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CHAPTER 3
Federalism
Multiple Choice questions
1. Woodrow Wilson held that the question of the relationship between the national and state governments.
e. could not be answered by a single generation.

2. The concept of separate, sovereign national and state governments is known as

d. federalism.

3. Which of the following countries does not have a federal system of government?
b. Great Britain

4. Which of the following allows national governments the right to alter or even abolish local government?
c. A unitary system

5. Ukraine, formerly one of the Soviet republics, had its own local unit of government, yet the Soviet Union was not considered a federal system.
This is because, in the former Soviet Union,
a. local governments were not independent of the central government.

6. One of the reasons that our local governments are independent of the national government is
c. the commitment of Americans to the ideal of local government.

7. At a time when other Western nations were debating whether government ought to provide pensions or regulate business, the question in the
United States was
c. whether the national government had the right to do these things.

8. In the United States, programs such as the interstate highway system and services to the unemployed are most accurately considered
e. state functions, although the federal government seeks to regulate them.

9. Which of the following systems of government would be most likely to appeal to those in the United States who wish to implement liberal
policies in the nation but who encounter resistance from conservative state legislatures?
d. Unitary

10. An interest group with a strong following in only one region of the country would have the best chance to achieve its goals under what type of
system?
c. Federal

11. A unitary form of government is most likely to appear preferable in the view of
a. liberal U.S. senators facing conservative state legislatures.

12. Under a unitary system of government, which of the following political outcomes would be highly unlikely?
c. Senators from a particular region of the country blocking the passage of major civil rights legislation

13. The cost of political participation to the average U.S. citizen is less than that to the average French citizen because, in the United States,
a. more small, political constituencies are found than in France.

14. Perhaps the most obvious effect of federalism in the United States has been to
e. mobilize political activity.

15. For the Founders, federalism was a device to

a. protect liberty

16. The government in the South during the Civil War was called a confederacy. A true confederacy differs from the federalist system of the
United States in that it
a. grants more sovereignty to the individual states.

17. Madison’s description of federalism in Federalist 46 suggests there should be little concern over conflicts between the federal and state
governments because
d. they are different agents with different powers.

18. Which of the following statements about the federal system adopted at the Constitutional Convention is most accurate?
c. It granted supreme authority to neither national nor state government.

19. The Founders did not include in the U.S. Constitution an explicit statement of state powers but added it later in the.
c. Tenth Amendment.

20. The reason a statement specific to state powers was not part of the original U.S. Constitution was that
e. it was assumed to be obvious.

21. Just what sort of commerce Congress could regulate between the states was not spelled out in the U.S. Constitution because

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a. no consensus existed.

22. In Federalist 45, Madison describes the powers of state governments as

b. numerous and indefinite.

23. Which statement best summarizes Madison’s view of federalism?

c. He was first an ardent supporter of national supremacy, then of state’s rights.

24. Applying the principles of Thomas Jefferson to current political issues would probably dispose one to
a. favor the decentralization of government power.

25. The Civil War settled one part of the issue of national supremacy versus states’ rights, namely, that
c. the national government derives its sovereignty from the people.

26. The early chief justice whose decisions generally gave the broadest possible sweep to federal powers was.
c. John Marshall.

27. The McCulloch v. Maryland decision established

c. national government supremacy over the states.

28. In McCulloch v. Maryland, if the Supreme Court reached the opposite conclusion on the right of Congress to charter a bank, the bank would
have been
b. declared unconstitutional.

29. The basic assumption of Marshall’s opinion in the McCulloch case was that the Constitution
b. was established by the people.

30. An important outcome of Marshall’s ruling in McCulloch v. Maryland (1819) was to

e. confirm the supremacy of the federal government in the exercise of the constitutional powers granted to Congress.

31. During the battle over slavery, the case for nullification was forcefully presented by.
d. John C. Calhoun.

32. The doctrine of nullification refers to

b. the claimed authority of the states to declare a federal law void for violating the U.S. Constitution.

33. The doctrine of dual federalism grew out of a protracted debate on the subject of
a. commerce..

34. Most forms of economic activity are now included under.

b. interstate commerce

35. According to the text, the Supreme Court has generally excluded ________ from many of the restrictions addressed in commerce clause
cases.
a. baseball players

36. The interstate commerce that the federal government can regulate is now interpreted to include
a. almost any kind of economic activity

37. The text concludes that it would be a mistake to conclude that the doctrine of dual federalism is
a. entirely dead.

38. By ruling that the government cannot require local police to conduct background checks on all gun purchases, the Court held that to do so
would be a violation of the __________ Amendment.
c. Tenth.

39. Under their police powers, states can enact and enforce all of the following except:
e. The regulation of interstate commerce

40. This is a procedure that enables voters to reject a measure adopted by the legislature.
b. Referendum

41. This procedure in effect in about one-third of the states permits voters to remove an elected official from office.
c. Recall

42. The Tidelands oil reserves case was an example of the national government’s deciding that
c. it was better to cede to the states a power that legally belonged to Washington.

