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Test your basic knowledge |
AP Government
Start Test
Study First
Subjects
:
civics
,
ap
Instructions:
Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
If you are not ready to take this test, you can
study here
.
Match each statement with the correct term.
Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.
This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. Inherent powers of state governments to pass laws to protect the public health - safety - and welfare; the national government has no directly granted police powers but accomplishes the same goals through other delegated powers.
Class action suit
Deficit
Police powers
Selective incorporation
2. 30-second statements on the evening news shows. The media have been accused of simplifying complicated political issues by relying on sound bites to explain them to the public.
Popular sovereignty
Pocket veto
Sound bites
Impeachment
3. A theory of international relations that focuses on the tendency of nations to operate from self-interest.
Trust
New Jersey Plan
Realism
Political socialization
4. The rights of an individual to own - use - rent - invest in - buy - and sell property.
Crossover sanctions
Libertarianism
Property rights
Earmarks
5. How groups form and organize to pursue their goals or objectives - including how to get individuals and groups to participate and to cooperate. The term has many applications in the various social sciences such as political science - sociology - and
Public policy
Entitlements
Random sample
Collective action
6. A congressional district created to include a majority of minority voters; ruled constitutional so long as race is not the main factor in redistricting.
Public defender system
Bicameralism
Majority-minority district
Oversight
7. The first governing document of the confederated states drafted in 1777 - ratified in 1781 - and replaced by the present Constitution in 1789.
Government corporation
Articles of Confederation
Antifederalists
Closed shop
8. Agreement between a prosecutor and a defendant that the defendant will plead guilty to a lesser offense to avoid having to stand trial for more serious offense.
Theory of deterrence
Protectionism
Cross-cutting requirements
Plea bargain
9. A belief that government can and should achieve justice and equality of opportunity.
Natural rights
Coattail effect
Liberalism
Iron triangle
10. The political arm of an interest group that is legally entitled to raise funds on a voluntary basis from members - stockholders - or employees to contribute funds to candidates or political parties.
Means-tested entitlements
Political action committee (PAC)
Permissive federalism
Presidential election
11. Presidential refusal to allow an agency to spend funds that Congress authorized and appropriated.
Keynesian economics
Tax expenditure
Impoundment
Department
12. Relationships among interest groups - congressional committees and subcommittees - and the government agencies that share a common policy concern.
Issue network
Adversary system
Socialism
Economic sanctions
13. Federal laws (starting with the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890) that try to prevent a monopoly from dominating an industry and restraining trade.
Congressional Budget Office (CBO)
Antitrust legislation
Concurring opinion
Weapons of mass destruction
14. A company with a labor agreement under which union membership is a condition of employment.
Closed shop
Political predisposition
Full faith and credit clause
Social Security
15. Election in which voters choose party nominees.
Direct primary
Enumerated powers
Public choice
Statism
16. A combination of entitlement programs - paid for by employer and employee taxes - that includes retirement benefits - health insurance - and support for disabled workers and the children of deceased or disabled workers.
Executive agreement
Restrictive covenant
Social Security
Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA)
17. A system of public employment based on rewarding party loyalists and friends.
Judicial review
Defendant
Commercial speech
Spoils system
18. System designed to reduce voter fraud by limiting voting to those who have established eligibility to vote by submitting the proper documents.
Social insurance
Keynesian economics
Voter registration
Court of appeals
19. International organization derived from the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) that promotes it free trade around the world.
Writ of habeas corpus
Free rider
Coattail effect
World Trade Organization (WTO)
20. Presidential staff agency that serves as a clearinghouse for budgetary requests and management improvements for government agencies.
Closed shop
New Jersey Plan
Office of Management and Budget (OMB)
Dual citizenship
21. The power to keep executive communications confidential - especially if they relate to national security.
Closed rule
Multilateralism
Executive privilege
Federal Reserve System
22. Alternative means of health care in which people or their employers are charged a set amount and the HMO provides health care and covers hospital costs.
Democratic consensus
Regressive tax
Health maintenance organization (HMO)
Proportional representation
23. A PAC formed by an officeholder that collects contributions from individuals and other PACs and then makes contributions to other candidates and political parties.
