Semester 1 Final - Key Terms
Chapter #10: Elections and Voting Behavior - Key Terms
Taken from Chapter 2 and Chapters 6 through 12 in the 14th Edition of Government in America: People, Politics and Policy
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| 619234650 | Incumbents | Those already holding office. In congressional elections, incumbents usually win. | |
| 619234651 | Casework | Activities of members of Congress that help constituents as individuals; cutting through bureaucratic red tape to get people what they think they have a right to get. | |
| 619234654 | Pork Barrel | The mighty list of federal projects, grants, and contracts available to cities, businesses, colleges, and institutions available in a congressional district. | |
| 619234657 | Bicameral Legislature | A legislature divided into two houses. The U.S. Congress and every American state legislature except Nebraska's are bicameral. | |
| 619234660 | House Rules Committee | An institution unique to the House of Representatives that reviews all bills (except revenue, budget, and appropriations bills) coming from a House committee before they go to the full House. | |
| 619234663 | Filibuster | A strategy unique to the Senate whereby opponents of a piece of legislation try to talk it to death, based on the tradition of unlimited debate. Today, 60 members present and voting can halt a filibuster. | |
| 619234666 | Speaker of the House | An office mandated by the constitution. The speaker is chosen in practice by the majority party, has both formal and informal powers, and is second in line to succeed to the presidency should that office become vacant. | |
| 619234669 | Majority Leader | The principal partisan ally of the Speaker of the House or the party's manager in the Senate. The majority leader is responsible for scheduling bills, influencing committee assignments, and rounding up votes in behalf of the party's legislative positions. | |
| 619234672 | Minority Leader | The principal leader of the minority party in the House of Representatives or in the Senate. | |
| 619234675 | Whips | Party leaders who work with the majority leader or minority leader to count votes beforehand and lean on waverers whose votes are crucial to a bill favored by the party. | |
| 619234678 | Standing Committees | Separate subject-matter committees in each house of Congress that handle bills in different policy areas. | |
| 619234681 | Joint Committees | Congressional committees on a few subject-matter areas with membership drawn from both houses. | |
| 619234684 | Conference Committees | Congressional committees formed when the Senate and the House pass a particular bill in different forms. Party leadership appoints members from each house to iron out the differences and bring back a single bill. | |
| 619234686 | Select Committees | Congressional committees appointed for a specific purpose, such as the Watergate investigation. | |
| 619234689 | Legislative Oversight | Congress' monitoring of the bureaucracy and its administration of policy, performed mainly through hearings. | |
| 619234692 | Committee Chairs | The most important influencers of the congressional agenda. They play dominant roles in scheduling hearings, hiring staff, appointing subcommittees, and managing committee bills when they are brought before the full house. | |
| 619234695 | Seniority System | A simple rule for picking committee chairs, in effect until the 1970s. The member who had served on the committee the longest and whose party controlled Congress became chair, regardless of party loyalty, mental state, or competence. | |
| 619234698 | Caucus (Congressional) | A group of members of Congress sharing some interest or characteristic. Most are composed of members from both parties and from both houses. | |
| 619234701 | Bill | A proposed law, drafted in precise, legal language. Anyone can draft a bill, but only a member of the House of Representatives or the Senate can formally submit a bill for consideration. | |
| 619234704 | Interest Group | An organization of people with shared policy goals entering the policy process at several points to try to achieve those goals. Interest Groups pursue their goals in many arenas. | |
| 619234707 | Pluralist Theory | A theory of government and politics emphasizing that politics is mainly a competition among groups, each one pressing for its own preferred policies. | |
| 619234709 | Elite Theory | A theory of government and politics contending that societies are divided along class lines and that an upper-class elite will rule, regardless of the formal niceties of governmental organization. | |
| 619234711 | Hyperpluralist Theory | A theory of government and politics contending that groups are so strong that government is weakened. Hyperpluralism is an extreme, exaggerated, or perverted form of pluralism | |
| 619234713 | Subgovernments | A network of groups within the American political system that exercise a great deal of control over specific policy areas. Also known as iron triangles, subgovernments are composed of interest group leaders interested in a particular policy, the government agency in charge of administering that policy, and the members of congressional committees and subcommittees handling that policy. | |
