It’s 33 multiple-choice questions, mostly about basic US civics, but straying a bit into economics. You can take the quiz yourself by going here.
They gave the quiz to a representative sample of Americans (or at least, of Americans with phone service). 7!% of Americans got a failing grade (that is, answered fewer than 60% of the questions correctly). The average score was 49%.
A few quick points:
1) Although the report emphasizes that college doesn’t make much difference, the opposite seems to be true. Going by the numbers, the single factor most clearly associated with higher scores was education (Average score of people with doctorates: 72%. Average for those without a high school degree: 35%.)
2) Amusingly, people who told the surveyor that they had been elected to public office at some point, did slightly worse on the test than those who had never been elected to public office.
3) These sort of quizzes are often used to argue that the young people are stupid, but they rarely give the same test to all age groups. This one did, and found that age made very little difference; baby boomers (the highest average scorers) did only a few points better, on average, than the youngest group.
4) Talking about politics a lot is associated with higher scores, as is using the internet, so I’m sure “Alas” readers will kick ass on the test. Watching lots of TV is associated with lower scores. So is talking on the phone a lot.
Weirdly, the report’s discussion refers to phones as “passive electronic media.” How is talking on the phone passive?
5) Race had a noticible association with test scores; whites and multiracial respondents scored about 50%, while Asians, Latin@s and Blacks scored about 40%. Men scored a little better than women. My guess is that this reflects a mixture of education & school quality effects, language barriers for some respondents, and stereotype threat.
6) Disappointingly, there’s no relationship between knowing this stuff and politics (conservatives and liberals both got about the same scores).1 If every American could pass this test, would anything change?
7) 32/33, in case you’re wondering.2
I guess I’m supposed to be frightened or appalled or something by the low scores on this test, but really it just makes me feel sort of alienated from my culture. It’s a reminder that knowing stuff like this is a hobby, and one I don’t happen to share with most Americans.
Aced it. Thought I was going to blow the one on Plato, Aquinas, etc., but got it. And I was a little worried about Question 30; it asked what the government would do, but I almost overthought the concept of “What it WOULD do, or what it SHOULD do?” The problem with that question is that it doesn’t take into account how much the government is already in debt at the time of the recession.
Interesting how economics got counted as “civics.” I don’t necessarily understand that. It’s useful basic knowledge, but so are the basics of many disciplines…Going to law school definitely helped my score. My US history education prior to that was piss-poor. 30/33
32/33 — I sped through the last few questions and didn’t read the final one carefully. It kind of annoys me though, because it’s a silly question: if A = B, then A/C = B/C. That’s not economics, that’s third grade math.
I did 84.85%. Not bad for a Canadian at work with people talking around him. I was rushing, too, and blew it on the First Amendment. (Sigh, yeah, that’s bad–that one embarrasses me.)
I just didn’t know the origin of the church/state thing from Jefferson’s letters. It looks like a lot of people don’t. I gaffed on Question 30 based on personal thoughts about the current economic situation, too.
I have to say too that some of that later, economics stuff doesn’t really strike me as essential civics knowledge. Since you can’t get two economists to agree on what colour the sky is, seems to me some of its pretty subjective.
You answered 23 out of 33 correctly — 69.70 %
I’m Canadian without much knowledge about the US (constitution, government and such, let alone public figures and history or economic policies).
I just answered the answers that seemed right, logically. I’m surprised to get a passing grade really.
The extra point baby boomers got may have come from the two Boomer-era questions (Sputnik & the Cuban Missile Crisis) – change that to something about WWII (something more specific, I mean) or a different space question (Challenger, anyone?) and it would be even across ages, I think.
Why is this quiz all over the internet all the sudden? It reads to me like propaganda – I got all the economics questions right by thinking “what would a free-trade propagandist think?”.
I got the Sputnik probably the only satellite I know of orbiting around Earth – and the Cold War thing…because of two movies:
Matinee is a 1993 period comedy film directed by Joe Dante. It is an ensemble piece about the home front in the Cuban Missile Crisis combined with a tribute to independent filmmaker William Castle. The film stars John Goodman, Cathy Moriarty, Simon Fenton, Omri Katz, Lisa Jakub, Kellie Martin, Jesse Lee, Lucinda Jenney, John Sayles, Dick Miller, David Clennon, Lucy Butler, Robert Picardo, and James Villemaire.
