Instructor's Manual to Accompany:
The World of Texas Politics
Chapter 3: Political Parties and Elections
Outline:
I. A Tale of Two Elections: How Texas elites run for two offices at the same time.
II. Political Party History
A. United States: Why political parties’ collective responsibility is important.
B. Texas: Why election turnouts in Texas are low and how two-party politics is developing.
III. Political Ideology: What is conservatism, what is liberalism and why do they matter?
IV. Party Structure
A. Permanent Party Organization: The various committees and chairpersons that form the backbones of the two parties.
B. Temporary Party Organization: The convention system from bottom to top and what purposes it serves.
C. The Party in Government: Officeholders and how party affiliation affects what they do.
D. The Party in the Electorate: Who are the Democrats, who are the Republicans, who are the independents, and how are partisan attitudes of voters changing.
V. Campaigns: How campaigns are planned and executed.
A. Testing the Water: How candidates decide to make the race.
B. Organization: What roles are essential in a campaign.
C. Campaign Finance: The significance of campaign contributions -- who makes them and how they are spent.
VI. Elections: How elections play out and what they mean, or don’t mean.
A. Voter Qualifications: It is easy to qualify, but few bother.
B. Primary and General Elections: How the nominating process affects the general elections.
C. Party Competition: Why it is important and how it has improved in Texas.
D. General Election Turnout: Texas turnouts are traditionally low and are not improving much.
VII. Summary and Conclusion: A review of how the electoral process has evolved in Texas.
VIII. The End of the Tale: How the LBJ law jumped up and bit the Democrats.
Summary:
Chapter 3 reviews the history of political parties and elections in Texas in order to show that Texans do not vote in large numbers because they have not been encouraged to do so, and because party competition is a relatively recent development. Conservatism and liberalism are defined, and then it is explained what those tendencies have to do with public opinion (conservative in Texas) and how they relate to the political parties. Republicans are usually conservative and Democrats are usually more liberal, although both parties are fairly conservative in Texas. We review how parties are organized and how their organizations interface with the public, candidates, officeholders, and geography. The different phases of campaigns are explained, and then those explanations are illustrated in a discussion of how elections work. The old puzzle of low voter turnout is explored, but not solved: Increasing levels of educational attainment and increased party competition should have increased voter interest, but neither seems to have had much impact.
Discussion Topics:
1. Why is collective responsibility in government important?
2. How well do the political parties provide us with collective responsibility?
3. How might we improve voter interest and turnout in Texas?
4. Why does Texas need both liberal and conservative forces?
Individual or Small Group Projects:
1. Conduct a voter registration drive on your campus.
2. Produce a public affairs forum in which off-campus guests, students, and faculty discuss the merits of the various political parties in Texas.
3. Survey your classes to determine the political ideologies of your students, and then have them write short papers in which they explain their choices.
Essay Questions:
1. Develop a socio-economic profile of a typical Democratic voter and a socio-economic profile of a typical Republican voter.
2. What reforms might be adopted by the Texas Legislature that would improve cohesion in political parties?
3. What might we do to improve voter turnout?
4. How is campaigning in a primary election different from campaigning in a general election?
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