Aric Gooch

Education
Ph.D., Political Science, University of Missouri
B.S., Social Sciences Education and Political Science, Southwest Baptist University

Aric Dale Gooch joined the Baylor faculty as a lecturer in Fall 2022 from the University of Missouri. His research and teaching interests include American political development, American political institutions, American political thought, political parties, and legislatures. Aric’s current project is a study of the development of state and national legislative candidate emergence and nomination in the first party era, 1788-1816. The creation of clear and relatively durable nomination procedures to structure candidate emergence is central to understanding the development of electoral parties. Not only did groups create nomination procedures that fit this description, but they also generally provided for meaningful grassroots participation. Political parties, and most importantly their nomination procedures, were understood as extensions of constitutional democracy to the people and operated as effective agents of democratization.

Courses at Baylor

PSC 1306 American State and Local Government
A course in American state government with emphasis on the Texas Constitution and government.

PSC 1387 The U.S. Constitution, Its Interpretation, and the American Political Experience
A study of the philosophical and historical background, development, and content of the United States Constitution and its interpretation by the Supreme Court in a complex and ever-changing multi-ethnic, multi-racial, and multi-religious society.

PSC 3310 Legislative Process and Behavior
An examination of state and national legislative institutions and processes. Areas covered include the nature of legislative responsibility, organizational structure, the role of parties and lobbying groups, legislative decision making, legislative relations with executive and judicial branches, policy output, and the theory and methods employed by scholars currently working in this field.

PSC 3382 Public Service Internship
Research and seminars supplemented by fieldwork in a regional federal agency, in a state or local governmental agency, or in a not-for-profit agency

PSC 4350 Political Parties

The diverse roles of political parties in representative democracies, with emphasis on the American experience.

Publications

Aric Dale Gooch. 2024. “Congressional Redistricting and Strategic Copartisans: Partisan Gerrymandering in Pennsylvania, 1800–1824.” Political Research Quarterly

Aric Dale Gooch and Jay Dow. 2021. “Congressional Nominations and Party Emergence, 1788-1808.” Social Science Quarterly 102(6): 2836-2848.

Jordan Butcher and Aric Dale Gooch. 2021. “The Development of Representation in American Political Institutions.” Legislative Studies Quarterly 46(4): 1059-1086.