Question 1

Nomination

Accepted Answer

The official endorsement of a can-
didate for office by a political party.

Generally, success in the nomination
game requires momentum, money,
and media attention.

Question 2

Campaign Strategy

Accepted Answer

The master game plan candidates lay
out to guide their electoral campaign.

Question 3

McGovern Fraser Commission

Accepted Answer

A commission formed at the 1968
Democratic convention in response
to demands for reform by minority
groups and others who sought better
representation.

Question 4

Super delegates

Accepted Answer

National party leaders who automati-
cally get a delegate slot at the national

party convention.

Question 5

Invisible primary

Accepted Answer

The period before any votes are cast
when candidates compete to win early
support from the elite of the party and
to create a positive first impression of
their leadership skills.

Question 6

Caucus

Accepted Answer

A system for selecting convention
delegates used in about a dozen states
in which voters must attend an open
meeting to express their presidential
preference.

Question 7

Presidential Primaries

Accepted Answer

Elections in which a state’s voters go
to the polls to express their preference
for a party’s nominee for president.
Most delegates to the national party
conventions are chosen this way.

Question 8

Frontloading

Accepted Answer

The recent tendency of states to hold
primaries early in the calendar in
order to capitalize on media attention.

Question 9

Party Platform

Accepted Answer

A political party’s statement of its
goals and policies for the next four
years. The platform is drafted prior to
the party convention by a committee
whose members are chosen in rough
proportion to each candidate’s

strength.

Question 10

Direct Mail

Accepted Answer

A method of raising money for a
political cause or candidate, in which
information and requests for money
are sent to people whose names appear
on lists of those who have supported
similar views or candidates in the past.

Question 11

Campaign Contributions

Accepted Answer

Donations that are made directly to
a candidate or a party and that must
be reported to the FEC. As of 2012,
individuals were allowed to donate up
to $2,500 per election to a candidate
and up to $30,800 to a political party.

Question 12

Independent Expenditures

Accepted Answer

Expenses on behalf of a political mes-
sage that are made by groups that are

uncoordinated with any candidate’s
campaign.

Question 13

Federal Election Campaign Act

Accepted Answer

A law passed in 1974 for reforming
campaign finances. The act created
the Federal Election Commission and
provided for limits on and disclosure
of campaign contributions.

Question 14

PAC

Accepted Answer

Groups that raise money from indi-
viduals and then distribute it in the

form of contributions to candidates
that the group supports.

Question 15

Federal Election Committee

Accepted Answer

A six-member bipartisan agency
created by the Federal Election
Campaign Act of 1974. The Federal
Election Commission administers and
enforces campaign finance laws.

Question 16

Soft Money

Accepted Answer

Political contributions earmarked
for party-building expenses at the
grassroots level or for generic party

advertising. For a time, such contribu-
tions were unlimited, until they were

banned by the McCain–Feingold Act.

Question 17

527 Groups

Accepted Answer

Independent political groups that are
not subject to contribution restrictions
because they do not directly seek
the election of particular candidates.

Question 18

501c Groups

Accepted Answer

Groups that are exempted from
reporting their contributions and
can receive unlimited contributions.

Question 19

Super PACS

Accepted Answer

may accept donations of any size
and can endorse candidates. Their
contributions and expenditures must
be periodically reported to the FEC.

Question 20

Selective Perception

Accepted Answer

The phenomenon that people’s beliefs
often guide what they pay the most
attention to and how they interpret
events.

Question 21

Suffrage

Accepted Answer

The legal right to vote in the United
States, gradually extended to virtually
all citizens over the age of 18.

Question 22

Political Efficacy

Accepted Answer

The belief that one’s political partici-
pation really matters—that one’s vote

can actually make a difference.

Question 23

Civic Duty

Accepted Answer

The belief that in order to support
democratic government, a citizen
should vote.

Question 24

Voter Registration

Accepted Answer

A system adopted by the states that
requires voters to register prior to
voting. Some states require citizens to
register as much as 30 days in advance,
whereas others permit Election Day
registration.

Question 25

Motor Voter Act

Accepted Answer

A 1993 act that requires states to
permit people to register to vote when
they apply for a driver’s license.

Question 26

Mandate Theory of Elections

Accepted Answer

The idea that the winning candidate
has a mandate from the people to
carry out his or her platforms and
politics. Politicians like the theory
better than political scientists do.

Question 27

Policy Voting

Accepted Answer

Electoral choices that are made on the
basis of the voters’ policy preferences
and where the candidates stand on
policy issues.

