Revised Study Guide for the 2305 Final

A few things to focus on for the test:

The ones that have been crossed out were current events for last semester. Look on the blog for a list of current event items likely to be on this test.

candidates for the presidency
area congressional representatives
libertarianism
U.S. Supreme Court cases from Texas
gay marriage
political generations
socialism
populism
Pete Olson
Randy Weber
The Republican establishment
tyranny
examples of checks and balances
attitudes towards governing institutions
government shutdowns
fundamental rights
examples of substantive liberties
examples of procedural liberties
compelling public purpose
interpretations of the Constitution
control of Congress
the presidential election
the 114th Congress
the Speaker of the U.S. House
the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court
Article One of the U.S. Constitution
the 10th Amendment
the implied powers
the Bill of Rights
Civil Rights
popular control of governing institutions
the expressed powers
judicial review
apportionment
presidential powers
the purpose of political parties
the party eras
party coalitions
groups that support each major party
the purpose of education
the self-evident truths
republics v democracies
the 4th amendment
agency capture
the components of democracy
the checks and balances
the basis of conservatism and liberalism
strict scrutiny
the definition of “government” and “politics”
the grievances in the Declaration of Independence
Federalist #45
national power / state power
voter turnout
proportional representation
the debate over interpreting the U.S. Constitution
the Emancipation Proclamation
the functions of the separated powers
the wall of separation between church and state
federalism and public policy
powers denied to the national government
powers denied to the states
minority rights
the census
religion in the U.S. Constitution
consequences of political parties
the election of senators
Federalist #78
the executive departments
rational basis review
original intent
lobbying
rulemaking
ideology and public policy
tyranny
free exercise of religion
the two party system
federal judges
protected speech
presidential powers
commander in chief powers
unified government
federalism
popular sovereignty
procedural liberty
the vesting clauses
the design of the federal courts
the security clause
the delegated powers
the elastic clauses
the right to privacy
who votes?
Baker v Carr
the 15th Amendment
standing
the inherent powers
the differences between the House and Senate
the general welfare clause
The Social Security Act
the declaration of war
the 6th Amendment
Federalist 51
the singular executive
strict scrutiny
the Voting Rights Act
election laws
local government

How do recent Supreme Court decisions affect 2305 topics?

This is a list of the court decisions GOVT 2305 - 5 week students wrote about this summer. Each decision allows the court to clarify - or update or modify or change - any number of topics we cover in class. Some of these topics might be on the final, so a look at these cases can also help you prep for the final.

You should also be prepared for questions related to the role of the courts in the governing process, controversies about that role, and the judicial process. Given the centrality of the judicial branch, you should be comfortable with questiosn about it.

Rodriquez v United States:
- Fourth Amendment
- procedural liberties
- unreasonable search and seizures

Hobbs v Holt:
- First Amendment
- substantive liberties
- religious freedom
- criminal justice

Young v. UPS:
- the equal protection clause
- the Civil Rights Act
- discrimination
- disparate treatment
- intermediate review

Yates v United States:
- strict and loose construction
- search and seizure

Glossip v Gross:
- eight amendment
- cruel and unusual punishment

North Carolina Board of Dental Examiners v The Federal Trade Commission:
- regulatory agencies
- agency capture
- interest groups
- monopolies

EEOC v Abercrombie and Fitch:
- religious liberty
- the Civil Rights Act
- executive agencies
- disparate treatment
- discrimination

Michigan v EPA:
- regulatory policy
- the EPA
- strict construction

Walker v Texas Division, Sons of Confederate Veterans, Inc.
- first amendment
- freedom of speech
- government speech
- private speech

City and County of San Francisco v Sheehan:
- mental disabilities
- fourth amendment
- warrantless searches
- qualified immunity

Johnson v. United States:
- due process rights
- procedural liberties
- strict construction

From the Washington Post: Who is the most conservative Republican candidate for president?

For 2305 students as you prep for the final. Have some familiarity with ideological terminology, as well as the two step electoral process. The chart above provides information about both - in addition to a list of many of the current candidates for the 2016 presidency, as well as information related to the 114th Congress most notably the degree of polarization between Democratic and Republican members.

- Click here for the accompanying article.

Ideology can be measured in many different ways, The author of the article uses Twitter followership, which allows for a dynamic measurement because people can follow and unfollow people regularly.

What stick out to me is the lack of candidates in the middle. Each is more likely to adopt positions that correspond to those of party identifiers. This makes sense since each candidate is running for their party's nomination for the presidency, not the presidency itself. The eventual nominees will concern themselves with the nominees in the few months between their nomination and the election in November 2016.

For purposes of the final, think of these topics in relationship to this material.

- ideology
- party polarization
- political parties
- primary elections
- party identification
- general elections

Main points from 2305

This is intended to be less a review than a review of key points made over the course of the semester. We will review these today in class.

• An educated public is considered essential to the preservation of a democratic republic

• American governing institutions and systems are based on history dated back at least to the Magna Carta.

• A side effect of this history is a governing arrangement is individual liberty.

• The government is legitimized by its resting on the authority of the general population, but the people  do not rule directly. 

• Governments do three basic things: they make, execute and adjudicate the law. Tyranny occurs if these three powers are controlled by one entity. The point of the separated powers is to ensure that these powers do not accumulate.

• The people who wrote the Constitution took human nature into consideration in how they designed each branch.

• Any action of the national government has to be justified by the Constitution – either directly or indirectly. This is not true of the states.

• The United States Constitution is written with vague terminology, which makes it subject to interpretation. Battles rage over how the Constitution should be interpreted.

• The Constitution says very little about the internal workings of each branch. They have evolved considerably over the years, and continue to evolve. 

• Some phrases in the Constitution can be traced to Magna Carta and the British Bill of Rights. 

• The Constitution says nothing about political parties, but parties developed very quickly as effective ways to organize Congress and then to organize the electorate.

• The Constitution allows the states to make rules concerning elections, and until the 15^th Amendment states has full power to determine who go to vote. This also includes the power to design House districts, which has led to gerrymandering on the state level.

• The Bill of Rights applied only to the national government prior to the passage of the 14^th Amendment.

• The Bill of Rights is focused primarily on limited the substantive and procedural powers of the national government. 

• The rights established in the Bill of Rights are generally balanced against the greater interests of society. They can all be limited. 

• The First Amendment is focused primarily on limiting the ability of Congress to pass laws regarding religion and political participation.

• States have the power to pass laws which organize political parties, primaries and how electoral votes are awarded.

• The right to vote - suffrage - was very limited in the early years of the republic but has expanded gradually over time. This has occurred largely because the national government has forced the states to expand suffrage.

• Some of the most important – or consequential anyway – checks and balances are not written in the Constitution.

• Voter turnout tends to be low in the United States.

• The relationship between the national government and the states was impacted significantly by the Civil War and the Great Depression.

• Equality was not a dominant concept in the Constitution until the 14^th Amendment.

• The bulk of elections in the United States are winner take all. This led to the development of a two party system. While there are multiple parties in the United States, only two are competitive.

• The two major competitive parties are not monolithic – they are composed of various factions which compete to determine what the parties actually stand for each election cycle.

• The Supreme Court has made it increasingly difficult for Congress to regulate campaign finance.

• Not all interests are effectively represented by groups. The most powerful groups are those that can overcome the free rider problem.

• Interest groups are especially effective when they are able to work themselves into the decision making processes of each of the branches of government.