Blast from the Past is a 1999 romantic comedy film starring Brendan Fraser, Alicia Silverstone, Sissy Spacek, Christopher Walken, and Dave Foley.
One night, while he and his pregnant wife, Helen, are entertaining guests, a family friend comes to inform him that John F. Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev are getting into a debate. The family turns on their television, and watch in horror. When the Cuban Missile Crisis begins, they ask their guests to leave, and they head down into the shelter.
heh, so I owe the media for that one
I took this a few days ago. It is everywhere. I got something like a 90.9% I think I missed 3. The ones I missed were economic, IIRC. I think I answered them more like how I wanted economics to be rather than their take, or something.
I used to work in social services. I wonder if they would have asked questions about that (i.e. what is the national health program for senior citizens called?) or something if I would have done better. Economics is not only about the profit-driven component of society. I also think some of the questions were worded in a confusing way.
BTW, I’m not trying to make excuses for my score, I’m the first to admit that I suck at economics. Just thought it was interested how those questions were part of a basic civics test.
31 out of 33. Grrr.
I missed that “Congress” declares war (too many years with Shrub declaring wars all over the place) and one that I felt was a trick question. It wasn’t.
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96.97 % – or 32/33. I missed the last one about taxes = spending. I thought that meant zero debt, but it apparently means that “tax per person equals government spending per person.” I don’t know if I understand that answer. Does that mean that everyone is taxed at the same rate and that there is a one-to-one ration between how much one is taxed and how much one is taxed? If so, does that imply a budget equally divisible among taxable citizens? Obviously my master’s degree is not in economics.
And Barry: How can you miss the one about the Anti-Federalists? Are you some State Absolutist or something? You big government pawn!
Good lord you people are way too smart – no wonder I lurk here but rarely post. I got a 26/33 but awarded myself a 28/33 as two of my mistakes were just plain dumb :)
In retrospect #14 (puritans) also makes sense if I thought about it and I should have worked out 29 & 33 (public work and tax/spending, respectively) – I tend to overthink US federal government spending issues because it is often a case where the govt preaches for free markets while practicing strong control. I felt knowledgeable about 31 of the 33 and don’t feel too bad about missing FDR’s SCOTUS threat (which I’ve read about come to think of it) or the anti-federalists which admittedly is an interesting point about the Bill or Rights.
I’m not sure what to think about this test. It’s not an easy set of questions and I would hardly call this a ‘basic test’ on US history and institutions. Asking about the content of the Lincoln/Douglass debates (#4/19%) is not basic. Knowing the outcome of Lincoln’s Presidency and the abolition of slavery is what I would expect and I’m sure a question about that would score much higher.
Knowledge of greek philosophy (#13/29%) may be important to furthering the myth that Greek & Rome were amazing places that lead to our ‘Modern Times’ but I don’t think it’s any more part of a ‘basic test’ on US history than details of English common law like defining what ‘bear arms’ means (which even Scalia got wrong!)
Pulling the answers into Excel, the questions with the lowest correct answers were (all percentages are ‘citizens’ – I don’t take much stock in the elected politicians numbers):
25 Free Markets vs. Centralized Planning (16.25%)
15 Source of phrase “a wall of separation” (18.92%)
4 Lincoln–Douglas Debates (19.06%)
14 The Puritans (19.1%)
7 Gettysburg Address (21.06%)
These four are under or around the expected percentage allowing for chance, but none of these really surprise me – nor do the next 6:
8 FDR and the Supreme Court (25.07%)
6 Action Prohibited by the Bill of Rights (26.41%)
29 Definition of a Public Good (27.6%)
33 Taxes and Government Spending (27.7%)
13 Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas (29.49%)
30 Fiscal Policy for Economic Stimulus (36.07%)
This last one is rather ironic considering yet another president was just elected because of the economy while both candidates were expected to follow the same policy of tax-cuts & more spending.
