Congressional tightwads and spendthrifts: Measuring fiscal behavior in thechanging House of Representatives

We evaluate fiscal behavior in the 103rd and 104th Houses using a newly def ined dependent variable which separates roll-call votes by how much each bi ll costs or saves in federal government expenditures. This allows, us to an alyze how members view these as fundamentally different expressions of budg etary preferences. Party groups are shown to trade-off and substitute goals across spending and saving over time based upon majority status, leadershi p goal, and exogenous political pressure. The impact of region interacting with party is diminished, implying that Southern Democrats are not uniquely cross-pressured as a result of realignment.