ACU 2015 state legislative ratings - numbers and questions

[smoltchanov]

Yesterday ACU finished a monumental task of assigning ratings to all legislators from all 50 states for 2015 year. It may be found here:

http://acuratings.conservative.org/acu-state-legislative-ratings/

ACU is frequently considered a sort of "exemplary conservative organization" in US with very long history (first Congressional ratings appeared in 1971), so it's first set of full state legislative ratings, must be, presumably, a "gold standard" in this area. But after detailed look i have many questions and even disbelief's. i will devote whole post in this thread exactly to that, but first - some general statistic, which already forced me to raise brows from time to time:

Collective statistic:

Five most conservative Republican state Senate Caucuses:

1. Hawaii - 100 (explainable, the whole caucus is one very conservative state Senator)
2. California - 96 (California politics is very polarized, even despite top 2, so - explainable)
3. New Hampshire - 94 (not so explainable, it's New England after all, where Republicans, presumably, must be more moderate)
4-6. Colorado, Tennessee, Texas - 91 (explainable)

Five most conservative Democratic state Senate Caucuses:

1. Alaska - 65 (absolute surprise to me)
2. Wyoming - 53 (no less surprising)
3. West Virginia - 52 (more or less understandable, but still mildly surprising)
4-8. Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, North Carolina, Tennessee - 40 (more or less natural, except Idaho)

Five most conservative Republican state House Caucuses:

1. Maine - 94 (big surprise, again - it's New England)
2-4. California, Tennessee, Wisconsin - 93 (understandable)
5. Montana - 92 (understandable)

Five most conservative Democratic state House Caucuses:

1. Wyoming - 56 (big surprise for me)
2. Alabama  - 46 (mildly surprising, as Democratic caucus is mostly Black)
3. Idaho - 45 (a big surprise from my point of view, but Wyoming is also here)
4. Oklahoma - 42 (understandable)
5. South Carolina - 40 (understandable)

Five most liberal Republican state Senate Caucuses:

1. Rhode Island - 23 (understandable, small caucus in New England state)
2. South Carolina - 45 (who could think?)
3. Louisiana - 48 (who could think?)
4. Delaware - 53 (understandable, even though most come from conservative Sussex county)
5-6 Connecticut, Florida - 56 (understandable for Connecticut, less so - for Florida)

Five most liberal Democratic state Senate Caucuses:

1. New Hampshire - 0
2. New Jersey - 1
3-4. Rhode Island, Utah - 3
5. Ohio - 4

(well, not many surprises here, remembering that almost all Utah Democratic state Senators come from SLC)

Five most liberal Republican state House Caucuses:

1. Hawaii - 34 (understandable because of state specific and small caucus)
2. Alabama - 48 (absolute surprise, always thought about Republicans there as being ultraconservative)
3. Georgia - 51 (again, who could think?)
4. Utah - 52 (not the most liberal state either, but so one party that moderates there try to make career as Republicans mostly)
5. Connecticut - 54 (understandable)

Five most liberal Democratic state House Caucuses:

1. New Jersey - 1
2. Massachusetts - 2
3. Arizona - 4
4-5. New York, Pennsylvania - 6

(no big surprises here, though i didn't expect to see Pennsylvania in top 5)

P. S. 1: individual statistic - in second post, questions - in third one

P.S. 2: Serious discussion and analysis is very much welcome, one-line opinions - not so much...

[/]

Cool! Looking at these will be interesting.

[smoltchanov]

Now about Individual ratings. It makes no sense to talk about "most conservative Republicans" and "most liberal Democrats" - there are at least hundreds of them, so here we will speak exclusively about "mavericks" (there are enough interesting examples here).

The most liberal (at least - according to ACU) Republican state Senators:

1-3. Algiere (RI), Ottiano (RI), Rankin (SC) - 0 (unbelievable, Algiere and Ottiano are really very moderate, and Rankin is extremely moderate for southern Republican, but i am reasobly sure no one of them is a "bold progressive")
4. Crist (NE) - 8 (Nebraska legislature is technically, nonpartisan, but it's well known who is who)
5. Shiozawa (UT) - 11 (as i said many moderates in Utah prefer republican label)

Honorable mention (below 20): Campbell (NE) - 13, Schmidt (KS) - 15, Alexander, Hayes, Leatherman, O'Dell (all - SC) - 16

A lot of surprises here: besides Rhode Island no one from North-East, but - a lot of persons from very conservative (on presidential level at least) states.