Question 28

Electoral College

Accepted Answer

A unique American institution cre-
ated by the Constitution, providing

for the selection of the president by
electors chosen by the state parties.

Question 29

Battleground States

Accepted Answer

The key states that the presidential
campaigns focus on because they are
most likely to decide the outcome of
the Electoral College vote.

Question 30

Interest Group

Accepted Answer

An organization of people with
shared policy goals entering the policy
process at several points to try to
achieve those goals. Interest groups
pursue their goals in many arenas.

Question 31

Pluralism

Accepted Answer

A theory of government and politics
emphasizing that many groups, each
pressing for its preferred policies,
compete and counterbalance one
another in the political marketplace.

Question 32

Elitism

Accepted Answer

A theory of government and politics
contending that an upper-class elite
will hold most of the power and thus
in effect run the government.

Question 33

Hyperplualism

Accepted Answer

A theory of government and politics
contending that groups are so strong
that government, seeking to please
them all, is thereby weakened.

Question 34

Iron Triangle

Accepted Answer

Subgovernments are composed of
interest group leaders interested in
a particular policy, the government
agency in charge of administering
that policy, and the members of
congre ssional committees and
subcommittees

Question 35

Potential Group

Accepted Answer

All the people who might be interest
group members because they share
some common interest.

Question 36

Actual Group

Accepted Answer

The people in the potential group
who actually join.

Question 37

Collective Good

Accepted Answer

Something of value that cannot be
withheld from a potential group
member.

Question 38

Free-Rider Problem

Accepted Answer

For a group, the problem of people not
joining because they can benefit from
the group’s activities without joining.

Question 39

Selective Benefits

Accepted Answer

Goods that a group can restrict to
those who actually join.

Question 40

Single-issue Group

Accepted Answer

Groups that have a narrow interest,
tend to dislike compromise, and often
draw membership from people new to
politics.

Question 41

Lobbying

Accepted Answer

According to Lester Milbrath, a
“communication, by someone other
than a citizen acting on his or her own
behalf, directed to a governmental
decision maker with the hope of
influencing his or her decision.”

Question 42

Electioneering

Accepted Answer

Direct group involvement in the
electoral process, for example, by
helping to fund campaigns, getting
members to work for candidates, and
forming political action committees.

Question 43

Union Shop

Accepted Answer

A provision found in some collective
bargaining agreements requiring all
employees of a business to join the
union within a short period, usually
30 days, and to remain members as a
condition of employment.

Question 44

Right-to-work Laws

Accepted Answer

A state law forbidding requirements
that workers must join a union to
hold their jobs. State right-to-work
laws were specifically permitted by the
Taft-Hartley Act of 1947.

Question 45

Public Interest Lobbies

Accepted Answer

According to Jeffrey Berry, organi-
zations that seek “a collective good,

the achievement of which will not
selectively and materially benefit
the membership or activists of the
organization.”

Question 46

Social Welfare Policies

Accepted Answer

Policies that provide benefits, cash or
in-kind, to individuals, based on either
entitlement or means testing.

Question 47

Unemployment Rate

Accepted Answer

As measured by the Bureau of Labor
Statistics, the proportion of the labor
force actively seeking work but unable
to find jobs.

Question 48

Underemployment Rate

Accepted Answer

(1) people who aren’t working and are
actively seeking a job, (2) those who
would like to work but have given up
looking, and (3) and those who are

working part-time because they can-
not find a full-time position.

Question 49

Inflation

Accepted Answer

A rise in price of goods and services.

Question 50

Consumer Price Index

Accepted Answer

The key measure of inflation—the
change in the cost of buying a fixed
basket of goods and services.

Question 51

Laissez-faire

Accepted Answer

The principle that government should
not meddle in the economy.

Question 52

Monetary Policy

Accepted Answer

Government manipulation of the
supply of money in private hands—
one of two important tools by which
the government can attempt to steer
the economy.

Question 53

Monetarism

Accepted Answer

An economic theory holding that
the supply of money is the key to a
nation’s economic health, with too
much cash and credit in circulation
producing inflation.

Question 54

Federal Reserve System

Accepted Answer

The main instrument for making
monetary policy in the United States.
It was created by Congress in 1913 to
regulate the lending practices of banks
and thus the money supply.

Question 55

Fiscal Policy

Accepted Answer

Use of the federal budget—taxes,
spending, and borrowing—to
influence the economy;

Question 56

Keynesian Economic Theory

Accepted Answer

the theory empha-
sizing that government spending and

deficits can help the economy deal
with its ups and downs.

