Instructor: Craig W. Allin
office: South 307
office phone: (319) 895-4278
home phone: (319) 895-8103
fax: (319) 895-4284
office e-mail: callin@cornellcollege.edu
home e-mail: allin.craig@worldnet.att.net
web site: http://www.cornellcollege.edu/~callin/.

Office Hours: If I'm not in class with you, you can probably find me in my office. To help you find me, I keep a detailed schedule of my activities over the next several days is posted on my office door. Feel free to make an appointment or just show up.

Prerequisites: This is an advanced course on Congress and the Presidency. Politics 262 is a prerequisite. This course operates on the premise that you know the basics already. If you do not, I recommend that you borrow a standard American government text book and read the chapters on Congress and the Presidency.

Class Meetings: South Hall, Room 300. See the assignment page for the tentative schedule of meeting times throughout the term.

Senior Assessment: This course is an approved senior assessment course for Politics Majors. If you are a senior Politics Major and have selected this course to be your senior assessment course, be sure to report that fact to your instructor by the first Wednesday of the course.

Books: The following are available for purchase in the bookstore.

• Lyn Ragsdale: Presidential Politics (1993)
• Steven S. Smith: The American Congress (1995)

Internet Resources: The information available on the Internet is growing exponentially. Lots of that information is about politics. It includes full electronic text of Supreme Court decisions within hours after they are issued, news groups devoted to a host of political topics, information from scores of government agencies, political cartoons, recordings of Socks (White House Cat), and the ravings of political wackos of every stripe. To help you get started, visit the Politics Department's Home Page on the World Wide Web.

It provides direct links to some of the most useful political information on the Internet and indirect links to thousands of others!

Read on if you are not familiar with net-speak. To gain access to the Politics Department home page, or anything else on the World Wide Web, you need to call up web browser software. The most user friendly and full-featured is Netscape. It requires a PC running Windows or a Mac and a direct network connection such as you will find in West, Norton, or Law labs, or in Cole Library. For those of us who lack Windows or who have Windows but must access the Internet through our accounts on Athena, the browser software is Lynx. Lynx is limited to text, so it's not pretty. On the other hand, being limited to text, Lynx is fast! To use Netscape you must open Windows (on the main menu in college labs), then open Netscape by double-clicking (mouse talk) on the Netscape icon in the WWW Program Group. To use Lynx you must log into Athena, select "I" (for Internet Tools) from the Main Menu, then select "X" (for Lynx). Whether in Netscape or Lynx, this procedure will leave you at the Cornell College Home Page. You'll find Politics on the list of Departmental Home Pages. Happy surfing!

1. Attendance -- You are expected to be in class every day unless you have been excused.
2. Reading -- You are expected to read and attempt to master the course assignments prior to the class for which they are assigned.
3. Independent Reading and Reporting -- On three days you will also have "Independent Reading" assignments. These are described on the following page. Each of the three independent reading assignments will count for 5 percent of the final course grade.
4. Exams & Quizzes -- There will be one comprehensive final examination accounting for 20 percent of the final course grade.
5. Term Project -- This accounts for 60 percent of your grade.
6. Participation -- This course is an upper division seminar. Its success depends on your active involvement and contribution. My best subjective evaluation of your involvement and contribution to the classroom experience will determine 5 percent of your course grade.

As is the custom in many graduate seminars, you have reading and reporting responsibilites that go beyond the assigned texts. The final page of this syllabus lists discussion topics for each day of the class beginning on Day #2 and concluding on Day #13. On three of the twelve days for which topics are listed you are obligated to locate, read, and share additional material relevant to the day's discussion topic. Your independent reading assignment for any given day is one chapter in a scholarly book, one article in a scholarly journal, or an equivalent "chunk" of reading from government documents. Each selection must be within the scope of the day's discussion topic and should bear some relationship to the topics covered in the assigned texts. You will be assigned to particular days during the first class period.

Your grade for this portion of the course will depend upon both what you contribute to the seminar discussion and what you submit in writing. For the discussion your job is

1. to report on the content of your selection,
2. to relate your selection to the assigned readings we have all done, and
3. to share the lessons you learned from the selection with the other participants in the seminar. What you are to submit in writing is a formal abstract of the selection you read. Your abstract should begin with the complete bibliographical entry. It should contain an accurate sysnosis of the selection in proper English. It should be typed, double-spaced, and limited to one page. The abstract should be submitted at the end of the class period for which your selection was prepared. Note: The abstract that you are to submit synopsizes only the contents of your selection. It should not include your effort to relate the selection to course reading or to evaluate its importance.

It is my hope that this form of assignment will have at least three benefits:

1. the opportunity to learn from fellow students,
2. the opportunity to select from among a wide range of appropriate reading, and
3. the opportunity to further develop efficient and effective research techniques.

