Congress and the people : deliberative democracy on trial
"Tracing the ways in which Congress has changed and adapted over two centuries to remain close and responsive to the people, the author addresses the question of whether some form of direct democracy will supplant representative, deliberative government in the United States. He sets the stage by covering key moments in our democratic history, from the constitutional convention and debate over the Bill of Rights, through debates over slavery petitions and war referendums in the First and Second World Wars - serious questions of democratic process that arose at critical moments in U.S. history."--Jacket
Print Book, English, ©2000
Woodrow Wilson Center Press ; Johns Hopkins University Press, Washington, D.C., Baltimore, ©2000
History
xi, 308 pages ; 24 cm
9780801863073, 9780801867262, 0801863074, 0801867266
42823623
Making a constitution
The Bill of Rights : Madison gets religion
The right to petition : the long drive
Congress and the progressive era
The Initiative and Referendum Movement
National referendum proposals and the isolationist impulse
The dawning of the sunshine seventies
A window on Congress : televising floor debates
The revival of direct democracy proposals
The road to the Republican Revolution
The road to governance : revolution, reform, and reality
Coming full circle : the complete revolution?
Term limits and the scarlet letter
The electronic Congress
The curtain falls twice on the House
The future of deliberative democracy