This week's study guide questions for 2305

For this week's look at the national government:

From the section on the development of executive power:
- What is the executive branch and what functions does it serve?
- What are the different aspects of executive power?
- What is the ultimate source of executive power?
- What titles do we use to refer to chief executives? Why are these titles meaningful?
- What does it matter if the executive is headed by one person or by multiple people?
- What aspects of executive power did the Magna Carta Attempt to limit? How did it intend to do so? Was it successful?
- What additional limitations did the Petition of Right and the British Bill of Rights attempt to impose on executive/monarchic power? Were they successful? Why or why not?
- Be able to describe the factors that led to an increase in executive power over British history. In what ways did the monarch become more powerful?
- Be familiar with the growth of the administrative state.
- What arguments did monarchs - especially the Stuarts - use to justify their power?
- What was the general attitude the Stuarts had towards parliament?
- How did Parliament deal with the Stuarts?
- What grievances did the colonists have with the British monarch? What specific usurpations of executive power dis they complain about? Why are these significant?

From the section on Article 2 of the US Constitution:
- What were the principle debates in the constitutional convention over the design of the US executive branch?
- What did Alexander Hamilton say about the proper design of the executive?
- What concerns did the Anti-Federalists have about the executive branch and the presidency in particular?
- Be able to define the subject matter of each of the sections in Article Two?
- Which parts of Article Two have been modified by constitutional amendments?
- How many specific executive positions are mentioned in the Constitution? Which are not?
- How is the president elected to office? How has this process changed over time?
- What controversy exists over the vested clause in Article Two?
- What autonomy does the Constitution grants the presidency?
What can the president do without being limited by the other two branches?
- What control does the president have over the bureaucracy? Congress? The Federal Courts?
- What is the extent of the president's power as commander-in-chief?
What can he do? What can he not do? Where are there major controversies?
- What controversies exist regarding the communications presidents have with other members of the executive branch?
- In what areas does the president have greater latitude than others?
- What is the extent of the president's powers of appointment? What are the principle controversies regarding this power?
- What does the Constitution say regarding presidential advising?
- What parts of the Constitution protect the president - and the executive overall - from the other two branches?
- What parts of the Constitution allow the president - and the executive branch itself - to limit the powers of the other two branches?
- What specific departments and agencies are established in Article 2 of the Constitution?

From the section on the evolution of the executive branch since the ratification of the Constitution:
- Be familiar with the original design of the executive branch as well as the impact of George Washington on the office.
- How have different presidents interpreted the Constitution regarding the powers of the office?
- What is the size of the executive branch now? Be able to provide numbers.
- What factors explain the rise of the executive branch over history?
- What are the more important executive positions - those not established in the Constitution - and what do they do?
- Be familiar with the three institutions that provide advice and assistance to the president. What are their unique roles? Why did the Senate - despite the Constitution - not become a principal advisory institution to the presidency?
- Which agencies contain the closest and most loyal advisers to the president?
- What relationships exist between executive agencies and other institutions like the legislature and interest groups? Who controls the bureaucracy?
- What relationship does the president have with the bureaucracy? What factors make it difficult for presidents to directly control the bureaucracy?
- What factors grant the bureaucracy strength? What controls do the other branches have over the bureaucracy?
- Be familiar with the eras of the presidency, especially the modern presidency. How has the power of the presidency been transformed in recent history?
- What is the "post-modern" presidency? Is the presidency losing strength?
- What factors condition the relationship between the president and the general population?

This week's study guide questions for 2306

To help clarify things today:

Constitutional Design
- What is the basic function of the Texas Legislature?
- Why is this article so long and detailed?
- What does the Texas Constitution say about the basic design of the Texas House and Senate?
- Who has represnted the ACC district in the legislature?
- What aspects of the bill making process are detailed in the Texas Constitution?
- What aspects of the powers of the Texas Speaker and Lieutenant Governor are established in the Constitution and what parts are established in House and Senate rules?
- Be able to answer questions about quorum, vacancies, individual legislators, legislative pay, redistricting, and the bill making process, among others.

Texas Bill Making
- Which institutions exist to help legislators with developing and researching bills?
- What online features allow you to track bills online? Why might people be interested in doing so?
- What types of laws exist? Why does this distinction matter?
- What might different bills attempt to do?
- Who can introduce bills into the legislature?
- What are the major stages in the bill making process?
- What influence does the governor, speaker, and lieutenant governor have on the bill making process?
- What roles do committees play in the bill making process?
- What role does the Legislative Budget Board play in the process?
- Be familiar with the informal process the Senate uses to allow a minority of Senators to protect the interests of their constituents.
- What is the full extent of the governor's veto power?

