Intra-legislative Communications in a Newly Emergent Two-party System: The Case of Education and the Florida House of Representatives, 1967

This research attempts to delineate the communications patterns
within the Florida House of Representatives of 1967 in its deliberations
concerning the issue of education. To accomplish this goal, a
questionnaire was personally administered or mailed to all 119 members
of the House. A return rate of 51.3% (61) was attained. The bulk
of the questionnaire items were of a sociometric nature.
To map the communications of the House, ten specific hypotheses
were tested. These hypotheses concerned the relative importance
of particular types of legislative actors and groups in the communications
patterns of both parties. Administrative officials were also
included in the analysis. The rationale for these hypotheses
concerned the variables of age and/or size of the respective parties
and were based upon the history of Florida politics. All ten
hypotheses were based upon the contention that, as in other organizations
and decision-making groups, in a legislative body there would
exist a "practiced" communications pattern distinctly different from
the "formal" organizational pattern. The pattern which emerged from the analysis revealed that
members of both parties relied upon a small number of education
experts or specialists for information, regardless of the experts'
formal positions. The Democrats did not consider their party leadership
to be an important information source while the Republican caucus
--and through the caucus, the leadership--was a strong source of
voting cues. With the exceptions of Dade and Pinellas counties,
intra-delegation communications did not appear important in either
party. While Democrats did not rely upon any Republicans for information,
the Republicans did rely upon some Democrats (the experts}.
No geographical splits were apparent in Democratic communications.
The Pinellas Republicans were somewhat isolated from east coast
Republicans in the information flow.
The communications pattern between House members and
administrative officials focused upon cabinet members. Republican
Governor Kirk was most generally listed as an information source
by Republicans while the Democrats relied for information upon
Superintendent of Public Instruction Christian. Legislative staffs
were identified as information sources by members of both parties.