Unit 5 - Political Participation Study Guide (AP GOV)

15th Amendment

(1870) - Right to vote could not be denied based on race (only applicable to men; men were the only ones allowed to vote at the time).

17th Amedment

(1913) - "Popular vote" used to elect U.S. Senators, instead of the House of Reps.

19th Amendment

(1920) - Right to vote could not be denied based on sex/gender.

23rd Amendment

(1961) - Allowed citizens living in D.C. to vote for electors in the electoral college (who then go on to vote for president).

24th Amendment

(1964) - Citizens do not have to pay poll taxes/other voting taxes in order to vote in federal elections.

26th Amendment

(1971) - Right to vote can not be denied to those 18+ (voting age was lowered).

- Altered a portion of the 14th Amendment

(Voting Model) Rational Choice

Voting based interests/issues important to the individual.

- Ex: Voting for the candidate or party that promises to erase student loan debt when you are in college, or to help small businesses if you own a small dry goods store.

(Voting Model) Retrospective Voting

MOST COMMON
- Looking backwards and researching a candidate's track record of votes, decisions, and advancement of campaign promises.

- Often looking at the incumbent (person running for reelection of a seat they hold), at a candidate who recently held the position, or their party.).

- Ex: Looking at the past actions/policies & laws Obama created when he was up for presidential re-election.

(Voting Model) Prospective Voting

Looking ahead to predict which candidate, campaign promise, and/or party would most benefit the voter and create the vision of America that voter wants.
- Opposite of retrospective voting

- Ex: Voting for a Democratic candidate because you believe they will create certain policies/laws, etc. (likely because of their parties' ideals/the candidates policy agenda).

(Voting Model) Party-Line Voting

Voting for a candidate based on the political party you identify with.
- Strong party loyality

- Ex: Voting for Trump because he is a Republican.

(Voter Turnout Impact) Demographics (race, gender, age)

People located in areas that historically have a lot of voting barriers (typically people of color) are less likely to vote. Younger people are also typically less likely to vote so areas more populated by people of color & younger citizens could have lower voter turnout as opposed to areas with white, older citizens.

(Voter Turnout Impact) Political Efficacy

People who have low trust in the government/don't feel that their vote would end up mattering tend to lower voter turnout in specific areas (sometimes align w/ demographical issues) and the country overall.

(Voter Turnout Impact) Registration Laws like Voter-ID/voter purge laws

Voter-ID laws in states can be discriminatory by excluding some forms of ID as valid for voting (ex: Texas doesn't count student ID's as valid ID for voting but count concealed weapon permits) and getting an ID also costs money. Both of these can decrease the voter turnout by discouraging people from going to vote.

(Voter Turnout Impact) Mid-term vs. Presidential General Elections

People tend to care more for big/primary elections and not so much for mid-term elections which can lower voter turnout for those mid-term elections. On the flip side, primary elections can prompt citizens to get registered to vote so that they can ensure a candidate is voted, which can increase voter turnout.

Linkage Institutions

Connect individuals/voters to the government and policy-makers.

- Allows them to communicate grievances, preferences, needs, wants, etc.

- Informs individuals, can try to persuade them, impact their actions (get them to donate or vote a certain way)

Examples of Linkage Institutions

1) Political Parties
2) Interest Groups
3) Media
4) Elections

(Third-Party/Independent Barriers) Winner-take-all System

In most states, electoral college votes are all given to the candidate/party that wins the most votes. This largely prevents third party/independent candidates from being able to secure electoral college votes, preventing them from winning elections overall.

(Third-Party/Independent Barriers) One of the major parties can incorporate Third-party/Independent platforms

If major party candidates incorporate third party/independent platforms into their own agenda, people who would have voted for those third party/independent candidates would likely just vote for the majority party candidate because they are more likely to win.

Iron Triangle

The relationship between an interest group, Congress, and a bureaucratic agency.

Issue Network

groups of various individuals & interest groups that come together to work on specific policy issue(s).

