The Optical Polarization Properties of X-ray Selected BL Lacertae Objects

Abstract

We discuss the optical polarization properties of X-ray selected BL Lacertae objects (XSBLs) as determined from three years of monitoring 37 BL Lac objects and candidates. The observed objects include a complete X-ray flux limited sample drawn from the EMS Survey. The majority of the XSBLs classi- fied solely on the appearance of their spectra are members of the class of BL~Lacs since they possess intrinsically polarized and variable continua. The duty cycle of polarized emission from XSBLs is 40\%. The majority of XSBLs ($\approx 85$\%) have preferred polarization position angles on time scales as long as three years. This reflects stability in the geometry of the region emitting the polarized optical emission. We discuss the observed spectral dependence of the degree of polarization and some of the possible mechanisms for producing the observed characteristics. While dilution of the polarized emission by the host galaxy starlight is present in some objects, we demon- strate that the average polarization properties derived from our observations are not drastically affected by this effect. The objects in our monitored sample did not display the larger than one magnitude variations generally used to characterize the optical variability of blazars in general.