Electoral competitiveness in North Dakota, 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. For example, North Dakota has seen an increase in the number of uncontested elections from 1968 to 2014.

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 North Dakota 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 North Dakota

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  [Ballot_StateGraph01_Marg_Stateno34NorthDakota2015_04_23.png|Marginal Elections]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph02_Uncont_Stateno34NorthDakota2015_04_23.png|Uncontested Elections]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph03_Inc_Stateno34NorthDakota2015_04_23.png|Incumbent Win Rates]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph04_US_HS_Stateno34NorthDakota2015_04_23.png|Competitiveness in U.S. House Seats]

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  [Ballot_StateGraph05_UpBallot_Stateno34NorthDakota2015_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, North Dakota
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	49	49	12.5	0	25	37.5	0	0	90	83.3	100	89.5
1970	49	55.1	37	0	22.2	51.9	0	14.8	80	74.1	100	76.5
1972	51	58.8	16.7	0	13.3	26.7	0	0	70.6	56.7	50	81.8
1974	51	52.9	48.1	0	14.8	40.7	0	7.4	84.2	70.4	83.3	84.6
1976	50	80	37.5	0	20	37.5	0	2.5	86.2	72.5	80	89.5
1978	50	50	16	0	12	28	0	20	83.3	96	50	100
1980	50	50	16	0	20	36	0	12	75	64	50	90
1982	53	66	48.6	0	14.3	34.3	0	11.4	69.2	74.3	100	61.9
1984	53	52.8	39.3	0	17.9	35.7	0	7.1	85.7	75	80	87.5
1986	53	50.9	66.7	0	22.2	33.3	0	22.2	82.6	85.2	91.7	80
1988	53	49.1	53.8	0	11.5	38.5	0	11.5	90.9	84.6	100	84.6
1990	53	50.9	48.1	0	18.5	48.1	0	11.1	68.4	70.4	58.3	85.7
1992	49	51	48	0	12	32	0	4	88.9	72	100	77.8
1994	49	51	32	0	16	32	0	16	88.2	68	71.4	100
1996	49	49	45.8	0	0	20.8	0	8.3	94.7	79.2	88.9	100
1998	49	53.1	30.8	0	15.4	19.2	0	15.4	100	73.1	100	100
2000	49	51	36	0	16	28	0	4	94.1	68	83.3	100
2002	47	55.3	34.6	0	19.2	23.1	0	7.7	87	88.5	85.7	87.5
2004	47	48.9	30.4	0	8.7	17.4	0	13	95.2	91.3	83.3	100
2006	47	51.1	58.3	0	12.5	33.3	0	8.3	72.2	75	100	61.5
2008	47	48.9	30.4	0	4.3	8.7	0	4.3	94.4	78.3	83.3	100
2010	47	51.1	20.8	0	4.2	12.5	0	33.3	75	83.3	50	100
2012	47	53.2	40	0	16	28	0	12	100	64	100	100
2014	47	51.1	20.8	0	4.2	12.5	0	33.3	95	83.3	100	93.8

State House

State House competitiveness, North Dakota
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	98	100	18.4	0	16.3	34.7	0	1	92.8	84.7	84.6	94.3
1970	98	100	40.8	0	19.4	39.8	0	15.3	79.5	74.5	100	75
1972	102	100	22.5	0	20.6	39.2	0	8.8	81.3	73.5	57.6	100
1974	102	100	39.2	0	30.4	52.9	0	11.8	84.3	81.4	90	82.5
1976	100	100	50	0	18	44	0	3	79.7	79	84.4	76.6
1978	100	100	30	0	21	38	0	13	71.9	96	51	93.6
1980	100	100	27	0	17	30	0	7	90.1	81	87.5	91.2
1982	106	100	50.9	0	21.7	43.4	0	7.5	72.2	84.9	95.7	64.2
1984	106	100	39.6	0	23.6	39.6	0	4.7	91.1	74.5	83.3	97.7
1986	106	100	42.5	0	15.1	32.1	0	19.8	93.5	86.8	100	89.3
1988	106	100	42.5	0	17.9	33	0	4.7	90.2	86.8	89.5	90.7
1990	106	100	45.3	0	25.5	47.2	0	4.7	80.5	72.6	81.3	80
1992	98	100	33.7	0	24.5	35.7	0	8.2	80.5	83.7	64.7	91.7
1994	98	100	23.5	0	13.3	29.6	0	15.3	91.7	85.7	76	98.3
1996	98	100	26.5	0	12.2	21.4	0	15.3	93.9	83.7	89.5	95.2
1998	98	100	34.7	0	14.3	24.5	0	15.3	86.3	81.6	95	83.3
2000	98	51	30	0	16	38	0	6	82.1	78	66.7	95.2
2002	94	52.1	30.6	0	14.3	26.5	0	12.2	90	81.6	90.9	89.7
2004	94	52.1	28.6	0	14.3	24.5	0	16.3	94.7	77.6	91.7	96.2
2006	94	51.1	41.7	0	18.8	33.3	0	18.8	83.7	89.6	100	76.7
2008	94	48.9	34.8	0	30.4	43.5	0	6.5	94.7	82.6	100	92.9
2010	94	51.1	18.8	0	10.4	20.8	0	25	80.6	75	46.2	100
2012	94	53.2	28	0	12	26	0	20	86.8	76	63.6	96.3
2014	94	51.1	18.8	0	4.2	16.7	0	33.3	94.7	79.2	83.3	96.9

Up ballot

Up ballot competitiveness, North Dakota
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								6.9
1916								1.6
1920								62.1
1924								2.7
1928								10.4
1932								42.6
1936								38.3	1.6
1938									4.9
1940						18.1		11	26.2
1942									15.2
1944						15.5		8.4	28.5
1946	2	100			0	39.4			37.8
1948	2	100			0			9.2	24.1
1950	2	100			0	35.2			32.6
1952	2	50	0	0	50	48.1		42.9	57.5
1954	2	100			0				28.4
1956	2	100			0	27.7		23.7	16.9
1958	2	100			0	15.9			6.2
1960	2	100			0			10.9	5.3
1962	2	0	0	100	0	21.3			0.9
1964	2	0	100	100	0	15.3		16.1	11.5
1966	2	0	50	50	0
1968	2	0	50	50	0	31.4		18.8	11.3
1970	2	0	50	50	0	23.7
1972	1	0	0	0	0			26.9	2.1
1974	1	0	0	0	0	0.1
1976	1	0	0	0	0	25.9		6	5.1
1978	1	0	0	0	0
1980	1	0	0	0	0	41.6		42	7.2
1982	1	0	0	0	0	29.7
1984	1	0	0	0	0			31.5	10.6
1986	1	0	0	0	0	0.7
1988	1	0	0	0	0	20.7		13.2	19.8
1990	1	0	0	0	0
1992	1	0	0	0	0	20.6		15.7	17.5
1994	1	0	0	100	0	16
1996	1	0	0	0	0			7.8	32.4
1998	1	0	0	0	0	28.5
2000	1	0	0	100	0	22.7		29.5	10.1
2002	1	0	100	100	0
2004	1	0	0	0	0	36.5		27.8	44.5
2006	1	0	0	0	0	40
2008	1	0	0	0	0			8.8	52
2010	1	0	0	100	0	54.9
2012	1	0	0	0	0	0.9		20.2	29.6
2014	1	0	0	0	0

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