POLI 100 Exam 3

______________ ocuppy center stage. what check is on it?

- house and senate

- president can veto

how can veto be overriden

- 2/3 vote from each chamber (very uncommon)

always easier to __________ things from happening in congress

- stop bc mutliple choke points

Congress is meant to be _________ to the people

- closest

but house only liked branch

ironically least liked

Congress & The Constitution:

powers

• Power of the purse (coin money, impose taxes,

regulate commerce) - executive and judicial

branches can't spend money without its approval

• Power of the sword (declare war, raise army,

etc.)

• Plus implied powers arising from the necessary

and proper clause (elastic clause)

Congress checks on president

• Impeachment of federal officers - House impeaches, Senate tries and can convict

• Can conduct investigations into the executive branch

• Senate ratifies treaties and confirms executive nominees and judicial nominees

Checks on congressional power/shared power

1. President can veto laws (Congress can override by 2/3 vote in each House)

• 2. Executive agencies implement congressional laws.

• 3. Supreme Court can declare an act of congress unconstitutional

• 4. President is commander in chief.

Foreign Policy? congress

President has almost all power

• Congress has formally declared war only 11 times (really only 5 conflicts)

• Pres. has sent troops over 200 times

size of house & senate

- 435 house (not set by constitution)

- 100 senate set by constitution

length of term senate and house

- 6 yrs senate

- 2 yrs house (staggered/shortest term in world) (requires re-election campaign as soon as in office)

house/senate special assignments

- house: orginate spending bills

senate: advise and consent for treaties and confirmation of senate

house/senate constituency

- house: part of state (district

senate: initially elected by state legislature, now whole state

senate/house qualifications

senate: 30 yrs old, citizen for 9

house: 25 yr; citizen for 7

Congress and the Constitution: Bicameralism (CT Compromise)

- House supposed to be "closer" to the people

- Wise, mature Senate supposed to temper the popular passions of the House

Bicameralism

- Having to clear two different chambers with different constituencies, structures, rules & incentives= more choke points in the system. Harder to pass legislation

• Few bills passed each session

The House: how do we arrive at

congressional districts? How does

this process shape politics?

Constitution calls for a decennial census

• congressional law has set size of Congress at 435 seats since 1911 (population has increased)

• Reapportionment - the allocation of House seats to the states after each decennial census

• Today ~1 congressperson per 700,000 people (Constitution only says you must have 1 per 30,000)

• Every ten years (in years ending in 0), some states lose seats in the House and some gain. Census politicized

Every state is guaranteed one house member - 7 states have only one member

DE, WY, SD, AK, MT, ND, VT

Delaware, Wyoming, South Dakota, Alaska, Montana, North Dakota, and Vermont

Gerrymandering

when districtl ines are drawn to give an advantage to a political party or group of people

gerrymandering benefits

1) incumbents

2) party

3) minority group - racial or ethnic

gerrymandering

Why is gerrymandering more common now

1. motive - frequent change inparty control in the House•

2. means - technology +clustering in ideological enclaves•

3. opportunity - rise in singleparty control

Effects of Gerrymandering: Does it cause polarization?

Gerrymandering costs the parties seats and affects partisan balance.

• 2018 analysis says 16 more R seats due to it.

• BUT, contrary to popular belief, it is not the only reason districts are

uncompetitive or that Republicans have an advantage in the House.

Why gerrymandering only modertly contributes to polarization

1. Most districts are now naturally uncompetitive: People live with like-minded people. Geographic sorting into like-minded communities

means districts are going to be distinct from each other ideologically.

• 2. Democrats are structurally disadvantaged in the House; their voters cluster together in dense cities whereas Republican voters spread themselves out more efficiently in rural areas and smaller towns.

The way we elect people to house causes

1. decreases competition in districts

• 2. candidates in most districts face little serious

competition from the other party (win by an

average of 28.8% in 2020)

—only chance of losing is in a primary - the fear of which makes them more likely to adopt extreme positions

• 3. leads to emphasis on district interests as opposed to national ones

Electoral connections?

A) leads to narrowly targeted programs, projects, or tax breaks for constituents without worry about impact on overall spending or revenues (collective action problem)•

B) Logrolling -legislators trade votes on different bills, agreeing to support each other's proposals in exchange for reciprocal support

Why lower (avg re-election 80%) senate

.1 large Constituency - must appeal to entire state (Senate more moderate??)

2. Senate attracts quality challengers because more prestigious (eg Mark Kelly, D-AZ)

house relection rate

95% re-election rate 2020

Why do incumbents have such an advantage?

