American Politics Commons^™

Impacts Of Media Communication To Motivate State Level Policy Action: The Case Of The Colorado River Basin, Abigail Rader

CSB and SJU Distinguished Thesis

The cultivation of life within the American Southwest would not have been possible without the Colorado River Basin. The water in the basin today maintains 40 million people and one-twelfth the American economy. As a result of the significance of this river, the Colorado is one of the most regulated waters in the world, yet drought concerns continue to proliferate due to climate change. Drawing from communication and political science literature, the media have frequently been cited as impacting the policy agenda, particularly local media. This paper addresses how the frequency of The Denver Post news reporting and its framing …

Delegating Or Divesting?, Philip A. Hamburger

Faculty Scholarship

A gratifying feature of recent scholarship on administrative power is the resurgence of interest in the Founding. Even the defenders of administrative power hark back to the Constitution’s early history – most frequently to justify delegations of legislative power. But the past offers cold comfort for such delegation.

A case in point is Delegation at the Founding by Professors Julian Davis Mortenson and Nicholas Bagley. Not content to defend the Supreme Court’s current nondelegation doctrine, the article employs history to challenge the doctrine – arguing that the Constitution does not limit Congress’s delegation of legislative power. But the article’s most …

On The Permissibility Of Homicidal Violence: Perspectives From Former U.S. White Supremacists, Steven Windisch, Peter Simi, Kathleen M. Blee, Matthew Demichele

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

Drawing upon in-depth life-history interviews with 91 North American-based former white supremacists, we examine how participants perceive homicidal violence as either an appropriate or inappropriate political strategy. Based on the current findings, participants considered homicidal violence as largely inappropriate due to moral concerns and its politically ineffective nature but also discussed how homicidal violence could be an appropriate defensive measure in RAHOWA (Racial Holy War) or through divine mandate. Capturing how white supremacists frame the permissibility of homicidal violence is a step toward better understanding the “upper limit” or thresholds for violence among members who are trying to construct and …

Climate Translators: The Impacts Of Broadcast News On The Political Divide Over Climate Change In The United States, Dylan V. Macy

Pitzer Senior Theses

In many instances, television news is the primary outlet through which the public gains knowledge on climate change. Both the perceived threat of climate change and American news media have grown politically divided since the 1980s. I make the argument that American news media influences the partisan divide over climate change. In addition to the political landscape of news media, focus on political events and figures in climate coverage further contributes to a partisan divide. Supporting these claims are research displaying how climate change news is processed in a partisan manner and a selection of three case study periods in …

Ground To A Halt: A Mixed Methods Approach To Understanding U.S. Government Shutdowns, Ian R. Baum

Honors Theses

Government shutdowns are a relatively frequent, yet understudied, phenomenon in American politics. To better understand these shutdowns, I present them as competitions between parties in two areas: First, the policy space, in which each party tries to end a shutdown with a policy that coincides with that party’s ideology and; second, the public opinion space, in which each party attempts to win support from the public. I use both qualitative (case studies), and quantitative (formal and statistical models) methods to evaluate shutdowns using this lens. Through my case studies, I found that parties which propose shutdown-ending policies that are close …

All The President’S Men? Politicization And Executive Control Over The Rulemaking Process, Josh Goldberg

Honors Theses

In the age of the administrative state, the battle over who controls the federal bureaucracy and the rulemaking process decides much of the direction of American public policy. The president has emerged from this milieu as the strongest political actor in the administrative state because of their ability to leverage political appointees and the centralized EOP to protect their agenda from entrepreneurial bureaucrats and a rivalrous Congress. Yet, little is known about the effectiveness of political appointees as a tool of presidential control outside of case studies of individual agencies in the large federal bureaucracy. Using data from the Office …

Man Bites Blue Dog: Are Moderates Really More Electable Than Ideologues?, Stephen M. Utych

Political Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

Are ideologically moderate candidates more electable than ideologically extreme candidates? Historically, both research in political science and conventional wisdom answer yes to this question. However, given the rise of ideologues on both the right and the left in recent years, it is important to consider whether this assumption is still accurate. I find that, while moderates have historically enjoyed an advantage over ideologically extreme candidates in congressional elections, this gap has disappeared in recent years, where moderates and ideologically extreme candidates are equally likely to be elected. This change persists for both Democratic and Republican candidates.

