Gov U3

Chapter 15

What is a Political Party?

• Political Party: A group that is seeking to control the governing apparatus by gaining office in a duly constituted election

  • Linkage Institution: Connects the public to the government

• Interest Group: an organized group of people sharing common objectives who attempt to influence government policymakers through direct and indirect methods

  • Not the same as Political Party

Difference
Political Parties: consider a large number of issues, run candidates for office

 Interest Groups: Promote a handful of key policies, well funded, tightly organized, do not                                       

 compete for public office

Why are there two parties?

• The Historical basis: the nation started out with two parties: the federalists and antifederalists

• Force of Tradition: America has a two-party system because it has always had (unitary) form of government

  • “Winner-takes-all system” vs “Proportional representation system” (ranked-choice voting)

Major Functions of Political Parties

• Nominate candidates

• Inform and activate supporters

Parties can be thought of in 3 parts

• Party in the electorate: the active party voters can identify with 

  • Base: voters that support the party

• Party as an organization: viewed as party’s structure

  • Ex. committees

• Party in government: party that has control

How Americans Vote

• Rational Choice Theory: when the voters act in their best interest for government

  • Political efficacy: voters believe their vote makes a difference

  • Party Identification: voter heavily identifies with party’s ideals

• Motor Voter Act (1993): americans can register to vote at DMV

  • Get out the vote (GOTV)

Third Parties

• Three Types

• “Single Issue”- focus heavily on one issue

• “Splinter” Party- broken away from a major party

• Ideological- focus on addressing role of government 

• Importance: willing to bring up issues major parties won’t

• Consequences

  • Party realignment: Major parties realign values to keep votes

Constitutional Provisions of Political Participation

• 15th amendment : No voting discrimination based on race, color, previous servitude

• 17th amendment : popular or direct election of senators

• 19th amendment : no discrimination to vote based on gender

• 24th amendment : outlawed poll tax

• 26th amendment : established voting age of 18

• Voting rights Act of 1965: outlawed poll taxes and other barriers to voting

Election Features

• Primaries: consist of candidates from same party

• General: between different parties

  • Ticket splitting: voter selects candidates for multiple parties

  • Split Vote: 

    • Two candidates only: fair election

    • More than two: divided and conquered

Three Ingredients for a successful campaign: $, campaign organization, media attention</span></p><p><br></p><p><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif"><strong>The Campaign Game</strong></span></p><ul><li><p><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif">Three ingredients for a successful campaign</span></p><ul><li><p><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif">$$

Money in Campaigns

• Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974: Legal limits on campaign contributions and spending

  • Federal election commission: nonprofit groups that support politicians

• Political Action Committees (PACs)- limited by spendings

  • Super PACS have unlimited spending due to citizens united case

Money in Campaign- Landmark Cases

• McCain-Feingold Act of 2002, 2004 a.k.a

  • Bipartisan Campaign reform act: Government should not limit how much a person spends

• Citizens United vs FEC (2010)

The Electoral College

• Located in Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution

  • Expanded in 12th amendment

• Winner-takes-all system

  • Except maine and nebraska

• Electors meet in December