My primary research agenda has been a consistent effort to remedy the dearth of information about Kentucky politics and government. My most significant contribution to the state of knowledge continues to be an attempt to fill some of that scholarship void. Most of this is, of course, to be found in my three books; the first two were co-authored with Malcolm Jewell. My in-depth study of the first 200 years of Kentucky politics and government, Kentucky Politics and Government: Do We Stand United?, is being used by undergraduates, graduate students, and scholars throughout the commonwealth and nation. My current and future research activities are rich and varied. I enjoy participating in a mix of local, state and national projects. My primary research passion remains Kentucky politics and government.

My colleague Don Gross and I are participating in a national research program, The Non-Candidate Campaign Money Project, which is funded by Pew Charitable Trusts and directed by David Magleby of Brigham Young University. The project includes academic investigators from 16 universities in 15 states; researchers have been tracking soft money and issue advertising to see how they impact 16 key House and Senate races in the 1998 campaign. Don and I have been studying the Bunning/Baesler U.S. Senate race and the Fletcher/Scorsone Sixth Congressional District race. Don and I are seeking to answer questions about how spending by issue groups and political parties affects the voters, candidates and campaigns in Kentucky. The 16 races in the national study (four Senate and 12 House contests) were among the most competitive races in the nation. They were considered prime targets for soft money and special interest spending. Don and I have been monitoring TV and radio ad buys, direct mailings, phone banks, push polls, and other actions. We are also engaged in interviewing campaign strategists, political reporters, and consultants from numerous special interest groups and from party committees. The results will be presented at a conference in Washington in early 1999 and at the Midwest Political Science Association Meeting in April 1999. Our work will eventually become a chapter in an edited book.

My colleague Steve Voss and I have been conducting an aggregate-data analysis of Kentucky's 1996 constitutional amendment vote. More than 40 years after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down "separate but equal" schools, and long after de jure racial distinctions had fallen out of judicial favor, the Kentucky state legislature asked voters to strip school segregation from their venerable 1891 constitution. Political elites were stunned when a third of the state's voters, and majorities in five counties, rejected the change. Our research shows that the culprit in this discouraging vote was not racism, however -- because African-American voters endorsed segregation at the same rate as whites. Our analysis thus makes clear that many, if not most, Kentucky voters did not realize they were endorsing segregation or poll taxes. The results of our research will be presented in a paper at the Kentucky Political Science Association Meeting in March 1999.

Another portion of my current research is focused on the severe underrepresentation (as a proportion to the population) of women in Kentucky politics, particularly in the twentieth century. Why is Kentucky still ranked nearly last in the nation in female representation in the General Assembly -- with women in 16 of the 138 positions? I have studied, spoken on, and worked with others on publishing both historical overviews and detailed studies of current women political leaders. Moreover, since 1993, I have worked with my colleague Ellen Riggle and others on a project examining stereotypes of women and discrimination by voters. This research on the use of gender stereotypes as cues in information and decision-making examines how social information is processed and how these cognitive activities affect evaluations of political candidates. See copy of our 1997 Women and Politics' article, "Gender Stereotypes and Decision Context in the Evaluation of Political Candidates," which presents a detailed explanation of our research methodology and goals. Currently, we have another paper under review by a journal.

For the past three years, I have been editing the Public Papers of former Governor Brereton C. Jones (1991-1995) The work is part of a series of volumes which preserves and disseminates the public record of Kentucky's chief executives. The series is useful to all those interested in Kentucky government, including citizens, scholars, journalists, and public officials.

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