I don’t know…I think the test is BS. Interesting to pass around I suppose, but democratic participation and an educated electorate are different than knowing important but obscure historical points. I’d love to see the Alas readers come up with similar questions that are similarily obscure but potentially more important for the US populace to know. I’d start with things about the addition of under God in the pledge, US vetoes in the UN, over/under on S American countries in which Reagan authorized illegal para-military incursions, US installed puppet leaders 1946-present, etc.
For those wondering why this reads like propoganda, it’s because it essentially is.
Read here.
Rosa and Dylan,
I didn’t think the test was wholly conservative; question 30 asks, “Which of the following fiscal policy combinations would a government most likely follow to stimulate economic activity when the economy is in a severe recession?” And the correct answer is basically Keynes’s: “decreasing taxes and increasing spending.” This is counter to pure supply-side conservative economic ideology. (Jon, why do you think “both candidates were expected to follow the same policy of tax-cuts & more spending”? I thought McCain made a big deal about his willingness to freeze spending.)
Personally, I think the quiz is a good sign of where the “center” in American civic thinking is today. How many people disagree with the claim that “Free markets typically secure more economic prosperity than government’s centralized planning”? Even the allegedly communist Chinese are increasingly abandoning government central planning, while retaining regulations on hours, wages, etc. as we have in the U.S.
30/33. I missed the Lincoln/Douglas debates (I dithered between “can Southern states leave the union?” and “can slavery expand to new territories?” and of course I picked the first, which was wrong), the source of “government of the people, by the people, for the people,” which I really should have known (again, I dithered and picked the wrong one), and the last question, which didn’t make sense to me — if taxes = spending, then taxes per person = spending per person, of course, but I got confused trying to decide if they meant per taxpayer or per person. Either way it would be true as long as you always count the same people. I’m not sure why it matters, though.
There were some questions like the 3 branches of govt and who can declare war (although I will agree that’s a tricky one after 8 years of Bush) that I thought every American over the age of ten should know.
Nevermind.
{Random non-Capitalist, non-Democracy comments deleted}
Jon,
1) I think you misunderstood the gist of the quiz question and of the difference between Obama and McCain’s spending plans, particularly as those were tuned to respond to the recession. “Decrease taxes and increase spending” refers to Keynesian economic theory, not to directing aid to a specific sector of the economy in order to ensure that it can survive. McCain would follow the same economic route we see Bush enacting today: reluctantly nod along with whatever Paulson says to do to prop up the financial sector so we don’t have a certain set of consequences: more banks failing, the permanent — instead of temporary — shutdown of the commercial paper market, and a regression in our ability to move capital where it can be well used. However, Bush and McCain do not support Keynesian economics in which the government responds to a severe recession with New Deal-type programs that are intended, not to prop up a half dozen specific companies within one sector, but to employ and skills-train thousands of Americans. This is what Obama is talking about in referring to spending money on rebuilding physical infrastructure, education and health care.
2) There’s a big difference between a free market’s regulations that require transparency and limits on leveraging, and a command-and-control economy. This is why Republicans sounded so silly talking about “socialism.” I have been in countries with actual socialism; it’s not the same thing as, say, requiring publicly available documentation of credit default swaps.
3) If you think China operates economically the same way today that it did just 40 years ago, I recommend studying its history since the Communist revolution in more detail. Local civic autonomy is pretty irrelevant to whether the Party mandates a specific level of output from this or that factory.
Similarly, India has had its same panchayats (village councils, which reserve a certain number of seats for women) for decades, yet its economy is very different from what it was 30 years ago. India after Independence adopted an extremely socialist economic model of five-year plans and state ownership of most industries. Google “License Raj” to learn about how industries were told how much to produce; car companies got government licenses to produce a certain number of cars — not an environmental or congestion grounds, but simply because the government believed it could centrally plan India into an industrialized, economically modern country. They finally realized they couldn’t, and globalization has fortunately coincided with India’s shift to a less centrally-planned economy. Lots of restrictions still remain on economic activity, but it’s much easier to do business than it once was. For example, foreigners aren’t allowed to buy land, but they now can own the structures that are on top of the land and just hold very long term leases on the underlying earth.
