The People's House - Membership, Qualifications and Apportionment - Elections

Elections

Elections for representatives are held in every even-numbered year, on Election Day the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. By law, Representatives must be elected from single-member districts by plurality voting. After a census is taken (in a year ending in 0), the year ending in 2 is the first year in which elections for U.S. House districts are based on that census (with the Congress based on those districts starting its term on the following Jan. 3).

In most states, major party candidates for each district are nominated in partisan primary elections, typically held in spring to late summer. In some states, the Republican and Democratic parties choose their respective candidates for each district in their political conventions in spring or early summer, which often use unanimous voice votes to reflect either confidence in the incumbent or the result of bargaining in earlier private discussions. Exceptions can result in so-called floor fight—convention votes by delegates, with outcomes that can be hard to predict. Especially if a convention is closely divided, a losing candidate may contend further by meeting the conditions for a primary election.

The courts generally do not consider ballot access rules for independent and third party candidates to be additional qualifications for holding office and there are no federal regulations regarding ballot access. As a result, the process to gain ballot access varies greatly from state to state, and, in the case of a third party may be affected by results of previous years' elections.

In 1967, Federal law was changed to require that representatives be elected from single-member-districts, due to fear that, as a consequence of the recent Wesberry v. Sanders decision, courts would impose at-large plurality districts on states that did not redistrict to comply with the new mandates for districts roughly equal in population, and also to prevent attempts by southern states to use such voting systems to dilute the vote of racial minorities.

Louisiana is unique in that it holds an all-party "primary election" on the general Election Day with a subsequent runoff election between the top two finishers (regardless of party) if no candidate received a majority in the primary. The states of Washington and California now use a similar (though not identical) system to that used by Louisiana. Seats vacated during a term are filled through special elections, unless the vacancy occurs closer to the next general election date than a pre-established deadline. The term of a member chosen in a special election usually begins the next day, or as soon as the results are certified.