HOW SOME RULES JUST DONT MATTER - THE REGULATION OF LOBBYISTS

Brinig, Holcombe, and Schwartzstein (1993) have argued recently that l obby regulation restricts entry into the population of lobbying organi zations, and that the number of lobbying organizations then influences legislative activity. However, they analyze only the relationship bet ween the restrictiveness of lobby regulation and legislative activity, thereby assuming that regulation actually reduces numbers of register ed interest organizations. We test this assumption with data on state interest organization populations and find little support for it. We c onsider several other explanations and comment more generally on the s tatus of institutions and their rules in the study of political phenom ena.