In the today’s look back, we feature an Indiana Chamber-produced cartoon from 1954 titled, “What Factors Decide a Legislator’s Vote?”
It’s a good question, even today. Here are the influencing factors it lists as possibilities:
- Conscience: What are the facts? What’s right? What’s wrong?
- Affected by : (A) Personal background and experiences; (B) Knowledge (or lack of knowledge) of the facts
- The Party “Line”: Party caucus decisions and party discipline
- Opinions of the folks “back home”: (A) Whose judgment the legislator respects and/or (B) Who he believes can help him be re-elected
While these are all pretty much the same conditions as today, we’d likely change the reference to legislators from “he” to “he/she” considering state government is no longer just a “boys club.” In fact, you can see that topic addressed in this old Throwback Thursday post.