One Voter Project

The Online Home of California's Political History

As a Reference

Information from the OneVoter and JoinCalifornia websites has been cited in a number of books and articles. While this is not necessarily a complete list, we feel it’s a pretty good representation.

Books & Publications

 

Professional Journal Articles

Legislation

News Articles

  • June 3, 2006
    Orange County Register;     Running against apathy
    The article credits JoinCalifornia.com as a source for a chart labeled “Orange County politicians who have run for state office”.
  • October 9, 2006
    Santa Cruz Sentinel; Childhood friends create online archive of California political history
    “Ever wonder who was governor of California the year you were born, or what local politicians made it to the big time in state and national politics? Maybe you want to know more about someone running for state office. You can find the answers to just about any question dealing with California elections at the state and national level at JoinCalifornia.com, a Web site launched this week by former Royal Oaks residents and North Monterey County High School graduates Alex Vassar, 25, and Shane Meyers, 26. Two years in the making, the Web site tracks California’s political movers and shakers, the parties they belonged to and the offices they occupied from 1849 to the present.“
  • 2006
    KSCO 1080am;     Political Online Archive
    “FORMER MONTEREY BAY AREA RESIDENTS RECENTLY UNVEILED A WEBSITE THAT COVERS CALIFORNIA’S POLITICAL HISTORY. AFTER 2 YEARS IN THE MAKING, 25 YEAR-OLD ALEX VASSAR AND 26 YEAR-OLD SHANE MEYERS, PRESENTED JOIN CALIFORNIA DOT COM. THE WEB SITE INCLUDES ALL OF CALIFORNIA’S POLITICIANS’ BIOGRAPHIES INCLUDING THE OFFICES THEY HELD AND WHEN THEY HELD THEM. AFTER EARNING A POLITICAL SCIENCE DEGREE, VASSAR RECRUITED MEYERS AND TOGETHER GATHERED AND ENTERED THE INFORMATION FOR RESEARCH PURPOSES.”
  • March 22, 2007
    La Opinion;     Alarcón vuelve a Los Ángeles
    “Según Alex Vassar, editor del archivo político Únete a California, el último funcionario público en durar un período muy breve fue John L. Harmer, quien fue vicegobernador por 94 días, a partir de 1974. Harmer fue nombrado por el gobernador Ronald Reagan luego de la renuncia de Edwin Reinecke. Antes, Thomas M. Storke, fue senador por 55 días en 1938.”
    Translation: “According to Alex Vassar, Editor of the political website JoinCalifornia, the last public official to serve a shorter period of time was John L. Harmer, who was Lieutenant Governor for 94 days in 1974. Harmer was appointed by Gov. Ronald Reagan after the resignation of Edwin Reinecke. Before that, Thomas M. Storke was Senator for 55 days in 1938.”
  • February 12, 2008
    Sacramento Bee CapitolAlert;     3,668, 3,629, who’s counting?
    “When they took the plastic wrap off Warren Furutani, California’s newest legislator, last week, Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez noted the Democrat from Gardena was the 3,668th person to serve in the state’s lower house.
    That didn’t seem right – at least in a numerical sense – to two legislative Fellows. So Alex Vassar, a Senate Fellow in Sen. Bob Dutton’s office, who runs a website on California political history, here and Chelsea Minor, an Assembly Fellow in Roger Niello’s office, put their heads together and went through the records. They came up with 3,629.
    “I’m confident in our number,” Vassar said in a press release heralding their feat. “We included everyone, including the short-term members who only held office for a few days before resigning or having their seats contested.”
    Hmmm. And I thought Speaker Núñez knew everything…”
  • May 8, 2008
    CSU Hayward Pioneer     Republican Seeks City Council and Assembly Seats at Same Time by Terri Lynn Lane
    “This will be the eleventh time he is running for public office according to JoinCalifornia.com, a website that archives the results of California elections. According to the site, Filipovich has never won any of those elections. In fact, the most support he has ever received was 26 percent in a race for State Senate against incumbent Ellen Corbett in 2006. Corbett won that election with an overwhelming 73 percent of the vote.”
  • October 2009
    Reason Foundation;     Redistricting in California: Competitive Elections and the Effects of Proposition 11