| 619234715 | Potential Group | All the people who might be interest group members because they share some common interest. A potential group is almost always larger than an actual group. | |
| 619234717 | Actual Group | That part of the potential group consisting of members who actually join. | |
| 619234719 | Collective Good | Something of value (money, a tax write-off, prestige, clean air, and so on) that cannot be withheld from a group member. | |
| 619234721 | Free-Rider Problem | The problem faced by unions and other groups when people do not join because they can benefit from the group's activities without officially joining. The bigger the group, the more serious the problem. | |
| 619234722 | Olson's Law of Large Groups | Advanced by Mancur Olson, a principle stating that "the larger the group, the further it will fall short of providing an optimal amount of a collective good." | |
| 619234723 | Selective Benefits | Goods (such as information publications, travel discounts, and group insurance rates) that a group can restrict to those who pay their annual dues. | |
| 619234724 | Single-Issue Groups | Groups that have a narrow interest, tend to dislike compromise, and often draw membership from people new to politics. These features distinguish them from traditional interest groups. | |
| 619234725 | Lobbying | According to Lester Milbrath, a "communication, by someone other than a citizen acting on his own behalf, directed to a governmental decisionmaker with the hope of influencing his decision." | |
| 619234726 | Electioneering | Direct group involvement in the electoral process. Groups can help fund campaigns, provide testimony, and get members to work for candidates, and some form political action committees. | |
| 619234727 | Political Action Committees (PACs) | Funding vehicles created by the 1974 campaign finance reforms. A corporation, union, or some other interest group can create a PAC and register it with the Federal Election Commission (FEC), which will meticulously monitor the PAC's expenditures. | |
| 619234728 | Amicus Curiae Briefs | Legal briefs submitted by a "friend of the court" for the purpose of raising additional points of view and presenting information not contained in the briefs of the formal parties. These briefs attempt to influence a court's decision. | |
| 619234729 | Class Action Lawsuits | Lawsuits permitting a small number of people to sue on behalf of all other people similarly situated. | |
| 619234730 | Union Shop | A provision found in some collective bargaining agreements requiring all employees of a business to join the union within a short period, usually 30 days, and to remain members as a condition of employment | |
| 619234731 | Right-to-Work Laws | A state law forbidding requirements that workers must join a union to hold their jobs. State right-to-work laws were specifically permitted by the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. | |
| 619234732 | Public Interest Lobbies | According to Jeffrey Berry, organizations that seek "a collective good, the achievement of which will not selectively and materially benefit the membership or activities of the organization." | |
| 619234733 | Legitimacy | A characterization of elections by political scientists meaning that they are almost universally accepted as a fair and free method of selecting political leaders. When legitimacy is high, as in the United States, even the losers accept the results peacefully. | |
| 619234734 | Referendum | A state-level method of direct legislation that gives voters a chance to approve or disapprove proposed legislation or a proposed constitutional amendment. | |
| 619234735 | Initiative Petition | A process permitted in some states whereby voters may put proposed changes in the state constitution to a vote if sufficient signatures are obtained on petitions calling for such a referendum. | |
| 619234736 | Suffrage | The legal right to vote, extended to African Americans by the Fifteenth Amendment, to women by the Nineteenth Amendment, and to people over the age of 18 by the Twenty-sixth Amendment. | |
| 619234737 | Political Efficacy | The belief that one's political participation really matters - that one's vote can actually make a difference | |
| 619234738 | Civic Duty | The belief that in order to support democratic government, a citizen should always vote. | |
| 619234739 | Voter Registration | A system adopted by the states that requires voters to register well in advance of Election Day. A few states permit Election Day registration. | |
| 619234740 | Motor Voter Act | Passed in 1993, this act went into effect for the 1996 election. It requires states to permit people to register to vote at the same time they apply for their driver's license. | |
| 619234741 | Mandate Theory of Elections | The idea that the winning candidate has a mandate from the people to carry out his or her platforms and politics. Politicians like the theory better than political scientists do. | |
| 619234742 | Policy Voting | Electoral choices that are made on the basis of the voters' policy preferences and on the basis of where the candidates stand on policy issues. | |
| 619234743 | Electoral College | A unique American institution, created by the Constitution, providing for the selection of the president by electors chosen by the state parties. Although the electoral college vote usually reflects a popular majority, the winner-take-all rule gives clout to big states. | |