Medicaid
Unfunded mandates
Leadership PAC
Amicus curiae brief
24. The widely shared beliefs - values - and norms about how citizens relate to governments and to one another.
Executive order
Political culture
Court of appeals
Veto
25. Consumer tax on a specific kind of merchandise - such as tobacco.
Excise tax
Soft power
Rule
Caucus
26. A company with a labor agreement under which union membership cannot be required as a condition of employment.
Petit jury
Recall
Open shop
Democracy
27. A landmark case in United States law and the basis for the exercise of judicial review in the United States - under Article Three of the United States Constitution. The case resulted from a petition to the Supreme Court by William Marbury - who had b
Green party
Federal Election Commission (FEC)
Soft money
Marbury v. Madison
28. A specific course of action taken by government to achieve a public goal.
National tide
Free exercise clause
Demographics
Public policy
29. Compromise between northern and southern states at the Constitutional Convention that three-fifths of the slave population would be counted for determining direct taxation and representation in the House of Representatives.
Labor injunction
Three-fifths compromise
Antitrust legislation
Public choice
30. A formal decision to reject the bill passed by Congress.
Stare decisis
Crossover voting
Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA)
Veto
31. The process by which individuals perceive what they want to in media messages.
Ethnicity
Categorical-formula grants
Natural law
Selected perception
32. The principle of a two-house legislature.
Random sample
Double jeopardy
Bicameralism
Cooperative federalism
33. Electoral system used in electing the president and vice president - in which voters vote for electors pledged to cast their ballots for particular party's candidates.
Racial profiling
Electoral college
Sales tax
Line item veto
34. Views the national government - 50 states - and thousands of local governments as competing with each other over ways to put together packages of services and taxes. Applies the analogy of the marketplace: we have some choice about which state and ci
Party identification
Cross-cutting cleavages
Racial gerrymandering
Competitive federalism
35. Review of all executive branch testimony - reports - and draft legislation by the Office of Management and Budget to ensure that each communication to Congress is in accordance with the president's program.
Linkage institutions
Policy agenda
Central clearance
Joint committee
36. Essays promoting ratification of the Constitution - published anonymously by Alexander Hamilton - John Jay - and James Madison in 1787 and 1788.
Bad tendency test
Cross-cutting requirements
The Federalist
Hard money
37. An election system in which the candidate with the most votes wins.
Linkage institutions
Immunity
Proportional representation
Winner-take-all system
38. The reliance on economic and military strength to solve international problems.
Centralists
Bipartisanship
Hard power
Theocracy
39. Written defamation of another person. For public officials and public figures - the constitutional tests designed to restrict libel actions are especially rigid.
Nonprotected speech
Project grants
Cycle of increasing effectiveness
Libel
40. A formal written statement from a grand jury charging an individual with an offense; also called a true bill.
Impeachment
Indictment
Cloture
Plurality
41. The inclination to focus on national issues - rather than local issues - in an election campaign. The impact of the national tide can be reduced by the nature of the candidates on the ballot who might have differentiated themselves from their party o
Progressive tax
National tide
Winner-take-all system
Unilateralism
42. A meeting of local party members to choose party officials or candidates for public office and to decide the platform.
Distributive policy
Realigning election
National supremacy
Caucus
43. A type of policy that provides benefits to all Americans.
Court of appeals
Voter registration
Distributive policy
Gerrymandering
44. Advisory council for the president consisting of the heads of the executive departments - the vice president - and a few other officials selected by the president.
Cabinet
Majority rule
Express powers
Impeachment
45. Powers the Constitution specifically grants to one of the branches of the national government.
Right of expatriation
Express powers
Distributive policy
Competitive federalism
46. National Health Insurance program for the elderly and disabled.
Closed rule
Implementation
Issue advocacy
Medicare
47. Trade status granted as part of an international trade policy that gives a nation the same favorable trade concessions and tariffs that the best trading partners receive.
Theocracy
Presidential ticket
Normal trade relations
Conservatism
48. A decision by the president not to spend money appropriated by Congress - now prohibited under Federal law.
Reinforcing cleavages
Impoundment
Affirmative action
Patronage
49. Views the Constitution as giving a limited list of powers—primarily foreign policy and national defense—to the national government - leaving the rest to the sovereign states. Each level of government is dominant within its own sphere. The Supreme Cou
Dual federalism (layer cake federalism)
Justiciable dispute
Writ of habeas corpus
Independent expenditures
50. An economic and governmental system based on public ownership of the means of production and exchange.
Precedent
Socialism
Bureaucrat
National tide