Center for Effective Lawmaking

Center for Effective Lawmaking

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Vanderbilt University

Highlights from the New 118th Congress Interest & Legislative Effectiveness Scores
About the CEL / Interest & Legislative Effectiveness Scores / Legislative Anaylsis / Legislative Effectiveness Scores / Legislative Research

Highlights from the New 118th Congress Interest & Legislative Effectiveness Scores

Highlights from the New 118th Congress Interest & Legislative Effectiveness Scores By Craig Volden and Alan Wiseman, Co-Directors, Center for Effective LawmakingWednesday, November 19, 2025The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) is pleased to announce the release of the Interest & Legislative Effectiveness Scores (ILES) in each of 21 different issue areas for the 118th Congress (2023-25). These categories are based on issue area codes from the Comparative Agendas Project with bill issue codings drawn from www.congress.gov. The methodology that we employed to construct these issue-based scores is the same as…

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November 19, 2025
The Legislative Success of “Giant Killers” in the U.S. House
Center Affiliates / Faculty Affiliates / Legislative Anaylsis / Legislative Research

The Legislative Success of “Giant Killers” in the U.S. House

The Legislative Success of “Giant Killers” in the U.S. House Monday, November 3, 2025In modern congressional elections, fewer than 10% of candidates who run against sitting members of Congress win and yet they comprise as much as 30% of the House in any given congress. In this forthcoming paper in Political Science Quarterly, Sean Theriault, Professor at The University of Texas at Austin and Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) Faculty Affiliate, along with Jared Hrebenar and Isabel Reyna, examine the legislative effectiveness of those relatively rare challengers who knock off…

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November 3, 2025
Highlights from the New 118th Congress Legislative Effectiveness Scores
Legislative Effectiveness Scores / Legislative Research

Highlights from the New 118th Congress Legislative Effectiveness Scores

Highlights from the New 118th Congress Legislative Effectiveness Scores Tuesday, March 25, 2025The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) is pleased to announce the release of the Legislative Effectiveness Scores (LES) for the recently completed 118th Congress (2023-25). This report, written by Co-Directors Craig Volden (of the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia) and Alan Wiseman (of the Department of Political Science at Vanderbilt University), offers highlights from our initial analyses of these scores, including:We list the top-10 lawmakers in each party in the House…

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March 19, 2025
Discussing Effective Lawmaking with West Virginia House Speaker Roger Hanshaw
Conversations with Lawmakers

Discussing Effective Lawmaking with West Virginia House Speaker Roger Hanshaw

Discussing Effective Lawmaking with West Virginia House Speaker Roger Hanshaw Thursday, December 12, 2024West Virginia House Speaker Roger Hanshaw has served in the West Virginia House of Delegates since 2014, and as House Speaker since 2018. He represents his native Clay County, along with Calhoun and Gilmer Counties, as a Republican in the legislature. During his first term as a delegate, four of his ten sponsored bills became law, making him one of the most effective lawmakers in his freshman class. Since then, he rose to be a top-ten lawmaker…

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December 13, 2024
Prior Experience and State Legislative Effectiveness
Center Affiliates / Faculty Affiliates / Legislative Anaylsis / Legislative Research / State Legislative Effectiveness Scores

Prior Experience and State Legislative Effectiveness

Prior Experience and State Legislative Effectiveness In this Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) working paper, Associate Professor Eric Hansen of Loyola University Chicago and Professor Sarah Treul of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (and CEL Faculty Affiliate) examine how the prior experiences of lawmakers affect their performance in office. Elected representatives who have professional backgrounds in fields closely related to lawmaking—specifically law, government, or politics—or who held prior office seem to have an advantage in winning elections, but it is unclear that such experience makes them better…

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September 9, 2024
Gendered Perceptions of Legislative Influence
Center Affiliates / Faculty Affiliates / Legislative Anaylsis / Legislative Research / State Legislative Effectiveness Scores

Gendered Perceptions of Legislative Influence

Gendered Perceptions of Legislative Influence In this Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) working paper, Faculty Affiliate Jaclyn Kaslovsky (Washington University in St. Louis), Tabitha Koch (Rice University), and Michael P. Olson (Washington University in St. Louis) examine whether legislative and electoral accomplishments translate into perceived influence differently for women and men. Women legislators often report that they must work harder than men to achieve the same outcomes and recognition. Existing research supports this argument in their interactions with voters, yet little previous scholarship has examined whether this expectations gap also…

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August 20, 2024
CEL Receives Grant From the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation
About the CEL / State Legislative Effectiveness Scores

CEL Receives Grant From the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation

CEL Receives Grant From the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation recently committed a three-year $1.5 million grant to the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) for our State Legislative Effectiveness Initiative.Since its founding in 2017 as a joint venture between the University of Virginia (UVA)'s Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy and Vanderbilt University, the CEL has studied and promoted lawmaking effectiveness in the United States. The overwhelming majority of our research and engagement activities to date have been focused on the U.S.…

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July 11, 2024
Legislative Effectiveness: The Elements of Success
Legislative Anaylsis / Legislative Effectiveness Scores / Legislative Research

Legislative Effectiveness: The Elements of Success

Legislative Effectiveness: The Elements of Success The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) co-directors Craig Volden and Alan Wiseman recently wrote an essay titled “Legislative Effectiveness: The Elements of Success” which was published in the Summer 2024 issue of the quarterly political journal Democracy as part of the symposium “Revitalizing Political Leadership.” The article examines the role of state legislatures in developing effective lawmakers at both the state and federal levels, based on the analysis of the CEL’s Legislative Effectiveness Scores (which measure lawmaking effectiveness of members of Congress) and the…

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June 25, 2024
Discussing Effective Lawmaking with Representative Mark Takano
Conversations with Lawmakers

Discussing Effective Lawmaking with Representative Mark Takano

Discussing Effective Lawmaking with Representative Mark Takano Representative Mark Takano has represented California in the U.S. House of Representatives since 2013, and currently serves the 39th congressional district. He has been identified by the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) as being the fifth-most and sixth-most effective Democratic lawmaker in the House in the 116th and 117th Congress, respectively (which convened from 2019-2021 and 2021-2023). He was also identified as being the most effective Democratic House member in these congresses in advancing Defense policy. In addition, he was the most effective…

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May 14, 2024
Discussing Effective Lawmaking with Representative Don Bacon
Conversations with Lawmakers

Discussing Effective Lawmaking with Representative Don Bacon

Discussing Effective Lawmaking with Representative Don Bacon Representative Don Bacon has served as the U.S. Representative for Nebraska’s 2nd congressional district since 2017. He has been identified by the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) as being the most effective Republican lawmaker in the U.S. House of Representatives in the 117th Congress (2021-2023) and the fourth-most effective lawmaker, overall, in the House during the 117th Congress, despite being a member of the minority party at the time. He was also the most successful member of the House in terms of incorporating…

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April 24, 2024

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