November 20, 2008 12:57PM # Dynastic Politics in Alaska By [David Boaz](https://www.cato.org/people/david-boaz) --- SHARE A year ago it looked like we might replace the son of a president in the White House with the wife of a president, while some Republicans grumbled that it was too bad the president’s brother couldn’t succeed him. I wrote then that [Americans fought a rebellion to replace a monarchy with a republic](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/jun/08/dynasticpoliticsintheamericanrepublic), “in which men (and later women) would be chosen to lead the republic on the basis of their own accomplishments, not their family ties.” But > In a country formed in rebellion against dynastic government, [some 18 members of the US Senate in 2005 had gained office at least in part through family ties,](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A29415-2005Jan22.html) along with dozens of House members. And the trend continues. Now Alaska, the Last Frontier, the state of rugged individualism, is going to be represented in the U.S. Senate by the daughter of a former governor and senator and the son of a former congressman. In a bit of a War of the Roses twist, Sen. Mark Begich’s father won his first congressional election by defeating Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s father. ##### Related Tags [General](https://www.cato.org/general), [Government and Politics](https://www.cato.org/government-politics) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).