Incumbency Advantage Phenomenon

The increased chance that the person already in office will win due to being able to use the tools of the office and name recognition to win again (note: this is stronger in Congress).

- Name recognition
- Networks of donors and campaign staff and volunteers.
- Command the "bully pulpit"
- Already seen as presidential
- 4 years of experience and a record of "wins" (although their record can sink them, too)

Open/Closed Primaries

Open = you can vote regardless of any party registration.

Closed = you can only vote as a registered member of that party.

Caucuses

Discussions and moving around a gym or venue to vote.

Party Conventions

Convention/meeting to discuss policy matters and choose which candidate to nominate

The Electoral College IMPEDES democracy.

1) It doesn't guarantee that the candidate with the popular/majority vote wins.

2) States that are known as "swing" states can be seen as having more power/influence since they are often what a candidate comes down to needing in order to win.

3) It puts Third Party & Independent candidates at a severe disadvantage (through the winner-take-all system).

The Electoral College FACILLITATES democracy.

1) Maintains federalism by giving power to the states in electing presidential candidates.

2) Demonstrates the country's trust/support in the candidate that wins (because they managed to secure the majority of the electoral votes).

3) Makes sure that candidates advertise/campaign in several states and not just majorly populated ones(in order to secure electoral votes).

Social Media

Candidates can now speak much more directly speak/interact with the public and hear their concerns; this can help candidates to seem more approachable, relatable, etc., ultimately helping to build more trust w/ the people. Candidates can also come across more negatively through social media, however, which can hurt their public support/reputation.

(LAW) Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002

- Tried to prevent the unlimited, "soft" money raised for state campaigns being funneled to federal campaigns, which required "hard", or regulated money.

- Also banned "electioneering communications" by corporations and unions that referred to a specific federal candidate and were made within 60 days of a general election and 30 days of a primary election.

- Tried to reduce attack ads with "Stand by Your Ad" provision: "I'm [candidate's name] and I approve this message".

(CASE) Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010)

Citizens United, a conservative nonprofit, made a movie that purportedly exposed Hillary Clinton's true nature and abilities

- Does this constitute electioneering communications? Supreme Court Ruling: NO - it's free speech.

- Legalized Super PACS and massive amounts of corporation and union spending
= private funding of elections

PACs

PACs = Political Action Committees --> regular PAC is regulated/limited but can work for/with a candidate

- Influence elections by raising money (from individuals) to help federal & state candidates get elected.

Limits (created by FEDERAL CAMPAIGN LIMITS (2019-2020):
- Individuals --> candidates for President, the U.S. Senate & the U.S. House of Representatives = max $2,800 per election

- Individuals & single candidate --> national party committees = max $35,500

- Individuals & single candidate --> other national party committee activities = $106,500

Super PACs

Unregulated and unlimited but must be independent of a candidate.

- Being able to donate such unlimited money helps to even further increase the likelihood of that candidate winning and also potentially influence the candidate to create policies that align w/ corporation/union ideals.

Gatekeeper

the agenda setters!

- News outlets decide what is worthy of being news (Is it genocide in a foreign country? Celebrity marriages and divorces? The increasing lack of religiosity in America?)

Scorekeeper

the political people!

- Downside: leads to horse-race journalism

- These "horse races" impact elections by making it more about popularity of candidate than ideas/actual policies/platforms

Watchdog

the detectives!

- Investigative reporting - research and publish accounts of corruption, scandal, fraud/waste, inefficiency.

"Horse-Race" Journalism

Reporters constantly over-discuss the ups and downs of near-daily polls, leading them to over-emphasize public opinion

1st Media Change during 21st Century

Widespread internet has become much more available, making it a lot easier for misinformation and/or accusations about a candidate, their policies, their personal life, etc., to be spread. Widespread internet/social media however also makes it easier for candidates to interact with the public more directly and observe their opinions and concerns about current legislation/issues.

