Incumbent Turnover in the House: A New Record?

[Squink]

I ran across this at CBS News today:

Rep. Dave Weldon (R-Fla.) will be announcing his retirement today, according to a GOP operative, becoming the 25th House Republican not to run for re-election this election cycle.

Losing 25 incumbents in a single election cycle seems like a lot to me.
Has there ever been a higher rate of retirement among congressmen?

[Captain_Amazing]

There are also six Democrats not running for reelection, adding to your list.

[Squink]

Bump.

I’ve found quite a few pages with titles like “Analysis of Turnover in the U.S. House of Representatives”, but the actual data is always behind a subscription wall.

Anyone?

[Exapno_Mapcase]

I remember from a newspaper article on this a while back and not findable, that 25 is nowhere near a maximum amount.

It may be true that it is unusual for recent years, since incumbants now have a much higher percentage of re-election than ever before.

[Ravenman]

The only thing I can really find is that Wikipedia says that in 2006, there were 28 congressmen not seeking re-election for either retirement or seeking another office.

This article claims that there were 50 open House seats in 1994. I can’t independently verify that without doing some serious work.

This is purely my opinion as a frequent Congress-watcher: the number of open seats leading into 2008 may be a bit higher than normal, but it’s really not anything historic.

[Squink]

G.O.P. Exodus in House Bodes Ill for Fall Success (Published 2008)

Four of the 28 Republicans who are so far leaving the House quit before their terms ended. They will be replaced in special elections before November, giving the winners of those races at least the technical mantle of incumbency in the general election.

That leaves 24 open Republican seats, though leaders of both parties expect at least a few more Republican retirements as state filing deadlines arrive. The high point for end-of-session Republican retirements is 27 in 1952, according to Congressional records

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/01/house_republicans_face_late_ex.html

“In 1996, when Democrats had 28 retirements, 27 had retired by this time. But the pace of Republican retirements doesn’t appear to be slowing,”

So the numbers are high this year, but not yet a record.

[Captain_Amazing]

Just as a further datapoint, Tom Davis (R-VA) announced he wasn’t running for reelection yesterday.

[muttrox]

Is the number historically high among either party? That is, the total number may not be unusual, but the number/percentage of Republicans retiring is.