| 619234744 | Retrospective Voting | A theory of voting in which voters essentially ask this simple question: "What have you done for me lately?" | |
| 619234745 | Nomination | The official endorsement of a candidate for office by a political party. Generally, success in the nomination game requires momentum, money, and media attention. | |
| 619234746 | Campaign Strategy | The master game plan candidates lay out to guide their electoral campaign. | |
| 619234747 | National Party Convention | The supreme power within each of the parties. The convention meets every four years to nominate the party's presidential and vice-presidential candidates and to write the party's platform. | |
| 619234748 | Caucus | A meeting of all state party leaders for selecting delegate to the national party convention. Caucuses are usually organized as a pyramid. | |
| 619234749 | Presidential Primaries | Elections in which voters in a state vote for a candidate (or delegates pledged to him or her). Most delegates to the national party conventions are chosen this way. | |
| 619234750 | McGovern-Fraser Commission | A commission formed at the 1968 Democratic convention in response to demands for reform by minority groups and others who sought better representation. | |
| 619234751 | Superdelegates | National party leaders who automatically get a delegate slot at the Democratic National Party Convention. | |
| 619234752 | Frontloading | The recent tendency of states to hold primaries early in the calendar in order to capitalize on media attention. | |
| 619234753 | National Primary | A proposal by critics of the caucuses and presidential primaries, which would replace these electoral methods with a nationwide primary held early in the election year. | |
| 619234754 | Regional Primaries | A proposal by critics of the caucuses and presidential primaries to replace these electoral methods with a series of primaries held in each geographic region. | |
| 619234755 | Party Platform | A political party's statement of its goals and policies for the next four years. The platform is drafted prior to the party convention by a committee whose members are chosen in rough proportion to each candidate's strength. It is the best formal statement of a party's beliefs. | |
| 619234756 | Direct Email | A high-tech method of raising money for a political cause or candidate. It involves sending information and requests for money to people whose names appear on a list of those who have supported similar views or candidates in the past. | |
| 619234757 | Federal Election Campaign Act | A law passed in 1974 for reforming campaign finances. The act created the Federal Election Commission (FEC), provided public financing for presidential primaries and general elections, limited presidential campaign spending, required disclosure, and attempted to limit contributions. | |
| 619234758 | Federal Election Commission | A six-member bipartisan agency created by the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974. The federal Election Commission administers and enforces campaign finance laws. | |
| 619234759 | Presidential Election Campaign Fund | Money from the $3 federal income tax check-off goes into this fund, which is then distributed to qualified candidates to subsidize their presidential campaigns. | |
| 619234760 | Matching Funds | Contributions of up to $250 matched from the Presidential Election Campaign Fund to candidates for the presidential nomination who qualify and agree to meet various conditions, such as limiting their overall spending. | |
| 619234761 | Soft Money | Political Contributions earmarked for party-building expenses at the grass-roots level or for generic party advertising. Unlike money that goes to the campaign of a particular candidate, such party donations are not subject to contribution limits. For a time, such contributions were unlimited, until they were banned by the McCain-Feingold Act. | |
| 619234762 | 527 Groups | Independent groups that seek to influence the political process but are not subject to contribution restrictions because they do not directly seek the election of particular candidates. Their name comes from Section 527 of the federal tax code, under which they are governed. | |
| 619234763 | Political Action Committees | Funding vehicles created by the 1974 campaign finance reforms. A corporation, union, or some other interest group can create a political action committee (PAC) and register it with the Federal Election Commission, which will meticulously monitor the PAC's expenditures. | |
| 619234764 | Selective Perception | The phenomenon that people often pay the most attention to things they already agree with and interpret them according to their own predispositions. | |
| 619234765 | Party Competition | The battle of the parties for control of public offices. Ups and downs of the two major parties are one of the most important elements in American politics. | |
| 619234766 | Political Party | According to Anthony Downs, a "team of men [and women] seeking to control the governing apparatus by gaining office in a duly constituted election." | |
| 619234767 | Linkage Institutions | The channels through which people's concerns become political issues on the government's policy agenda. In the United States, linkage institutions include elections, political parties, interest groups, and the media. | |