The most conservative (again - here and below, according to ACU) Democratic state Senators:

1. Hoffman (AK) - 88
2-3. Sheldon (WA), Clark (NC) - 78
4. Egan (AK) - 75
5-6. Stollings, Williams (both - WV) - 74

Honorable mention (70 or more): Plymale (WV), Lucio (TX) - 72, Tate (TN) - 70.

Serious surprises here: never considered Hoffman to be very conservative, Lucio is Hispanic, Clark and Tate are black (and, IIRC, represent Obama districts). Otherwise - more or less believable, and Sheldon is much more conservative then most of Washington state Republicans

The most liberal Republican state Representatives:

1. Matsumoto (HI) - 9
2-3. Edwards, Powell (both - UT) - 11
4-8. Ward (UT), Bollier, Rooker (both - KS), DeWeese, Hale (both - KY) - 13

Honorable mention: Pitcher (UT) -14

Again - we see either very Republican or very special (Hawaii) states in this list.

The most conservative Democratic state Representatives:

1. Browning (VT) - 100 (absolutely unbelievable, but you may check himself)
2. Wardlaw (AR) - 83 (believable, Wardlaw is one of the last really conservative Democratic state legislators)
3. Bouldin (NH) - 79 (one of the few Freestaters, who ran as a Democrat, so - no big surprises here)
4. Herron (AK) - 78 (believable, "bush Democrats" are frequently very conservative in Alaska)
5. Baine (AR) - 75 (again, relatively conservative Arkansas Democrat, though less, then Wardlaw)

Honorable mention: Pelowski (MN), Dunlap (TN), Joannou (VA) - 73, Foster (AK), Freeman, Throne (both - WY), Brisson (NC) - 70 (Brisson is by far the most conservative of NC Democrats, IMHO)

The lists itself give food for a lot of questions. After some break (may be Monday) - i will formulate some of them...

[Frodo]

I'm interested to see how they define the terms 'conservative' and 'liberal', and whether they weight economics (taxes, government programs, regulations, etc.) more heavily than views on social issues.  

[100% pro-life no matter what]

The overall rankings were displayed at CPAC.  Tennessee was #1 in a landslide (8 points ahead of #2), while Rhode Island came in at #50.

[smoltchanov]

I'm interested to see how they define the terms 'conservative' and 'liberal', and whether they weight economics (taxes, government programs, regulations, etc.) more heavily than views on social issues.  

Quite simply. They have a list of legislation (different for different states both in size and issues voted), define their own position on each bill and then count percentage of agreement with their position for each legislator.

[smoltchanov]

The overall rankings were displayed at CPAC.  Tennessee was #1 in a landslide (8 points ahead of #2), while Rhode Island came in at #50.

Probably yes. Though if we consider Republican caucus only it will be (probably) California. But California has much bigger and much more liberal Democratic caucus then Tennessee

[100% pro-life no matter what]

The overall rankings were displayed at CPAC.  Tennessee was #1 in a landslide (8 points ahead of #2), while Rhode Island came in at #50.

Probably yes. Though if we consider Republican caucus only it will be (probably) California. But California has much bigger and much more liberal Democratic caucus then Tennessee

I am speaking as someone who has seen the full rankings.

[RFayette]

Some of the rankings for Deep South states are pretty misleading (particularly showing the Republicans to be relatively moderate there) in my opinion.  For instance, in Alabama, Governor Bentley (and many GOP state legislators) have been aggressively pursuing excise tax hikes in order to raise more revenue for roads and to a lesser extent, schools.  This is because in many of those Deep South states, revenue is historically lower than in other areas.  What's the upshot?  Raising taxes in the Deep South is a very different action than raising them in a higher-tax state with more existing services.  So these "moderate" GOP legislators in Alabama/Georgia are just acting on necessity in order to keep up basic services like infrastructure and education to an acceptable level.

