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a regional, ethnic, racial or economic subgroup within the House or Senate
also used to describe the party in the House or Senate (Ex. Republican caucus) |
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| a system for nominating delegates to the national party convention characterized by neighboring and areawide meetings of party supporters and activists |
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| a gathering of delegates who nominate a party's presidential candidate |
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elected representatives of the states who votes formally elect the President;
the number of electors in each state is equal to the total number of senators and representatives in the House and are almost always cast in a block for the candidate who wins a plurality of the vote in a state in the quadrennial presidential election |
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| Electoral Competition Model |
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| a form of election in which parties seeking vote move toward the median voter or the center of the political spectrum |
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| Electoral Reward and Punishment |
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| the tendency to vote for the incumbents when times are good and against them when times are bad |
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| representatives who are elected in the states to formally choose the president |
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| procedures available in some states for citizens to put proposed laws and constitutional amendments on the ballot for voter approval or rejection |
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| refers to the voter at the exact middle of political political opinion |
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a political system in which three or more viable parties compete to lead the government;
because a majority winner is not always possible, multiparty systems often have coalition governments where governing power is shared among two or more parties |
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| the proportion of the votes that each party would win if party identification alone affected voting decisions |
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| an organization of the members of a political party in the house or senate |
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| the sense of belonging to one or another political party |
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| more votes than any other candidate but less than a majority of all votes cast |
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| Political Action Committee (PAC) |
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| an entity created by an interest group whose purpose is to collect money and make contributions to candidates in federal elections |
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| the basic principle of democracy that the people ultimately rule |
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statewide elections in which voters choose delegates to the national party conventions;
normally, all delegates are pledged to a specific candidate for the party's nomination |
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| Proportional Representation |
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| the awarding of legislative seats to political parties to reflect the proportion of the popular vote each party receives |
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| a theory of democratic elections in which voters decide what government will do in the near future by choosing one or another responsible party |
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| procedures available in some states by which state laws or constitutional amendments proposed by the legislature are submitted to the voters for approval or rejection |
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| indirect democracy, in which the people rule through elected officials |
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| a political party that takes clear, distinct stands on the issues and enacts them as policy when in office |
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| a form of election in which voters look back at the performance of a party in power and cast ballots on the basis of how well it did in office |
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unregulated expenditures by political party on general public education, voter registration, and voter mobilization;
often used to indirectly influence campaigns for elective office, until banned after 2002 |
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elected officials from all levels of government and others who are appointed by party committees to be delegates to the national convention of the Democratic party;
not selected in primary elections or caucuses |
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| the proportion of eligible voters who actually vote in given election |
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| voting members of a political party convention |
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| Conventional Participation |
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| conciliatory methods of participating in government such as voting, letter-writing, and campaign contributions |
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| people without party affiliation or bias |
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| revocation of the right to vote |
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| taking part in an activity |
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| Federal Election Committee (FEC) |
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| an independent regulatory agency that was founded in 1975 by the United States Congress to regulate the campaign finance legislation in the United States |
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| Kind of democracy not limiting participation of citizens to voting, but striving to create opportunities for everybody to make meaningful contributions to decision-making |
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the official who currently holds office |
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| a meeting of supporters or members of a political party |
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| also known more colloquially as "mudslinging", is trying to win an advantage by referring to negative aspects of an opponent or of a policy rather than emphasizing one's own positive attributes or preferred policies |
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| The declared policy of a political party or group |
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| The financing, in part, of presidential election campaigns from a fund maintained by the US Treasury. The money in the fund comes exclusively from voluntary contributions made by US taxpayers when they pay their annual federal income tax |
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an election that causes a dramatic change in the political system, such as a new coalition coming to power |
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| a phrase coined from the SBVT’s campaign against presidential candidate John Kerry in 2004 describing a political attack that the speaker considers unfair or untrue |
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| money voluntarily contributed from taxpayers’ taxes for presidential campaign public funds |
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| Unconventional Participation |
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| Methods of showing disapproval of government actions such as boycotts, sit-ins, marches, demonstrations, violence |
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| turnout calculated based on voting age population (VAP) vs. the more accurate voting eligible population (VEP) |
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| Voting Rights Act of 1965 |
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| prohibits states from imposing any "voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure ... to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or color." |
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