100%
If answering correctly is correlated to education, isn’t it odd that there is no correlation with political viewpoints, since liberalism also correlates positively with education? (As I understand it. IIRC, up untill 2000 there was a curved correlation between political viewpoints and education, with people who had no high school diploma and those with post-graduate degrees being more liberal, and those with only college degrees being more conservative, but the curve had straightened by 2004.)
30/33
Maybe there’s no correlation with political viewpoints because of some of the conservative assumptions embedded in the questions. *shrug*
Also, these kinds of tests tend to frustrate me because of their emphasis on trivia rather than analysis or synthesis. I’m not sure memorizing which phrase originated in which speech really has anything to do with a meaningful understanding of civics.
Mandolin,
Because the War of Northern Aggression was the biggest power grab in the entire history of the U.S., that’s why :)
I, otoh, am a trivia magnet. I got 32/33 even though I really don’t know that much US history.
Two points:
1) In my long-ago youth I was a champion test-taker and not surprisingly I got 100% on this thing. And as I worked through it I began to remember how annoying multiple choice tests are. A lot of these questions test standardized test-taking ability – they have many answers that “can’t” be right because of the way the question is phrased. If knowledge levels are about equal, it’s my guess that a good test-taker will do significantly better than a poor test-taker.
2) Some of these questions require specialized knowledge. Take one of the questions that Dylan Thurston (#13) is concerned about: whether the Bill of Rights “explicitly” bars prayer in the schools. No, Dylan, it doesn’t, because the First Amendment “explicitly” applies only to the federal government, and schools are agents of state government. The First Amendment applies to state governments only by virtue of the Fourteenth Amendment, which does apply to the states and which “incorporates” the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of religion and the prohibition of an established church. Therefore the First Amendment on its own does not “explicitly” bar prayer in the schools.
But how many non-lawyers have heard of the incorporation doctrine? And why is knowledge of it required on a test like this?
“I, otoh, am a trivia magnet. I got 32/33 even though I really don’t know that much US history.”
I’m not bad at trivia; I just think it’s not particularly relevant to measuring knowledge. If the test weren’t making any claims about showing how informed Americans are, that would be fine.
“Conservative” in the current usage doesn’t quite get at the test’s bias, as has been pointed out, because “liberals” are just as much pro-capitalism in the US. The bias is a capitalistic one in the economics questions. I got those “right,” but I kept one hand on Das Kapital the whole time. As for its being “centrist,” I suppose so, relative to the US political spectrum of today, which is to say, those two nearly indistinguishable shades of mauve.
Mandolin,
I too am a fan of analysis and synthesis over memorization of facts (for two reasons: a) facts are what Google is for; b) open-note timed essay exams in law school played to my advantage), but if what you’re measuring is how much knowledge and information Americans have, I think “trivia” is a reasonable way to do it. For example, if I don’t know the “trivia” — i.e., facts — about the British tax code, then I am accurately described as being uninformed about it, even if, given the code and some recent decisions on its interpretation, I might be able to analyze a British tax problem.
I got 29/33 as a Brit, albeit a Brit who spends a lot of time reading about US politics. Some of the right answers were pure fluke though.
Well, yes. It’s a trivia test, not a knowledge test. There really is nothing there that will allow one to demonstrate a knowledge of US civics. Most questions are about an event rather than about a process. I always thought of civics as process based and not event based. But they stopped teaching civics before my generation, so maybe I’m wrong.
Still, it’s entertaining in the same way that Jeopardy is. It is also misused to determine how “smart” somebody is in the same way that Jeopardy is. I looked at it as entertainment since there is nothing resembling a real survey there.
31/33 — both pretty dumb mistakes. For more depressing stuff within the site, see the video quizzing voters on Election Day. That’s here: http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/resources/ifmedia.aspx
I got 31 out of 33, which shows too much of my brain is occupied with knowledge about American history and politics. But the last section was pure capitalist propoganda.
31/33 and I’m a sophomore in college. I feel like some of these questions would actually be easier for younger people because they learned it more recently. The history-related questions, for example, were ridiculously easy for me because I took the AP US History exam three years ago. I was less certain about general policy stuff.
30/33
As I was taking it, I thought, Hmm, what free-market-loving think tank thought this one up? Ditto what others have said about the underlying assumptions in the last section being pretty blatant.