| 619234768 | Rational-Choice Theory | A popular theory in political science to explain the actions of voters as well as politicians. It assumes that individuals act in their own best interest, carefully weighing the costs and benefits of possible alternatives. | |
| 619234769 | Party Image | The voter's perception of what the Republicans or Democrats stand for, such as conservatism or liberalism. | |
| 619234770 | Party Identification | A citizen's self-proclaimed preference for one party or the other. | |
| 619234771 | Ticket Splitting | Voting with one party for one office and with another party for other offices. It has become the norm in American voting behavior. | |
| 619234772 | Party Machines | A type of political party organization that relies heavily on material inducements, such as patronage, to win votes and to govern. | |
| 619234773 | Patronage | One of the key inducements used by political machines. A patronage job, promotion, or contract is one that is given for political reasons rather than for merit or competence alone. | |
| 619234774 | Closed Primaries | Elections to select party nominees in which only people who have registered in advance with the party can vote for the party's candidates, thus encouraging greater party loyalty. | |
| 619234775 | Open Primaries | Elections to select party nominees in which voters can decide on Election Day whether they wan to participate in the Democratic or Republican contests. | |
| 619234776 | Blanket Primaries | Elections to select party nominees in which voters are presented with a list of candidates from all the parties. Voters can select some Democrats and some Republicans if they like. | |
| 619234777 | National Convention | The meeting of party delegates every four years to choose a presidential ticket and write the party's platform. Brokered Convention occurs if no candidate has won a majority of delegates in state primaries & caucuses. | |
| 619234778 | National Committee | One of the institutions that keep the party operating between conventions. The national committee is composed of representatives from the states and territories. | |
| 619234779 | National Chairperson | The national chairperson is responsible for the day-to-day activities of the party and is usually handpicked by the presidential nominee. | |
| 619234780 | Coalition | A group of individuals with a common interest upon which every political party depends. | |
| 619234781 | Party Eras | Historical periods in which a majority of voters cling to the party in power, which tends to win a majority of elections. | |
| 619234782 | Critical Election | An electoral "earthquake" whereby new issues emerge, new coalitions replace old ones, and the majority party is often displaced by the minority party. Critical election periods are sometimes marked by a national crisis and may require more than one election to bring about a new party era. | |
| 619234783 | Party Realignment | The displacement of the majority party by the minority party, usually during a critical election period. | |
| 619234784 | New Deal Coalition | A coalition forged by the Democrats, who dominated American politics from the 1930s to the 1960s. Its basic elements were the urban working class, ethnic groups, Catholics and Jews, the poor, Southerners, African Americans, and intellectuals. | |
| 619234785 | Party Dealignment | The gradual disengagement of people and politicians from the parties, as seen in party by shrinking party identification. | |
| 619234786 | Third Parties | Electoral contenders other than the two major parties. Such in America are not unusual, but they rarely win elections. | |
| 619234787 | Winner-Take-All System | An electoral system in which legislative seats are awarded only to the candidates who come in first in their constituencies. In American presidential elections, the system in which the winner of the popular vote in a state receives all the electoral votes of that state. | |
| 619234788 | Proportional Representation | An electoral system used throughout most of Europe that awards legislative seats to political parties in proportion to the number of votes won in an election. | |
| 619234789 | Coalition Government | When two or more parties join together to form a majority in a national legislature. This form of government is quite common in the multiparty systems of Europe. | |
| 619234790 | Responsible Party Model | A view favored by some political scientists about how parties should work. According to the model, parties should offer clear choices to the voters, who can then use those choices as cues to their own preferences of candidates. Once in office, parties would carry out their campaign promises. | |
| 619234791 | High-Tech Politics | A politics in which the behavior of citizens and policy makers and the political agenda itself are increasingly shaped by technology. | |
| 619234792 | Mass Media | Television, radio, newspaper, magazines, the Internet, and other means of popular communication. | |
| 619234793 | Media Events | Events purposely staged for the media that nonetheless look spontaneous. In keeping with politics as theater, media events can be staged by individuals, groups, and government officials, especially presidents. | |