2nd Media Change during 21st Century

Increased availability of news channels make it a lot easier to broadcast national issues/spread important information across the country, overall help improve the safety of the country. Bias however is a big issue when it comes to new networks, which can severely discredit information being shared with the public (depending on the channel) which can ultimately hurt the public opinions on government officials and cause mistrust in the nation citizens.

Electorate

People who are eligible to vote in elections.

- has expanded as various groups received suffrage, or the right to vote.

Barriers on Electorate

Barriers:

- Bans on voting based on one's color.
- Poll taxes
- Literacy test
- Grandfather clauses (could only vote if your grandfather was able to).
- Whites-only primary elections.
- Bans based on one's gender (quite a few states allowed women to vote in state elections between 1869 - Wyoming - and 1919)..

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Protections against discrimination

- Banned literacy tests

- Followed murders of activists in 1964 who were trying to fix voter suppression.

- Tried to fix disproportionately-low registration of Black voters and other systemic barriers to voting like intimidation with federal legislation.

- Any procedure that would impact voting procedures (i.e. redistricting) in a county that had less than 50% eligible people registered had to be approved by the Justice Dept. (removed by Shelby County v. Holder in 2013 - formula was too old).

Voter Turnout (& Impacts)

- the percentage of the voting-age population that actually votes (not simply registered voters).

Impacts on voter turnout include - states' rules (states set up elections) vs. federal/national rules
- voting hours and sets most dates
- chooses primary rules (open or closed)
- types of ballots allowed and deadlines for them
- ID laws
- incentives or fines/punishments
- voter roll purges
- sets voter districts,
- certifies results

Voting Bloc

a group that tends to vote in noticeable patterns.

Roles of Political Parties in Elections

- Encourage candidates to run in the election
- "Officially" nominate their candidate for president
- Create/run a campaign intended to win the most votes (strategize!)
- Define important issues and the party's stance on it
- Raise money (more on that later)
- Handle scandals and issues that come up
- Watch the other party

Ideology vs. Party

Ideology: a consistent set of political beliefs and attitudes shared by a group about what government should do: its purposes and scope.

Political Party: an official group of people with shared interests whose goal is to help their candidates win in order to advance their vision of the state or country.

National Party Structure

National Committees - RNC and DNC with large numbers of employees.

National Chairperson - leading strategist and spokesperson for party.

National Party Subcommittees for recruitment, platform creation, communications, mobilizing voters to the cause.

Congressional Campaign Committees led by groups of Congresspeople and other staff, who don't work on bills but try to recruit and reelect candidates, issue polls, create ads, and fundraise.

Impact of Parties/Campaigns Include...

On voters
- Encourage them to vote a certain way
- Provide a sense of belonging
- Strength in numbers - advance your ideas
- Provide education/information on issues

(Parties) On the Government
- Can lead to divided government and gridlock, where Congress can't pass bills because they can't agree.
- Influences appointments
- Influences the topics/goals of bills
- Statewide: can influence voting district maps

Parties have to adapt/restructure because...

Parties have to adapt/restructure because...
- Political parties used to have much more control on their nomination because campaigns were centered on the party, not the individual candidate.

- Today, we have candidate-centered campaigns, and their role in nominating candidates has been weakened.

- Parties have become more democratic, as in, open to more regular people participating vs. backroom dealings.

- They need to reach the largest number of people/appeal to demographic groups, or coalitions.

- Try to advance goals while appealing to as many people as possible.

Realignments happen during critical elections

Example of Adaptation

Issue: When Democrats only won one election after that, they revisited the issue

Adaptation: Created superdelegates, highly-ranked delegates who didn't have to vote according to any state's primary, to give more power back to elites

Parties have to adapt/restructure because (CONT)...

Critical elections and regional realignments drastically change the landscape

- Realignment: changes in electoral forces due to changes in party identification.

- Critical elections: the contests/elections when realignments are revealed.

Happens because:
- A party suffers such a bad election that it gets replaced by a new party

- Large blocs of voters shift allegiance due to social, economic, political crisis

Example: division over how to handle slavery leading to the rise of the Republican party.

