GOVT 2 Exam Finished

civil rights

guarantees of equal opportunity and protection for all citizens throughobligations imposed on government power.

social movements

Collective efforts advocating for social change.

Collective Action

How groups form and organize to pursue their goals or objectives, including how to get individuals and groups to participate and to cooperate.

Equal Protection Clause

14th amendment clause that prohibits states from denying equal protection under the law, and has been used to combat discrimination

burden of proof

the obligation to present evidence to support one's claim

Strict Scrutiny

A Supreme Court test to see if a law denies equal protection because it does not serve a compelling state interest and is not narrowly tailored to achieve that goal

Abolitionist Movement

An international movement that between approximately 1780 and 1890 succeeded in condemning slavery as morally repugnant and abolishing it in much of the world; the movement was especially prominent in Britain and the United States.

Dred Scott v. Sanford

Supreme Court case that decided US Congress did not have the power to prohibit slavery in federal territories and slaves, as private property, could not be taken away without due process - basically slaves would remain slaves in non-slave states and slaves could not sue because they were not citizens

Discrimination

unjustifiable negative behavior toward a group and its members

Plessy v. Ferguson

a 1896 Supreme Court decision which legalized state ordered segregation so long as the facilities for blacks and whites were equal

"seperate but equal" rule

the doctrine that public accommodations could be segregated by race but still be equal

Jim Crow Laws

Laws designed to enforce segregation of blacks from whites (poll taxes, literacy tests, and grandfather clauses that disenfranchised Black voters).

NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People)

African American organization that devised strategies for asserting their constitutional rights through political pressure and litigation.

13th Amendment (1865)

Abolition of slavery w/o compensation for slave-owners

14th Amendment (1868)

Grants citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the US; forbids any state to deny any person "life, liberty or property, without due process of law" or to "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of its laws."

15th Amendment (1870)

U.S. cannot prevent a person from voting because of race, color, or creed

Brown v. Board of Education (1954)

laws required Black and white students to attend separate schools under the "separate but equal" doctrine (established by Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896). The NAACP helped sue school boards for denying their children access to white-only schools, arguing that this violated the Constitution. Chief Justice Earl Warren, ruled unanimously (9–0) that: “Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal,” and therefore violate the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.

Civil Rights Act of 1964

This made racial, religious, and sex discrimination by employers illegal and gave the government the power to enforce all laws governing civil rights, including desegregation of schools and public places.

de jure and de facto segregation

De jure segregation is segregation by law; de facto segregation is segregation in practice.

19th Amendment (1920)

Gave women the right to vote

Chicano Power Movement

social and political movement of mostly Mexican Americans focused on community empowerment and collective organizing against discrimination and repressive policing

Civil Liberties Act of 1988

a United States federal law that granted reparations to Japanese-Americans who had been interned by the United States government during World War II.

Affirmative Action

A policy designed to redress past discrimination against women and minority groups through measures to improve their economic and educational opportunities

DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals)

instructing immigration officials to take no action to deport law-abiding people who as children entered the United States as children.

George Floyd Incident

In 2020, a 46-year-old Black man named George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who held his knee on Floyd's neck. The viral video of murder in broad daylight displayed the vulnerability of Black lives and illuminated the continued need to fight for greater civil rights protections.

EEOC v. Abercrombie & Fitch (2015)

Samantha Elauf, a Muslim woman, applied for a job at Abercrombie & Fitch.

She wore a headscarf (hijab) for religious reasons. The company denied her employment, claiming the headscarf violated its "Look Policy," which banned headwear.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) sued the company on Elauf's behalf for religious discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (8-1 in favor of Elauf and EEOC).

Bostock v. Clayton County (2020)

Gerald Bostock was fired after joining a gay softball league. He sued, arguing that his termination violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employment discrimination based on sex. The case was combined with two others involving discrimination against LGBTQ+ employees (6-3 in favor of Bostock).

Allen v. Milligan (2023)

Alabama's legislature drew a congressional map with only one majority-Black district, even though approximately 34% of the state's population is Black Civil rights groups (including Evan Milligan and others) sued, arguing this redistricting violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) by diluting Black voting power. Alabama must now provide real electoral opportunities for Black voters, setting a powerful precedent for states nationwide.

public opinion

the distribution of the population's beliefs about politics and policy issues

political ideology

the coherent set of values and beliefs about the purpose and scope of government held by groups and individuals

liberal

open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values by using Government involvement in solving social and economic problems (Often associated with the Democratic Party).

conservative

A person who believes government power, particularly in the economy, should be limited in order to maximize individual freedom (Often associated with the Republican Party).

agents of socialization

social institutions, including families and schools, that help to shape individuals' basic political beliefs and values

public opinion polls

interviews or surveys with samples of citizens that are used to estimate the feelings and beliefs of the entire population

sampling error (margin of error)

polling error that arises based on the small size of the sample

selection bias

A polling error in which the sample is not representative of the population being studied, so that some opinions are over- or underrepresented

push polls

polls taken for the purpose of providing information on an opponent that would lead respondents to vote against that candidate

social desirability bias

the tendency for people to say what they believe is appropriate or acceptable

straw poll

unscientific survey used to gauge public opinion on a variety of issues and policies

Literary Digest Poll

1936- An inaccurate poll taken on upcoming the presidential election. It over-represented the wealthy and thus erroneously predicted a Republican victory.

quota sampling

A nonprobability sampling technique in which researchers divide the population into groups and then arbitrarily choose participants from each group

stratified random sampling

A form of probability sampling; a random sampling technique in which the researcher identifies particular demographic categories of interest and then randomly selects individuals within each category.

Exit polls

polls based on interviews conducted on election day with randomly selected voters

media

various methods for communicating information

principled journalism

reporting that involves being as accurate, fair, and balanced as possible, relying on original sources, being transparent about citing sources, and presenting multiple viewpoints

adversarial journalism

a form of reporting in which the media adopt a skeptical or even hostile posture toward the government and public officials

citizen journalism

news reported and distributed by citizens, rather than professional journalists and for-profit news organizations

agenda setting

Determining which public-policy questions will be debated or considered.

Framing

the way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect decisions and judgments.

Priming

the activation, often unconsciously, of certain associations, thus predisposing one's perception, memory, or response

Watergate Scandal

Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward were the investigative journalists who helped expose the Watergate scandal, ultimately leading to President Nixon's resignation. Their reporting highlighted the power of journalism in a democracy.

selective exposure

The process by which individuals screen out messages that do not conform to their own biases.

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.

motivated reasoning

processing information in a way that allows consumers to reach the conclusion that they want to reach

Yellow Journalism

Journalism that exploits, distorts, or exaggerates the news to create sensations and attract readers

Muckraking

the action of searching out and publicizing scandalous information about famous people in an underhanded way.

Narrowcasting/broadcasting

Broadcasts are simply information for everyone to read about without a target audience. Narrowcasting is media that talks about a specific media and goes to a specific audience

Meta & X (current event)

Both Meta and X have shifted away from professionally moderated systems toward crowdsourced models, while simultaneously rolling back key moderation tools and policies. This move has sparked criticism from researchers, regulators, and watchdogs who worry it will undermine efforts to combat misinformation, hate speech, and extremist content online.

telegenic

having an appearance or manner that is appealing on television

digital divide

A worldwide gap giving advantage to those with access to technology

blogosphere

the term for the millions of blogs on the web