized electorate John Quiggin observes?

In the case of the dems, let me note that the answer is clearly tied up with a unique feature of U.S. history: black/white race relations. In other words, the key term that has been missing from this discussion is Southern Strategy.

The movement conservatives are determined to destroy liberalism and completely restructure the US. They do not recognize the legitimacy of liberals and Democrats, or even of conservative and moderate Republicans who are willing to work with liberals and Democrats. Along with a highly partisan strategy they’ve adopted uncompromising, highly partisan tactics, which include smears, character assassination, and a preference for electing extreme candidates and passing extreme laws in close votes (rather than trying for consensus.) For them a candidate who gets 65% of the vote isn’t conservative enough, and a bill in Congress which gets 65% of the votes isn’t either.

It’s only just starting to be symmetrical. I’m a Democrat (or anti-Republican) who’s as partisan as the Republicans are, but until recently many or most Democrats haven’t believed that victory is possible, and many of them still long for the old days of comity and mutual respect.

(There’s a slightly less egregious case in North Carolina, designed to create a ‘black district’ extending from Charlotte along the I-85 corridor, and removing minority voters from the surrounding districts.)

Remember also that US congressional districts are much larger than UK or Australian constituencies, meaning that it’s possible to draw the lines more widely.

Lastly, as others have mentioned, there’s a psychological impact behind the solidifying of gerrymandered districts. It’s a rare thing for elections to be uncontested in the UK or Oz, but relatively common in the US, as one party decides that it’s not worth the expense of competing. (In contrast, the ‘blooding process’ for British candidates more or less demands that a candidate be sent to fight a losing battle.)

It has taken 40+ years for the country to turn so far to the right; it’ll take just as long for it to turn to the left. Yes, we are becoming more partisan. Yes, thos 55-45 districts will turn around. Yes, soon after that happens, the country will be less partisan, things will correct, we’ll go back to ignoring politics and focussing instead on making mone and watching T.V. and eating junk food. Then, when the country falls to hell again, we’ll stick our heads up and start paying attention to politics again, start being more partisan, and those 55-45 seats will be in danger of flipping again.

Ask this question 20 years from now; you’ll have your answer.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it true that the parties simply don’t allow primary challenges in safe districts? To run in a primary against an incumbent you’ll need at least some party support and if it’s not there the incumbent will get in without a hitch.

If the incumbent is sufficiently disciplined in toeing the party line, the party will try to make sure there is no primary challenge – and that’s a typical scenario; if he/she doesn’t want to play ball – then the party will promote and finance a challenger, but that’s a rare scenario: they’ll play ball, they know what’s good for them.

I think this is pretty much the answer to your question.