    Data from JoinCalifornia was cited as the basis for the research in this study.
  • February 5, 2009
    Sacramento Bee CapitolAlert;     Fabian Núñez files for state Senate
    Fun fact: JoinCalifornia, a site dedicated to California election history, says Núñez, if he does run and win, would be the first speaker to be elected to the state Senate in more than 80 years. The last was Frank F. Merriam.
    Who was the last speaker to try? Ex-Speaker James W. Silliman, who ran — and lost — in a special election in 1955, according to JoinCalifornia.
  • January 12, 2010
    GayPolitics; California LGBT groups eye redistricting process
    Article used photo of the 1982 Congressional Redistricting from JoinCalifornia website.
  • March 13, 2010
    Ballot Access News    ; “Join California” Preliminary Tally of How Many Candidates Filed in Primary for Partisan Office
    “The web page “Join California” has made a strenuous effort to learn how many candidates filed for partisan office in the June 8, 2010 California primaries. This information is not official. Each candidate files in his or her own home county, so “Join California” had to contact each of the 58 counties to gather the data this early in the cycle. The filing deadline was Friday, March 12.”
  • June 4, 2010
    Capitol Notes on     KQED Public Radio; Prop 14: The Agent Of Change?
    Article used photo of Steve Peace from JoinCalifornia website.
  • July 13, 2010
    Paradise Post;     SILVA: Romero takes on a deadly rock
    “On another note, the same guy who got serpentine designated as the state rock was also the guy who pushed Proposition 1A in 1966. That, according to joincalifornia .com, was the initiative that created the fulltime legislature.”
  • July 13, 2010
    Protect Consumer Justice.org;     Mary Salas’s manager: ‘Make sure that every vote is counted’
    It’s a long shot, says Alex Vassar, who helps run the Join California political archive when he’s not serving as floor manager for the Senate Republican Policy Office.
    “Because of how elections results are recorded makes it very difficult to get a good count of how often recounts impact the outcome. Because the Secretary of State only publishes the final vote count (in the Statement of Vote, after the certification of the vote), the only time that the ‘official record’ shows recounts resulting in a changed outcome is when a seat is successfully contested. The only successful contest of an election in recent history was the Fondse/Johnston recount in 1980, which stands out because it was just that rare.”
  • July 13, 2010
    Orange County Register;     Loophole boosts Brown’s pension
    “And what did the Watchdog find? Of the 209 statewide elected officials and legislative statutory officers who served from 2005 to 2009, 34 were age 65 or older as of when the actuarials were produced, according to data collected off of JoinCalifornia .com, pocket directories of the California Legislator published by Capitol Enquiry and voter registration files provided by the secretary of state.”
  • August 31, 2010
    Sacramento Bee CapitolAlert;     Merv Evans throws his hat in yet another ring
    In the 2010 cycle, Evans has at one point announced his intention to run in primaries for controller, lieutenant governor, treasurer, U.S. Senate, the 33rd Congressional District and the 48th Assembly District, according to JoinCalifornia.com, a website that tracks California campaigns. Earlier this summer, Evans’ own website indicated he would run for U.S. Senate in Hawaii.
  • September 10, 2010
    Orange County Register;     Loophole boosts Brown’s pension
    “And what did the Watchdog find? Of the 209 statewide elected officials and legislative statutory officers who served from 2005 to 2009, 34 were age 65 or older as of when the actuarials were produced, according to data collected off of JoinCalifornia.com, pocket directories of the California Legislature published by Capitol Enquiry and voter registration files provided by the secretary of state.”
  • November 9, 2010
    Capitol Morning Report;     Former Democratic Assemblyman Alister McAlister died
    “He unsuccessfully ran for Controller in 1986, referring to himself as “Honest McHonest” in several ads, according to JoinCalifornia.com.”
  • November 9, 2010
