For Democrats to win back the House in 2018, the first step is believing they can

Daily Kos Elections is pleased to present this guest post from longtime community member and political science doctoral candidate Jacob Smith.

Earlier this month, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel urged Democrats to “‘take a chill pill’ and realize they are not going to win national power anytime soon.” While many Democrats are apt to disdain such pessimistic sentiments, these kinds of remarks are more than just talk—they’re potentially harmful to the party’s ability to win back a congressional majority in 2018. My academic research suggests that comments like Emanuel’s can turn into a self-fulfilling prophesy because if stronger candidates don’t believe that their party can win a majority, they may be less likely to even run in the first place.

I’ve examined a phenomenon I call “minority party hardship” that helps explain how pessimism can affect electoral outcomes, though it doesn’t hinge on the tenor of public statements by party leaders. Rather, it looks at two conditions: political polarization in a given legislative body, and the probability of the minority party winning back that body.

When we see conditions of high political polarization in a legislative body—that is to say, votes on most legislation break down along party lines, meaning the majority party has little interest in the opinions and votes of minority members—and a low probability of the minority party winning a majority in the next election, that yields a condition of high hardship. On the flipside, where partisan control of the chamber is up for grabs, and/or lower polarization makes bipartisan legislation more common, you end up with much lower hardship. (You can read my dissertation here for more technical details about this measure.)

Under such conditions of high hardship, service in a legislative body isn’t a whole lot of fun for the minority, particularly in institutions like the U.S. House of Representatives, where the majority controls almost everything of consequence. Minority members in the House spend all day fighting losing battles against policy proposals put forth by the majority and are typically unable to advance their own preferred policies.

Furthermore, House members need to spend considerable time raising money not just to win their own races, but for their party, too. The DCCC once even advised new incumbent House members to spend at least four hours a day, every day on the phone raising money, something that Democratic Rep. John Larson referred to as "the most painful thing.” Adding insult to injury, the majoritarian nature of the House can make this unpleasant endeavor feel almost pointless unless the minority is able to win 218 seats in the next election, since the minority continues to be unable to advance its legislative aims no matter how much money its members raise.