[updated below - Update II (w/transcript)]

Last month, when the possibility first arose that Caroline Kennedy (or Andrew Cuomo) would be appointed to Hillary Clinton's Senate seat, I wrote about how prevalent dynastic succession is in our political system.  Though I was aware anecdotally of what a problem this has become, I was actually surprised, as I wrote that, by how high the number really is of current members of Congress with immediate family members who previously occupied either their seat or some other high political office in their state.  In response, numerous commenters and emailers questioned whether dynastic succession, as commonplace as it now is, was just as common in the past or whether it's an increasing trend -- a question I couldn't answer because I hadn't performed, and wasn't aware of, any empirical historical analysis of those issues.

Dr. Nathan Burroughs, a Ph.D. in Political Science who is currently with Indiana University's Center for Evaluation and Education Policy, has done extensive work studying dynastic politics.  His dissertation examined the systemic advantages dynastic candidates have enjoyed over the last several decades, and in response to my inquiries a month or so ago, he has now analyzed recent historic trends in Congress to determine whether there is now a notably higher percentage of dynastic office-holders than in the past.

Dr. Burroughs is my guest today on Salon Radio, where we discuss those findings, including:

• The trend of dynastic candidates in Congress, particularly the Senate, has increased steadily and substantially since the 1950s, to the point where almost 25% of the current U.S. Senate can be deemed a dynastic candidate;
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• Dynastic candidates enjoy numerous inherent advantages over non-dynastic candidates, and those advantages are also increasing; and,
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• Having a disproportionately high percentage of dynastic candidates poses numerous and serious anti-democratic threats.

The discussion is roughly 20 minutes and can be heard by clicking PLAY on the recorder below.  A transcript will be posted shortly.

UPDATE:  One additional point worth highlighting which Burroughs' research revealed:  dynastic office-holders tend disproportionately -- both historically and currently -- to be Democrats, by a significant (though not enormous) margin.  Both Republican and Democratic voters love their celebrity/royal political families -- the bizarre, People-Magazine-level swooning over Caroline Kennedy is strong anecdotal evidence of that --  but Democrats, for whatever reasons, rely on dynastic succession even more than Republicans do.

UPDATE II:  The transcript is here.