Abstract: This article examines the importance of formal judicial selection systems for understanding the outcomes of judicial recruitment. Data collected concerning appointments of the Carter administration...

Abstract: Gary Hart enjoyed his greatest support among young voters, while Walter Mondale's strength was drawn from older voters, especially those over 65. The appeal of Jesse Jackson varied by age as well. Young blacks flocked to the Jackson banner. Older blacks, perhaps no less excited by the presence of an attractive black candidate for president, were more reluctant to follow, giving a greater share of their vote than did young blacks to Walter Mondale. Not since the protest candidacies of McCarthy and Kennedy in 1968 or the more successful insurgency of McGovern in 1972 has so much attention been paid to the contrasting responses of Americans of different ages to candidates for the presidency.

Abstract: Wendell Willkie never held a public office, yet he nearly became President of the United States. A registered Democrat until the fall of 1939, he captured the Republican party's nomination less than a year later. It was, by all accounts, a meteoric rise - to win the nomination Willkie defeated such party stalwarts as Thomas Dewey, Robert Taft, and Arthur Vandenberg. These Republican front-runners had been insisting that the war in Europe wasn't a national concern since two oceans protected the US from the aggressors, while for months Willkie had warned of the danger of a Europe controlled by fascists. Almost overnight Willkie moved the Republican party out of its hidebound isolationism and sent a message to the world that Americans stood together against Axis aggression. Roosevelt, although recognizing Willkie as a formidable political opponent, called his nomination a "godsend" because it finally brought national unity. Roosevelt's election to a third term - and Willkie's defeat - turned out to be the closest presidential race in a generation. Despite his defeat, Willkie grew in stature, becoming Roosevelt's special envoy during World War II, first to London during the Blitz and later to the Middle East, to Russia and to China. On the home front Willkie became the conscience of American politics, speaking out against isolationism, imperialism, and the persecution of minorities.

Abstract: Jesse Jackson's bid for the Democratic nomination constituted the most important challenge to the American left since the emergence of the civil rights movement in the fifties and the feminist movement in the seventies. Unfortunately, the American left, for the most part, missed this grand opportunity. In this essay, I will argue that this failure to respond in a serious and sustained manner to the contemporary black political upsurge signifies the need for a reassessment and reconstruction of the American left-a rearticulation of progressive forces centered on antiimperialist struggles (against U.S. and Soviet forms) and black unity (a unity open to nonblack allies yet subordinate to no nonblack groups).

Abstract: Candidate and media spending during the presidential nomination process can amount to a substantial windfall for state economies. Yet states seem to be almost unaware of this potential economic boost. For instance, states appear to choose their means of selecting presidential convention delegates?either by the caucus-conven tion or primary procedure?without con sideration of economic maximization. Our study suggests that states are not acting economically rational in ignoring this choice. We find that the primary selection procedure brings substantially more money into state economies even after controlling for state size, temporal order to the selection processes, and the number of active candidates. The presidential nominating process can

Abstract: sues ideologically indistinguishable from the other liberal Democrats running for the party's presidential nomination. What he demands from the party is the nomination of substantially more black candidates for elective office and the appointment of more blacks to nonelective offices. His demands are for proportional representation. As demonstrated in Bruce Cain's recent book, The Reapportionment Puzzle, this is the same demand made upon the Democratic party by MexicanAmericans. Achieving increases in the turnout rates of blacks, Mexican-Americans, and other minority groups will require the Democrats to accede to demands for proportional representation. It will also require getting people registered. The dramatic successes in Chicago and Philadelphia should not blind us to the fact that producing even a modest increase in minority turnout rates will require a tremendous investment of money, labor, and organizational resources. There are strong, competing claims for these resources; how likely, for example, is the Democratic presidential nominee to favor diverting funds programmed for a media blitz in October to a registration drive in August? Discriminatory registration requirements and electoral systems that discourage blacks and other minorities from voting still exist in many parts of the country. Millions of voters are regularly purged from the rolls for failure to vote in consecutive elections. A large effort at registering new minority voters is needed to simply keep from losing ground.I--1

Abstract: Norman Mailer’s career as a writer and political activist is a personal index of American history since the Second World War. Throughout this period he has sustained a record of social analysis through a variety of literary forms: six novels, short stories, films like Maidstone, and a whole range of journalism or non-fiction works that has included coverage of heavyweight boxing, successive Presidential party conventions since 1960, and of the Apollo manned moon-shot. His work has appeared in a diverse range of publications, that straddle mass and minority culture; from radical journals like Dissent, and Village Voice, which he co-founded in 1954, to the middle brow world of Harper’s, Esquire and Playboy. His political activism has included forays into institutional party politics and participation in mass street action. In 1952, as the Cold War intensified, he publicly defended the promise of socialism against the attacks of Dwight Macdonald at Mt Holyoake College; in 1967 he marched on the Pentagon in protest against the Vietnam War, and was arrested, and in 1969 he sought the Democratic nomination for Mayor of New York. In recent years his main form of commentary on American culture has been non-fiction that has included two photo-journalistic biographies of Marilyn Monroe, and most recently a life of Gary Gilmore, a convicted multiple murderer who demanded to be executed rather than pardoned.