Question 57

Supply-side Theory

Accepted Answer

An economic theory, first applied
during the Reagan administration,
holding that the key task for fiscal
policy is to stimulate the supply of
goods, as by cutting tax rates.

Question 58

Entitlement Programs

Accepted Answer

Government programs providing
benefits to qualified individuals
regardless of need.

Question 59

Means-tested Programs

Accepted Answer

Government programs providing
benefits only to individuals who
qualify based on specific needs.

Question 60

Income Distribution

Accepted Answer

The way the national income is
divided into “shares” ranging from the
poor to the rich.

Question 61

Relative Deprivation

Accepted Answer

A perception by an individual that he
or she is not doing well economically
in comparison to others.

Question 62

Income

Accepted Answer

The amount of money collected
between any two points in time.

Question 63

Wealth

Accepted Answer

The value of assets owned.

Question 64

Poverty Line

Accepted Answer

The income threshold below which
people are considered poor, based on

what a family must spend for an “aus-
tere” standard of living, traditionally

set at three times the cost of a subsist-
ence diet.

unit 5 test

AP Gov

Question	Answer
Nomination	The official endorsement of a can- didate for office by a political party. Generally, success in the nomination game requires momentum, money, and media attention.
Campaign Strategy	The master game plan candidates lay out to guide their electoral campaign.
McGovern Fraser Commission	A commission formed at the 1968 Democratic convention in response to demands for reform by minority groups and others who sought better representation.
Super delegates	National party leaders who automati- cally get a delegate slot at the national party convention.
Invisible primary	The period before any votes are cast when candidates compete to win early support from the elite of the party and to create a positive first impression of their leadership skills.
Caucus	A system for selecting convention delegates used in about a dozen states in which voters must attend an open meeting to express their presidential preference.
Presidential Primaries	Elections in which a state’s voters go to the polls to express their preference for a party’s nominee for president. Most delegates to the national party conventions are chosen this way.
Frontloading	The recent tendency of states to hold primaries early in the calendar in order to capitalize on media attention.
Party Platform	A political party’s statement of its goals and policies for the next four years. The platform is drafted prior to the party convention by a committee whose members are chosen in rough proportion to each candidate’s strength.
Direct Mail	A method of raising money for a political cause or candidate, in which information and requests for money are sent to people whose names appear on lists of those who have supported similar views or candidates in the past.
Campaign Contributions	Donations that are made directly to a candidate or a party and that must be reported to the FEC. As of 2012, individuals were allowed to donate up to $2,500 per election to a candidate and up to $30,800 to a political party.
Independent Expenditures	Expenses on behalf of a political mes- sage that are made by groups that are uncoordinated with any candidate’s campaign.
Federal Election Campaign Act	A law passed in 1974 for reforming campaign finances. The act created the Federal Election Commission and provided for limits on and disclosure of campaign contributions.
PAC	Groups that raise money from indi- viduals and then distribute it in the form of contributions to candidates that the group supports.
Federal Election Committee	A six-member bipartisan agency created by the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974. The Federal Election Commission administers and enforces campaign finance laws.
Soft Money	Political contributions earmarked for party-building expenses at the grassroots level or for generic party advertising. For a time, such contribu- tions were unlimited, until they were banned by the McCain–Feingold Act.
527 Groups	Independent political groups that are not subject to contribution restrictions because they do not directly seek the election of particular candidates.
501c Groups	Groups that are exempted from reporting their contributions and can receive unlimited contributions.
Super PACS	may accept donations of any size and can endorse candidates. Their contributions and expenditures must be periodically reported to the FEC.
Selective Perception	The phenomenon that people’s beliefs often guide what they pay the most attention to and how they interpret events.
Suffrage	The legal right to vote in the United States, gradually extended to virtually all citizens over the age of 18.
Political Efficacy	The belief that one’s political partici- pation really matters—that one’s vote can actually make a difference.
Civic Duty	The belief that in order to support democratic government, a citizen should vote.
Voter Registration	A system adopted by the states that requires voters to register prior to voting. Some states require citizens to register as much as 30 days in advance, whereas others permit Election Day registration.
Motor Voter Act	A 1993 act that requires states to permit people to register to vote when they apply for a driver’s license.
Mandate Theory of Elections	The idea that the winning candidate has a mandate from the people to carry out his or her platforms and politics. Politicians like the theory better than political scientists do.
Policy Voting	Electoral choices that are made on the basis of the voters’ policy preferences and where the candidates stand on policy issues.
Electoral College	A unique American institution cre- ated by the Constitution, providing for the selection of the president by electors chosen by the state parties.