“Still, it’s entertaining in the same way that Jeopardy is. It is also misused to determine how “smart” somebody is in the same way that Jeopardy is. I looked at it as entertainment since there is nothing resembling a real survey there.”
Sure, absolutely. I don’t mean to impugn your being entertained or having fun — I took the test, too. ;)
I just think it’s not particularly sociologically relevant, and it did seem to me that the original blog article gave it some credence on that front.
31/33 as a Canadian who currently resides in America. Missed the last one, for the same reasons that Kevin Moore did: picked (a) instead of (d). I didn’t read all five choices, just figured (a) was right upon reading, and was impatient to finish the test. Upon reflection, I suppose (a) is wrong in that it doesn’t account for either past or foreign debt, but if this were a standardized test, I think this is the type of question that could be successfully challenged.
I also missed that “government of/by/for the people” was said in the Gettysburg Address, not the Declaration of Independence.
On the ideological bias of the test, I count two statements that I consider to be pushing conservative/right wing arguments, and one that I consider to be pushing a liberal/left wing argument. The “Jefferson’s letter” example was perhaps the most egregious, given the wording. (If they had put “Thomas Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptists”, I’d have less problem with it. The current wording seems mocking.)
The question about FDR was just propaganda in its selectiveness, given that there are far more important Supreme Court cases in history (nothing on Marbury v. Madison, Dred Scott, Brown v. Board of Education, Roth, Miranda… ), and every president from Aaronson to Zuckerman tries to stack the Court with ideological favourites. I’d add one of the two following companion questions: (1) Who was the only president to be elected four times into office, prior to the ratification of the 22nd Amendment setting term limits, or (2) in which Supreme Court case did majority opinion declare the Missouri Compromise, which barred the expansion of slavery into new territories, unconstitutional?
And the question PG mentioned about lowering taxes and increasing spending during a recession thankfully pushes back a bit by enforcing a liberal talking point – though I have no data to back this up, I’d imagine that most people think incorrectly that spending should be lowered during recessions.
Overall, though, I found mostly fair, and it certainly could have been a lot worse. (The World’s Shortest Political Quiz, anyone?) It leans very slightly conservative, in contrast to Political Compass, which I think leans very slightly liberal.
RonF, that is the textbook answer. There are times when spending shouldn’t be increased during recession (though more salient for third world countries with free floating currencies than a country like America), and there are times when the capitalist price system fails. If a test wants to even try to be fair, it has to go with the textbook explanation.
Longtime reader but usually a lurker. 31/33 here, missed the last one (which I thought was a badly phrased question) and the “government of/by/for the people” one (which I feel completely stupid about. I’d forgive myself for missing the last one, but that one I should have gotten right.)
31/33. Government of/by/for as well, plus a mis-click.
I am no expert at multiple choice questions or test design, but I think this test was brilliantly written to make the people who took it online or in paper form feel much smarter than the “average” American. Many of the questions seemed to be written in a confusing manner that would make them much harder to answer if someone were reading them to you over the phone. The “revenue matches expense means: ” “no debt”, “revenue per person = expenses per person” is a particularly egregious one. Dept is conceptually very close to deficit, while the division problem is simultaneously trivial and a complex statement that you probably would assume meant something non-trivial when it was read out. If both debt and deficit had been offered as answers, then it would have been a fairer question, but to give a close but no cigar option and a trivially correct option, but not a meaningfully correct option is not testing civics.
100%, bring it, suckas!
Type12Point:
I was rushing, too, and blew it on the First Amendment. I just didn’t know the origin of the church/state thing from Jefferson’s letters. It looks like a lot of people don’t.
In fact, that was apparently the second to lowest scoring question on the whole quiz. I’d guess that’s because Jefferson’s phrase is quoted so often to justify the attempt to remove governmental support for religion that people think it’s part of the First Amendment, instead of an interpretation of how to apply it in a specific instance not duplicated by how most people use it today. The context that Jefferson was using it as a summary of how the First Amendment bans supporting one specific church preferentially over others is glossed over or simply not reported at all. That’s probably why the First Amendment question is also one of the lowest scoring questions – people have been misled by the reports they’ve seen to think that it means that the government can’t support religion overall. Rarely if ever do you see the First Amendment itself quoted (as opposed to the freely used “separation of church and state”), nor any discussion of what “establishment of religion” means.