1. Redistricting (in the House)

• 2. campaign war chest discourages competition

• 3. large staff, travel budget, money for

communications (franking privilege)

• 4. greater name recognition

• 5. constituency service - mix- up with Veterans' benefits, Social Security checks

• Incumbents work tirelessly to keep this advantage!

• Best chance to win a seat: run when someone

retires (called an open seat)

More "individualism" in the U.S. House than in other countries because

1. members are elected in single member plurality districts vs. proportional representation

• 2. members must first win primary elections to secure the party's nomination

• 3. district boundaries can be carefully designed to protect incumbents

• But don't overstate this. Members of Congress do

work together and feel constrained by collective

goals. Particularly partisan goals.

2 crucial institutional structures needed to overcome

collective action problem and pass laws congress:

• 1. Party leadership

• 2. The committee system - provides specialized

information and benefits members' re-election efforts

(22 standing committees in House)

• These two ways or organizing are related to each other.

"Congress at work is Congress in committee." But who

decides on the committees?

What do leaders do? congress

In the House, the Speaker is very powerful

• Majority party chooses speaker

• Speaker controls committee appointments, refers bills to committees, and controls the Rules Committee

• Senate - Majority Leader weaker than Speaker but still

powerful

• Controls agenda on the floor (what gets a vote and what

doesn't)

Insecure majorities increase partisanship in Congress (Lee reading/smith 6.2) why?

• Now: party control changes all the time.

• Chance that party control can change almost every

election; thus, members face incentives to stick together

and exaggerate partisan differences.

• Knowing this, why would you compromise with the other

side and give them a victory?

• This partially explains the rise in use of the filibuster.

The House proceedings

• Larger, more centralized control - less debate. Each bill is given a "rule" from Rules Committee - determines debate time, whether amendments can be offered from the floor (open rule) or not (closed rule)

• No filibuster procedure

• Bill needs a simple majority to pass

Senate proceedings

• leaders negotiate unanimous consent agreements as to how long debate will go on for

• In theory, bill needs simple majority to pass but in practice it needs 60 votes

Cloture

a vote to stop the debate and end the filibuster. 60 votes needed

Fillibuster

• Filibuster in Senate only -- an obstructive measure used to delay a vote by continued, unlimited debate.

• not in Constitution (a Senate rule, Rule 22 cloture) A historical accident

In reality, Senators send an email saying they (and others) object to the bill

• No "talking a bill to

death"

fillibuster exceptions

• Dem - 2013, lowered the 60-vote threshold to 51 for approval of Executive Branch appointees and federal judges below the Supreme Court

• 2017 -Republicans amend rules: eliminate filibuster for Supreme Court nominations

Procedure to circumvent filibuster

- Budget reconciliation - a work-around.Reconciliation allows for expeditedconsideration of certain tax, entitlement spending, and debt limit legislation.

• reconciliation bills aren't subject to filibuster by law• scope of amendments is limited

• Used 21 times since 1980 (Bush and Trumptax cuts, Affordable Care Act, 2021 AmericanRescue Plan, infrastructure?)

How a Bill Becomes a Law (Or Doesn't)

• Out of about 10,000 proposed bills a year, maybe 10% become law (usually 4-5%)

• Multiple roadblocks along the way

- bias against action

• Most bills die in committee - gatekeepers. Never reported out.

• The House and the Senate both must pass the same bill in the

exact same language- and the President must sign it

How bill becomes law

1. written

2. introduced, referred to committe

3. committee hearings, markups, reported out

4. congress floor ( first rules if house, fillibuster in senate)

5. conference committee for differences (if needed and back to floor)

6. President signs it or vetoes it (which brings back to Congress, needs 2/3 vote to override veto)

Green Lantern Presidency

- (incorrect) belief that the president can

achieve any political or policy objective if only he tries hard enough or uses

the right tactics"

• Presidents are partially responsible for this belief due to their overly ambitious promises

Popular view on presidents/green lantern backwards

View is that the president is functionally all-powerful and failure is due to a lack of trying.

2 variants: Ronald Reagan (communicate better) and Lyndon Johnson (twist more arms in Congress)

• But presidents have limited formal powers and are checked by many things

• In fact, green lantern theory is backward -- presidents who do try extrahard generate push back in polarized climate

Expectations gap presidency

tremendously high expectations with limited

formal powers to achieve them

• Presidential rhetoric raises expectations. Presidents

overpromise and under-deliver (note: not for lack of trying)

US: Different roles, same people

Pres is both head og state and govt/ diff from UK (state is king)

Presidency caveat

presidents may not be as all-powerfulas we think, but they are still very powerful andarguably more powerful than the otherbranches

How has presidential power changed over time?

