The four Democratic senators are crucial to Democrats' efforts to keep control of the Senate, where Republicans need to gain six seats to take over the chamber.
The SAI was a measure of the proportion of females in the control chamber over the treated chamber after correcting for the proportion of females in the control chamber.
(Although Democrats have a numerical majority in the Senate, Republicans have partial control of the chamber — and veto power over any bill moving to the floor — thanks to an alliance they formed with an independent faction of Democrats).
Perhaps, though, after the mobilisation of tens of thousands of outraged workers in February, culminating in an extended occupation of the state capitol, Democrats' attempts to use this grassroots movement to gain control over one chamber of the state legislature couldn't help but feel anticlimactic, not to mention self-serving.
In the battle between the GOP establishment and the tea party, Thom Tillis' nomination for the U.S. Senate seat from North Carolina scored a win for party elders who are trying to exert control over the elections and wrest the chamber from Democrats.
Most legislative bodies confer some special privileges on the majority party, but few take it to such as an extreme as New York's Legislature, where the Democrats who dominate the Assembly and the Republicans who rule the Senate exert minute control over each chamber's perks, privileges and patronage.
Lawmakers were weary after spending weeks battling for control of the chamber and broke for the summer without taking up much of their agenda, from legalizing gay marriage to extending mayoral control over New York City's public schools.
THE HOUSE In 2010, in the wake of a bitter legislative battle over the Affordable Care Act, Republicans gained sixty-three seats in the House and took control of the chamber.