Example: the Democrats used to be states-rights/conservative/popular in the South, until the Civil Rights era when Johnson's Civil Rights Act of 1964 lost the South.

Third Party's

A smaller, lesser-known political party
- The Democratic Party and Republican Party each started as a third party.

Why do people create them?
- Economic protest - say, against monopolies or corruption.

- Single-issue parties - Prohibition Party, Green Party

- Splinter parties - faction breaks off from main party out of dissatisfaction.

Why don't they win elections? --> not a large enough following (people)/money to support them (compared to Republicans & Democrats).

Examples of Third Parties

Libertarian Party
- 1971, Colorado Springs

- "Libertarians strongly oppose any government interference into their personal, family, and business decisions".


Green Party
- 1984, Minnesota, won recognition by FEC in 2001

- Four Pillars: Peace and Non-Violence, Ecological Wisdom, Grassroots Democracy, and Social Justice.


Constitution Party
- 1992, location unclear, as the U.S. Taxpayer's Party, switched names in 1996 after official recognition by FEC.

- "It is our goal to limit the federal government to its delegated, enumerated, Constitutional functions".

Pluarism

System/society with many different groups working together to advance goals

Interest Group

-An organization focused on one issue/topic that tries to influence public policy.

Free-Rider Problem

Some interest groups struggle when people benefit from their group's work without needing membership/paying dues.

Election Process for President

First - Primaries: to whittle down the field of candidates to 1 person

- Can be caucuses (discussions and moving around a gym or venue to vote).

- Or direct primaries, where the voter goes to a booth, votes privately, and leaves.

- Can be closed (you can only vote as a registered member of that party).

- Can be open (you can vote regardless of any party registration).

- Even mixed (in some states, if you vote for a different party than registered, your registration switches!).


Second - That summer, each major party holds conventions to "officially" nominate their candidate



Finally - General Election held in November of election year. However, it's not over that night....

Congressional Election (impacted by)

- Incumbency advantage phenomenon - again, and stronger, especially in the House of Reps.

- Impact of gerrymandering on the voting districts for House of Representatives

- Way fewer competitive districts since 25-ish years ago

- Can lead to more extreme candidates

- Open and closed primaries

- Caucuses

- General (presidential and midterm) elections

- Lower voter turnout in midterm elections

Modern Campaigns

The benefits and drawbacks of modern campaigns are represented by:

- Dependence on professional consultants instead of volunteers (more partisan, very well-paid, just trying to win)

- Rising campaign costs and intensive fundraising efforts

- Duration of election cycles - longer!

- Impact of and reliance on social media for campaign communication and fundraising.

Campaign Finance

= All funds raised to promote candidates, political parties, or policies in elections, party activities, and party organizations,

- Essentially the process by which candidates and political parties raise money to help promote an issue or get a candidate elected.

- Congressional Reforms in the 1970s and 2000s tried to rein in corporate/interest group spending, but recent Supreme Court decisions say that money = freedom of speech and is allowed.

Campaign Finace Terms

Hard money - regulated money given according to federal rules with donors disclosed.

Soft money - unregulated money made outside of federal rules (because they are not affiliated with campaigns/candidates or parties).

- Dark money - unlimited money donated to nonprofits that is not regulated, not traced, and donor don't have to be identified.

- Allowed to be spent on ads if they don't say to vote for or against someone

Dark Money Groups

A "501(c)(4) social welfare group or (c)(6) trade association named after the sections of the Internal Revenue Code that grant tax exempt status to these organizations. Sometimes referred to as "issue advocacy" groups, they can accept unlimited contributions from any source and are not required to publicly disclose their donors."


Ex: 501 (c)(4): National Rifle Association (NRA), Planned Parenthood, Majority Forward, One Nation

(LAW) Federal Election Campaign Act - 1971

Tried to regulate (limited) campaign donations from contributors and required transparency in the amount of money candidates spend to get elected.

