Political Parties and Elections - AP Government and Politics

Historically, Americans have preferred divided government, where one party controls the executive, but voters typically vote the opposing party into the legislative. This may serve as an additional check and balance that the public invented themselves.

The responsible party model argues that the party represents a platform of policy propositions that should be adhered to by the members of the party above any other concerns.

Political parties in America are decentralized and thus not centrally controlled. They cannot discipline nor remove party members who go against the party platform. Additionally, the American electorate is largely moderate, so American parties must attempt to be catch-all.

One of the fundamental components of the American Conservative ideology is a belief in states' rights. This often involves a condemnation of a large federal government.

The term "New Democrat" was first introduced into the popular consciousness during the Democratic National Convention of 1992; however, it first appeared as an ideology in the wake of the election of George H. W. Bush in 1988. It meant to establish the Democrat party as considerably more conservative and centrist than the party had previously been. This may be understood as a reaction to two broad American political trends of recent years: firstly, the movement to the political right of the majority of the American population and secondly, the idea that a political party, be it conservative or liberal, is best served by adopting centrist views and appearing less extreme than its opponent(s).

The modern Democratic Party tends to be supported by minorities, women, young people, people living in cities, whereas the modern Republican party tends to be supported by wealthy people, southerners, and white males.

Supply-side economics is a macroeconomic theory that suggests that the best way to encourage economic growth is to remove obstacles for those who produce goods. Essentially it proposes lowering regulations and taxes on wealthier individuals and corporations, supporting the notion that such a policy will cause a "trickle-down" effect that will improve the economic and social conditions of the working and middle classes. It is most closely associated with Ronald Reagan and was part of the platform on which he won his landslide election victory in 1980 over Jimmy Carter.

The political spectrum, from left to right, could be illustrated as: Radical - Liberal - Moderate - Conservative - Reactionary. So a "radical" would appear furthest left on the political spectrum. Radicals favor quick and immediate changes to the social or political life. A "reactionary," on the other hand, favors the maintenance of the status quo at all costs, or even further, the return to some previous ordered system that has been overturned by recent "radical" action.

This is a relatively simply policy question. The Republican Party is the correct answer. On the whole, Republicans tend to be less enthusiastic about economic and environmental regulations, and more enthusiastic about moral or social regulations. In other words, Republicans are unlikely to support things like higher taxes, expansive government, or large social entitlements. They are, on the other hand, more likely to support things like abortion bans, or to disapprove of gay marriage.

This, like the prior question, is a policy question. The Democratic Party is the correct answer. On the whole, Democrats tend to be very supportive of legal abortion, gay marriage, ‘fairness’ and equality, and greater regulation of businesses, along with higher taxes.

Blue Dog Democrats are Democrats who loyally vote with their party on most issues, except for economic ones. When it comes to financial matters, they tend to be more conservative (meaning they want the government to spend less money) than their fellow Democrats. So when a spending or funding bill arises, perhaps in the House of Representatives, Blue Dog Democrats are known to cross over and vote with the Republican opposition instead, denying their own party their support.

The Era of Good Feelings lasted from 1816 until 1824. It is called the Era of Good Feelings because the Federalist Party had receded from the national scene and the Democratic-Republicans, under President James Monroe, were the only Party in the political arena. The Era ended with the rise of Jacksonian Democrats and the Republican Party.

A "marginal district" is a district in which the elected representative carries less than fifty-five percent of the popular vote is said to have won only marginally. The opposite of a marginal district is a "safe seat." Because marginal districts can change hands much more easily, they receive a disproportionate focus during campaign season.

This is a straightforward vocab question. Caucus is the correct answer. Remember: caucuses are relatively active events, where participants will debate, express support, and even sometimes physically move (as in to one side of the room or another) to show which candidate they think is worthy. Caucuses were once the most popular way of picking a presidential nominee, however, states that use the caucus now are in the minority.

Closed primaries– where only those voters who have registered beforehand as party members are permitted to vote – are legally allowed as part of the political process. While many more states choose to host open primaries, which allow any citizen (unregistered included) to partake, closed primaries remain a valuable tool that some parties continue to employ. Party machines, however, with their infamous fondness for dispensing overt patronage to those citizens who demonstrate loyalty but not necessarily ability, have been done away with by a series of new regulations put in place after the turn of the twentieth century. Soft money (funds stored aside by the party leadership to later distribute freely to candidates) has been more recently banned, as part of modern efforts to reduce corrupt party practices.

When the Whig Party collapsed in the 1850s, it was largely attributable to a defection of Southern Whigs to the Democratic Party over the issue of slavery. The remaining anti-slavery Whigs banded together with Northern Democrats who were anti-slavery, as well as a few other smaller political groups, to form a new party, christened the Republican Party, for the 1856 Presidential Election.

In the decades after the Civil War, the Republican Party was the party of liberals and the North, whereas the Democratic Party was dominant in the South. Over the last century, particularly the last thirty years, there has been a shift and reversal of this trend. The Democratic Party is now primarily supported in the Northeast and on the West coast. Whereas the Republican Party has its greatest success in the Deep South.

The Presidential election of 1980 was the election that ushered Ronald Reagan into the White House on the back of a landslide victory over incumbent Jimmy Carter. It witnessed a dramatic shift in the American voting public towards conservatism, which has not really abated in the thirty years since. It showed that the general public had completed its turning away from the New Deal ideology of Roosevelt and the 1930s Democratic Party and now desired lower taxes and less government intervention in the economy, not to mention a much larger military.

The First Party System in American political history witnessed the Federalists, led by Alexander Hamilton, pitted against the Democratic-Republicans. The Federalists favored a strong central government and close ties with Britain, whereas the Democratic-Republicans (usually considered to be led by Thomas Jefferson) favored more power in the hands of the States. The First Party System endured until the end of the War of 1812, when the Federalists refusal to support the war effort effectively looked like cowardice and treason in the face of America’s favorable emergence from the war.