In 1914, Congress, at the request of the Wilson administration, created the ________ to
protect small businesses and the public from unfair business practices and competition.
A) Interstate Commerce Commission
B) Department of Economic Affairs
C) Department of Commerce
D) Federal Trade Commission
E) Anti-Monopoly and Trust Commission
________ is the largest Hispanic group in the United States.
A) The Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund
B) The Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund
C) The League of United Latin American Citizens
D) The Council of Hispanics
E) The Hispanic Anti-Discrimination and Defamation Council
In recent years, Congress has expressed its unhappiness with Supreme Court decisions
on abortion and gay rights by
A) refusing to confirm new lower federal judges until the Court reverses its decision.
B) ignoring its decisions.
C) blocking confirmation votes on President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominees.
D) attempting to alter the Court’s jurisdiction.
E) threatening to reduce the justices’ salaries.
The National Defense and Education Act was a policy designed to
A) teach military strategy.
B) emphasize math and science in schools in an ultimate effort to fight communism.
C) add funding to military schools.
D) introduce military history in high schools.
E) promote English-only education.
Under the ________ Amendment, the police may search things in plain view, the person
arrested, and things under the arrestee’s immediate control.
A) Third
B) Fourth
C) Fifth
D) Sixth
E) Eighth
The suffrage movement
A) promoted broad social issues.
B) had racist overtones.
C) promoted voting rights for blacks.
D) advocated equal rights for women.
E) led to passage of the Eighteenth Amendment.
Almost every political issue in Texas politics can be viewed as a conflict over the ideas
A) found in the Texas Constitution of 1876.
B) rooted in Texas’s experience as a slave state before Reconstruction.
C) in the Texan Creed.
D) that were handed down from the state’s English and Spanish legal traditions.
E) found in the Declaration of Independence.
You are an attorney and prior to trial you are attempting to establish the trial’s scope
with questions about what evidence is admissible and what witnesses may testify about.
These and other similar issues are determined in the
A) pretrial motions.
B) magistrate appearance.
C) grand jury indictment.
D) arraignment.
E) post-trial motions
The American Independent Party, founded in 1968, took root as a result of what issue?
A) Desegregation
B) Tax reform
C) Social justice
D) Prohibition
E) Factionalism within the Republican Party
The legislative campaign season in Japan
A) is longer than that in the United States.
B) is comparable to the length of the campaign season in Israel.
C) has far greater restrictions on length than the United States.
D) is limited to 60 or fewer days.
E) includes direct mailings to potential voters.
Voter turnout rates are most similar in
A) France and the United Kingdom.
B) the United States and France.
C) Japan and Denmark.
D) the United States and Japan.
E) France and Denmark.
Supporters of the Wagner Act would be disappointed at the relatively low level of union
participation in the modern era.
Members of the House often seek positions on the Judiciary Committee
A) to bring back pork to the district.
B) to help them win earmarks.
C) to help them win reelection.
D) because they aspire to an eventual position on the U.S. Supreme Court.
E) because they are interested in matters that come before the committee.
The Texas Constitution has ________ numbered articles.
A) 3
B) 7
C) 27
D) 254
E) 467
Which of the following states did Barack Obama carry in the 2008 election?
A) Virginia
B) Georgia
C) South Carolina
D) Texas
E) Mississippi
“Congress in session is Congress on exhibition, whilst Congress in its committee rooms
is Congress at work,” wrote
A) John F. Kennedy.
B) Lyndon B. Johnson.
C) Abraham Lincoln.
D) Woodrow Wilson.
E) Theodore Roosevelt.
“The power to tax is the power to destroy” comes from
A) Alexander Hamilton’s essay in The Federalist Papers.
B) Thomas Paine’s The Crisis.
C) John Marshall’s opinion in McCulloch v. Maryland.
D) John Marshall’s opinion in Gibbons v. Ogden.
E) James Madison’s essay in The Federalist Papers.
Under the Articles of Confederation, the executive branch was
A) relatively weak.
B) nonexistent.
C) quite strong.
D) responsible for executing all laws.
E) able to raise a national army.
The big winner in the 2010 midterm elections was the
A) Democratic Party.
B) Republican Party.
C) middle-aged woman.
D) Mama Grizzly.
E) independent candidate.
Interstate compacts
A) were abolished by the Bush Administration.
B) have not been particularly successful in helping states carry out their functions.
C) can exist only between five or fewer states.
D) allow you to transfer your driver’s license from one state to another.
E) are made between states and the federal government.
Crispus Attucks is said to be
A) the founder of the Committees of Correspondence.
B) the first man killed in the Revolution.
C) the only Georgia delegate to the Continental Congress.
D) a militia leader in Shays’s Rebellion.
E) the author of Common Sense.
The Senate’s checks on the bureaucracy include
I. the power to confirm presidential appointees.
II. its investigatory powers.
III. its ability to remove presidential appointees for any reason.
IV. congressional review.
A) I and II
B) I, III, and IV
C) II, III, and IV
D) I, II, and IV
E) I, II, III, and IV
Historically, some of the biggest gender differences in political attitudes have been on
A) gun control.
B) gay rights.
C) economic issues.
D) abortion.
E) military issues.
Based on the average age of the state’s population, which issue would you expect to be
least important to voters in Florida?
A) Social Security
B) Medicare benefits for the elderly
C) Regulation of nursing homes
D) Public education
E) Prescription drug costs
The most commonly used system of judicial selection is
A) partisan elections.
B) nonpartisan elections.
C) the merit plan.
D) gubernatorial appointment.
E) legislative appointment.
Among the powers of the judiciary specified in Article III are all of the following
EXCEPT
A) all cases involving maritime law.
B) controversies between two states.
C) controversies between citizens of two states.
D) controversies between Congress and the president.
E) all cases affecting ambassadors or other public ministers.
Texas’s method of financing elementary and secondary public education through a
combination of state and local revenue has produced
A) wide disparities in education spending and, as a result, considerable controversy and
litigation.
B) an efficient, equitable, and fair system of education funding for Texas public
schools.
C) the highest level of per capita funding for school children anywhere in the country.
D) equal per-student funding across the state.
E) public praise and international acclaim.
Based upon the text, Americans have the most difficulty forming opinions about
A) women candidates.
B) domestic policy.
C) policies that don’t affect them personally.
D) social security.
E) the amount of taxes they pay.
Local governments derive their power from
A) the federal government.
B) state governments.
C) one another.
D) independent charters.
E) both federal and state governments.
The president’s 1823 pledge that the United States would oppose any attempt by
European states to extend political control in the Western Hemisphere was called the
A) Madison Rule.
B) Adams Doctrine.
C) Monroe Doctrine.
D) Jackson Principle.
E) Jefferson Rule.