1. ¹Vanderbilt University
2. ²Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville
3. ³Ohio University

^*The authors thank Bob Albritton, Miles Cooper, and Charles Turner for comments on previous drafts of this paper. Portions of this article are based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant no. 0001808 (awarded to Grose). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

Abstract

Do democratic legislators, African-American legislators, and/or legislators from black-majority districts hire a higher proportion of district staff that are African-American? Legal experts and policymakers are engaged in discussions over the efficacy of districts with significant African-American populations in the wake of the extension of portions of the Voting Rights Act. With the Act's extension, critics have planned to file suit against districts likely to elect African-American legislators, alleging that these districts may harm African-American constituents. In contrast, we argue that these districts may be useful in enhancing African-American political empowerment and that the presence of African-American staff in legislative district offices is an indicator of this empowerment. Based on interviews with staff in 41 congressional district offices, and on quantitative analysis, we find that African-American-majority districts and the presence of African-American and Democratic legislators lead to a higher proportion of African-American district staff. The results suggest that contrary to the conventional wisdom of some voting rights scholars, in the aggregate the election of African-American legislators (and thus the drawing of African-American-majority or influence districts) enhances the empowerment of African-American constituents when based on an examination of African-American district staff and constituency service.