Jon:
the anti-federalists which admittedly is an interesting point about the Bill or Rights.
It’s not just an interesting point. It’s a central point. WHY was a Bill of Rights adopted? WHY was it deemed necessary to have it in the first place? The whole idea that the Bill of Rights was adopted under pressure from the public to ensure that the Constitution (which, as written, is a blueprint for what rights the Federal government has and what it is restricted from doing and says little about individuals) also spelled out what rights individuals had is key to understanding what it was meant to do. For example, it leads to an understanding of why the concept that somehow the 2nd Amendment was meant to preserve the rights of the States instead of individuals is fallacious.
Here’s one for you – why didn’t the writers of the Constitution incorporate something like the contents of the Bill of Rights in the first place?
Knowledge of greek philosophy (#13/29%) may be important to furthering the myth that Greek & Rome were amazing places that lead to our ‘Modern Times’ but I don’t think it’s any more part of a ‘basic test’ on US history than details of English common law like defining what ‘bear arms’ means (which even Scalia got wrong!)
Well, Greece and Rome were amazing places. Sure, they had slavery, had oligarchies running things often, etc., but they are where many of the ideas incorporated in our governmental philosophies were first articulated and preserved, even if they were not always observed at the time. Additionally, it’s important to understand that the people who founded this country were well educated in those ideas and applied them to their own philosophies and actions. So it’s important to know them in order to understand how we got to where we are.
FurryCatHerder
I missed that “Congress” declares war (too many years with Shrub declaring wars all over the place) and one that I felt was a trick question.
No trick. First, it’s plainly set forth in the Constitution. Second, Congress did just that when we invaded Kuwait in Gulf War I, and it was very well publicized at the time, since it was the first time that such a declaration passed Congress with a less than unanimous (or virtually unanimous) vote. IIRC the vote was carried live on TV. Finally, if you’re going to oppose actions such as you describe by Bush II, it’s essential to know what the Constitutional basis for your opposition is.
PG
facts are what Google is for;
Facts are what your brain is for; why you have memory as well as an analytical engine. You have to have a basic understanding of our history and our fundamental laws in order to be able to sort out what’s true and what’s bullshit when you listen to politicians or other advocates of one action or another. Google, etc. has it’s place, but you’ve got to carry the base around with you to make judgements.
I got about 90% but I guessed on quite a few or just responded by what sounded good.
32/33. 33/33 if adjusted for sarcasm. The test had a notable political position and bias.
why didn’t the writers of the Constitution incorporate something like the contents of the Bill of Rights in the first place?
IIRC, some framers were concerned that spelling out certain rights would lead people to conclude that all other rights were not retained by the people and could be restricted at will. They turned out to be quite right (see the “right to privacy or lack thereof” debate), but it’s not clear to me that not spelling out certain rights wouldn’t have just led to a country where the people didn’t have those rights (freedom of speech, the press, etc) as well.
@RonF
I wrote: or the anti-federalists which admittedly is an interesting point about the Bill or Rights.
Then you wrote:
It’s not just an interesting point. It’s a central point. WHY was a Bill of Rights adopted? WHY was it deemed necessary to have it in the first place?
I have no doubt that this is a central point and I could have been clearer about why it was an ‘interesting point’ and why I am not the slightest bit ashamed at missing that question. The difference to me is in understanding vs. trivia. I feel that I have a decent knowledge of the viewpoints of the founders and arguments of including specific rights vs. general implied rights, state power vs. federal, establishment of the branches of government, etc. that shaped the constitutional conventions. If you asked me ‘what did the Anti-Federalists want?’, however, I couldn’t tell you. At best I could make an educated guess about on which side they were.