| 619234794 | Press Conferences | Meetings of public officials with reporters | |
| 619234795 | Investigative Journalism | The use of in-depth reporting to unearth scandals, scams, and schemes, at times putting reporters in adversarial relationships with political leaders. | |
| 619234796 | Print Media | Newspapers and magazines, as compared with broadcast media. | |
| 619234797 | Broadcast Media | Television, radio, and the Internet, as compared with print media. | |
| 619234798 | Narrowcasting | Media programming on cable TV of the Internet that is focused on one topic and aimed at a particular audience. Examples include MTV, ESPN, and C-SPAN | |
| 619234799 | Chains | Newspapers published by massive media conglomerates that account for over four-fifths of the nation's daily newspaper circulation. Often these chains control broadcast media as well. | |
| 619234800 | Beats | Specific locations from which news frequently emanates, such as Congress or the White House. Most top reporters work a particular beats, thereby becoming specialists in what goes on at that location. | |
| 619234801 | Trial Balloons | An international news leak for the purpose of assessing the political reaction. | |
| 619234802 | Sound Bites | Short video clips of approximately 10 seconds. Typically, they are all that is shown from a politician's speech on the nightly television news. | |
| 619234803 | Talking Head | A shot of a person's face talking directly to the camera. Because this is visually unappealing, the major commercial networks rarely show a politician talking one-on-one for very long. | |
| 619234804 | Policy Agenda | The issues that attract the serious attention of public officials and other people involved in politics at the time. | |
| 619234805 | Political Entrepreneurs | People who invest their political "capital" in an issue. According to John Kingdon, a policy entrepreneur "could be in or out of our government, in elected or appointed positions, in interest groups or research organizations. | |
| 619234806 | Public Opinion | The distribution of the population's beliefs about politics and policy issues. | |
| 619234807 | Demography | The science of population changes. | |
| 619234808 | Census | A valuable tool for understanding demographic changes. The U.S. Constitution requires that the government conduct an "actual enumeration" of the population every 10 years. | |
| 619234809 | Melting Pot | The mixing of cultures, ideas, and peoples that has changed the American nation. The United States, with its history of immigration, has often been called a melting pot. | |
| 619234810 | Minority Majority | The emergence of a non-Caucasian majority, as compared with a White, generally Anglo-Saxon majority. It is predicted that by about 2045, Hispanic Americans, African Americans, and Asian Americans together will outnumber White Americans. | |
| 619234811 | Political Culture | An overall set of values widely shared within a society. | |
| 619234812 | Reapportionment | The process of reallocating seats in the House of Representatives every 10 years on the basis of the results of the census. | |
| 619234813 | Political Socialization | The process throught which a young person acquires political orientations as they grow up, based on inputs from parents, teachers, the media, and friends. | |
| 619234814 | Sample | A relatively small proportion of people who are chosen in a survey so as to be representative of the whole. | |
| 619234815 | Random Sampling | The key technique employed by sophisticated survey researchers, which operates on the principle that everyone should have an equal probability of being selected for the sample. | |
| 619234816 | Sampling Error | The level of confidence in the findings of a public opinion poll. The more people interviewed, the more confident one can be of the results. | |
| 619234817 | Random-Digit Dialing | A technique used by pollsters to place telephone calls randomly to both listed and unlisted numbers when conducting a survey. | |
| 619234818 | Exit Poll | Public opinion surveys used by major media pollsters to predict electoral winners with such speed and accuracy. | |
| 619234819 | Political Ideology | A coherent set of beliefs about politics, public policy, and public purpose. It helps give meaning to political evets, personalities, and policies. | |
| 619234820 | Gender Gap | A term that refers to the regular pattern by which women are more likely to support Democratic candidates. Women tend to be significantly less conservative than men and are more likely to support spending on social services and to oppose higher levels of military spending. | |
| 619234821 | Political Participation | All the activites used by citizens to influence the selection of political leaders or the policies they pursue. The most common but not the only means of political participation in a democracy is voting. Other means include protest and civil disobedience. | |
| 619234822 | Protest | A form of political participation designed to achieve policy change through dramatic and unconventional tactics. | |
| 619234823 | Civil Disobedience | A form of political participation that reflects a conscious decision to break a law believed to be immoral and to suffer the consequences. | |
