This research analyzes the election of the Representative to the United States House for the Second District of State of Washington in November 1996. The results of this research are presented in the following discussions: (1) demographics of the 2nd Congressional District of Washington; (2) the political and philosophical character of the 2nd Congressional District; (3) the outcomes of prior congressional elections in Washington's 2nd district; (4) backgrounds of the major candidates in the 1996 election in the 2nd District; (5) results of the 1996 election in the 2nd Congressional District; and (6) the probable role of the winner in the 1996 election in Washington's 2nd District in the 105th Congress.
Washington's 2nd Congressional District is comprised of five counties located in the north-central region of the state. The counties are Island, San Juan, Skagit, Snohomish, and Whatcom. The populations of these counties are as follows:
Island County residents are a mix of military (Naval Air Station personnel and their families account for approximately 20 percent of the county's population), commuters (to jobs at Boeing's Everett complex and to jobs in Seattle), back-to-nature adherents, and retirees. San Juan County residents include back-to-nature people, wealthy refugees from Southern California, and long-time residents of the San Juan Islands. Skagit County is primarily agricultural with some logging operations in the Cascade foothills. Most of the residents were born in the county; however, there also are migrant agricultural workers from both Mexico and the Southwestern states, back-to-nature adherents, and a growing number of non-agricultural migrants seeking to "escape the tyranny of the government." Snohomish County is an urban-suburban-industrial-rural-logging-primitive mix that nearly defies description. The southern part of the county is dotted with wealthy bedroom communities that serve the Seattle economy, ...