Partisan Redistricting and the 1982 Congressional Elections

This research note investigates the impact of partisan redistricting on the results of the 1982 elections for the U.S. House of Representatives. The increase in the Democratic proportion of House seats relative to the increase in the Democratic proportion of the popular vote for House candidates (the swing ratio) was much greater in the seventeen states where the Democrats had complete control of redistricting than in any other group of states. Only in these states did the Democrats realize a substantial seat dividend from the popular vote swing toward the Democratic Party in 1982.