Electoral competitiveness in Louisiana, 1912-2014

Competitiveness in state legislatures
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Published in April 2015

The 2014 national election continued the decline in U.S. electoral competitiveness that has occurred since 1972. The decline of electoral competitiveness that has been seen on the national stage, has also been seen in states. The Louisiana State Senate and Louisiana House of Representatives incumbent win rate never dipped below 80 percent from 1968 to 2011.

This page contains electoral competitiveness information at various levels of government in this state up to 2014. For more recent information about state legislative competitiveness nationwide, click here.

The data presented below are part of a larger project on electoral competitiveness, the full report is available in the table to the right. The images below illustrate the changes in the competitiveness of elections in Louisiana from 1912 through 2014. The data used to generate these graphs is available in the tables below those images.

Background

Since 1972, electoral competitiveness has tended to decrease across the United States. During that time, people who are members of the same political party have become more likely to live in the same area as one another than in the past. Nationally, the rate at which incumbents won reelection is also close to an all-time high. However, this does not have to do with incumbents deriving more advantages from holding office than before. It is because they are more likely to be in safe districts for their party. In contrast to the high incumbency reelection rate, the rate at which incumbents run for reelection has gone down over time.

Competitiveness is declining. On the national level, the percentage of state legislative elections won by 5 percent or less was nearly the lowest in the 1972 to 2014 period. In an absolute sense, the incidence of such elections was very low. Only 4.9 percent of U.S. residents in districts with elections saw their election won by 5 percent or less. Similarly, more Americans lived in areas with uncontested elections than ever before in the time period studied: 36.7 percent. State legislative primaries were often found to be won by wide margins or not contested at all. The rate at which incumbents won reelection is also close to an all-time high. However, this does not have to do with incumbents deriving more advantages from holding office than before. It is because they are more likely to be in safe districts for their party. In contrast to the high incumbency reelection rate, the rate at which incumbents run for reelection has gone down over time.

Competitiveness in elections in Louisiana

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  [Ballot_StateGraph01_Marg_Stateno18Louisiana2015_04_23.png|Marginal Elections]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph02_Uncont_Stateno18Louisiana2015_04_23.png|Uncontested Elections]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph03_Inc_Stateno18Louisiana2015_04_23.png|Incumbent Win Rates]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph04_US_HS_Stateno18Louisiana2015_04_23.png|Competitiveness in U.S. House Seats]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph05_UpBallot_Stateno18Louisiana2015_04_23.png|Margin of Victory in Up Ballot Elections]

Table explanation

The columns in the tables below for both state senates and state houses are as follow:

• Seats: number of seats in the state legislative chamber.
• Percent Seats Up: percent of seats in the state legislative chamber that are up in a particular year for the November election.
• Percent Won By Dem: the percent of seats in the state legislature that were won by a Democrat.
• Percent Unusable: percent of seats for the state legislative chamber that weren’t usable to compute whether a race was marginal or not for this chamber in this year because of missing data. This column usually says “0.”
• Percent with 5% margin: percent of seats for a state chamber in a year that were won by 5% or less.
• Percent with 10% margin: percent of seats for a state chamber in a year that were won by 10% or less.
• Percent Unusable Other: percent of seats that have missing data that prevent the computation of whether an incumbent won or lost, whether an incumbent ran or not, or whether a race was uncontested. This column usually says “0.”
• Percent Uncontested: percent of races in a chamber that are uncontested.
• Percent Incumbent Win: percent of incumbents who ran for a state chamber in a particular year who won.
• Percent With Incumbent: number of incumbents running for reelection for a state-chamber in one year, divided by the number of seats that are up for election for that state-chamber, multiplied by 100.

The columns for the “Up ballot” tab are as follows:

• U.S. House Seats: number of U.S. House Seats that a state was apportioned in the year in question.
• Percent Not Usable: percent of U.S. House Seats in the state and year that aren’t usable to compute marginality or contestation, because of something unusual about the race.
• Percent With 5% Margin: percent of U.S. House races in the state and year that were won by 5% or less.
• Percent With 10% Margin: percent of U.S. House races in the state and year that were won by 10% or less.
• Percent Uncontested: percent of U.S. House races that were uncontested in the state and year.
• U.S. Senate 1 Margin: difference between the percent obtained by the winner of the U.S. Senate election with the U.S. Senate candidate receiving the second most votes.
• U.S. Senate 2 Margin: This is only recorded when a second election to the U.S. Senate was held because of a Senator not completing their term. For such elections, this is the difference between the percent obtained by the winner of the U.S. Senate election with the U.S. Senate candidate receiving the second most votes.
• President margin: difference between the percent of votes obtained by the presidential candidate receiving the most votes in a state minus the percent of votes obtained by the presidential candidate receiving the second most votes in a state.
• Governor margin: difference between the percent obtained by the winner of the gubernatorial election in a state with the gubernatorial candidate receiving the second most votes.