[smoltchanov]

Some of the rankings for Deep South states are pretty misleading (particularly showing the Republicans to be relatively moderate there) in my opinion.  For instance, in Alabama, Governor Bentley (and many GOP state legislators) have been aggressively pursuing excise tax hikes in order to raise more revenue for roads and to a lesser extent, schools.  This is because in many of those Deep South states, revenue is historically lower than in other areas.  What's the upshot?  Raising taxes in the Deep South is a very different action than raising them in a higher-tax state with more existing services.  So these "moderate" GOP legislators in Alabama/Georgia are just acting on necessity in order to keep up basic services like infrastructure and education to an acceptable level.

Exactly the version i will propose when asking questions at Monday.

[smoltchanov]

The overall rankings were displayed at CPAC.  Tennessee was #1 in a landslide (8 points ahead of #2), while Rhode Island came in at #50.

Probably yes. Though if we consider Republican caucus only it will be (probably) California. But California has much bigger and much more liberal Democratic caucus then Tennessee

I am speaking as someone who has seen the full rankings.

Full rankings for whole Tennessee legislature (more then 3/4 Republican) will obviously be higher then for 2/3 Democratic California legislature. That doesn't prevent California Republican caucus being as conservative (or even more so) as Tennessee one.

[RFayette]

Some of the rankings for Deep South states are pretty misleading (particularly showing the Republicans to be relatively moderate there) in my opinion.  For instance, in Alabama, Governor Bentley (and many GOP state legislators) have been aggressively pursuing excise tax hikes in order to raise more revenue for roads and to a lesser extent, schools.  This is because in many of those Deep South states, revenue is historically lower than in other areas.  What's the upshot?  Raising taxes in the Deep South is a very different action than raising them in a higher-tax state with more existing services.  So these "moderate" GOP legislators in Alabama/Georgia are just acting on necessity in order to keep up basic services like infrastructure and education to an acceptable level.

Exactly the version i will propose when asking questions at Monday.

Wait, you have a different rating scheme you're working on?  Care to enlighten us on the details?

[muon2]

Some of the rankings for Deep South states are pretty misleading (particularly showing the Republicans to be relatively moderate there) in my opinion.  For instance, in Alabama, Governor Bentley (and many GOP state legislators) have been aggressively pursuing excise tax hikes in order to raise more revenue for roads and to a lesser extent, schools.  This is because in many of those Deep South states, revenue is historically lower than in other areas.  What's the upshot?  Raising taxes in the Deep South is a very different action than raising them in a higher-tax state with more existing services.  So these "moderate" GOP legislators in Alabama/Georgia are just acting on necessity in order to keep up basic services like infrastructure and education to an acceptable level.

The reverse happens in the minority party in a state. In the minority party one has little control over the major legislation brought to a vote. As a result the votes on a scorecard tend to reflect legislation far from the minority party's core interests. That tends to push their record more towards the extreme.

[RFayette]

Some of the rankings for Deep South states are pretty misleading (particularly showing the Republicans to be relatively moderate there) in my opinion.  For instance, in Alabama, Governor Bentley (and many GOP state legislators) have been aggressively pursuing excise tax hikes in order to raise more revenue for roads and to a lesser extent, schools.  This is because in many of those Deep South states, revenue is historically lower than in other areas.  What's the upshot?  Raising taxes in the Deep South is a very different action than raising them in a higher-tax state with more existing services.  So these "moderate" GOP legislators in Alabama/Georgia are just acting on necessity in order to keep up basic services like infrastructure and education to an acceptable level.

The reverse happens in the minority party in a state. In the minority party one has little control over the major legislation brought to a vote. As a result the votes on a scorecard tend to reflect legislation far from the minority party's core interests. That tends to push their record more towards the extreme.

Interestingly, these current ratings seem to show Deep South Democrats (in Alabama and South Carolina) as very moderate.  I wonder if that's because the scorecard reflects "NO" votes on tax increases as necessarily a conservative vote, even though in reality, the Democrats there would have simply favored a more progressive tax increase (or simply a larger one to raise more revenue).