- Established PACs, or Political Action Committees

- Contributions by corporations or unions were banned in federal elections.

= public funds for presidential elections

COURT CASE 2 - U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT CIRCUIT EMILY'S LIST V. FEC (2009)

Case: Emily's List (regular PAC) challenged several FEC regulations/limits that restricted how nonprofits may spend and raise money to advance their preferred policy positions and candidates.

- (Example: there were more restrictions if the money came from a certain solicitation/donation request - like when companies send your parents requests for donations with a stamped return envelope included)
U.S. Court of Appeals Ruling: campaign contributions and expenditures constituted "speech" and, therefore, fell under the protection of the First Amendment.

- Would have gone to the Supreme Court to decide if the FEC appealed to them (they chose not to)
Money to Campaigns from regular PACS/nonprofits = Freedom of Speech

Functions of the Media

- To inform/educate

- To interpret current events

- To persuade/sway

- To expose corruption/abuses of power

- Entertainment

- Provide political information

- Help us to interpret events and policies

- Provide a forum for political conversations

- Socialize children to the political culture

Mid-19th Century

- Rise of penny newspapers (cost a penny) and popular magazines.

- Content changed - less government and political information, more recipes, poems, etc.

- Still had plenty of political reporting - "just-the-facts" type of reporting on what the government is doing, what laws and policies are passed, etc.

- Telegraph lines allowed information to be sent across the country rapidly.

- Led to the Associated Press (AP) - unbiased reporting sent out to outlets across the country.
The AP inspired Reuters and United Press International

20th Century

- located around the country)

- "Big Three Networks" - ABC, NBC, CBS = first big networks, set the tone for in-depth, objective reporting of current events, domestic and international affairs, etc.

- 1934 - Congress created the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to oversee electronic media (radio, TV, wire, now internet).

- FCC decides on things like which words/shows are allowed on what channels and when, and can enforce regulations with fines.

Modern Era (1960's --> present)

1980 - Ted Turner created the Cable News Network - CNN and changed the news cycle from a prime-time evening news to 24-hr news cycle.

- What are some effects of "news" shows running all day long?

• 1990s - MSNBC (NBCUniversal = subsidiary of Comcast) and FOX News Channel (Rupert Murdoch).

• Creation of 8-second (ish) "sound-bites".

• Ratings competition, "what the people want," has led to less objective news and more commentary shows.

Modern Era (1960's-present) = Rise of Internet

- Very democratic, in that we can all get information and take part in the media.

How does this change objectivity, credibility, traditional reporting?
- Has led to information silos
- Less productive political discourse
- Increased confirmation bias, or our tendency to seek out what we already agree with.

Types of Bias

1. Bias by omission - leaving one side out of an article, or a series of articles over a period of time; ignoring facts that tend to disprove your position whether liberal or conservative.

2. Bias by selection of sources - including more sources that support one view over another. This can mean when a reporter uses such phrases as "experts believe", "observers say," or "most people believe" Also includes "cherry-picking," or only using the sources that fit your argument.

3. Bias by story selection - a pattern of highlighting news stories that coincide with the agenda of one political party while ignoring stories that coincide with the agenda of the other party.

4. Bias by labeling - The tagging of one party's politicians and groups with extreme labels (Sleepy/Corrupt/Crazy/Unhinged).

What makes information credible (trustworthy or reliable)?

1. Evidence - do the facts hold up?
2. Source - do I trust the author?
3. Context - weigh the source against other events or information
4. Audience - is it intended for a certain audience?
5. Purpose - why was it made? Can you tell?
6. Execution - how is the information presented? (Images, word choice, format).

Adverserial Press

= press skepticism of government, where reporters continually question and investigate government officials and people in power.

- Presidents use press conferences where the presidents speak.

- Press briefings from the White House Press Secretary give the White House version of events and policies.

Try to create good sound bites for the press to run - gaffes/mistakes can also be shared by the media.