POLSCI 318 Chapter 4: C&P 9.14 (R) DOLS Chapter 4
11 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Congress and the President
9.14.16 Reading Notes: Congress and its Members (Ch 4 Making It: The Electoral Game)
Campaign Strategies
Campaigns – mixtures of personal contacts, fundraising, speech-making, advertising, and symbolic
appeals
Asking the Right Questions
Constituency, sources for resources, important issues, reaching out to voters, beginning and pace
of campaign = campaign strategy
Constituency and its partisan leanings
o Dominant party strategy – stress party loyalty, GOTV efforts because high voter turnout
usually aids their side
o Minority party strategy – downplay partisan differences, highlight personalities, invoke
wedge issues that may have factionally split parties
o Increased polarization harder to win over defectors
Polling – captures perceptions and attitudes of voters
Choosing the Message
Overabundance of campaign messages and commercials
To stand out create a brand and manage the business with discipline and impact
Distinct theme or slogan
Incumbents have liabilities
o Votes/support for unpopular issues are public record
Campaign Resources
Senate - $7 million, House - $1 million/per nominee
Over the years, the cost of campaigning has increased
o Population growth and new campaign technologies
Campaign Finance Regulations
Buckley v. Valeo (1976) – campaign contributions and spending are free speech under the 1st
Amendment
o Congress may legitimately regulate campaign contributions to prevent corruption or
appearance of corruption
Candidate’s campaigns – rules governing how candidates can raise money for their own
campaigns
o Congressional candidates may raise money from four sources: 1) individual contributors,
2) political action committees (PACs), 3) party committees, and 4) themselves and family
o More than half raised from individual contributors
McCutcheon v. FEC: Congress may not regulate contributions to reduce the amount of money in
politics or restrict political participation to enhance the relative influence of others
PACs can directly donate to candidates, but their donations are capped
Party committees also provide money, but very little
Independent expenditures – rules governing the electioneering activities of organized entities
not controlled by candidates
o Several types of organized groups:
▪ Tax-exempt 527s can raise unlimited funds from individuals, labor unions, and
corporations
▪ Super PACs (as a result of Citizens United) are non-connected political action
committees that cannot directly contributed money to campaigns and cannot
coordinate with the campaigns
• SuperPACs permitted to make unlimited expenditures to influence outcome
of elections
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Asking the right questions of campaign = campaign strategy. 9. 14. 16 reading notes: congress and its members (ch 4 making it: the electoral game) Constituency, sources for resources, important issues, reaching out to voters, beginning and pace. Polling captures perceptions and attitudes of voters: increased polarization harder to win over defectors. To stand out create a brand and manage the business with discipline and impact. Incumbents have liabilities: votes/support for unpopular issues are public record. Senate - million, house - million/per nominee. Over the years, the cost of campaigning has increased. Amendment: population growth and new campaign technologies. Buckley v. valeo (1976) campaign contributions and spending are free speech under the 1st. Mccutcheon v. fec: congress may not regulate contributions to reduce the amount of money in politics or restrict political participation to enhance the relative influence of others. Pacs can directly donate to candidates, but their donations are capped. Party committees also provide money, but very little.