| 619234824 | Constitution | A nation's basic law. It creates political institutions, assigns or divides powers in government, and often provides certain guarantees to citizens. Constitutions can be either written or unwritten. See also U.S. Constitution. | |
| 619234825 | Declaration of Independence | The document approved by representatives of the american colonies in 1776 that stated their grievances against the british monarch and declared their independence. | |
| 619234826 | Natural Rights | Rights inherent in human beings, not dependent on governments, which include life, liberty, and property. The concept of natural rights was central to English philosopher John Locke's theories about government and was widely accepted among America's Founders. | |
| 619234827 | Consent of the Governed | The idea that government derives its authority by the sanction of the people. | |
| 619234828 | Limited Government | The idea that certain restrictions should be placed on government to protect the natural rights of citizens. | |
| 619234829 | Articles of Confederation | The first constitution of the United States, adopted by Congress in 1777 and enacted in 1781. The Articles established a national legislature, the Continental Congress, but most authority rested with the state legislatures. | |
| 619234830 | Shays' Rebellion | A series of attacks on courthouses by a small band of farmers led by Revolutionary War Captain Daniel Shays to block foreclosure proceedings. | |
| 619234831 | U.S. Constitution | The document written in 1787 and ratified in 1788 that sets forth the institutional structure of the U.S. government and the tasks these institutions perform. It replaced the Articles of Confederation. | |
| 619234832 | Factions | Interest groups arising from the unequal distribution of property or wealth that James Madison attacked in Federalist Paper No. 10. Today's parties or interest groups are what Madison had in mind when he warned of the instability in government caused by factions. | |
| 619234833 | New Jersey Plan | The proposal at the Constitutional Convention that called for equal representation of each state in Congress regardless of the state's population | |
| 619234834 | Virginia Plan | The proposal at the Constitutional Convention that called for representation of each state in Congress in proportion to that state's share of the U.S. population. | |
| 619234835 | Connecticut Compromise | The compromise reached at the Constitutional Convention that established two houses of Congress: the House of Representatives, in which representation is based on a state's share of the U.S. population, and the Senate, in which each state has two representatives. CC | |
| 619234836 | Great Compromise | The compromise reached at the Constitutional Convention that established two houses of Congress: the House of Representatives, in which representation is based on a state's share of the U.S. population, and the Senate, in which each state has two representatives. GC | |
| 619234837 | Writ of Habeas Corpus | A court order requiring jailers to explain to a judge why they are holding a prisoner in custody. | |
| 619234838 | Seperation of Powers | A feature of the Constitution that requires each of the three branches of government - exacutive, legislative, and judicial - to be relatively independentof the others so that one cannot control the others. Power is shared among these three institutions. | |
| 619234839 | Checks and Balances | Features of the Constitution that limit government's power by requiring that power be balanced among the different governmental institutions. These institutions continually constrain one another's activities. | |
| 619234840 | Republic | A form of government in which the people select representatives to govern them and make laws. | |
| 619234841 | Federalists | Supporters of the U.S. Constitution at the time the states were contemplating its adoption. | |
| 619234842 | Anti-Federalists | Opponents of the American Constitution at the time when the states were contemplating its adoption. | |
| 619234843 | Federalist Papers | A collection of 85 articles written by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison under the name "Publius" to defend the Constitution in detail. | |
| 619234844 | Bill of Rights | The first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution, drafted in response to some of the Anti-Federalist concerns. These amendments define such basic liberties as freedom of religion, speech, and press and guarantee defendents' rights. | |
| 619234845 | Equal Rights Amendment | A constitutional amendment passed by Congress in 1972 stating that "equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex." The amendment failed to acquire the necessary support from three-fourths of the state legislatures. | |
| 619234846 | Marbury v. Madison | The 1803 case in which Chief Justice John Marshall and his associates first asserted the right of the Supreme Court to determine the meaning of the U.S. Constitution. The decision established the Court's power of judicial review over acts of Congress, (the Judiciary Act of 1789). | |
| 619234847 | Judicial Review | The power of the courts to determine whether acts of Congress and, by implication, the executive are in accord with the U.S. Constitution. Judicial review was established by John Marshall and his associates in Marbury v. Madison. |