43. According to the text, the grant-in-aid system grew rapidly because it helped state and local officials resolve what dilemma?

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a. How to get federal money into state hands without violating the U.S. Constitution

44. Which of the following was not one of the reasons federal grants were attractive to state officials?
b. Passage of the Fifteenth Amendment

45. The first form of grant-in-aid to the states made by the federal government to the state governments was that of
e. land grants.

46. When North Dakota received over one million dollars to purchase biomedical suits and other equipment to deal with weapons of mass
destruction, it highlighted the fact that
b. when Washington wants to send money to one state or congressional district, it must send money to many states and districts.

47. Federal officials’ perceptions of national needs came to dominate the allocation of federal grants in the
e. 1960s and 1970s.

48. While gleefully accepting federal grants with no apparent strings, state governors were disregarding which fundamental axiom of politics?
a. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.

49. In the 1960s and 1970s, federal grants to states were increasingly based on
d. what federal officials perceived to be national needs.

50. Between 1960 and 2001, the category of federal grant that decreased most as a percentage of all grants was
d. transportation and highways.

51. The term intergovernmental lobby is used in the text to refer to lobbying activities by
a. state and local officials at the national government.

52. An example of an intergovernmental lobby would be a lobby comprising

a. local police chiefs.

53. A categorical grant is a transfer of federal funds designed for

a. the private sector.
e. specific purposes.

54. A block grant is essentially a

b. group of categorical or project grants.

55. Block grants were designed to remedy a common criticism of categorical grants, namely,
c. the difficulty of adapting categorical grants to local needs.

56. Federal grants over which local officials have wide discretion are called
d. revenue-sharing funds.

57. According to the text, both revenue sharing and block grants have enjoyed only marginal success, in part because
a. the federal government steadily increased the number of strings attached to such grants.

58. Between 1993 and 1995, the entire growth in federal grants to state and local governments was in
e. categorical grants.

59. Political maneuvering and lobbying by local officials will probably be greatest when what type of federal money is involved?
d. A categorical grant

60. Categorical grants are supervised by

c. special committees of Congress.

61. What types of federal funds are most likely to be critical for an agency that depends on the federal government for its existence?
a. Categorical grants

62. One reason why revenue sharing has proved unsuccessful as a means of distributing federal money to local governments is because it
a. lacks strong local political support.

63. The type of locally distributed federal money that would be most affected by changes in population and distribution formulas is
c. revenue sharing.

64. When a locality is required by federal law to do something, regardless of whether it receives federal funding for that purpose, this duty is
called a
b. mandate.

65. The difference between a mandate and a condition of aid is that

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e. with a mandate it makes no difference who is paying the costs of a program.

66. Which of the following statements about mandates is not true?

c. They are tied to specific federal grants.

67. One of the problems the text mentions in connection with the administration of the Americans with Disabilities Act is
c. the absence of a clear-cut definition of "equal access."

68. Judges have ordered Massachusetts to change the way it hires firefighters, even though the state does not receive aid from the federal
government for fire fighting. Such an order is referred to as a
c. mandate.

69. For states to qualify for certain federal highway funds, they must allow drivers to make a legal right-hand turn after stopping at a red light.
This requirement by the federal government is known as a
c. condition of aid.

70. States must pay construction workers the prevailing wage if they want to build something with federal money, even if the federal share is only
part of the total building costs. When might such a requirement prevent a needed building from being constructed?
b. If it makes the total costs prohibitively high.

71. A result of the Reagan-era block grants and budget cuts was
d. higher service levels than otherwise would have been the case.

72. The first important function that the new Republican-controlled Congress sought to shift back to the states in 1994 was ________.
c. welfare

73. As strong as support for reform of AFDC may have been, the complexities of the issue were somewhat highlighted by the fact that
a. President Clinton vetoed two bills that would have cut it back.

74. Republicans in Congress eventually succeeded in

a. ending federal guarantees for funding of AFDC.
b. turning much of the management of AFDC over to the states.
c. demanding that women on aid begin working within two years.
d. disallowing women from AFDC for more than five years.
e. All of the above.

75. Devolution was an old idea but it required a new vitality because ________ was/were leading the effort.
b. the president

76. AFDC and ________ accounted for over half of all federal grant-in-aid spending.
a. Medicaid

77. The 104th Congress (1994-1996) block-granted the following federal aid program:
d. Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC).

78. The flow of power and responsibility from the states to local governments is referred to as a _____________.
b. second-order devolution

79. From 1996, when the federal welfare reform law took place, to 2002, the nation’s welfare caseload has declined by _____ percent.
a. 10

80. Which of the following was not a reason driving devolution efforts in the mid-1990s?
c. Lack of confidence in state and local government capacity

81. The text suggests relatively poor citizens are more likely to suggest _________ give(s) them more for their money.
c. the federal government

82. Why do members of Congress who represent the interests of localities to the federal government pass laws that create so many problems for
the mayors and governors of these localities?
e. Because members of Congress often represent different constituencies from the same localities