The Presidency and Bureaucracy

Question 1

Divided Government

Answer 1

A government in which one party controls the White House and another party controls one or both houses of Congress.

Question 2

Unified Government

Answer 2

A government in which the same party controls both the White House and both houses of Congress. When Bill Clinton became president in 1993, it was the first time since 1981 (and only the second time since 1969) that the same party was in charge of the presidency and Congress.

Question 3

Representative Democracy

Answer 3

A political system in which leaders and representatives acquire political power by means of a competitive struggle for the people’s vote. This is the form of government used by nations that are called democratic.

Question 4

Direct Democracy

Answer 4

A political system in which all or most citizens participate directly by either holding office or making policy. The town meeting, in which citizens vote on major issues, is an example of participatory democracy.

Question 5

Electoral College

Answer 5

The institution that officially elects the President and Vice President of the United States every four years

Question 6

Faithless Electors

Answer 6

A member of the United States Electoral College who, for whatever reason, does not vote for the presidential or vice presidential candidate for whom he or she had pledged to vote.

Question 7

Pyramid Structure

Answer 7

A method of organizing a president’s staff in which most presidential assistants report through a hierarchy to the President’s chief of staff.

Question 8

Circular Structure

Answer 8

A method of organizing a president’s staff in which several presidential assistants report directly to the president.

Question 9

Ad Hoc Structure

Answer 9

A method of organizing a president’s staff in which several task forces, committees, and informal groups of friends and advisers deal directly with the president.

Question 10

Cabinent

Answer 10

By custom, the cabinet includes the heads of the fourteen major executive departments.

Question 11

Executive Office of the President

Answer 11

It consists of the immediate staff of the President of the United States, as well as multiple levels of support staff reporting to the President.

Question 12

Office of Management and Budget

Answer 12

The largest office within the Executive Office of the President of the United States.The main job is to assist the President to prepare the budget.

Question 13

National Security Council

Answer 13

The principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials and is part of the Executive Office of the President of the United States.

Question 14

Council of Economic Advisers

Answer 14

An agency within the Executive Office of the President that advises the President of the United States on economic policy.

Question 15

Executive Agencies

Answer 15

Also known as a next-steps agency, is a part of a government department that is treated as managerially and budgetarily separate in order to carry out some part of the executive functions of the United States Executives.

Question 16

Independent Agencies

Answer 16

Those agencies that exist outside of the federal executive departments.

Question 17

Acting Appointment

Answer 17

Most appointments are in the President’s cabinet, and ambassadors. When those appointments resign, become to ill, die in office, and can no longer function in the position, a temporary member of their staff, usually a deputy or assistant, assumes their role until the President can nominate, and the Senate approve, a new appointment.

Question 18

Presidential Honeymoon

Answer 18

When a newly elected president takes office the opposing party will not be politically critical of him or her for about 100 days.

Question 19

Veto Message

Answer 19

One or two ways for a president to disapprove a bill sent to him by Congress. The veto message must be sent to Congress within ten days after the president receives the bill.

Question 20

Pocket Veto

Answer 20

One of two ways for a president to disapprove a bill sent to him by Congress. If the president does not sign the bill within ten days of his receiving it and Congress has adjourned within that time, the bill does not become a law.

Question 21

Line Item Veto

Answer 21

Power of an executive to veto some provisions in an appropriations bill while approving others. The President does not have the right to exercise a line-item veto and must approve or reject an entire appropriations bill.

Question 22

Executive Privileges

Answer 22

The Presidential assertion of the right to withhold certain information from Congress

Question 23

Impeachment

Answer 23

A formal accusation against a public official by the lower house of a legislative body. Impeachment is merely an accusation and not a conviction. Only two presidents, impeached. They were not, however, convicted, for the Senate failed to obtained the necessary two-thirds vote required for conviction.

Question 24

Bully Pulpit

Answer 24

A position sufficiently conspicuous to provide an opportunity to speak out and be listened to.

Question 25

Inherent Power

Answer 25

Powers held by a sovereign state. In the United States, the President derives these powers from the loosely-worded statements in the Constitution that “the executive Power shall be vested in a President” and the president should “take care that the laws be faithfully executed”

Question 26

Executive Orders

Answer 26

Help officers and agencies of the executive branch manage the operations within the federal government itself.

Question 27

Approval Ratings

Answer 27

Presidential job approval ratings were introduced by George Gallup in the late 1930s (probably 1937) to gauge public support for the President of the United States during his term.

Question 28

Imperial Presidency

Answer 28

Term coined by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. to describe the modern presidency of the United States.

Question 29

Bureaucracy

Answer 29

A large,complex organization composed of appointed officials. The department and agencies of the U.S. government make up the federal bureaucracy.

Question 30

Patronage

Answer 30

The support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows to another.

Question 31

Spoils Systems

Answer 31

Another phrase for political patronage-that is, the practice of giving the fruits of a party’s victory, such as jobs and contracts, to the loyal members of that party.

Question 32

Issues Network

Answer 32

A network of people in Washington-based interest groups, on congressional staffs, in universities and think tanks, and in the mass media who regularly discuss and advocate public policies-say, health care or auto safety. Such networks are split along political, ideological, and economic lines.

Question 33

Authorization Legislation

Answer 33

Legislative permission to begin or continue a government program or agency. An authorization bill may grant permission to spend a certain sum of money, but that money does not ordinarily become available unless it is also appropriated.

Question 34

Appropriatons

Answer 34

A legislative grant of money to finance a government program.

Question 35

Committee Clearance

Answer 35

The ability of a congressional committee to review and approve certain agency decisions in advance and without passing a law. Such approval is not legally binding on the agency, but few agencies heads will ignore the expressed wishes of committees.

Question 36

Legislative Veto

Answer 36

Rejection of a presidential or administrative agency action by a vote of one or both houses of Congress without consent of the president. In 1983 the Supreme Court declared the legislative veto to be unconstitutional.

Question 37

Red Tape

Answer 37

Complex bureaucratic rules and procedures that must be followed to get something done.

Question 38

National Performance Review

Answer 38

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