California Congressional Districts in 2006

Description

Election returns and identifying information, California's 53 congressional districts in the 2006 Congresisonal elections.

Usage

data(ca2006)

Format

A data frame with 53 observations on the following 11 variables.

district

numeric, number of Congressional district

D

numeric, number of votes for the Democratic candidate

R

numeric, votes for the Republican candidate

Other

numeric, votes for other candidates

IncParty

character, party of the incumbent (or retiring member), D or R

IncName

character, last name of the incumbent, character NA if no incumbent running

open

logical, TRUE if no incumbent running

contested

logical, TRUE if both major parties ran candidates

Bush2004

numeric, votes for George W. Bush (R) in the district in the 2004 presidential election

Kerry2004

numeric, votes for John Kerry (D) in 2004

Other2004

numeric votes for other candidates in 2004

Bush2000

numeric, votes for George W. Bush in 2000

Gore2000

numeric, votes for Al Gore (D) in 2000

Source

2006 data from the California Secretary of State's web site, http://vote2006.sos.ca.gov/Returns/usrep/all.htm; Excel data at http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/sov/2006_general/congress.xls. 2004 and 2000 presidential vote in congressional districts from the 2006 Almanac of American Politics.

Thanks to Arthur Aguirre for the updated links, above.

References

Michael Baraon and Richard E. Cohen. 2006. The Almanac of American Politics, 2006. National Journal Group: Washington, D.C.

Examples

data(ca2006)

## 2006 CA congressional vote against 2004 pvote
y <- ca2006$D/(ca2006$D+ca2006$R)
x <- ca2006$Kerry2004/(ca2006$Kerry2004+ca2006$Bush2004)

pch <- rep(19,length(y))
pch[ca2006$open] <- 1
col <- rep("black",length(y))
col[11] <- "red"    ## Pembo (R) loses to McNerney (D)
plot(y~x,pch=pch,
     col=col,
     xlim=range(x,y,na.rm=TRUE),
     ylim=range(x,y,na.rm=TRUE),
     xlab="Kerry Two-Party Vote, 2004",
     ylab="Democratic Two-Party Vote Share, 2006")
abline(0,1)
abline(h=.5,lty=2)
abline(v=.5,lty=2)
legend(x="topleft",
       bty="n",
       col=c("red","black","black"),
       pch=c(19,19,1),
       legend=c("Seat Changing Hands",
         "Seat Retained by Incumbent Party",
         "Open Seat (no incumbent running)")
       )