Nebraska

About Nebraska

History of Nebraska

For years, United States Senator George Norris and other Nebraskans encouraged the idea of a unicameral legislature, and demanded the issue be decided in a referendum. Norris argued:

…The constitutions of our various states are built upon the idea that there is but one class. If this be true, there is no sense or reason in having the same thing done twice, especially if it is to be done by two bodies of men elected in the same way and having the same jurisdiction.

Unicameral supporters also argued that a bicameral legislature had a significant undemocratic feature in the committees that reconciled Assembly and Senate legislation. Votes in these committees were secretive, and would sometimes add provisions to bills that neither house had approved. Nebraska’s unicameral legislature today has rules that bills can contain only one subject, and must be given at least five days of consideration.

Finally, in 1934, due in part to the budgetary pressure of the Great Depression, Nebraska’s unicameral legislature was put in place by a state initiative. In effect, the Assembly (the house) was abolished; as noted, today’s Nebraska state legislators are commonly referred to as “Senators.”

The Nebraska delegation to the US Congress is dominated by the Republican Party, whose presidential nominee has carried the state in all but one election since 1940–the 1964 landslide of Lyndon Johnson. Since 1991, two of Nebraska’s five electoral votes are awarded based on the winner of the statewide election; the other three go to the highest vote-getter in each of the state’s three congressional districts. However, in the four presidential elections held since then, a Democrat has not won a single electoral vote in the state. In the 2004 presidential election, George W. Bush won the state’s five electoral votes by the overwhelming margin of 33 percentage points (the fourth most Republican vote among states) with 65.9% of the vote; only Thurston County voted for John Kerry.

Despite the current Republican domination of Nebraska politics, the state has a long tradition of electing centrist members of both parties to state and federal office; examples include Norris (who served his last few years in the Senate as an independent), J. James Exon, and Bob Kerrey. This tradition is illustrated by Nebraska’s current United States senators: Republican Chuck Hagel is considered a maverick within his party, while Democrat Ben Nelson is the most conservative member of his party in the Senate. However, all three of the state’s congressional districts are held by Republicans.

The Nebraska legislature is housed in the third Nebraska State Capitol building, which was built between 1922 and 1932.

Nebraska

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