The Supreme Court rarely invalidates federal statutes.
President George W. Bush appointed a higher proportion of Hispanic judges to the
federal courts than any other president.
The mission was an important institution of Spanish colonization.
The Cabinet is a constitutionally mandated set of presidential advisors.
The Federal Reserve System was created to adjust the money supply to the needs of
agriculture, commerce, and industry.
The Texas Courts of Appeals have exclusively civil jurisdiction.
Individualism stresses the primacy of the individual conscience as the basis of behavior
and is the product of seventeenth century Protestantism.
A CEO of a large conglomerate would most likely align with Republicans.
The Texas governor is the president of the Texas Senate.
Suppose a poll includes 1,000 respondents, ensuring that the number of those sampled
in a rural area is proportional to the actual rural population of the United States. This is
called stratifying the sample.
Under one of the pillars of No Child Left Behind, parents should take an active role in
the education of their children.
The Obama campaign had large grassroots efforts in all 50 states.
The Treaty of Paris, signed in 1763, stipulated that France would cede its claims to any
lands west of the Mississippi River.
Texas is the only state in the nation which has a constitutional mandate for a balanced
budget.
An Equal Rights Amendment was added to the Texas Constitution in 1972.
Measures undertaken by Republicans to require photo identification for voters in Texas
was one of the most divisive partisan issues of the 2009 Texas legislative session.
The Electoral College takes the power to directly elect the president out of the citizens’
hands.
The Civil Rights Cases promulgated the doctrine of ‘separate but equal”.
According to current U.S. immigration policy, if a raft of Cuban refugees succeeded in
landing on U.S. shores, they cannot be immediately returned to their country.
Human rights became an important part of American foreign policy during the
presidency of Ronald Reagan.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit includes California and Oregon.
A provision in the 1845 Texas Constitution that provided for the emancipation of slaves
was strengthened in the Constitution of 1861.
Most states use partisan systems to elect judges.
The peak of executions occurred during the 1990s.
There is a strong consensus in the United States about which foreign policy initiatives
to pursue.
The Framers agreed that a free press was necessary to monitor government and assure
the continuation of a democratic society.
The courts have ruled that the bureaucracy does not have to recognize due process
rights.
W. Mark Felt, the source used by Washington Post journalists Bob Woodward and Carl
Bernstein to report of President Richard M. Nixon’s role in the Watergate scandal, was
never referred to by name or by his place of employment. If they were to reveal
anything about his identity, he would refuse to provide more information. Thus, he
spoke on condition of deep cover.
Seniority plays no role in committee assignments in either the Texas Senate or House.
The Constitutional Convention of 1974 was an example of a piecemeal revision effort.
Vote choice is absent of party considerations.
Among the provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a prohibition on arbitrary
discrimination in employment.
In terms of the importance of political parties, today may be described as similar to the
Era of Good Feeling.
The length of the campaign season greatly influences who candidates meet on the
campaign trail.
The rise of pro-business groups in response to the creation of Progressive era groups is
an illustration of ________’s theory of interest group formation.
A) David B. Truman
B) Jeffrey M. Berry
C) Mancur Olson
D) Robert Salisbury
E) William Lloyd Garrison
As mayor of your small hometown, you cut ribbons at store openings and speak at
Rotary Club luncheons. You preside over your city council meetings, but your vote is
no more significant than that of any other member of the council which, as a body, runs
the city. You have no executive power, nor is there any city manager with executive
power. What kind of city government are you serving under?
A) Strong mayor-council
B) Weak mayor-council
C) Council-manager
D) Commission
E) Home-rule
Since 1869, the Supreme Court has consisted of ________ associate justices.
A) six
B) seven
C) eight
D) nine
E) ten
All of the following can be issued by a municipal court EXCEPT
A) verdicts.
B) warrants.
C) fines over $500.
D) fines under $500.
E) jail time.
Assume you are on a jury in a felony criminal trial in state district court. If you believe
the accused is guilty, how many of the other eleven jurors must you persuade to agree
with you to convict?
A) 10
B) Five
C) Seven
D) 11
E) None; it only takes one vote to convict
During the 1970s, the Supreme Court found that ________ was protected by the right to
privacy implied from guarantees in the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment.
A) an absolute right to abortion
B) a woman’s right to sex education
C) the right of married couples to have access to information on birth defects
D) an absolute right to disseminate birth control information to minors
E) a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy under certain conditions
The Texas Highway Trust Fund is an example of a(an) _____ fund.
A) dedicated
B) mandated
C) implemented
D) non-profit
E) endowment
A conservative group formed in 1978 and led by the Rev. Jerry Falwell was called the
A) Christian Coalition.
B) Family Research Council.
C) Eagle Forum.
D) Moral Majority.
E) Conservative Public Coalition.
Polls show that women and men
A) hold identical views on 99 percent of issues.
B) hold different views on a variety of social issues.
C) hold identical views on social issues.
D) hold identical views on foreign policy issues.
E) hold different views on only one or two minor issues.
President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty
A) was an unprecedented expansion of the federal government and its bureaucracy.
B) was a way for him to curry favor with southern legislators.
C) produced additional growth in the bureaucracy.
D) was equal in scope to President Theodore Roosevelt’s expansion of the federal
bureaucracy.