State Senate

State Senate competitiveness, Louisiana
Year	Seats	% Seats up	% Won by Dem	% Unusable	% With 5% margin	% With 10% margin	% Unusuable other	% Uncontested	% Incumbent win	% With incumbent	% of Dem inc winning	% of Repub inc winning
1968	39	100	100	0	0	0	5.1	64.1	100	76.9	100
1972	39	100	100	0	2.6	2.6	0	56.4	100	43.6	100
1975	39	100	100	0	15.4	20.5	0	69.2	87.5	61.5	87.5
1979	39	100	100	0	10.3	15.4	0	15.4	87.1	79.5	90	0
1983	39	100	97.4	0	0	15.4	0	30.8	85.7	89.7	85.7
1987	39	100	87.2	0	10.3	10.3	0	30.8	84.8	84.6	82.8	100
1991	39	100	84.6	0	12.8	15.4	0	28.2	92.9	71.8	92	100
1995	39	100	66.7	0	10.3	23.1	0	23.1	83.3	61.5	78.9	100
1999	39	100	66.7	0	5.1	15.4	0	41	92.9	71.8	94.4	90
2003	39	100	61.5	0	5.1	10.3	0	35.9	90.3	79.5	84.2	100
2007	39	100	61.5	0	15.4	25.6	0	23.1	100	38.5	100	100
2011	39	100	38.5	0	12.8	17.9	0	51.3	90.9	56.4	75	100

State House

State House competitiveness, Louisiana
Year	Seats	% Seats up	% Won by Dem	% Unusable	% With 5% margin	% With 10% margin	% Unusuable other	% Uncontested	% Incumbent win	% With incumbent	% of Dem inc winning	% of Repub inc winning
1968	105	100	99	0	1	1.9	0	49.5	100	88.6	100
1972	105	100	96.2	0	1.9	4.8	1	59	94.3	33.3	94.3
1975	105	100	97.1	0	8.6	19	0	65.7	94.2	65.7	94	100
1979	105	100	91.4	0	6.7	16.2	0	20	92.5	76.2	91.8	100
1983	105	100	87.6	0	8.6	16.2	0	27.6	87.2	74.3	85.5	100
1987	105	100	81.9	0	10.5	21	0	21	83.1	73.3	83.3	82.4
1991	105	100	83.8	0	11.4	20	1.9	21	80.8	74.3	82.5	69.2
1995	105	100	74.3	0	8.6	17.1	0	23.8	93	67.6	91.1	100
1999	105	100	70.5	0	7.6	9.5	0	47.6	94.7	71.4	93	100
2003	105	100	64.8	0	6.7	10.5	0	42.9	95.2	80	96.4	92.9
2007	105	100	50.5	0	14.3	21	0	24.8	94.4	34.3	89.5	100
2011	105	100	42.9	0	1.9	9.5	0	41	92.5	63.8	96.3	89.7

Up ballot

Up ballot competitiveness, Louisiana
Year	U.S. House Seats	% Not usable	% With 5% margin	% With 10% margin	% Uncontested	U.S. Senate 1 margin	U.S. Senate 2 margin	President margin	Governor margin
1912								73.5
1916								85
1920								38.9
1924								58.1
1928								52.6
1932								85.9
1936								77.7	100
1940								71.8	100
1942						100
1944						100		61.2	100
1946	8	0	0	0	75
1948	8	0	0	0	87.5	49.8	100	19.9	100
1950	8	0	0	0	100	75.4
1952	8	0	0	0	87.5			5.8	100
1954	8	0	0	0	87.5	100
1956	8	0	0	0	75	100		14.8	100
1958	8	0	0	0	87.5
1960	8	0	0	0	37.5	59.5		27.6	65.1
1962	8	0	0	0	75	51.1
1964	8	0	0	25	50			13.6	22.4
1966	8	0	0	0	62.5	100
1968	8	0	12.5	12.5	62.5	100		26.3	100
1970	8	0	0	0	87.5
1972	8	0	0	12.5	75	48.7		39.5	14.3
1974	8	0	12.5	12.5	62.5	100
1975									100
1976	8	0	25	25	37.5			5.9
1978	8	0	12.5	12.5	87.5
1979									1
1980	8	0	0	0	100			5.6
1982	8	0	0	0	100
1983									33.9
1984	8	0	0	0	100			22.8
1986	8	0	12.5	12.5	87.5	5.6
1987									8.2
1988	8	0	0	0	87.5			10.4
1990	8	0	0	0	100
1991									22.3
1992	7	14.3	0	0	71.4			5.3
1994	7	0	0	0	100
1995									27
1996	7	28.6	0	0	57.1			13.1
1998	7	0	14.3	14.3	85.7	33.4
1999									35.6
2000	7	0	0	0	42.9			7.9
2002	7	14.3	0	0	71.4	2.9
2003									3.9
2004	7	42.9	25	25	14.3	3.6		14.7
2006	7	28.6	0	0	14.3
2007									51.1
2008	7	28.6	0	20	28.6	6.5		18.9
2010	7	14.3	0	0	14.3	20
2012	6	50	0	0	50			17.5
2014	6	33.3	0	0	16.7	11.9

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