Battleground States	The key states that the presidential campaigns focus on because they are most likely to decide the outcome of the Electoral College vote.
Interest Group	An organization of people with shared policy goals entering the policy process at several points to try to achieve those goals. Interest groups pursue their goals in many arenas.
Pluralism	A theory of government and politics emphasizing that many groups, each pressing for its preferred policies, compete and counterbalance one another in the political marketplace.
Elitism	A theory of government and politics contending that an upper-class elite will hold most of the power and thus in effect run the government.
Hyperplualism	A theory of government and politics contending that groups are so strong that government, seeking to please them all, is thereby weakened.
Iron Triangle	Subgovernments are composed of interest group leaders interested in a particular policy, the government agency in charge of administering that policy, and the members of congre ssional committees and subcommittees
Potential Group	All the people who might be interest group members because they share some common interest.
Actual Group	The people in the potential group who actually join.
Collective Good	Something of value that cannot be withheld from a potential group member.
Free-Rider Problem	For a group, the problem of people not joining because they can benefit from the group’s activities without joining.
Selective Benefits	Goods that a group can restrict to those who actually join.
Single-issue Group	Groups that have a narrow interest, tend to dislike compromise, and often draw membership from people new to politics.
Lobbying	According to Lester Milbrath, a “communication, by someone other than a citizen acting on his or her own behalf, directed to a governmental decision maker with the hope of influencing his or her decision.”
Electioneering	Direct group involvement in the electoral process, for example, by helping to fund campaigns, getting members to work for candidates, and forming political action committees.
Union Shop	A provision found in some collective bargaining agreements requiring all employees of a business to join the union within a short period, usually 30 days, and to remain members as a condition of employment.
Right-to-work Laws	A state law forbidding requirements that workers must join a union to hold their jobs. State right-to-work laws were specifically permitted by the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947.
Public Interest Lobbies	According to Jeffrey Berry, organi- zations that seek “a collective good, the achievement of which will not selectively and materially benefit the membership or activists of the organization.”
Social Welfare Policies	Policies that provide benefits, cash or in-kind, to individuals, based on either entitlement or means testing.
Unemployment Rate	As measured by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the proportion of the labor force actively seeking work but unable to find jobs.
Underemployment Rate	(1) people who aren’t working and are actively seeking a job, (2) those who would like to work but have given up looking, and (3) and those who are working part-time because they can- not find a full-time position.
Inflation	A rise in price of goods and services.
Consumer Price Index	The key measure of inflation—the change in the cost of buying a fixed basket of goods and services.
Laissez-faire	The principle that government should not meddle in the economy.
Monetary Policy	Government manipulation of the supply of money in private hands— one of two important tools by which the government can attempt to steer the economy.
Monetarism	An economic theory holding that the supply of money is the key to a nation’s economic health, with too much cash and credit in circulation producing inflation.
Federal Reserve System	The main instrument for making monetary policy in the United States. It was created by Congress in 1913 to regulate the lending practices of banks and thus the money supply.
Fiscal Policy	Use of the federal budget—taxes, spending, and borrowing—to influence the economy;
Keynesian Economic Theory	the theory empha- sizing that government spending and deficits can help the economy deal with its ups and downs.
Supply-side Theory	An economic theory, first applied during the Reagan administration, holding that the key task for fiscal policy is to stimulate the supply of goods, as by cutting tax rates.
Entitlement Programs	Government programs providing benefits to qualified individuals regardless of need.
Means-tested Programs	Government programs providing benefits only to individuals who qualify based on specific needs.
Income Distribution	The way the national income is divided into “shares” ranging from the poor to the rich.
Relative Deprivation	A perception by an individual that he or she is not doing well economically in comparison to others.
Income	The amount of money collected between any two points in time.
Wealth	The value of assets owned.
Poverty Line	The income threshold below which people are considered poor, based on what a family must spend for an “aus- tere” standard of living, traditionally set at three times the cost of a subsist- ence diet.
Feminization of Poverty	The increasing concentration of poverty among women, especially unmarried women and their children.
Progressive Tax	A tax by which the government takes a greater share of the income of the rich than of the poor—for example, when a rich family pays 50 percent of its income in taxes, and a poor family pays 5 percent.
Proportional Tax	A tax by which the government takes the same share of income from every- one, rich and poor alike.
Regressive Tax	A tax in which the burden falls relatively more heavily on low-income groups than on wealthy taxpayers. The opposite of a progressive tax, in which tax rates increase as income increases.