Healthy And Unhealthy Responses To American Democratic Institutional Failure, Thomas D'Anieri

CMC Senior Theses

I have set out on the hunch that politics in America “feels different,” that we are frustrated both with our institutions as well as with one another. First, I will seek to empirically verify this claim beyond mere “feelings.” If it can be shown that these kinds of discontent genuinely exist to the extent that I believe they do, I will then explain why people feel this way and why things are different this time from the economic, political, and social points of view. Next, I will examine two potential responses, what I will call the populist and the institutional …

Mobilization And Polarization: American Jewish Politics Following The 2016 Election, Jennifer Gurev

CMC Senior Theses

The 2016 election sparked fundamental changes in American politics. From the rise of Donald Trump’s popularity to the growth of progressive protests in response to his election and subsequent policies, this paper explores how fundamental changes stemming from the 2016 election directly impacted American Jewish interest groups and political stances, particularly on the issue of Israel. Prior to the 2016 election, the American Jewish community was growing increasingly divided on Israel primarily due to the disparate experiences between young Jews and that of older generations, as well as increasingly right-wing Israeli politics. However, the election of Trump—and his alignment with …

“It’S The Procedure, Stupid!”: Amendment Procedures And Their Effects On Constitutional Stability, Joseph Noss

CMC Senior Theses

Constitutions must change. No human can stop time from marching forward, nor the social, economic, cultural, and technological developments associated. As a result, constitutions necessitate mechanisms that allow for their own progress. The amendment procedure of a constitution—the rules that govern what changes can occur—is therefore fundamental to any constitutional system. Importantly, scholars, politicians, and citizens alike fail to take into account the significance of these amendment processes and their effects on the constitutions they govern. While usually treated as a constitutional after-thought, amendment procedures have one of the most pronounced, substantive effects on the permanence of a constitutional order. …

Obama, Trump, And Xi: Three South China Sea Strategies In The U.S.-China Battle For Global Hegemony, Adam Singer

CMC Senior Theses

The South China Sea is one of the world's largest regions of untapped resources and fisheries. Moreover, one-third of all global trade flows through its waters. Due to its rapid ascension to great power status, China has been able to aggressively expand into the region and both build new islands and lay claim to already existing ones. With no other countries capable of or willing to push back against Beijing, the United States stepped in.

The purpose of this thesis is to examine the strategies undertaken by the Obama administration and the Trump administration in the face of China’s expansion …

Populism: An Exploration Into The American Case Through The Academic Literature, Data Analysis, And Fiction, Maxwell Knowles

CMC Senior Theses

The twenty-first century has seen a rise in populist leadership and rhetoric throughout the globe, with the United States standing as one powerful case. This thesis hopes to develop the “story” of populism from multiple perspectives, attempting to not only inform but change the way we approach the populist movement in America, and perhaps, the world. In Part I, I summarize and blend much of the core literature written on populism and economic change, developing the story that populism in America today has its roots in the significant techno-economic and cultural paradigmatic shifts of the 1970s. Social media and an …

Disappropriation, Matthew B. Lawrence

Faculty Articles

In recent years, Congress has repeatedly failed to appropriate funds necessary to honor legal commitments (or entitlements) that are themselves enacted in permanent law. The Appropriations Clause has forced the government to defy legislative command and break such commitments, with destructive results for recipients and the rule of law. This Article is the first to address this poorly understood phenomenon, which it labels a form of “disappropriation.”