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Overall Top 5:

1- Tennessee: 80.5%
2- Idaho: 73%
3- Alaska: 70.5%
4- Arkansas: 66.5%
4- North Carolina: 66.5%

[smoltchanov]

Overall Top 5:

1- Tennessee: 80.5%
2- Idaho: 73%
3- Alaska: 70.5%
4- Arkansas: 66.5%
4- North Carolina: 66.5%

Absolutely natural: all are states with republican dominance in legislatures AND rather conservative Republican caucuses. So, their overall rating is much higher then either in states where Democrats play much bigger role in the legislature, or where Republican caucus is more moderate. Montana's Republican caucus, for example, may be even somewhat more conservative then Idaho's, but Democrats (mostly - liberal) play substantially bigger role in Montana then in Idaho. And so on..

[smoltchanov]

Not sure. The reason for such coalition in Louisiana (and Mississippi, and, to some extent - Alabama and South Carolina) is that considerable number of Republican legislators there are still  former Democrats (some - conservative, some - not so much, but who switched out of convinience to majority (or - near majority) caucus, or because their voters wanted them to do it), who preserved natural connections with moderate-to-conservative Democrats. Thats's not true in most other Southern states.

P.S. And 65% of vote with GOP does't make Democratic legislator "very conservative", it's, essentially, "right-of-center-pragmatic conservative" area. When i began to study American politics 95-98% voting with GOP were "normal numbers" for "really conservative Democrats". Look at voting record of "two Daniels" from Virginia in 1970th (Republican Robert Daniel and Democrat Dan Daniel) and try to find many differences in their voting records and to determine "who is more conservative"))) That's what i call "really conservative Democrat", and people like Collin Peterson and Henry Cuellar (and even John Matheson) are no especially conservative to me... I can't even compare them with Dan Daniel or David Satterfield... The same for Republicans: though Susan Collins is a moderate, i smile when someone calls her "RINO" or something like "liberal Republican": i still remember Jacob Javits, Clifford Case and Charles Whalen, who were real liberal Republicans... No comparison with Collins. I don't even speak about state legislatures of that period here: there were an exemplary conservative Democrtas and liberal Republicans then, what we have now is a pale shadow...

[100% pro-life no matter what]

I think this metric is way overestimating the importance of the remaining GOP/ConservaDem coalitions in Southern states.  If they are measuring distance between voting patterns and there are still 5 nationally right of center Democrats hanging around who vote with the GOP 65% of the time, it will make the state GOP look really moderate because there are almost never true party line votes.  I know that such a coalition still exists in LA and did until very recently in the AK state senate.  Could this explain other Southern states as well?

It's the result of how they voted on certain key votes (literally the cumulative percentage that agreed with the ACU position).  It's possible that the votes chosen in some states like Alabama were more controversial than in a neighboring state with a far higher rating (like Tennessee).

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Tennessee intrigues me. That GOP normally has a reputation of being fairly boring, centrist and technocratic - see Corker, Haslam, Alexander.

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Tennessee intrigues me. That GOP normally has a reputation of being fairly boring, centrist and technocratic - see Corker, Haslam, Alexander.

They're not what the state legislature is...

Jack Johnson is a typical GOP State Senator (his website has a section for "Our Tennessee Values")

Plus, the fact that the State Senate is 28-5 (and the 5 are relatively moderate for the most part) and that the House is almost as unbalanced diminishes the Democratic vote share.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Tennessee intrigues me. That GOP normally has a reputation of being fairly boring, centrist and technocratic - see Corker, Haslam, Alexander.

They're not what the state legislature is...

Jack Johnson is a typical GOP State Senator (his website has a section for "Our Tennessee Values")

Plus, the fact that the State Senate is 28-5 (and the 5 are relatively moderate for the most part) and that the House is almost as unbalanced diminishes the Democratic vote share.

You would expect they statewide officials to be a reflection of the legislature though?

[100% pro-life no matter what]

Tennessee intrigues me. That GOP normally has a reputation of being fairly boring, centrist and technocratic - see Corker, Haslam, Alexander.

They're not what the state legislature is...

Jack Johnson is a typical GOP State Senator (his website has a section for "Our Tennessee Values")

Plus, the fact that the State Senate is 28-5 (and the 5 are relatively moderate for the most part) and that the House is almost as unbalanced diminishes the Democratic vote share.

