Replication Data for: Towards a Theory of Minority-Party Influence in the U.S. Congress: Whip Counts, Amendment Votes, and Minority Leverage in the House

The literature on congressional decision-making has largely ignored the influence of the minority party in the legislative process, particularly in the U.S. House of Representatives. This omission follows from the widely held belief that the majority party dominates the agenda-setting process, and thus is primarily responsible for determining legislative outcomes. Though we agree that the minority party rarely achieves major policy success in Congress, we argue that the minority has significantly more influence over the legislative agenda than is commonly believed – and we begin establishing a foundation for a broader theory of minority-party influence. We posit that, under some conditions, the minority has enough bargaining leverage to get floor votes on their proposals, in the form of both amendments and bills. To investigate this claim, we first examine minority-party disappointments and majority-party rolls across the post-World War II era. We then test our hypothesis using whip count data from the House and show that when a whip count on a bill occurs, the likelihood of a minority amendment disappointment and a majority amendment roll increases, respectively. This suggests that the more leverage the minority party has, the more we see their legislative proposals on the floor.