Support for a Bill: Thought or Action?

In my research on political coalitions (specifically, the spread of cosponsorship) in the United States Congress, I have found that current social contact with other members of Congress makes it more likely that one will join on to their political causes. However, the accumulated amount of interaction with active members in the past seems to have no effect on the likelihood of joining a political coalition. What might explain the distinction in effect between past social contact and current social contact? It could be that theorists like Kathleen Carley (1991) are simply incorrect in their claim that individuals hold ideas in their heads for lengthy periods of time; perhaps we simply forget and are inconsistent. However, that would not only contradict research that makes use of this insight; it would also contradict the common-sense notion that individuals have long-term memories that work, if imperfectly.

A more reasonable explanation of the results is that cosponsoring may not have to do with ideas at all. If cosponsorship occurs because ideas about a bill spread to an individual and lead to the active decision to cosponsor, and if we keep many if all ideas in our brains for some time, then yesterday's ideas should matter just as today's do, and therefore yesterday's social contacts should matter just as today's contacts do. Yet this study has found that, at least in the political arena, only current patterns of social contact matter.

What if, on the other hand, members of Congress find themselves pulled into cosponsoring first and rationalizing about it later? A complaint against the legalization of cosponsorship in the U.S. Senate makes just this contention:

"There are half a dozen letters on my desk every morning: “Please call my office if you wish to cosponsor bill XYZ.”

That takes time. We have to assign stenographic help to do it, and when that does not do the job, if there is adequate interest, we must send one of our clerks who has floor privileges over here, and let him go about buttonholing Senators with the plea, “Couldn’t you possibly go up to the desk and add your name to our bill?”

Probably you do not know what is in it, to begin with, but as a personal favor, you go up and add your name. That is an unfair practice, to say the least. Moreover, it is taking unfair advantage of a Senator to buttonhole him and say, “I have a bill up there; I wish, as a favor, you would go up and lend your name to that bill.”

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