You would expect they statewide officials to be a reflection of the legislature though?

Normally, you would.  But, Haslam, Corker, and Alexander are all old-school East Tennessee Republicans (actually an ancestrally-Republican region).  Haslam will certainly get replaced with someone significantly to the right in 2018 (unless he and Corker actually execute the swap).  Joe Carr will probably win a primary some day.  Maybe Marsha Blackburn would be interested in moving up?  And, Grant Starrett, 27, is a potential rising star if he beats DesJarlais in the primary.

[Nyvin]

Wow,  is New Hampshire the most polarized state in the country for the state legislatures?   I really can't find one with a bigger difference between GOP and Dem.

[smoltchanov]

Wow,  is New Hampshire the most polarized state in the country for the state legislatures?   I really can't find one with a bigger difference between GOP and Dem.

No, California's 172 (96-8 - Senate, 93-9 - House) is bigger then New Hampshire 167 (94-0, 81-8)

[smoltchanov]

And now is the time for numbers, that almost forced me to shake my head in disbelief:

1. I can't believe that woman legislator from Vermont may be the most conservative Democratic state legislator in the country.

2. While i can believe that a Democratic legislator from Alaska (especially from "Bush") may be very conservative (Foster Sr. is the best example for me) - i doubt that that particular state Senator (Hoffman) is so conservative. There is absolutely different metric for evaluating state legislators
(details here:

https://americanlegislatures.com/

), which traces voting records of US state legislators since mid-90th, and it gives very different results for this particular person. Of course - to compare two different metrics is a very thankless task, but still - i tend to agree with most ratings from that site.

3. As i already said - many Deep South states legislators and corresponding caucuses have relatively very low ratings, and, to the contrary, many New England (exception - Rhode Island and Connecticut, but even Connecticut ratings for Republican caucuses are slightly higher then Louisiana's and almost "on par" with Alabama's and South Carolina's) have high marks. While it's clear that present day Republican caucuses in New England contain substantially less moderates then, say, 20 years ago, New England is still considered a "cradle" of moderate Republicanism, while Deep South Republicans are famous for  social conservatism. Maine legislature, for example, according to ACU, has exactly one "slightly left-of-center" Republican - state Senator Katz (47), while i mentioned 5 state Senators from South Carolina with ratings no more then 16.

4. Wild swing in ACU ratings from year to year in the states, where information for previous year is available. Take Alabama again, for example. Republican state Senator Ball had believable 92 in 2014, but only 44 - in 2015, Boothe - 92 and 39 correspondingly, Clouse - 100 and 44. Even "forced" voting for some tax increases to preserve and develop necessary infrastructure can't explain all that difference. And Alabama isn't the only such state....

5. Relatively high ratings among Black  (and in some cases - Hispanic) state legislators in the South (from reliably Democratic districts), and, at the same time - relatively low ratings for few remaining white southern Democratic  legislators with conservative reputation: in Mississippi the highest Democratic ratings went to state Senator S. Jackson (60) and state Representative Cockerham (67) (both - Black), while usually considered the most conservative "old school" white Democrat state Senator Wilemon has only 36, the highest conservative Democratic state Senate rating in Alabama (58) goes to black Black Belt state Senator Singleton, while the only (essentially - centrist) white Democratic state Senator from Alabama (Beasley) gets much more modest 33, and the highest Democratic rating in Louisiana went to black state representative Williams (67), while such conservative leaning Democrats as Smith (56), Nevers (54), Thompson (38), Danahay (42), Hill (53), Thibaut (39) were scored much lower. Clark (North Carolina) got 78,  Tate (Tennessee) - 70 (both are black), Lucio (Hispanic) in Texas - 72.

6. I already mentioned that some Republican ratings look strange to me. I know that state Senators Algiere and Ottiano were very moderate, but - 0? And the same for state Senator Rankin in South Carolina??? Yes, he is, probably, the most moderate Republican state legislator in state (and former Democrat), but he is, essentially a centrist. Even rating 9 for Matsumoto in Hawaii is typical for "bold Democratic progressive", not a Republican. Especially in our times of very strong polarization and "ideological sorting"...

There are other questions too, but post is already very long, so i think, it's enough for a while.