Civitas Action Releases 2013 State Legislative Rankings

Published: Wednesday, June 11th, 2014 @ 4:31 pm
By: Civitas Insitute ( More Entries )

    Publisher's note: This post, by Francis De Luca, was originally published in the Legislative Activity and Press Releases section(s) of Civitas's online edition.

    RALEIGH     Civitas Action has released its annual Conservative Effectiveness Ranking of North Carolina state lawmakers for the 2013 legislative session.

    Scores suggest that the Senate was more conservative than the House last year, with more than half of the Senate members earning an "A", while no House members garnered such a high mark. Five House members earned a "B+", the highest grade awarded in the House.

    "The General Assembly had great success advancing conservative reforms in its last session," Civitas President Francis De Luca said. "But more needs to be done to ensure people here enjoy the benefits of prosperity and freedom. And success can lead to complacency. We will continue to urge our elected officials to stick with proven, successful conservative solutions to the challenges facing North Carolina."

    The average score for Senate members is 71 percent, while House scores averaged 60.7 percent.

    The Civitas Action Conservative Effectiveness Ranking is the only rating system in North Carolina that allows the citizens of North Carolina to gauge how effective their state legislator actually is in votes in the legislature.

    Civitas Action has been producing its annual legislative ranking since the 2008 legislative session.

    The ranking analyzes each member's vote on important legislation to better decipher the member's ideological stance on the issues. For the 2013 session, votes that were ranked included key legislation such as the state budget, tax reform, setting up a state Obamacare exchange/Medicaid expansion, election reform and unemployment insurance reform. To see the bills on which the rankings are based, click here.

    To see the full 2013 rankings, click here.

    Civitas Action is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit that educates and informs North Carolinians on policy issues and the actions of their elected officials.

    The Civitas Institute is a policy institute based in Raleigh, N.C. More information is available at www.nccivitas.org, or contact Jim Tynen at (919) 834-2099 or james.tynen@nccivitas.org.