Surveys legislators in Minnesota about their attitudes toward family policy and related activities. Findings indicate a need for broad public discussion about family policy so that family policy maps of legislators may be more clearly drawn and prospects of coherent family policy more likely. (Author/BEF)

Investigates national media attention to Democratic and Republican women congressional candidates in 1990 and 1992. Finds media attention related to whether the candidates are running for the Senate or House, incumbency, and state population. Shows that party is a statistically significant factor associated with media attention, and that ethnic…

U.S. Senator Nancy Kassebaum has become the leading Republican advocate for education. She shares AASA's support for the Head Start program, but is skeptical about financing a federal day care program. She also supports latchkey, intergenerational, and vocational/technical programs, and favors community volunteering over a national youth service…

The authors discuss how to write an effective, persuasive letter to an elected official. They encourage business communications instructors to promote letter writing to their students as a means of political activism. (CH)

Explores the nature of the political ideology that justified and sustained conservative efforts to prevent the passage of the Library Services Act of 1956 and discusses implications for current efforts to secure reauthorization of the Library Services and Construction Act. Highlights include a historical account of actions by Congress and state…

States that changes in the United States Senate evolve slowly and idiosyncratically. Discusses Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania's violation of the Senate's style of rhetorical decorum. Concludes that, while clinging to the customs of the past and slowness of pace that distinguish it from the House of Representatives, the Senate has not escaped the…

As most state governments were beginning their fiscal years on July 1, it looked like another tight year for state spending in many regions--and, by implication, also for appropriations for higher education institutions and state student assistance programs. The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) spring report…

In this article, the author insists that those seeking public office prove their literary mettle. As an English teacher, he does have a litmus test for all public officials, judges and senators included--a reading litmus test. He would require that all candidates and nominees have read and reflected on a nucleus of works whose ideas and insights…

The dataset presented here illustrates to students the utility of logistic regression. Its analysis results in a fit that explains much of how senators vote on a particular bill, and allows for quantification of the effects of ideology and money on the vote. A number of interesting quantitative interpretations follow from a good fit. A successful…

NASBE is enlarging its focus from information and liaison functions to action-oriented policies with state legislators and as a representative at the national level. (MLF)

This directory includes data on more than 800 legislators who are enacting policy in their state capitols from the perspective of an educator. With occupation as the starting point, a summary was developed for each legislator from the education profession. These summaries include his/her chamber and party affiliation, address, telephone number,…

This guide contains resources gathered by the Department of the Army to celebrate the bicentennial of the U.S. Constitution. Within the document, there are brief historical facts about: (1) the Constitutional Convention; (2) the early years of the Constitutional government; and (3) the U.S. Army of the 1780s and 1790s. There are also condensed…

This discussion of the possibilities in televising Congressional sessions is a part of a symposium on legislative and judicial communications. (CH)

Although philosophers in the United States have advocated the concept of adversarity for the relationship between reporters and people in Congress, in actuality these two groups work together in symbiosis. This document reports on a study in which 190 reporters, members of Congress, and Congressional aides were interviewed regarding particular…