1. Pres have become more powerful in part because the presidency is a unitary office•

- They can claim to speak for the nation notjust a state or district

- appeals to popular support

2, president power grows in time of war; doesnt scale back after

3. Much of the president's power flows from commander in chief role

*Much of the power is informal in nature (see 2 and 3) - power to persuade others

2 Types of Constitutional Powers Granted to the President: Article II

1. Express powers - powers that are explicitly stated in the Constitution; things the president can do (eg, veto, make appointments)

2. implied (inherent powers) - claimed by presidents; not

specified in the Constitution but are inferred because "the

rights, duties, and obligations of the office" demand it (eg

Lincoln in Civil War)

Express Powers and Checks pres

1. Execute the law (take care laws be faithfully executed;

executive power shall be vested in the President)

• 2. Veto or sign legislation - makes president the single most

important legislator

• Can be overridden by 2/3 vote of both House and Senate but

that happens rarely (veto is negative power)

• 3. Commander in chief of the armed forces (check: Congress

declares war. Weak check)

• 4. grant pardons for federal offenses

• 5. Convene Congress in special sessions in extraordinary

circumstances (rarely happens)

• 6. Receive ambassadors (can recognize nations by receiving

their reps; diplomacy)

• 7. appoints Cabinet officials, federal judges, ambassadors, etc.

(Senate must confirm)

• 8. Make treaties (with advice and consent of the Senate)

• 9. Give a State of the Union address from time to time

(legislative agenda setting power)

How did pres become more powerful than express pwrs?

1. Commander in chief role very powerful today

• 2. Government has grown in size and reach

• 3. Executive actions?

Inherent Powers: The Pen (Executive Actions - eg

executive orders)

Executive order- a rule or regulation issued by the president

that has the formal effect or status of law though it is NOT a law; a directive to agencies telling them how to implement the law

• Many are mundane, but some have been incredibly important.

Ex. Desegregation of armed forces, Japanese-American

internment camps during WWII, DACA, travel ban, vaccine

mandate, etc

• Powerful but also can be fleeting

Where does this power come from?

"Implied/inherent" powers

• "The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America."

• The executive branch should "take care that the laws be

faithfully executed."

• President is the head of the executive branch; he's making sure the law is implemented and executed

Executive orders can be a way for presidents to make policy (legislate example)

- DREAM ACT - Development, Relief, Education for Alien Minors

• Legislative proposal to grant permanent residence to qualifying

immigrants who entered the US as minors

• Proposed several times in Congress; passed the House in 2011 and

died by filibuster in Senate in Dec. 2010(cloture vote: 55-41)

• President Obama issued an executive action, a memorandum called

DACA in 2012 - Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals - if

conditions are met, childhood arrivals are provided work

authorization in the United States and protection from deportation

for two years

Constraints- executive order

1. only has force of law until a subsequent president rescinds it with another executive order

• The first day of many presidencies is spent reversing executive order

• 2. Congress can nullify it by passing a law (though that could be vetoed)

• 3. the Courts can rule it unconstitutional

and void it

• 4. Congress can threaten investigations,

defund programs, etc

Are executive orders increasing over time?

not really

Historic vs modern presidency

Historic Presidency• President is a clerk and Congress #1

Modern Presidency -FDR to present

• Increased popular expectations

• President #1 (increased attention)

But no change in formal powers (Constitutional)-- executive action but issues with that

Presidential power today = power of

persuasion (Phone)

1. Persuade Congress by individual bargaining (the carrot and the stick) - phone calls promising to bring up legislation, take trip on Air Force One, etc. OR punishments

• This is somewhat overblown

• 2. Persuade the Congress by "going public"

• "going public"- using the prestige and visibility of the office (the "bully pulpit") to put pressure on Congress to enact president's policies; convince Congress it's in THEIR best interest to do what a popular president wants

• Ex. Domestic travel, rallies, speeches, prime time addresses, Twitter, etc

The Stick and Senator Shelby

• Dem criticizes Clinton's Budget

• Space Shuttle moved from AL to TX

• One ticket for 'Bama Celebration at WH

• Shelby's response?

• He voted with the Democrats, then switched parties

What Affect Presidential Approval?

1. Foreign events and crises - "rally 'round the flag."

• 2. Economic conditions - people reward the president in good times and punish president in bad times

• 3. Inexorable decline as expectations go unfulfilled?

