Chapter 12 govt.

Pork-barrel legislation

deals with specific projects and their location within a particular congressional district.

Members of Congress can represent the people in two ways: as a ______, a member of Congress acts on the express preferences of his or her constituency; as a ______, a member is more loosely tied to constituents and makes the decisions he or she thinks are best.

delegate; trustee

Who decides which committee assignments members of the House of Representatives receive?

each party's own "steering and policy" committee

"Closed rule" and "open rule" refer to congressional provisions regarding

floor debate on a bill

The role the House of Representatives plays in impeachments can best be compared with that of a

grand jury

Which of the following statements concerning the process of reapportionment is correct?

in order for one state to gain a seat, another state must lose a seat.

A(n) ______ has the same status as a treaty but does not require Senate approval.

international accord multilateral initiative executive agreement foreign policy position

In the House of Representatives, the majority leader

is subordinate to the Speaker of the House

Which of the following statements concerning the representation of women and minorities in the U.S. Congress is true?

Representation of women and minorities has increased over the past two decades, but is not comparable to their proportions in the general population.

The determination of the time and structure of floor debate on a bill, in the House of Representatives, is up to the

Rules Committee

Which statement about the membership of Congress is not true?

Senators and members of the House are less likely than the population on the whole to be Protestants.

Who is the Speaker of the House?

The elected leader of the majority party in the House is the Speaker.

The most common occupation among members of Congress before coming to Congress is

lawyer

When two members of Congress who share no common interests agree to support each other's bills, the practice is called

logrolling

Congress adjourns during a ten-day period after presenting the president with a bill, and the president takes no action. This is known as a

pocket veto

Congressional leaders form ______ committees when they want to take up an issue that falls between the jurisdiction of existing committees, to highlight an issue, or to investigate a particular problem.

select

In addition to pressuring members of Congress to vote a certain way on a bill, interest groups also have substantial influence in

setting the legislative agenda.

Agencies in Congress designed to oversee administrative agencies and evaluate presidential proposals are called

staff agencies.

The House Ways and Means Committee has jurisdiction over which of the following areas?

taxes, trade, and entitlement programs

One reason some people support the instatement of term limits in the House and Senate is

that it will increase turnover and get new faces into Congress.

Which of the following best describes a way in which the House differs from the Senate?

the House is more centralized and organized than the Senate

Oversight can best be described as

the efforts of congress to supervise the manner in which its laws are implemented by the executive branch

The need to divide the labor of legislation is best exemplified in what formal structure of Congress?

the establishment of standing committees

According to the text, which of the following is not an important influence on the legislative agenda of Congress?

the federal courts

Which of the following does not typically affect an individual's decision to run for elected office?

the individual's ability to meet the extensive list of educational requirements defined by local, state, and federal laws

The Senate's constitutional power of advice and consent extends to which of the following?

the president's power to make treaties with foreign nations

Cloture is

the process by which three-fifths of the Senate can end a filibuster

Gerrymandering refers to

to the process of carving out legislative districts for political advantage.

The idea of ______ identifies the best representative as the one who shares a similar racial, ethnic, religious, or occupational background with those he or she represents.

trustee representation

Which of the following is the best definition of a congressional caucus?

unofficial groups of representatives or senators sharing similar interests or opinions

Three factors related to the American electoral system affect who is elected to office in this country and what they do once they get there. Those factors are

who decides to run for office, incumbency, and the drawing of district lines.

Approximately what percentage of proposed bills die in committee?

95 percent

The process of allocating congressional seats among the fifty states is called

Apportionment

Which of the following is not a service often provided by representatives to their constituents?

Offering constituents legal advice regarding new administrative laws

A senator or representative running for re-election is called the

INCUMBENT

Which statement about a party unity vote is true?

In 2005, party unity voting was close to an all-time high

Which of the following is the best definition of a constituent?

It is a person who lives in the district represented by a member of the legislature.

Responsibility for communicating the leader's wishes to members in Congress lies with the

Whip System

A vote on which 50 percent or more of the members of one party take one position while at least 50 percent of the members of the other party take the opposing position is called

a party unity vote.

The filibuster is likely to remain a feature of legislative politics in the United States because

a sixty-seven vote majority is required to eliminate it.

Congress is a ______ legislature with ______ members.

bicameral, 535

When the House and the Senate coordinate two versions of the same bill, they will often use a ______ to obtain a single unified bill.

conference committee

Which of the following is not a resource congressional party leaders have at their disposal to secure the unity and cooperation of their members?

constituency service