    Torrance Daily Breeze;     Few hats in the ring for Oropeza’s state Senate seat
    “According to JoinCalifornia.com, which tracks the state’s election history, in the 2010 election cycle alone Evans announced his intention to run for lieutenant governor, controller, treasurer, U.S. senator, the 33rd Congressional District, the 48th Assembly District, U.S. senator in Hawaii and the 1st Congressional District in Hawaii. He also was a write-in candidate for the 47th Assembly District and received one vote in the general election.”
  • January 7, 2011
    PublicCEO.com;     Redistricting and “Communities of Interest” for Local Government
    Article used photo of the “1951 California State Senate Districts” from JoinCalifornia website.
  • May 3, 2011
    San Jose Mercury News;     Republican wins Northern Calif. Assembly seat
    “The pattern has been repeated several times under different circumstances as far back as 1952, according to the JoinCalifornia web site, which tracks the state’s election history. Two wives have replaced their termed-out husbands in the Legislature since voters enacted term limits in 1990. Two widows succeeded husbands who died in office, while eight other spouses have served in the Legislature years apart from each other.”
    [Article also printed in the San Francisco Examiner, Ventura County Star, San Luis Obispo Tribune, Tahoe Daily Tribune, The Republic [Columbus, Indiana], Contra Costa Times]
  • May 27, 2011
    Capitol Morning Report;     Memorial Day Tribute to Assemblyman Jeff Gorell
    “According to Alexander Vassar, who has researched the history of the CA Legislature, Gorell is only the second California lawmaker to be called to active duty during a time of war. The other was a lawmaker who served in WWII and was at Pearl Harbor on the day of the infamous attack. That member, Asm. John Cooke, also served in the Navy and ironically, represented Ventura County, Gorell’s district.”
  • June 2, 2011
    Capitol Morning Report
    “Vassar started researching lawmaker and political history for a website     www.joincalifornia.com that he and his friend Shane Meyers started in 2005. He decided to compile the data into book form during the interim session in December 2010.”
  • July 14, 2011
    Capitol Weekly;         Personnel Profile: Alexander Vassar
    “I thought that the information would be more accessible if the election data could be sorted a number of ways (by candidate, district number, county, election, etc…). In 2005, Shane Meyers, my best friend, offered to write some code to convert the data into a website, which went online a few months later. Since then, most of the time I’ve spent has been on adding information to the biographies of the candidates.”
  • December 21, 2011
    Fresno Bee;     Gov. Earl Smittcamp? If the disaster was big enough, it could happen
    “Earlier this month, the One Voter Project had a blog about the position of “Disaster Acting Governor.” The blog by Alex Vassar notes that the position was created by law in the 1950s, which was at the height of the Cold War — when nuclear war seemed a very real possibility.”

Organizations that reference JoinCalifornia:

    • California State Library (Site)
    • UC San Diego Library (Site)
    • UC Davis Library (Site)
    • Internet Public Library (Site)
    • Sonoma County Library (Site)
    • Cabrillo College Library (Site)
    • Professor Justin Levitt [Loyola Law School] (Site)
    • Professor John J. Pitney [Claremont McKenna College] (Site)
    • Professor Gayle Olson-Raymer [Humboldt State University] (Site)
    • League of Women Voters – Berkeley Albany Emeryville (Site)
    • Yolo County Republican Party (Site)
    • Fresno County Republican Party (Site)
    • Ventura County Republican Party (Site)
    • Bay Area Progressive Directory (Site)
    • The Green Pages (Site)
    • Politics1.com (Site)
    • Estero Bay Republican Women Federated (Site)
    • Swarthmore College Library (Site)
    • Sacramento State University Library (Site)

 

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Fun Fact

Q: Which California legislators were killed in “Indian Attacks”? A: State Senator James A. Banks (killed in Nevada in 1867) and Assemblyman George W. Leihy (killed in Arizona in 1866).

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