You are in browse mode. You must login to use MEMORY

level: Level 1

Questions and Answers List

level questions: Level 1

Question	Answer
Make all laws; Oversight - monitor executive; Establish lower courts	Joint powers of congress
Initiate all revenue bills (taxation through representation); Initiate impeachment (treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors)	Powers of House of Rep.
Offers ‘consent’ to Pres. appointments (majority vote) Ex. federal judges and cabinet; Tries impeached officials (⅔ vote); Approves treaties (⅔ vote)	Powers of Senate
When senator says they want to be informed about the bill before they vote, basically just trying to push off vote later and later (manipulative)	Hold in Senate
Random talking on stage to push back/end vote on bill Ex. Strom Thurman talked for over 24 hours to prevent Civil Rights legislation; Cloture vote - puts time limit on debate, thereby ending a filibuster, requires ⅗ votes from members (at least 60 members)	Filibuster in Senate
Nancy Pelosi; Most powerful in Congress - appoint people to committees, chairs rules committee (puts bills on calendar and plans debates), decide where bills will get assigned to committees	Speaker of the House
Hoyer; Help w/ legislation on floor	Majority Leader (house)
Clyburn; Heads team of 9-10 regional whips Tries to convince ppl to vote certain ways, vote counts ahead of time, take things off agenda if not enough votes	Majority whip (house)
McCarthy	Minority leader (house)
Scalise	Minority whip (house)
Harris; Very weak position, preside over meetings, read off agenda, tie breaker vote	VP
Leahy; fills in for VP; senior senator of majority party	Pres pro tempore
Schumer; most powerful in senate, right of first recognition	Majority leader (senate)
Durbin	Majority whip (senate)
McConnell	Minority leader (Senate)
Thune	Minority whip (senate)
Committee a bill is referred to for consideration; 20 in both House and Senate; Subcommittees mark up bills (most bills get stuck here); appointments	Standing committee
Temporary committees appointed for a specific task	Ad Hoc Committee (AKA Standing)
Committees w/ members from both houses formed to coordinate investigations or special studies	Joint committees
Reconcile differences in bills passed by House and Senate; rarely used; less than 10% bills solved by them	Conference committee
committees serve interests of individual members (ex. tobacco interests)	Side effect of committees
proposed law	Bill
law enacted by legislature	Statute
Bill is drafted	Bill becoming law: Step 1
Committee referral - referred to committee by Speaker, then a subcommittee by the committee chair; multiple referrals	Bill becoming law: Step 2
Rules committee - procedure that bumps a bill up in calendar, determines extent of debate, and governs voting rules on floor; either open or closed rule	Bill becoming law: Step 3
Floor voting - binary agenda; motion, amendment, substitute amendment, status quo	Bill becoming law: Step 4
Allows any amendment related to a bill to be proposed on the floor	Open rule
Prohibits amendments on floor (except by committee reporting the bill)	Closed rule
Median voter's ideal point is in equilibrium under majority rule	Median voter theorem
Alternatives considered under pairwise majority rule, alternatives are positioned on a single dimension, preferences are single peaked	MVT assumptions
Alternative closer to the median will defeat the alternative farther from the median voter under pairwise majority rule; due to this, alternatives will get drawn towards median; same assumptions as MVT but also preferences are symmetric	Corollary of MVT
The extensive manipulation of the shape of a legislative district to benefit a certain incumbent or party; Davis v Bandemer (1986) - Supreme Court held that gerrymandering would be unconstitutional if it were too strongly biased against a party's candidates (has yet to declare any districting scheme to be in violation of this vague standard); cracking, packing, and stacking are all tactics used in gerrymandering districts	Gerrymandering
Vote trading by lawmakers to ensure that each legislator's favored provisions have a higher chance of passing; often combining several provisions into one bill to secure a majority vote	Logrolling
Article II; Unitary executive - elect on executive who appoints everyone else (rather than electing multiple executive positions); constitution does not provide for cabinet; president chosen independently by the people not by congress; framers didn't hammer out most important powers of executive in much detail (left room in defining precedent in role of president)	The presidency and the constitution
"Executive power shall be vested in a President of USA" - puts president at top of executive	Vesting clause
"Pres shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed" - warning that pres should implement laws passed by congress	Take Care Clause