EI Tax Credit	Also known as the EITC, a refundable federal income tax credit for low- to moderate-income working individuals and families, even if they did not earn enough money to be required to file a tax return.
Transfer Payments	Benefits given by the government directly to individuals—either cash transfers, such as Social Security pay- ments, or in-kind transfers, such as food stamps and low-interest college loans.
SS Act of 1935	Created both the Social Security program and a national assistance program for poor families, usu- ally called Aid to Families with Dependent Children.
Personal RWOR Act	The welfare reform law of 1996, which implemented the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program.
TANF	Replacing Aid to Families with Dependent Children as the program for public assistance to needy families, TANF requires people on welfare to find work within two years and sets a lifetime maximum of five years.
SS Trust Fund	The “account” into which Social Security employee and employer contributions are “deposited” and used to pay out eligible recipients.
HMO	Organization contracted by individu- als or insurance companies to provide health care for a yearly fee. Such net- work health plans limit the choice of doctors and treatments.
Medicare	A program added to the Social Security system in 1965 that provides hospitalization insurance for the eld- erly and permits older Americans to purchase inexpensive coverage for doctor fees and other medical expenses.
Medicaid	A public assistance program designed to provide health care for poor Americans and funded by both the states and the national government.
National Health Insurance	A compulsory insurance program for all Americans that would have the government finance citizens’ medi- cal care. First proposed by President Harry S. Truman.
EPA	The largest federal independent regulatory agency, created in 1970 to administer much of U.S. environmen- tal protection policy.
National Environmental Policy Act	Passed in 1969, the centerpiece of federal environmental policy, which requires agencies to file environmental impact statements.
Environmental Impact Statements	A detailing of a proposed policy’s environmental effects, which agen- cies are required to file with the EPA every time they propose to undertake a policy that might be disruptive to the environment.
Clean Air Act of 1970	The law aimed at combating air pol- lution, by charging the EPA with pro- tecting and improving the quality of the nation’s air.
Water Pollution Control Act of 1972	A law intended to clean up the nation’s rivers and lakes by enabling regulation of point sources of pollution.
Endangered Species Act	A law requiring the federal govern- ment to protect all species listed as endangered.
Superfund	A fund created by Congress in 1980 to clean up hazardous waste sites. Money for the fund comes from tax- ing chemical products.
Global Warming	The increase in the earth’s tempera- tures that, according to most scientists, is occurring as a result of the carbon dioxide that is produced when fos- sil fuels are burned collecting in the atmosphere and trapping energy from the sun.
Foreign Policy	Policy that involves choice taking about relations with the rest of the world. The president is the chief initiator of U.S. foreign policy.
United Nations	Created in 1945 and currently includ- ing 193 member nations, with a central peacekeeping mission and programs in areas including economic development and health, education, and welfare. The seat of real power in the UN is the Security Council.
NATO	A regional organization that was cre- ated in 1949 by nations including the United States, Canada, and most Western European nations for mutual defense and has subsequently been expanded.
European Union	A transnational government com- posed of most European nations that coordinates monetary, trade, immi- gration, and labor policies, making its members one economic unit.
Secretary of State	The head of the Department of State and traditionally the key adviser to the president on foreign policy.
Secretary of Defense	The head of the Department of Defense and the president’s key adviser on military policy and, as such, a key foreign policy actor.
Joint Chiefs of Staff	A group that consists of the com- manding officers of each of the armed services, a chairperson, and a vice chairperson, and advises the president on military policy.
CIA	An agency created after World War II to coordinate American intelligence activities abroad and to collect, ana- lyze, and evaluate intelligence.
Isolationism	The foreign policy course the United States followed throughout most of its history whereby it tried to stay out of other nations’ conflicts, particularly European wars.
Containment Doctrine	A foreign policy strategy advocated by George Kennan that called for the United States to isolate the Soviet Union,
Arms Race	A tense relationship beginning in the 1950s between the Soviet Union and the United States whereby one side’s weaponry became the other side’s goad to procure more weaponry, and so on.
Detente	A policy, beginning in the early 1970s, that sought a relaxation of tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union, coupled with firm guar- antees of mutual security.
Interdependency	Mutual reliance, as in the economic realm, in which actions in nations reverberate and affect the economic well-being of people in other nations.
Tariff	A special tax added to imported goods to raise their price, thereby protecting businesses and workers from foreign competition.
Balance of Trade	The ratio of what is paid for imports to what is earned from exports. When more is paid than earned, there is a balance-of-trade deficit.
OPEC	An economic organization consisting primarily of Middle Eastern nations that seeks to control the amount of oil its members produce and sell to other nations and hence the price of oil.

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