E) was unrelated to fighting discrimination.
Which of the following lessons can be taken away from the 2008 Democratic primary
in Texas between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama?
A) Size matters.
B) Front-loading is always beneficial.
C) There are some advantages to having a late primary election date.
D) The Texas primary handed the general election to Barack Obama.
E) The “Texas two-step” encourages voter fraud.
The advantage that MOST helps members of Congress stay in office is
A) redistricting.
B) incumbency.
C) political action committees.
D) being a member of the president’s party.
E) demographics.
InEyes on the Prize, Juan Williams wrote of the social code in the American South:
I. Whites did not have to remove their hats even when they entered a black family’s
home.
II. There were Jim Crow schools.
III. Blacks were supposed to tip their hats.
IV. Blacks were to be called by their first names.
A) I only
B) II and III
C) I and IV
D) II, III, and IV
E) I, II, III, and IV
Suppose three candidates are running in the Texas Democratic primary for governor.
What happens if Candidate X wins 45% of the vote, Candidate Y receives 30% of the
vote, and Candidate Z wins 25% of the vote?
A) Candidate X becomes the governor.
B) Candidate X becomes the Democratic candidate for governor.
C) Candidates X and Y compete in the general election to determine who will be
governor.
D) Candidates X and Y compete in a run-off election to determine who will be the
Democratic
candidate for governor.
E) Candidates X, Y, and Z compete in a run-off election to determine who will be the
Democratic
candidate for governor.
In general, the justices serving on the Roberts Court in 2010 share all of the following
characteristics EXCEPT
A) they all graduated from Ivy League or other prestigious law schools.
B) they are all Protestant or Catholic.
C) they all served on the U.S. Court of Appeals.
D) they have been appointed to the Court between 1975 and 2010.
E) they share all of the above characteristics.
Litigation, today a common tool of interest groups, was first practiced extensively by
what groups in the 1950s and 1960s?
A) Professional and labor groups
B) Business and professional groups
C) Environmental and civil rights groups
D) Professional and environmental groups
E) Civil rights and labor groups
According to the text, globalization presents numerous challenges to the American
bureaucracy in that
A) if other countries are in charge, cultural disputes sometimes prevent progress.
B) there are constantly competing interests.
C) multinational organizations cause confusion as to who is in charge.
D) international law always supersedes national law.
E) it is unclear how international organizations can be held accountable.
________ is/are crucial to the success of all interest groups.
A) Political support
B) Funding
C) Direct mail
D) PACs
E) Media advertising
One of the major reasons Jerry Brown beat Meg Whitman in the California
gubernatorial election was
A) his issue agenda.
B) young voter turnout.
C) Republican voter turnout.
D) the gender gap.
E) his charisma.
Ordinary individuals who collect, report, and analyze news content are most accurately
called
A) embedded journalists.
B) political reporters.
C) citizen journalists.
D) residential reporters.
E) amateur anchors.
Which of the following is MOST relevant to the growing concern over the prevalence
of media conglomerates?
A) The Parker-Dobbs Act
B) The Sherman Anti-Trust Act
C) The Federal Reserve Act
D) The Anti-Monopoly Act
E) The Interstate Commerce Act
Literary Digest used ________ polls to predict the popular vote in presidential
elections.
A) exit
B) straw
C) tracking
D) deliberative
E) representative
Because the Texas legislature meets in regular session only once every other year,
A) legislators must pass a state budget during its regular session for the first year and
during a special session for the next year.
B) legislators must pass a budget during its regular session for the first year and the
governor must enact a budget for the next year.
C) legislators must pass a biennial, or two-year, budget for Texas government.
D) the Legislative Budget Board enacts the budget without input from the legislature.
E) Texas operates in an ad hoc fashion without using a budget.
In the Texas Senate, members of committees and committee chairs are assigned
A) by the lieutenant governor.
B) according to seniority.
C) by the lieutenant governor and according to a weak seniority system.
D) by a vote of the full Senate.
E) by the majority leader of the Senate.
How many presidents have been impeached?
A) One
B) Two
C) Three
D) Four
E) Five
Interest groups
A) rely on voter guides.
B) successfully lobbied for the U.S. to honor the Kyoto Protocol on climate change.
C) often hire lobbying firms to represent them in Washington, D.C.
D) are largely libertarian in focus.
E) have greater access when Democrats are in office.
Of the following interest group leaders, all but ___________ served key leadership
roles in progressive groups.
A) Marian Wright Edelman
B) the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.
C) Ralph Nader
D) Elizabeth Cady Stanton
E) the Reverend Jerry Falwell
According to the text, which of the following is an ideology that political scientists
generally do not measure?
A) Moderate
B) Liberal
C) Fiscal conservative
D) Social conservative
E) Libertarian
State legislators in ________ states have term-limit laws.
A) all fifty
B) more than half of
C) about half of
D) fewer than half of
E) only ten
Interest groups most often participate in Supreme Court cases through the use of
A) amicus curiae briefs.
B) monetary donations.
C) direct mail campaigns.
D) marches, protests, and petitions.
E) case sponsorship.
Who dominated Texas politics from a period immediately following Reconstruction
until the latter part of the twentieth century?
A) Prohibitionists
B) Libertarians
C) E.J. Davis
D) The Democratic Party
E) The Republican Party