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Constituents Versus Fat Cats

Testing Assumptions About Congressional Access Decisions

Arizona State University

Studies of interest groups and Congress generate conflicting perspectives about the influence of campaign contributions on legislative decisions. In choosing between constituent and donor interests, electorally minded legislators always (a) pay attention to their campaign contributors and (b) attend "slavishly" to constituents. But do donor "fat cats" indeed get preferential treatment at the expense of constituents? I replicate an experimental design reported by Chin, Bond, and Geva (2000) to test whether organized groups with a history of high campaign contributions are more likely than groups with a history of low campaign contributions to gain access to members of the U.S. Congress. Ninety-six congressional staffers participated in this experiment. I find that members’ access decisions are influenced primarily by constituency status rather than an access-seeker’s contribution history or PAC status. There are no interactive effects between the PAC, constituency, or contribution history variables.

Key Words: Congress • interest groups • PACs • campaign contributions • political influence • congressional staff

American Politics Research, Vol. 33, No. 6, 751-786 (2005)
DOI: 10.1177/1532673X05275632


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