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Congress and History Conference

 

Congress & History Conference

May 21-23, 2015- Vanderbilt University
Co-conveners: Joshua D. Clinton and Bruce I. Oppenheimer
 

Thursday, May 21- Arrival at Holiday Inn Vanderbilt

7:00 (approx.) - Gather in lobby for informal dinner

Friday, May 22- Vanderbilt Student Life Building- Board of Trust Room

 8:30- 9:50 Panel 1- Party Leaders in the House and Senate

  Chair            Josh Clinton, Vanderbilt University

  Presenter     John Owens, University of Westminster, “Macon and Stevenson: The Evolution of the Proto-Partisan Speakership in the Ante Bellum House”

 Discussant   Frances Lee, University of Maryland 

 Presenters   Gerald Gamm, University of Rochester and Steven Smith, Washington University, “The Emergence of  Senate Party Leadership,1913-1937: The Case of the Democrats

 Discussant   Gregory Wawro, Columbia University

 10:00-11:20 Panel 2- Civil Rights and Southern Representation

 Chair            Tom Schwartz, Vanderbilt University

 Presenters   David Bateman, Cornell University and John Lapinski, University of Pennsylvania, “ The Alternative South: Foundations and Fault Lines of Southern Solidarity in the Gilded Age"

 Discussant   Barbara Sinclair, UCLA

Presenters   Jeffrey Jenkins, University of Virginia and Justin Peck, Wesleyan University, “The Erosion of the First Civil Rights Era: Congress and the Redemption of the White South, 1877-1891”

Discussant   David Brady, Stanford University

11:30-1:15 Lunch and Roundtable 

Roundtable - The Status of Congress and History Research: Untapped Topics and Well-Trod Paths

Discussion Leaders: David Brady, Stanford University, Sarah Binder, George Washington University and The Brookings Institution, Eric Schickler, University of California, Berkeley

1:30-2:50 Panel 3- The Politics of Appropriations and Debt

Chair            Alan Wiseman, Vanderbilt University

Presenters   Frances Lee and Timothy Cordova, University of Maryland, “The 'Ins' vs. the Outs': The Congressional Politics of the Debt Limit, 1953-2014."

Discussant   Anthony Madonna, University of Georgia

Presenter   Peter Hanson, University of Denver, “Open Rules in a Closed House: Agenda Control in House Appropriations, 1995-2012”

Discussant   Sarah Binder, George Washington University and the Brookings Institution

3:00-4:20 Panel 4- The Politics of Federal Spending

Chair            Hye Young You, Vanderbilt University

Presenters   Kate Krimmel, Boston University and Kelly Rader, Yale University, “Behind the Federal Spending Paradox: Economic Self- Interest and Symbolic Racism in Contemporary Fiscal Politics”       Supplemental Appendix

Discussant   David Karol, University of Maryland

Presenter     Charles Finocchiaro, University of South Carolina, “The Public Buildings Boom: Distributive and Partisan Politics in the Modernizing Congress”

Discussant   Richard Bensel, Cornell University

6:00  Dinner - Gather in the Holiday Inn Lobby for Transportation to The Mad Platter Restaurant

Saturday, May 23- Vanderbilt Student Life Building- Board of Trust Room

8:30-10:30 Panel 5-Districting and Elections

Chair             Marc Hetherington, Vanderbilt University

Presenters   Jamie Carson, Ryan Williamson, and Joel Sievert, University of Georgia, “Assessing the Rise and Development of the Incumbency Advantage in Congress”

 Discussant   Robert Erikson, Columbia University

 Presenters   Stephen Ansolabehere, Harvard University and Maxwell Palmer, Boston University, “A Two Hundred-Year Statistical History of the Gerrymander”

 Discussant   Michael Crespin, University of Oklahoma

  Presenters   Kenneth Lowande, University of Virginia and Justin Peck, Wesleyan University, “Congressional Investigations and the Electoral Connection”

 Discussant   Timothy Nokken, Texas Tech University

10:40-12:00 Panel 6- Careers and Residences

Chair              Larry Bartels , Vanderbilt University

Presenter      Samuel Kernell, University of California, San Diego and Scott Mackenzie, University of California, Davis “Latent Class Modeling of Political Mobility: Implications for Legislative Recruitment, Representation and Institutional Development"

Discussant   Eric Schickler, University of California, Berkeley 

Presenters   Gregory Caldeira and William Minozzi, Ohio State University, "Social Influence in the U.S. House of Representatives, 1801-1861"

Discussant   Charles Stewart III, MIT

 Noon- Lunch