Replication Data for: Campaign Contributions, Reciprocity, and Gender Solidarity

We show that women in Congress are significantly more likely to donate to female candidates than similar men are. Donors follow up their money with other forms of assistance, such as serving as mentors and cosponsoring the recipient’s legislation. We find that the beneficiaries of this largesse reciprocate by cosponsoring their benefactors' legislation. This implies that the well-observed pattern that women in Congress tend to cosponsor one another's legislation arises in part from reciprocal obligations women have to repay the women who helped them early in their careers. Gendered networks of collaboration begin to take form even before women are elected to the institution.