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Cited by 282

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 15 of the 15 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

The Marginals Never Vanished: Incumbency and Competition in Elections to the U.S. House of Representatives, 1952-82

Jacobson, Gary C.·1987·American Journal of Political Science

Abstract

The average vote margin enjoyed by incumbent candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives increased sharply during the 1 960s. Despite this, and contrary to assumptions common in the literature on recent congressional elections, electoral data show that House incumbents are no safer now than they were in the 1950s, the marginals, properly defined, have not vanished; the swing ratio has diminished little, if at all; and competition for House seats held by incumbents has not declined. Vote margins increased without adding to incumbent security, diminishing competition, or dampening swings because the heterogeneity of interelection vote swings increased at the same time.

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Metadata

Authors
Jacobson, G. C.
Venue
American Journal of Political Science
Publisher
JSTOR
Published
1987-02
Volume
31
Issue
1
Pages
126
ISSN
0092-5853 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W3123699281
Cited by
282
References
15
FWCI
52.24
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed

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CoChat. (2026). Citation check: The Marginals Never Vanished: Incumbency and Competition in Elections to the U.S. House of Representatives, 1952-82. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.2307/2111327
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Jacobson, G. C. (1987). The Marginals Never Vanished: Incumbency and Competition in Elections to the U.S. House of Representatives, 1952-82. American Journal of Political Science. https://doi.org/10.2307/2111327

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