The Article theorizes recent high-profile disappropriations as one probabilistic consequence of Congress’s decision to create permanent legislative payment commitments that the government cannot honor without periodic, temporary appropriations. Such partially temporary programs include …

The Obama Paradox: Policy Success, Political Failure, Laura Chiu

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The presidency of Barack Obama presents us with a paradox, in that it was both a policy success and a political failure, two states that seemingly contradict with one another. His presidency is considered a policy success due to its ability to successfully pass many key pieces of legislation, despite several challenges. On the other hand, Obama's presidency is also considered a political failure primarily due to the election of Donald J. Trump, someone who is not an ally to the Obama administration and has worked to undo Obama's accomplishments as president in nearly every area. Today, Obama's legacy as …

Constitutional Reflections Of The People: Representation In The Constitutions Of The United States (1789) And Chile (1833), Zoe E. Nelson

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

This paper is a comparative analysis of the American Constitution of 1789 and the Chilean Constitution of 1833, as well as the political writings of major political theorists prior to the making of each constitution. In comparing the historical development and making of Constitutions in post-war, newly independent American nations, this paper seeks to understand the similarities between American and Chilean Constitutional institutions and underlying political theory from a historical perspective. Bearing this purpose in mind, this paper asks, “In what ways were the Constitution making measures of Chile and the United States in 1833 and 1789, respectively, a reflection …

Labor Union Members' Stance On Major Social Issues In The 2016 General Election, Matthew Sauser

Political Science Theses and Capstones

In 2016, Democratic Candidate for President Hillary Clinton faced off against Republican Candidate Donald Trump in what was expected to be a lopsided victory for the Democrats. As the campaigns and researchers did a post-mortem on the results, they saw that white voters in key states of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan weren’t as motivated to get to the polls for Candidate Hillary Clinton versus her opponent Donald Trump. I took a deep dive into trying try to find the reason that why labor union members could have broken from their traditional ranks of Democrats to vote for Donald Trump by …

The Codification Of American Federalism: An Analysis Of Events Preceding The Ratification Of The United States Constitution, Timothy Spangler

Capstone Showcase

The focus of my project is American Federalism, a cornerstone of American political thought for centuries. American Federalism is a political system where power is divided between federated states and a central government, and the federated states retain a large portion of their original independence and police powers. The question this project seeks to answer is: How and why did the idea of a federated system, where the states retain their own sphere of sovereignty, become codified in American political thought? Scholars have attempted to answer this question, but their arguments look at American Federalism in a vacuum and ignore …

Criminals In Action: The Cia And The Crack Epidemic, Krystine O'Connor

Capstone Showcase

The Crack Epidemic hit the United States in the early years of the 1980’s. Crack was cheaper to produce and therefore cheaper to distribute. The Crack Epidemic disproportionately affected black communities and created long lasting issues that crippled many communities for decades to come. Incarceration rates, death rates, gang violence, fetal death rates and long term health effects rose dramatically between 1980- 1995. With the epidemic reaching its peak and its effects becoming unavoidable, communities struggled to find a reason as to how crack had gotten into the country and into their cities. In 1996 a small town journalist from …

Foster Rhodes Jackson And The Visual Conquest Of The West, Eve Kaufman

Scripps Senior Theses

Colonizers settled the Los Angeles and the Southern California region in part by using Modernism’s visual rhetoric and propagandic implications during the time of suburban sprawl. Suburban sprawl refers to the mass single family home development which took place from the 1920^[1]s until now but peaked from the 1970s to the 1990s. Los Angeles sprawl grew particularly in the 1950^[2]s as soldiers returned from WWII. It was a way for middle class white families to accrue generational wealth and follow through on the American Dream^[3].

The primary result however disenfranchised already marginalized groups. This …

Stationary Distribution Of Recombination On 4x4 Grid Graph As It Relates To Gerrymandering, Camryn Hollarsmith

Scripps Senior Theses

A gerrymandered political districting plan is used to benefit a group seeking to elect more of their own officials into office. This practice happens at the city, county and state level. A gerrymandered plan can be strategically designed based on partisanship, race, and other factors. Gerrymandering poses a contradiction to the idea of “one person, one vote” ruled by the United States Supreme Court case Reynolds v. Sims (1964) because it values one demographic’s votes more than another’s, thus creating an unfair advantage and compromising American democracy. To prevent the practice of gerrymandering, we must know how to detect a …