Local City Council- What range of powers do city councils have?
- How are city councils similar to and different from state legislatures and the US Congress?
- What different types of city counciles exist? What types are common in the area governments?
- What types of powers do city councils have? How do these vary depending on the type of city government?
- Which area cities have strong and weak city councils?
- What relationships do city councils have with mayors? City managers?
- What is the Open Meetings Act and what impact does it have on city councils?
- Be able to answer questions about the nature of city council elections.
- What is the purpose of single members districts?
- What are the pros and cons of term limits? How many area city concil are term limited?
- Be able to answer factual questions about area city councils.

Goals and Objectives for Quiz 5: 2301 and 2302 - 16 week

Here's what students should know following the next set of lectures in 2301 and 2302:

2301: Elections and Political Parties
AG: Chapters 10 and 11
PTP: Chapters 4 and 5

- understand the role elections play in a democracy
- know the nature of the electoral system created in the US Constitution
- understand the role states play in organizing elections
- know what a winner take all election is, and its consequences.
- understand the way that electoral design can manipulate outcomes
- be able to define what a political party does and how it does it
- understand the history of political parties in the US
- know the difference between the major parties and who their supporters are
- understand how and why the strength of parties ebbs and flows over time

2302: Public Policy and the Economy
Up and Down With Ecology The "Issue-Attention Cycle"
AG: Chapter 14
PTP: Chapter 11

- be able to define public policy
- know the stages in the public policy process
- be familiar with the concept of an issue attention cycle
- know how the Constitution shapes economic policy
- know the difference between fiscal and monetary policy
- be able to define terms related to taxation
- understand what a market economy is and what merits and deficiencies it has
- be able to define market failure, and its four major features
- know how the economy changed from the 19th to 20th century
- the Great Depression and its aftermath
- current issues associated with economic policymaking

Goals and Objectives for Quiz 4: 2301 and 2302 - 16 week

Goals and Objectives for Quiz 42301 and 2302 - 16 week

2301: Civil Liberties and Civil Rights

AG: A25-A34, Chapter 4
Griswold v. Connecticut
Brown v. Board of Education
Parent involved in Community Schools v. Seattle

Students should understand:
- The nature of the Bill of Rights in Texas and the U.S.
- How civil liberties and civil rights condition the relationship between the individual and government
- How the nature of this definition is a functon of how the Supreme Court interprets both statutory law and the Constitution
- The difference between a substantive and procedural liberty
- The different meanings of "establishment" and "speech"
- Griswold v Connecticut and the conflict over the right to privacy
- The nature of the die process of the law
- The problem with defining "probably cause"
- The 14th amendment and the establishment of civil rights
- The gradual incorporation of the Bill of Rights to the States
- The problem with defining equal protection
- Brown v. Board of Education and its aftermath
- Suspect classifications and strict scrutiny

2302: The Judiciary

The US Judiciary: AG-Chapter 8
The Texas Judiciary: PTP-Chapter 10

Students should understand:
- The function of the court and the design in the US and Texas Constitutions
- The nature of the judicial process especially civil and criminal law, and precedence
- The difference between a trial and an appeal
- The importance of jurisdiction and habeas corpus
- The politics of judicial selection
- The development of judicial review and conflict associated with it
- The conflict over how to interpret the Constitution
- The process by which cases get to the Supreme Court
- The nature of the current justices and recent decisions
- The two judicial revolutions
- The unique design of the Texas judiciary
- The problems posed by the election of judges in Texas

Goals and Objectives for Quiz 2 2301 and 2302

These are the items I expect you to know by the end of next week if you are in my 2301 or 2302 classes.

2301:
You will know
The conflicts which led to the Constitutional Convention
the problems the Constitution was intended to solve
the proposed designs for the Constitution
The document’s basic outline
the principles underlying the Constitution
the importance of the separation of powers
the nature of the powers given to the national government, those reserved to the states, and the areas of ambiguity and dispute
the way that the Constitution is argued to check the violence of factions
the way that the Constitution makes ambition counteract ambition

2302:
You will know:
the role the legislature plays in the governing process
the struggle over the design in the convention
why congress is bicameral
the consequences of the bicameral congress
the problems associated with apportionment
the powers delegated to Congress
the constitutional and extra-constitutional checks Congress has on other institutions
the evolution of parties and committees
the relationship between members of Congress and their constituents
the unique nature of the Texas Legislature