• 4. Honeymoon - first 100 days of office, maximum optimism and good will (honeymoon phase shorter and shorter, declining over time)

Lawless and Fox segment 32

- Tals about incumbency advantage accounts for high reelection

Advantage #1: Incumbents Run Their Own Customer Service Agencies

Advantage #2: Incumbents Can Build and Tout a Legislative Record

Advantage #3: Incumbents Have Access to Big Money

Advantage #4: Incumbents Run in Tailor-Made Districts (partisan gerrymandering)

Lawless and Fox 34

- how well does congress represent american people?

collective rep: mixed. Congress fails to take action on a lot of issues where there's a public consensus, but it does act on many others. (majority of ppl)

- constituent rep: pretty good. Majority of districts/states are repped by members who share the same party affiliation as the majority

- descriptive rep- not well but changing in democrats

lawless and fox 35

• 3% of proposed bills become law

- how doesnt a bill become a law

The legislative process is difficult to traverse because it is long and complex, involving powerful special interests, party leaders, committees, both chambers of Congress, and the president.

- Party politics dominate; bills that are controversial and supported by majority often meet strong resistance from minority. minority party's legilative rarely passes

Lawless and fox 42

- One hand: essential tasks for american people

-Other: party polarization, a governing structure that requires compromise, and politicians with little incentive to cooperate leads to government incapable of addressing most pressing problems.

is federal govt system broken?

Smith 6.1: (binder)

legislating in polarizing time

Legislative gridlock has increased over time—party polarization/divided government is a big part of this.

• Also the filibuster

-trump not divided but his ideas are often against conservative ideals

• Two main reasons why party polarization hurts legislative productivity: (smith 6.2, 6.3)

1. There is a decreasing number of members in the "ideological center," meaning it is harder to get bi-partisan support for bills, which is often necessary (but sometimes insufficient re: filibuster) to get legislation passed.

2. Majorities are so small because of polarization that each party is incentivized

to obstruct the majority party's activity (again, the filibuster is big here) and "message" rather than legislate

Smith 6.3

-Rather than committee-driven policy-making (i.e., based on expertise, background, knowledge, etc.), parties control a lot of the activity in producing legislation.

- Bipartisanship shrinking; mainly in committee

-less conference committee

-committees and partisanship

Smith 6.5

Descriptive vs. substantive representation in Congress

• Descriptive representation in Congress has been increasing, but not to "proportional" levels in the electorate.

• Women and racial minorities tend to be slightly more liberal, on average.

- Pelosi (breaks glass ceiling) and Harris

-Women and black rep increasing; next is Latinx to increase

Lawless and Fox 36

- Commander in chief, partisan in chief, administrator in chief, head of state, legislator in chief, chief diplomat

- responsible for developing and implementing most major foreign and domestic policies as well as representing the nation in times of crisis, celebration, and on the global stage.

-what do presidents do

smith 7.1: neustradt

- Key to presidental success relies on persuasion and ability to persuade relies on bargaining.

- technically in charge but needs reciprocal relationship with others to succeed

pres power

smith 7.2: Kernell

- going public incompatible with bargaining/pluralistic (new theory for presidency)

- more straightfoward, more risks

-prefer the threat of going public

- PR more strategic closer to elections

smith 7.3: howell

- presidents also have unilateral powers they can use w/o bargaining

- executive orders, proclamations, agreements, national security directives

- most important example is Bush post 9/11

-allow important changes that would not pass in congress (truman desegregates military)

-judicial action can check this

power without persuasion

Political Parties role in Congress

Political parties help structure the policy preferences of members of Congress to pass legislation

• w/o party= collective action and/or coordination problem

• The Speaker of the House and Senate majority leader are elected by the majority party

• Fundraising helps members of Congress get re-elected (a big part of the incumbency advantage

State pioneers in state legislative and House gerrymandering

Wilson Congress

NC and WI

Agenda-Setting Power congress

Majority parties in Congress have both positive and negative agenda-setting power

• Positive power examples:

• Determine the partisan composition and chair of each committee in the chamber, including members assigned to the conference committee and the rules committees

• Control which pieces of legislation make it to the floor for a vote

• Negative power examples:

• Not allowing minority party legislation to make it to the floor for a vote

• Filibuster?

Lyndon Johnson and Political Time

War on Poverty - a million different programs

• Civil Rights Act of 1964

• Voting Rights Act of 1965

• Medicare

• Medicaid

• 1966 Midterm Elections

• GOP gains 47 seats in House, 8 governorships, and 3 senate seats

Donald Trump and Political Time

Remaking the American economy

• Reshore Manufacturing and Heavy Industry using tariffs

• Reorient America's position relative to other countries in the world

• Return of immigrants who entered the country illegally through mass deportation

• Deemphasizing federal investment in university research

• Turning back toward fossil fuels and turning away from renewable energy

Current court dem

Sonia Sotomayor (Obama), Elena Kagan (Obama),

Kentanji Brown Jackson (Biden)

Current court rep

Thomas (GHW Bush), Roberts (GW Bush), Alito

(GW Bush), Gorsuch (Trump), Kavanaugh (Trump),

Coney Barrett (Trump)

current court demographic

All Yale and Harvard Law School except Amy

Coney Barrett - Notre Dame

• 4 women, 2 African American, 1 Latina

Knowledge of the Supreme Court

Survey in summer 2010 found that 2/3 of people couldn't name

a single sitting justice

• 1% could name all 9

• On a Pew survey in 2010, respondents were asked to choose

the Chief Justice out of 4 names. 10% chose Thurgood

Marshall.

