15
By what year were most federal government positions protected by the Pendleton Act?
1900
Starting in what era did parties hire pollsters to conduct survey research for their candidates, leaving the candidates beholden to the party for the data?
1930s
_____ presidential election, in which the Shivercrats ran for office, broke the tradition of straight-ticket Democratic voting in Texas.
1952
In which era was there a shift from party-centered politics to more candidate-centered politics?
1970s
John Tower was first elected in 1961. In what year was the next Republican elected to statewide office in Texas?
1978
Republicans in Texas experienced setbacks in which of the following elections?
1982
Republicans bounced back in the elections of ______ and set the stage for today's Republican Party.
1986
The Republican Party has controlled the governor's office in Texas without interruption since
1994
After what election did the Republican Party hold all statewide offices and comprise the majority in both the Texas House and Senate?
2000
At the state level, Texas elects ______ state senators and ______ representatives.
31; 150
At the national level, Texas elects 2 senators and ______ representatives.
36
The Texas Republican Party suffered a big setback in 1990 when Democrat ______ was elected to the governor's office.
Ann Richards
Which of the following accurately describes the Shivercrats?
Conservative Democrats who stood for office as both Democratic and Republican candidates
Voting for which presidential candidate ended the Texas tradition of straight-ticket balloting for Democrats?
Dwight Eisenhower
The only instance of one-party Republican politics in Texas before the 1990s was during Reconstruction under the governorship of
Edmund J. Davis.
True or false: Ballot reforms increased the influence of political parties on the voting process.
False
Throughout most of U.S. history, competitive parties have always existed at the national level. How does Texas compare?
For most of Texas's history, one party has tended to dominate.
Which of the following were political parties that developed in Texas in the latter half of the nineteenth century?
Greenback Party the Grange People's Party
What was Sam Houston's position with respect to the issue of slavery?
He opposed it.
In Texas, how significant is the digital divide for politics?
It is significant.
Adoption of the Australian ballot initiated which of the following changes?
It reduced party influence at the local level.
What effect does candidate-centered politics have on political parties?
It weakens political parties.
For many years in Texas, the Democratic Party
Leaned very conservative and traditional
The resignation of ______ as a U.S. senator allowed Texas Republicans to capture their second U.S. Senate seat in 1992.
Lloyd Bentsen
How has party dealignment affected the relationship between candidates and parties?
Many candidates distance themselves from parties to make a more direct connection with the voters.
______ is a technique in which data is gathered about individuals and used to "serve up personalized messages to prospective voters."
Microtargeting
Which of the following is true of party politics in Texas from the end of Reconstruction until the 1960s?
No Republican was elected to statewide office.
Why was Phil Gramm able to easily win the special election for the U.S. House in 1983?
No other candidate could put together a campaign in the short time between his resignation and the election.
Which of the following describes the interaction between Texas state legislators and federal legislators from Texas?
Overall there is very little interaction, but they occasionally find some common ground.
In what way has the role of political parties changed since the era of labor-intensive politics?
Parties are no longer solely in charge of the purse strings of candidates' campaigns.
Phil Gramm was elected to the House of Representatives as a Democrat, but he soon began to lean toward the Republicans partly through his close relationship to which president?
Reagan
Who among the following dominated the politics and government of the Republic of Texas?
Sam Houston Mirabeau Lamar
What prominent Tea Party candidate in Texas has held a U.S. Senate seat since 2012?
Ted Cruz
Which of the following statements about the political party system in the United States is accurate?
The United States has 50 state party systems.
What best describes libertarian efforts at party-building in Texas?
They have made little progress.
Which of the following is historically true of political parties in the United States?
They have never been strongly centralized.
What is the chief goal of a political party?
To have its candidates elected to office
True or false: During the time of labor-intensive politics, the parties raised money directly and then distributed it to the different candidates' campaigns.
True
Which Texas electoral faction supported Dwight Eisenhower in both the 1952 and 1956 presidential elections?
Yellow Dog Democrats
What is a "faithless elector"?
a member of the Electoral College who does not vote for his/her party's designated candidate
In 1994, Republican victories in Texas included which of the following?
all seats on the Railroad Commission control of the agricultural commissioner's office gain of three seats on the state board of education George W. Bush as governor
Today, Republicans in Texas hold
all statewide elected offices.
Party ideology refers to a party's
basic belief system.
John Tower was the first Texas Republican to
be elected to statewide office since the era of Democratic dominance began.
In the era of candidate-centered politics, mass communication replaced ______ as the primary way to communicate with voters.
candidate rallies
In ______ politics, prospective officeholders tend to emphasize their own characteristics and backgrounds rather than an association with a major political party.
candidate-centered
In the past 17 presidential elections, Texas voted Democratic only four times. Three of those times it was because the
candidates hailed from Texas or the South.
If Texas in the era from the 1940s to the 1960s can be described as a two-party system, what were the two parties?
conservative and liberal Democrats
Since the era of labor-intensive politics, the role of political parties in the election process has
declined.
During the Republic of Texas, political parties
did not exist like they do today.
Until the late 1960s, Texas politics revolved around which issues?
economic issues personality
The Texas Regulars, a group within the Texas Democratic Party, opposed which of the following?
government growth World War II-era economic restrictions the New Deal
Which of the following did the Progressive movement support?
governmental activism prohibition women's suffrage
By 1988 the Republicans had made significant gains, aided by Bill Clements's election as ______ and George H. W. Bush's election as ______.
governor; president
Which of the following could benefit the Democratic Party's attempt to "Turn Texas Blue"?
influx of in-migrants from other states demographic realities
Pro-business conservatives at the core of the Texas Republican Party establishment seek to
keep government spending low.
Which of the following describe a faction of the Texas Republican caucus?
libertarian pro-business conservative social conservative
Journalist Wayne Slater argues that the "real divide" in the Republican Party is between Christian conservatives and
liberty groups with more secular views.
During the era of labor-intensive politics, parties prepared ballots for general elections. Who or what prepares these ballots today?
local governments, using state specifications
The only offices elected on a nationwide basis in the U.S. are
president and vice president.
Following the Obergefell decision in 2015, two men sued the City of Houston. The governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general of Texas all joined this suit, which remains undecided. What is at the heart of the lawsuit?
providing employment benefits to same-sex couples
In 1919, Texas did which of the following, marking notable achievements for the Progressive movement in the state?
ratified the Nineteenth Amendment (women's suffrage) ratified the Eighteenth Amendment (prohibition)
A lasting shift of party loyalty or attachment is known as _______
realignment
The Republic of Texas's constitution did not allow presidents to ______, leading to elections that revolved around personalities.
serve consecutive terms
Although introduced during the Progressive Era, the direct primary was widely adopted by the national parties after what disastrous event?
the 1968 Democratic Convention
What became the key reform movement after the decline of the Populists?
the Progressive movement
What event triggered widespread U.S. support for reforming the spoils system?
the assassination of President Garfield
What is a drawback of heavy campaign use of the Internet to communicate with likely voters?
the digital divide
What catalyst did Phil Gramm use to make his conversion from Democrat to Republican?
the loss of his Budget Committee seat
What was the direct primary designed to accomplish?
to allow voters, rather than party bosses, to select candidates for office
In Texas, straight-ticket voting
will be eliminated starting in 2020.
