2. Holding Elections Direct democracy versus the Republic.. Representative Republic Done in regular, competitive and free elections

3. The Right to Vote The Right to vote is a key to Elections Modern American Democracy frees the right to vote from white, male landowners to, well, everybody. The changing concept of “liberty”

4. Male Suffrage Best indication of a virtuous and independent voter in was being a WASP All white men got the vote after the Declaration of Independence.

5. Electoral College Designed to insulate the process of elections from, well, us! Originally, before Parties, the winner became President and the runner up, Vice President. Indirect election: we vote for electors who then pledge to vote the way we wanted them to.

6. Women’s Suffrage 19 th Amendment in 1920 An almost militant battle, which was won

7. 26 th Amendment We will hit civil rights later on… …but the 26 th Amendment gave 18 year olds the right to vote, versus 21 years olds.

8. Turnout The Biggest problem with voting is turnout. It has gone steadily down. Getting people motivated to vote is often a major party goal…. Vote for their party, of course!

10. 2008 2008*Registered: 231,229,580  Voted :132,618,580* 56.8%

11. Why don’t people vote? Younger people, such as those under 25, are less inclined to vote Is it hard to vote? Perhaps not caught up on the issues and canidates?

12. Voter Registration By getting people registered, the theory is that they will vote: Motor Voter Law: Allows registration while obtaining or renewing drivers licenses. Voter Reg is used by political campaigns to encourage voting (especially among College Students!)

13. A By-product Jury Duty is often tied to voter registration.

17. 2008 Many believe that Obama’s “grassroots” campaign was a major tool in winning the White House. Bottom up, encourage people to take control of the campaign Obama’s campaign recruited people that had never did such work ever into the political world.

19. 2008 I'm 52, I've been around for a while, and [Obama's] is the most spontaneous, energetic political operation that I've ever seen," said Keith Wilkowski, a lawyer and former Democratic Party chair in Toledo. (Time)

20. "Clinton doesn't have as many volunteers as Obama right now," says Steve Fought, a longtime grassroots organizer for the Ohio Democratic Party who works as an aide to Congresswoman Marcy Kaptor of Toledo. "But she has deep party support, and I suppose they'll get their machine cranked up. (Time)

21. Then Conwell's constituents sat him down for a little chat. "I met with my residents and tried to get them to go with Hillary," Conwell says. "Not one of them would move. All of my volunteers, all my block club presidents, every last one of them was going for Barack." Conwell was forced to relinquish his seat at the convention. He spent last Saturday canvassing his ward for Obama. "Now that I've been with both campaigns, I see that Obama's has a lot more volunteers, and they're all grassroots people from the neighborhood," Conwell says. "I didn't think this movement would grow. I was wrong. It's strong." -Time

23. Party Label Many people take election cues from the parties This divides into…

24. Performance Voting Vote for the party in that is either doing a good job in office or the party out of office because the controlling party is doing poorly.

25. Issues Voting Vote based on issues. Second Amendment Abortion You name it!

26. Party ID THE focus of electoral research