David,
I don't think that that is quite the right question. I suspect that there are few cases, if any, where a tea party backed nominee (and remember, the tea parties are little more than a loosely associated, largely unorganized coalition of people) specifically ran stronger than a more "mainstream" Republican would have. (I would, however, suggest at least two: Rand Paul, who won by a much bigger margin than any statewide Kentucky Republican since Mitch McConnell's 1996 re-election) and Marco Rubio, who clobbered the opposition in what Democrats had expected to be a pick up opportunity not that long ago). Be that as it may, I suspect that without the rise of the tea parties, Republicans overall would not have done nearly as well. That is, the enthusiasm of the tea partiers, the jolt of energy they gave to the GOP, the galvanizing effect they had on opposition to the Democratic agenda, surely strengthened Republicans, even if, in the end, (to use just one high profile example) Sharron Angle might not have run as well as Danny Tarkanian or Sue Lowden against Harry Reid. In other words, if you didn't have the tea parties, Reid might have lost, but Democrats such as Charlie Wilson and Zach Space here in Ohio, would not have lost. Similarly, Republicans benefited from tea party enthusiasm down ballot, in races such as Auditor and Secretary of State (where victories give the Ohio GOP control of Ohio's reapportionment process) would not have lost. And Ohio actually has a relatively weak tea party movement, so I would guess the effects are stronger elsewhere.
The Democrats have had, I think, a similar story when the on-line left provided enthusiasm, spark, and money to Democrats in 2006 and 2008, even while some of its specific favorites, such as Ned Lamont, were pretty weak. (You might compare that race to what appears to be a Murkowski win in Alaska this year).
I have a slightly different question -- can anyone name a race where a
Tea Party candidate won and in which, arguably, a regular Republican
would have lost? That is, did any Tea Party candidates win because of,
rather than in spite of, their affiliation?
I know this rests on counterfactuals, so it will be impossible to
prove one way or another, but standard political models predict that,
all else being equal, extremist candidates will underperform relative
to more centrist candidates in general elections. And we have at least
a few examples of Senate races (Nevada, Delaware) where a regular
Republican probably would have won but the Tea Party candidate lost.
So are there examples from any level of races where things went the
other way? If so, then it's a good example of the enthusiasm vs.
left/right positioning tradeoff. If not, it helps put the Tea Party
phenomenon in perspective.
David Epstein
On Wednesday, November 3, 2010, Lloyd Mayer <lmayer@nd.edu> wrote:
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> One congressional race where the presence of a third party candidate
> may have been decisive is in my home district of Indiana-2. The incumbent
> Democrat, Joe Donnelly, won by about two thousand, five hundred votes out of approximately
> 190,000 cast, narrowly edging out the Republican candidate. A Libertarian
> candidate received almost 9,445 votes, or almost four times the margin of
> victory. For exact figures, see http://64.255.123.76/indiana.htm.
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> Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer
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> Associate Professor
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> Notre Dame Law School
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> P.O. Box 780
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> Notre Dame, IN 46556-0780
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> Phone: (574) 631-8057
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> Fax: (574) 631-4197
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> Web Bio <http://law.nd.edu/faculty/lloyd-hitoshi-mayer>:
> http://law.nd.edu/faculty/lloyd-hitoshi-mayer
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> SSRN Author
> Page <http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=504775>: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=504775
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> Questions for Tomorrow
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> How did Independents and third party candidates do, did their presence
> affect any D-R races, and what of "none of the above" in Nevada? What
> we know now is that independent Chafee won the R.I. gubernatorial race,
> Tancredo lost in Colorado, None of the above is polling under two percent in
> the Reid-Angle race, but it is doing much better than the "Tea Party"
> candidate in that race (who some allege was put there by Democrats to take
> votes away from Angle.)
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> Posted by Rick Hasen at 09:07 PM <http://electionlawblog.org/archives/017793.html>
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--
**************************************
David Epstein
Professor of Political Science
Columbia University
New York, NY 10027
212-854-7566 (W)
646-391-7733 (C)
http://www.columbia.edu/~de11
http://www.reflectivepundit.com
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