Problem Task. Dual and Cooperative Federalism

Statistical Abstract of the US, State Rankings The U.S. Census Bureau maintains one of the largest collections of data about social and economic conditions in the United States as a whole, and all of the nation's 50 states. Each year the Bureau publishes a summary of this information in the Statistical Abstract of the United States. You can link to an electronic version of this publication at the Bureau's web site, http://www.census.gov/. Go the U.S. Census Bureau's web site and locate the Statistical Abstract. From there, identify the collection of what the Bureau calls "State Rankings," and study in particular the following three measures: (1) Infant mortality rate, (2) Violent crime rate, and (3) Persons below the poverty level. How might a conservative use this information to argue for a system of "dual federalism"? How might a liberal use this information to argue for a system of "cooperative federalism"?

Home Task

The Challenge of Democracy - chapters 1,5
M. Parenti's - chapter 3, 11

Problem Task on Majoritarian vs Pluralist Democracy

League of Women Voters "Charting the Health of American Democracy" The League of Women Voters, founded in 1920 as an outgrowth of the suffragist movement, is one of the nation's premier political education and advocacy groups. The League is non-partisan and neither supports nor opposes candidates for office at any level of government. Recently, the League's concern with the state of democracy in the United States led it to publish a report entitled Charting the Health of American Democracy. Go to the League's home page, located at http://www.lwv.org/, and find the online version of this report. Read the sections entitled "Introduction-The Diagnosis" and "Summary." Does the League appear to be focusing its attention and efforts on concerns about the state of majoritarian or pluralist democracy in the U.S.?

Problem Task

Is the nation awash in libertarians? The Libertarian Party is one of the most established and active minor political parties in the United States. In the 2000 elections, for example, it appeared on ballots in all 50 states and ran nearly 2,000 candidates for public office at various levels, including president. Go to the Libertarian Party's web site located at http://www.lp.org/. From this page follow the link to a feature called the World's Smallest Political Quiz. Once you get to the quiz, you can leave the default settings in place-you do not have to fill it out, unless you're interested-and hit the "submit" button. Pay close attention to the overall results of the quiz that the Libertarian Party reports. Notice that the overall number of libertarian identifiers is almost 40%, a figure that is nearly double the number reported in the Challenge of Democracy (see figure 5.5). What do you think is the best possible explanation for this large discrepancy? Would you be more likely to trust the numbers reported by the Libertarian Party or the textbook as being representative of the nation as a whole? Why?