...He left the bench over 20 years ago

Trust in supreme court

- strongest of three branches

lowering in dems

The Balls and Strikes Analogy

Umpires don't make the rules; they apply them. ... They make

sure everybody plays by the rules. ... And I will remember that it's my job to call balls and strikes and not to pitch or bat."- Chief Justice John Roberts

But is there really just one strike zone?

• Ken Kaiser, former American League umpire, wrote, "The strike zone as defined in the rule book ... is a myth. It doesn't exist. It's a nonexistent imaginary box. It has always not existed."

Are Justices more like umpires or

"politicians in robes"?

meant to be umpires... but it is unclear

Judicial activism

judges make decisions with larger societal

impact in mind

Judicial restraint

judges stick only to strict reading of the

Constitution

• Again, the two get blurred sometimes (Roberts' analogy of balls and strikes)

How then do justices decide?

- attitudinal vs legal model

reality is a mixture of two

Attitudinal model:

judges decide based on their liberal or conservative ideologies

- social, psychological, and political factors that impact

judicial decision-making

The legal model

legal theories in accordance with the constitution (e.g.,

textualism, originalism, living constitution, etc.)

decide based on law

Supreme Court nominees are nominated by ?

- by President and confirmed by Senate. Confirmation hearings have become more politicized over time, even in this Court

The judges who were selected by Presidents have tended to

vote

together as a bloc. (eg Scalia and Thomas voted the same

99% of the time; Ginsburg and Breyer voted together 94% of

the time) [Attitudinal Model]

_____ of supreme court cases between 1950-2020 are unanimous

40%

Smith 9-3: Hamilton, Fed 78

- Judges should only be removed according to a "standard of good behavior."

The judicial branch will always be the "least dangerous" branch of government.

WHy does hamilton say judicial is least dangerous

• They possess neither the "purse" nor the "sword," and they have neither "force" nor "will" to enact policies, but rather judgments

The judiciary can never truly impede individuals' liberty, so long as it remains

separated from the executive and legislative branches.

• This is why lifetime appointments are theoretically essential to keeping then judiciary independent and impartial

wht does hamilton say abt judcial rveiew a

saying that the courts ought to be allowed to declare unconstitutional laws as "void," and this is essential for preserving constitutional order. Moreover, it is up to

judges to determine what is constitutional and what is not

Article III

• Article III has only 3 sections

• Establishes one Supreme Court and "in such inferior courts as the

Congress may from time to time ordain and establish"

• Nominated by President with advice and consent of Senate

• Judges shall hold their offices during good behavior

• Establishes original jurisdiction

Power of court comes from _______ & what case is it assumed

judicial review - the ability to review federal, state, and local

laws and invalidate them on constitutional

grounds

• Nowhere in the Constitution

• Assumed in Marbury v. Madison (1803)

Checks on judicial review from other branches?

2/3 and ¾ majorities can overturn judicial review

How?

• Amend the Constitution to overcome judicial review

• How often does this happen? Rare.

Because other Branches can't checkJudicial Review

Limits on it by the Court are self imposed

• Judicious use of power

• Refuses to get involved in "Political questions"

• Delays rulings till controversy dies down

• Roche-- "The court's power has been maintained by a wise

refusal to employ it in unequal combat"

U.S. constitutional law is higher than

-statutory law passed by Congress.

• than state statutory law or state constitutional law

Examples of Judicial review overriding state laws

- Brown v board of eduation (17 states illegal)

- Roe v Wade

- Obergefell v. Hodges (same sex marraige)

Structure of Federal Judiciary

1 supreme court (Mostly appellate) < state courts

2 U.S. Courts of Appeals (3-judge panels hear appeals)

3 U.S. District Courts (Trial courts with original jurisdiction)

How does a case get to the Supreme Court

• Writ of certiorari - a formal request to have the Supreme Courtreview a decision of a lower court

• Rule of 4 - 4 justices decide to grant certiorari

• A denial of cert doesn't mean anything about whether or not theCourt agrees with the rulings in the case