Frankly, I don’t care what the Anti-Federalists called themselves or what history called them and it’s not remotely ‘basic’ US civics. Understanding why the Constitution is shaped the way that it is does not require knowing all the bits and pieces of trivia about who said what when. It requires a larger knowledge and analysis of who was in charge when and why they made the decisions they did (though often that answer is simply ‘to stay in charge’). Further knowledge into what options weren’t considered, who wasn’t represented, & dissimlar results in other countries is drastically more important than knowing who the Whigs were or who the 14th president was (probably some priveledged white guy).
Here’s one for you – why didn’t the writers of the Constitution incorporate something like the contents of the Bill of Rights in the first place?
Because they felt that the Constitution would be a malleable document and go through many revisions and re-writes as time progressed and the requirements of a group of 13 rag-tag states changed into a those of a recognized nation, a stable nation, a powerful nation, a potential a world player…perhaps even a world power…or a superpower?
Nah, that probably wasn’t it. I guess they must have been afraid of putting in specific rights because someone might read…oh, the 2nd amendment and after 217 years decide that it means something else. Or maybe they were worried that it might lead to other attempts at direct legislation through the amendment process and potentially scary legislation like…oh, the 14th amendment. God (large G because the hypothetical 1st amendment against the establishment of religion may not have come into existence in this hypothetical world without a Bill or Rights) forbid that equal protection is extended equally to all citizens of the United States.
Yah, those founders that signed the constitution sure without a Bill of Rights were smart. They knew not to include any specific rights as they would inevitably lead to guns, violence, gay marriage, the destruction of the family, destruction of society, and Revelation.
(Please forgive my poorly written response and non-veiled sarcasm. Yes I know this is important stuff, but I hope at least some of what I wrote gets across my views about teaching ‘history’ and ‘civics’. I really don’t care if people average a 30% on this test and don’t know facts to an extent that Ampersand so wonderfully described as a ‘hobby’. History is not about facts, names, and dates — unfortunately most have to go through years of schooling to realize that and to start seeing the bigger picture.
If you asked the same quiz takers about Reagan’s economic policies and they told you that he believed in and practiced ‘small governement’ I would cry for our future if 70% thought that he did.
Unfortunately, I bet that question would fare even lower than the 16% Keynesian market planning question)
(by the way, after reading a bit of the dailykos comments from the link above does anyone else find it interesting that the average score of Alas & dailykos commenters is somewhere around 31+/33? Maybe I’m just dumber than I thought)
by the way, after reading a bit of the dailykos comments from the link above does anyone else find it interesting that the average score of Alas & dailykos commenters is somewhere around 31+/33? Maybe I’m just dumber than I thought
Or alas/daily kos readers are obsessed history/civic buffs. Or are lying. Or possibly even are better educated on this particular point. But I see no evidence to suggest that the average daily kos/alas reader is any smarter than you.
The sponsoring organization, hence the quiz, have a clear libertarian bent.
78.something %; since I’m Dutch I didn’t know all those US history/speeches questions.
Jon, I got 32/33, but I have no integrity and gave “right” answers that don’t reflect how I was taught to see the world. If you got a lower score that might be your problem.
RonF,
Congress did just that when we invaded Kuwait in Gulf War I, and it was very well publicized at the time, since it was the first time that such a declaration passed Congress with a less than unanimous (or virtually unanimous) vote.
Congress hasn’t declared war since WWII, and you might want to search your memory of its being “well publicized” a little more closely. Bush’s response to the invasion of Kuwait was criticized at the time by libertarian institutions (such as Cato) for being yet another executive action without an explicit declaration of war by Congress. What Congress did for the first Gulf War — as well as for the Barbary wars, Vietnam, Afghanistan and the current Gulf War — was authorize military engagements, i.e. the use of troops without a formal declaration of war.
You may want to rethink your reliance on your brain and disdain of Google as a repository of facts.
Given what that resolution authorized and what the results were I had considered that a de facto declaration of war. However, you are correct to point out that those words were not formally used.
But then you’re wrong to say that “it was the first time that such a declaration passed Congress with a less than unanimous (or virtually unanimous) vote.” As McCain noted during the presidential debates, he voted against the authorization of military force in Lebanon during Reagan’s presidency, and that vote also was far from unanimous: 54-46 in the Senate, 253-156 in the House, making it nearly as close as the Gulf War resolution (52-47 and 250-183).
Really, Google is good.