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A-Level Politics Paper 3 > 2. Congress > Flashcards

2. Congress Flashcards

1
Q

Congress

A

Bicameral legislature with two equal legislative bodies

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2
Q

What are the two legislative bodies in Congress?

A
  • The House of Representatives
  • The Senate
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3
Q

How does the House provide representation?

A

Awards political representation based on the size of their population

Ex: California will have more seats than Wyoming

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4
Q

How does the Senate provide representation?

A

Each state is awarded 2 senators

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5
Q

How long are the terms for the House of Representatives?

A

2 years

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6
Q

How long are the terms for the senate?

A

6 years

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7
Q

How many seats are in the House of Representatives?

A

435

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8
Q

How many seats are in the Senate?

A

100

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9
Q

Mid-term elections

A

Congressional and state-based elections held mid way through a President’s four-year term

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10
Q

How many classes are the Senate divided up into?

A

3

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11
Q

What do the 3 classes of the Senate decide?

A

Which seats will be up for election in any two year cycle, as one third of the Senate is up for election during presidential elections and mid-terms - (1/3 being elected every 2 years)

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12
Q

Why can the majority in either chamber change every 2 years?

A
  • Congressional elections take place every 2 years in November
  • All members of the House are on the ballot
  • In addition to this, 1/3 of the members of the Senate are also on the ballot, as they are
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13
Q

Concurrent Powers

A

Powers granted to both the House of Representatives and the Senate

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14
Q

Why are concurrent powers so important?

A

They allow for even more checks and balances and power sharing - Which help ensure that one branch does not become too powerful

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15
Q

What are the concurrent powers of Congress?

A
  • Legislate
  • Representation
  • Amending the Constitution
  • Declaring War
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16
Q

Which powers are exclusive to the House of Representatives?

A
  • Introducing impeachment cases
  • Elect the President if no candidate has over 50% of Electoral College votes
  • Introduce financial bills
17
Q

Why do the House of Representatives have more power over financial legislation than the Senate?

A
  • Founding Fathers decided to give the House, the only elected chamber at the time, more influence over taxation than the Senate
18
Q

Which powers are exclusive to the Senate?

A
  • Ratifies foreign treaties negotiated by the President
  • Elect the Vice President if no candidate has over 50% of the Electoral College votes
  • Try and impeachment case
  • Confirm executive appointments
19
Q

What is the vote needed for the Senate to impeach/remove someone from office?

A

2/3

20
Q

Which chamber is seen as being more prestigious?

A
  • The Senate
  • Members of the House leave in order to seek election to the Senate
  • However, members of the Senate don’t leave to seek election to the House
21
Q

Why is the Senate seen as the more prestigious chamber?

POTENTIALLY TRY AND REFINE THIS FLASHCARD

A
  • Longer terms - House members are constantly having to focus on fundraisers and election campaigns due to frequent elections, whereas Senate members have more breathing room and can therefore focus on effective scrutiny and legislation - Can raise their profile
  • Senates serve an entire state, which means that they have far greater name recognition + It could be argued they have a larger mandate, as they recieved more voters
  • Senates can use filibusters, which is extremely important, because the Senate, unlike the House, allows for unlimited debate - The Senate also needs a supermajority of 60 members to prevent filibustering - This gives the vote of each individual even more weight than in the House
  • Exclusive powers given to the Senate are more significant than the ones given to the house
22
Q

What are the 3 main functions of Congress?

A
  1. Representation
  2. Legislative
  3. Oversight
23
Q

What are the different ways that Congress can perform it’s representative function?

A
  • Descriptively representative
  • Democratically representative
24
Q

Substantive Representation

A

Refers to how well members of Congress will act on behalf of numerous diverse groups in their constitutency

**How effective they are representing people who are descriptively different from themselves*

25
Q

What are the main arguments for descriptive representation being a good thing?

A
  • Influences how much Congress is trusted by voters
  • Impact on Political participation - If there are only male congress members, then women may be less likely to participate in Political voting - (As there is little point in participating in)
  • Influences the types of issues raised in Congress - The more groups are represented, the more diverse issues Congress can try and solve - Which means that minority groups’ interests would not be marginalised
  • Research pointing to Diverse groups being better at problem solving
26
Q

In the 114th Congress, (Jan 3rd 2015-Jan 2nd 2017), how many congresswomen were there?

A

104
**Out of the 450 seats*

27
Q

What % of the American population in 2017, (during the 114th Congress), were women?

A

51%

28
Q

In the 114th Congress, (Jan 3rd 2015-Jan 2nd 2017), how many congress members were part of minority groups?

A

91
**Out of the 450 seats*

29
Q

How many women were members of Congress in 1979-1980?

A

16
**Out of 450 seats*

30
Q

How many women were Senators in 1979-1980?

A

0

31
Q

How many women were members of Congress in 2015-2016?

A

104
**Out of 450 seats*

32
Q

In the 114th Congress, how many women held leadership roles across both the Republican and Democrat parties?

A

1
**Out of 10 leadership roles* - 5 per party

33
Q

How many senators in 2015-2016 were African-American?

A

2
**Out of 100 seats*

34
Q

Why did the racial descriptive representation of congress improve in the 1990s?

A
  • Article 1, Section II of the Constitution states that a count of the entire population is to be undertaken for the purpose of keeping the House representative
  • After the 1990 census, many states lost or gained seats in Congress, which caused them to redraw the boundaries of congressional districts
  • As these districts were re-drawn, numerous districts that consisted of a majority of minority citizens were drawn
35
Q

After the 1990 census, how many African-American majority districts were created?

A

15

36
Q

Are there limits to redrawing boundary lines to improve descriptive representation?

If so, what are they?

A
  • There are limits
  • The Supreme Court ruled that using race as the sole factor when drawing district lines would undermine the 14th amendment, Equal Protection Clause
37
Q

Example of the Supreme Court ruling against drawing new district lines to try and improve descriptive representation?

A
  • Bush vs Vera 1996
  • The Supreme Court struck down ‘Texas’ 30th District’ because of it’s ridiculous shape
  • They believed that this ridiculous shape was designed specifically to create a district that had a majority population of ethnic minority citizens

A-Level Politics Paper 3 (4 decks)

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