"pres shall be commander in chief of army and navy of US, and of militia of the several states" - gives pres power to make and carry out war (congress has power to declare war and to raise and equip militia	Commander in Chief Clause
Commander in Chief of armed forces; Chief of state - ceremonial and symbolic head of country; Chief Executive - responsible for leading government and nominating high ranking officials with the consent of senate; Chief legislature - expected to propose and work for the passage of a legislative agenda that benefits the country; Chief diplomat - negotiates treaties, foreign agreements, and executive agreements	Duties of president
Established cabinet; slowly expanded power of fed gov over states; established prominence of chief executive in area of foreign and military affairs; precedent of stepping down after 2 terms (not yet codified)	George Washington (1789-1797)
Strengthened notion that pres didn't have to wait for congressional dictates in military matters and foreign relations	Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809)
Extended political parties to electorate and held nation together during sectional crisis	Andrew Jackson (1829-1837)
Used commander and chief powers to establish what is often referred to as a "constitutional dictatorship"; writ of habeas corpus	Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865)
Formulated stewardship theory of presidency where the pres must serve american people whether congress liked it or not	Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909)
Adopted whig theory of presidency where the pres must be totally subservient to congress	William Howard Taft (1909-1913)
Expanded resources of executive branch; created executive offices of the pres; persuaded congress to pass new deal legislation; established practice of sending legislative programs to congress for approval	Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933-1945)
Negotiated by pres w/ 2/3 consent of senate	Treaties
Negotiated by pres w/ majority consent in both houses	Foreign agreements
Quasi legal agreements b/w pres and other heads of state; not binding on future administrations	Executive agreements
Domestic orders which manage the operations of the fed gov; not binding on future administrations	Executive orders
First step in election process; Election in which voters pick party delegates to national convention; either open or closed or blanket	Primary election
Registered voter may vote in any party primary regardless of their own party affiliation (Ex. GA, CO, VA)	Open primary election
Voters may only vote in party's primary only if they are registered members of that party, independents cannot participate (Ex. FL, NY, NM)	Closed primary election
Combination of closed and open	Blanket primary election
Meeting in which party activists pick party delegates to send to national convention (Iowa)	Caucus
Dem - proportional representation in open primary ( 57 in proportion to votes in each district, 19 in proportion to votes in state, 27 super delegates who speak their mind); Rep - winner takes all open primary (42 delegates allocated by 14 districts, if candidate wins majority of district they get all 3 delegates, if they win plurality they get two and person w/ next most votes gets 1, candidate who wins most in state gets 10 additional, lastly 10 at large 3 party and 21 bonus)	GA primaries
2nd step in process of elections; in the past, delegates actually deliberated and voted on their party's nominee; today, candidate who receives most votes in primaries and caucuses wins nomination (free delegates support front runner, pres chooses VP); present party platform	National Conventions
Party's positions on key issues and policies	Party platform
3rd step in election process; party nominees re-campaign until general election (1st Tuesday, Nov.); only one candidate for each party	General Elections
Last step in election process; each state assigned # of electors based on number of senators and congresspeople they have (GA has 14 representatives, so we have 16 electors); if candidate wins majority of electors at national level, candidate wins; if they don't win majority then three candidates w most electoral votes are voted upon by House (in state delegations)	Electoral college
Assumptions - single dimensions of alternatives, voters prefer candidate closer to ideal point, candidates can exceed two and move across spectrum to maximize their chance of election, vote using plurality rule not majority (candidate w/ most votes wins)	Downs' Model of Elections
Argued candidates adopt ideologies to simplify their messages to voters; since candidates want to appear responsible and reliable, they won't jump to eachother	Downs' Ideology
15 department heads appointed by president	The cabinet
Helps pres oversee bureaucracy and give him advice; Office of management and budget (OMB) - creates pres budget; National security council (NSC) - advises pres on military and foreign policies; Council of economic advisors (CEA) - consists of economic experts	The Executive Office of the Presidency