ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews a literature on party competition in House elections both before and after the Republican takeover of Congress. It discusses the specific pattern of GOP advancement in the 1990s and presents a theoretical explanation for Republican ascen-dancy in southern House elections. The chapter offers an explanation for the ascendancy of the Republican Party in southern House elections in the 1990s. Right up until the Republican victory in 1994, the apparent permanent minority status of the GOP spawned several hypotheses for the failure of the party to win back the US House of Representatives. Reapportionment led to improved political opportunities for Republican House candidates. The reconfiguration of congressional boundaries fostered greater Republican voting in House races by increasing the likelihood that white southerners would vote in line with their presidential preferences. Republican identifiers are a plurality of the southern electorate and a majority among whites.