Here are some hints to get you started:

1. Learn to use research tools like Cole Online, the various Wilson on-line indexes (1989 to present), the Social Science Index (paper, pre-1989), the Public Affairs Information Service Index (paper), the Congressional Information Service Index (paper), the Essay and General Literature Index (paper), the Monthly Catalog of U. S. Government Publications (paper), and GPO on CD-ROM (1976 to present).
2. Search out recently edited volumes that print or reprint significant articles in areas of interest to our course.
3. Search out relevant texts which contain notes and/or bibliographies which can help you find relevant reading. Don't ignore the possibilites raised by the citations in our own text books.
4. Avoid selecting older articles and books unless the specific discussion topic is historical.

Learning Objectives:

1. To enhance knowledge of the complex interactions of Congress, the President, and other players as they engage over a specific area of public policy.
2. To improve knowledge of research methods and materials including scholarly articles and books, government documents, internet resources, and specialized indexes.
3. To emphasize the role of grammar, punctuation, spelling, mechanics, usage, and documentation in effective expository prose.
4. To master the use of a recognized style sheet.
5. To use critical comment effectively as a means of improving your writing.
6. To communicate your expertise effectively to an audience using primarily the spoken word.

ASSIGNMENT: Surprise! Your assignment is NOT a policy paper. I have described the interaction of Congress and the Presidency as a struggle for supremacy over American public policy. You are to prepare case study of that struggle and to present is in both a paper and an oral report to the class. As you prepare your case you should attempt to answer the following questions:

1. What happened in this case?
2. Why did it happen in this case?
3. What are the broader lessons, conclusions, generalizations, or hypotheses that arise from this case? The term project assignment has six distinct procedural phases.

Phase I -- TOPIC SELECTION & CONFIRMATION OF RESOURCES: I will post a roster. Register your case topic as soon as you have selected it. The topic is not yours until it is registered. You may not select a topic that has already been registered by another student. Your case study may be contemporary or historical, but it must involve both the Presidency and the Congress in some effort to make public policy. No later than the 6th day of the course you must submit a paragraph describing your case topic and an annotated bibliography sufficiently well developed to guarantee that you have the materials required for your project. Your bibliography must indicate with specificity which sources will provide the information you need concerning Congress and which the information you need about the Presidency. If there are other important players--interest groups, etc.--indicate which sources will provide information on them. Do not include any source in your bibliography that you have not actually consulted. The bibliography is to be a list of sources you have found, not a list of sources that exist somewhere according to some index. Your submission must be typed or printed and the bibliography must be in proper form according to one of the approved styles. Please consult "Common Sense for College Students: Papers," for the list of approved styles.

Phase II -- RESEARCH: Give particular atention to the Congressional and Executive Branch documents that can provide data and insights relevant to writing your case history. The standard indices to government documents--Congressional Information Service, Public Affairs Information Service, GPO on CD-ROM, the Monthly Catalog to Government Publications, etc.--will be indispensible. Explore for relevant scholarly articles and books using Cole On-Line, the Wilson indices on-line, and (for older materials) the paper analogs. Remember the central questions are:

1. What happened in this case?
2. Why did it happen in this case?
3. What are the broader lessons, conclusions, generalizations, or hypotheses that arise from this case? Target your research to answer these questions.

Phase III -- OUTLINE or ABSTRACT: No later than the 11th day of the course you must submit an outline or abstract of your paper/presentation. Your outline or abstract should include the answers in brief to the key questions:

1. What happened in this case?
2. Why did it happen in this case?
3. What are the broader lessons, conclusions, generalizations, or hypotheses that arise from this case?

Phase IV -- PAPER: Your case history, analysis, and conclusions will be presented in a formal paper with appropriate manuscript format, proper citations, etc. It is quality, not quantity that counts, but I would guess that many of you might end up in the range of 9 to 12 pages exclusive of notes, illustrations, appendices, etc. Your work product in this form is worth 30% of the final course grade.

Phase V -- SEMINAR PRESENTATION: Your case history, analysis, and conclusions will also be shared with the class in the form of a seminar report. You will have 15 minutes to make your presentation. You will not have sufficient time to read your paper, nor would it be appropriate to do so. You will want to rework your material, including text and illustrations (if any), for the most effective possible oral presentation. Generally a good oral report will require you to simplify the presentation and to give even greater attention to organization and to communicating that organization to the listener. Good visual aids may be very helpful. Your instructor and selected classmates will provide you with critiques of your oral presentation, which is worth 20% of the final course grade.

Phase VI -- REWRITE: I will provide you with a written critique of your paper. You will utilize this feedback to rework and improve your paper. The rewrite is required and accounts for an additional 10% of your course grade.

Please consult "Common Sense for College Students: Papers," for information and suggestions pertinent to writing any paper, as well as requirements that apply to all papers written in courses I teach.