American National Government
PSCI 210 Study Guide for Exam 2
Professor Greene
NOTE: Exam 2 covers Chapters 12 - 17 in the Wilson and DiIulio text. This includes the Congress, Presidency, Bureaucracy, Judiciary, and Public Policy. Like Exam 1, the test will consist of true/false and multiple choice questions. The following material is intended to be a sample and some terms may appear on the exam that are not listed here. Note that the media chapter is included on Exam 2.
All students should bring a Scantron form to take the exam. The exact form is a Scantron F-289.
Terms & Concepts
| Executive Office of the President Marbury v Madison The Electoral College Succession Act of 1947 Impoundment of Funds Line-Item Veto Pocket Veto Legislative Veto 22nd Amendment The Imperial Presidency Kitchen Cabinet Common Law Stare Descisis Statutory Law 16th Amendment Spoils System Buddy System Bureaucracy The Revolving Door Parkinson's First Law Criminal Law Peter Principle Standing Sovereign Immunity Budget & Impoundment Act of 1974 Earl Warren Chief Justice Public Policy Process |
25th Amendment Office of Management and Budget The Cabinet Warren Burger Federal District Courts Appellate Courts A Cease-and-Desist Order Senatorial Courtesy Civil Rights Movement Writ of Certiorari Civil Service Filibuster Gerrymandering Pork Barrel Logrolling Franking Privilege Bicameral Legislature Concurrent Resolution Iron Triangles Laissez-faire The Spoils System Pocket Veto Legislative Veto Judicial Review Chief of Staff |
General Themes
Be familiar with the history and development of Congress. How does a bill become a law? What are the major differences between the House and Senate? Who is in charge of the House? Who is in charge of the Senate? How many standing committees are found in the House and Senate? What are standing committees? Where does the real work of Congress occur? How many members in the House? What is divided government? Is power centralized or decentralized? Is there a bias in representation? Has the structure of Congress changed through the years? What are the typical personal characteristics of members of Congress?
Be familiar with the history and development of the Presidency. What are the qualifications? How long can a president serve? What is the Kitchen Cabinet? The regular Cabinet? What are the duties of the president? What is the president's role in executive-legislative relations? What significance is the 25th Amendment for the Presidency? Has the 25th Amendment ever been used? How does the electoral college work? How many votes are included in the electoral college?
Be familiar with history and development of the bureaucracy (and civil service) in the United States?
Be familiar with structure of the federal court system. How are federal judges appointed? How long do judges serve? How does one get to the Supreme Court? How many justices are on the Supreme Court? What is the difference between common and statutory law? What is the typical case load of the Supreme Court? When and how long are they in session?
Sample Questions
True/False Questions
1. The typical member of Congress is a white, male, lawyer in his mid-50s. (True)
2. There are 538 electoral votes in the Electoral College; a candidate must get 270 electoral votes to win the presidency. (True)
3. In Gibbons v. Ogden (1824), the state of New York granted Robert Fulton the exclusive right to operate steamboats on the Hudson River. The Supreme Court ruled that granting monopolies to operate steamboats on the river were unconstitutional because rivers were used to transport goods among the states (interstate commerce). The Supreme Court's ruling held that Congress' authority to regulate interstate commerce included commercial activity. (True)
4. George W. Bush was sworn in as the 42nd President of the United State on January 20, 2001. (False; George W. Bush is the 43rd President of the United States).
5. In the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore won the popular vote but lost the electoral college. Thus, George W. Bush won the presidency. (True; Al Gore won the overall popular vote by slightly more than 550,000 votes but George Bush won a majority of the electoral college votes. According to the U.S. Constitution, the person that receives the most electoral college votes wins the presidency).
6. The Department of Homeland Security is located in the Executive Office of
the President. (False; the Office of Homeland Security was originally in the
Executive Office of the President but later became the fifteenth cabinet level
department in 2002).
7. The Bureau of the Budget (BOB) was originally located in the Treasury
Department but would later become the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and
is now located in the Executive Office of the President (EOP). It is responsible
for developing the executive budget. (True)
8. What are the salaries for the president, members of Congress, and members of the U.S. Supreme Court? Click here for details about salaries.
9. The first woman to serve in both the House of Representatives and Senate was Margaret Chase Smith (R-Maine). She died on May 29, 1995 at 97. (True)
10. The closest popular vote in a presidential election in modern times occurred in 1960 between John Kennedy and Richard Nixon. (True: just over 100,000 votes separated the two candidates).
Multiple Choice
1. The 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1917, provided for:
a. a national income tax
b. popular election of U.S. Senators
c. women's suffrage
d. universal suffrage (The answer is "b")
2. If no presidential candidate wins the electoral college (receives 270 or more electoral
votes), then the election is decided by:
a. the House of Representatives
b. the U.S. Senate
c. a simple majority vote in the House and the Senate
d. a coin toss (The answer is "a")
3. According to the U. S. Constitution, a person may serve for no longer than ______ years
as president:
a. 4 years
b. 8 years (two terms of four years each)
c. 12 years
d. 10 years (The answer is "d." See the specifications provided in the
Twenty-Second Amendment)
4. One of the first presidents to effectively use the media was (he also referred to
the office as the "bully pulpit because of its visibility to preach to the nation and
bring popular pressure to bear against his opponents"):
a. Woodrow Wilson
b. Thomas Jefferson
c. Franklin Roosevelt
d. Theodore Roosevelt (the answer is "d.")
5. Which of the following type of presidential veto was overturned by the U.S. Supreme
Court as an unconstitutional delegation of power?
a. Pocket Veto
b. Package Veto
c. Adjournment Veto
d. Line-item Veto (the answer is "d." The measure was passed by Congress during
the Clinton administration but overturned by the Supreme Court)
6. Prime ministers (in a parliamentary system of government) as chosen by the
a. members of parliament
b. public at large in open elections
c. president
d. monarch (the answer is "a.")
7. The federal merit system was created by the:
a. Civil Service Reform Act of 1978
b. Civil Service Act of 1883
c. Classification Act of 1923
d. Civil Service Reform Act of 1820 (the answer is "b," which is also known as
the Pendleton Act)
8. There currently are 15 cabinet level departments in the executive branch. The
most recently created cabinet level department is
a. Veterans Affairs
b. Homeland Security
c. the Security and Exchange Commission
d. Energy (the answer is "b," which was approved by Congress in 2002
to assist fighting terrorism)
9. Federal elections are administered by the states. The state officer
typically in charge of overseeing elections in each state is the:
a. Secretary of State
b. Attorney General
c. State Auditor
d. Governor (the answer is "a." Students will recall that during the
controversial 2000 presidential elections Florida's Secretary of State, Katherine
Harris, was frequently in the news. She later was a member of the U.S. House of
Representatives for Florida's 13th Congressional District but unsuccessfully ran
for the U.S. Senate in 2006).