Authority, Democracy, and Legislative Intent

Enhancing Democracy through Legislative Redistricting

e demonstrate the surprising benefits of legislative redistricting (including partisan gerrymandering) for American representative democracy. In so doing, our analysis resolves two long-standing controversies in American politics. First, whereas some w scholars believe that redistricting reduces electoral responsiveness by protecting incumbents, others, that the relationship is spurious, we dem...

Democracy and Legislative Proceedings in Spain

This paper reviews certain decisions adopted recently by the Spanish Constitutional Court (STC 136/2011, ATC 7/2012 and ATC 9/2012), which reveal a certain disregard for rule of law in legislative proceedings. This affects Parliament’s minorities insofar as it prevents or hinders their legislative participation and their access to the Constitutional Court, both key elements in any democratic st...

Interest Analysis and the Myth of Legislative Intent

NEEDLESTICK SAFETY AND PREVENTION ACT: JOINT STATEMENT OF LEGISLATIVE INTENT (Senate)

The text, reproduced here by the International Healthcare Worker Safety Center, University of Virginia, is part of the U.S. government legislative record and as such is in the public domain. Passages deemed of particular importance have been highlighted in bold. The Statement of Legislative Intent provides guidance to courts and OSHA administrative law judges in cases where the " plain meaning ...

Legislative Policy-Making Authority, Party System Size, and Party System Aggregation

How does the size of the legislative prize, particularly the internal organization of legislatures, shape the legislative party system? While existing studies focus upon the electoral system and the regime type, we argue that the nationalization and fragmentation of the national legislative party system are related to the size of the legislative prize itself: that is, how the legislature’s inte...