Texas Government (2306); Textbooks: Farmer, Brain R. Choices: Custom Resources for Political Science.

True/False Questions

1. Texans, unlike most American citizens, are subject to the authority of an array of governments.

2. Delegates to the U.S. Constitutional Convention of 1787 accepted the confederation principle in place of federalism.

3. If a person commits a crime in Texas, they cannot escape trial by fleeing Texas.

4. As a person travels from one state to another, the Texas Constitution entitles that person to the privileges and immunities of the states where he or she is going.

5. Cooperative federalism is often compared to a marble cake.

6. The economic hardships experienced during the Great Depression of the 1930s led to cries for intervention by the federal government.

7. President Lyndon B. Johnson's domestic programs produced an extraordinary increase of federal government intervention in virtually every area of domestic policy.

8. President Ronald Reagan expressed a commitment to increasing federal programs, especially welfare.

9. President Ronald Reagan was an advocate of categorical grants.

10. The 1993 Motor Voter Bill discouraged people from voting by making it mandatory to have a driver's license to vote.

11. Bill Clinton was committed to deficit reduction.

12. In the Seminole Tribe case, the U.S. Supreme Court gave the state governments the authority to pass laws related to American Indians.

13. State agencies are required to pursue relevant federal grants.

14. The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 led to an increase in the number of Asian immigrants.

15. The common problems and interests that affect Mexico and the United States are referred to as transnational regionalism.

16. The maquiladora program allows businesses to develop twin plants, one in the United States and one in Mexico.

17. Texas has experienced little economic benefit from the North American Free Trade Agreement.

18. Recent estimates suggest that there are approximately 1.8 million illegal immigrants in the state of Texas.

19. Some Mexican trucks are allowed on U.S. highways.

20. Population growth in Texas has always been affected by migration from other states and foreign countries.

21. Texas has had seven constitutions.

22. Scholars generally believe that constitutions should be brief and should only include general principles.

23. The Texas Constitution requires a public school system with equitable per capita spending across schools and across school districts.

24. The bulk of the Texas Constitution contains basic governmental principles.

25. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna was the first president of the Republic of Texas.

26. After the disastrous defeat at the Alamo, the Texas army under the command of Sam Houston fought a bloody battle for independence that lasted for nearly two years.

27. The Constitution of 1845, which allowed Texas annexation to the United States, was so unpopular that all of its provisions were scrapped when the Civil War Constitution was adopted in 1861.

28. When it seceded from the United States in 1861, Texas once again became an independent republic.

29. It is easier to amend the Texas Constitution than the U.S. Constitution.

30. While Texans detested Reconstruction, they were rather fond of Governor Edmund J. Davis despite his history as an officer with the Union army.

31. All of the delegates who produced the current Texas constitution were native Texans.

32. Members of the Grange were systematically excluded from the negotiations that produced the Texas Constitution of 1876.

33. The dedication of large amounts of revenue to specific purposes in the current constitution has made it increasingly difficult for lawmakers to address changing state needs.

34. The Texas Constitution has been amended more often than the U.S. Constitution, despite the fact that the U.S. Constitution has been around much longer.

35. The Constitutional Convention of 1974 resulted in a major revamping of the Texas Constitution.

36. Governor Dolph Briscoe was a major advocate for constitutional reform in the 1970s.

37. The Texas Constitution has been amended on a piecemeal basis.

38. The Texas Constitution has an amendment that makes coffee beans and cocoa imported through the Port of Houston exempt from property taxes.

39. The Texas legislature has sometimes sought political cover by selectively letting voters decide particularly controversial issues.

40. Paradoxically, the Texas Constitution of 1876 has been accused of serving the interests of a small number of elites, even though the original framers sought to limit the influence of elites.

41. Regressive taxes are typically opposed by the wealthy since such taxes disproportionately affect them.

42. Water resources have been a recurring issue in Texas politics.

43. Texas is the only state to have been a republic prior to joining the United States.

44. The Texas mythology includes the Texas Rangers, but the cowboy plays only a small role.

45. Over the past twenty years, Hispanics and African Americans in Texas have failed to make significant political or economic gains.

46. The two political subcultures that have shaped Texas's political culture are the individualistic and the traditionalistic.

47. There are currently three different Native American groups residing on reservations in Texas.

48. Native Americans in Texas want to open casinos on their reservations as a way to create revenue, jobs, and economic development for their people.

49. Hispanics are projected to become a majority of Texas's population by about 2020.

50. Hispanics in Texas were traditionally concentrated in South Texas and along the border with Mexico.

51. There are large concentrations of African Americans in West Texas because that is where white southerners and their slaves originally settled.

52. The first Anglo immigrants to Texas in the early nineteenth century came from the upper South.

53. Race and ethnicity no longer play any role in political and policy issues in Texas.

54. Population growth in Texas has exceeded the national average over the past fifty years.

55. The rise of the Republican Party in Texas is largely a result of in-migration of residents from other states.

56. Population density refers to the number of people per square mile in a specific political jurisdiction.

57. One reason that counties along the border with Mexico have some of the highest poverty rates in the country is that they have large Hispanic populations.

58. On all measures of income, Hispanics and African Americans are equal with the Anglo population.

59. Education generally has no effect on individuals' participation in politics.

60. Historically, the health of the Texas economy was linked to oil and natural gas.