Examines elections at the federal, state, and local levels, covering such topics as the use of policical consultants, polling, campaign finance reform, and partisan politics.

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Product Description: When average Americans think of rights, they generally conceive of written guarantees, like the Bill of Rights, which provide a framework for the defense and protection of individuals. But America has changed since the Constitution was written―technologically in terms of cars, telephones, and e-mail, and socially in terms of changing marriage patterns, urban violence, and gender equality...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

In an increasingly complex and unpredictable world, a growing number of observers and practitioners have called for a reexamination of our national security system. Central to any such reform effort is an evaluation of Congress. Is Congress adequately organized to deal with national security issues in an integrated and coordinated manner? How have developments in Congress over the past few decades, such as heightened partisanship, message politics, party-committee relationships, and bicameral relations, affected topical security issues? This volume examines variation in the ways Congress has engaged federal agencies overseeing our nation's national security as well as various domestic political determinants of security policy.

Product Description: The Supreme Court is frequently portrayed as an isolated entity void of politics that reaches judgments by some unseen and unknowable logic. At the same time, Congress is cast as a singularly political enterprise with little regard for nuanced lawmaking...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: The Senate is becoming more like the House of Representatives in its increasing levels of partisanship and ideology. A transformation of the institution is underfoot, posing questions about the Senate's role as the chamber in which 'cool judgment' prevails...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: The creation of temporary, independent advisory bodies that give advice to Congress, is an important yet under-investigated area of congressional delegation. With variations to fit the circumstances, lawmakers entrust commissions to accomplish diverse goals, such as coping with increases in the scope and complexity of legislation, forging consensus, drafting legislation, finessing institutional obstacles, coordinating strategy, and promoting party unity...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Why did congressional Republicans obsessively pursue the impeachment of President Bill Clinton when the 1998 midterm elections and public opinion polls suggested that the majority of Americans opposed it? Some claimed indignation over perjury, others outrage over immorality. But as Nicol Rae and Colton Campbell show, the driving force behind the impeachment was nothing less than the intensifying partisanship of American politics.Impeaching Clinton offers a fascinating case study of how the American political system operated during the 1990s and of the critical factors underpinning the political process. It particularly examines the congressional aspect of the drama to show that the Lewinsky affair was simply a trigger—that the context for impeachment had been set over the course of two decades of partisan warfare.Drawing on new interviews with six of the Republican members of the Judiciary Committee in 1998, Rae and Campbell reexamine why the House Republicans acted in defiance of electoral rationality on the impeachment issue, demonstrating that they took their cues from the voting party faithful rather than from the nation's centrist citizenry. The authors unravel the web of partisan politics to reveal how the pattern of events was determined, from the decision to open an impeachment inquiry to the eventual acquittal of the president.Rae and Campbell also look at the Judiciary Committee proceedings from the perspective of the Democratic minority, who helped shape media coverage and public opinion and the eventual Senate outcome. They show how the Senate was able to bring closure to this highly polarizing proceeding.Overdramatized by the media, the Clinton impeachment process was nevertheless the most extreme manifestation of partisan warfare in our time. The authors' special contribution here is to greatly expand our understanding not only of a particular constitutional crisis but also of a dynamic that still prevails in congressional politics today.

Product Description: The elections of 1998 bear out the thesis of this book: so far, the Republicans in Congress are operating more like an old minority party than the new majority party they've become. Still, Congress has changed under Republican leadership and the Republicans have changed, too...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: An insider account of how Congress works, this book contains insightful first person reminisces, from former congressional fellows and staffers, about the ins and outs and dos and don'ts of everyday life on Capitol Hill. Each reader-friendly essay focuses on one or more aspects of congressional controversy experienced by the writer, and places the “story” in the broader historical and conceptual framework necessary for understanding how Congress and its members function...read more