The American Electoral Process Is A Complicated Process By Means Of Which The El

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Term Paper Title	The American Electoral Process Is A Complicated Process By Means Of Which The El
# of Words	3182
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	12.73

The American electoral process is a complicated process by means of which the electorate chooses those men and women who will represent their interests on the local, state and national levels. Of course, this is an oversimplification of the electoral process, which is influenced by a number of different factors having little to do with the "voice of the people." Among those influences are the reaction of the mass media to any particular issue or candidate, the ability of that candidate to articulate his or her "message" in a con-vincing manner, the relative abilities of those public relations and other professionals employed to create a politician's public image or persona (and to generate media interest in the candidate), and the various organised interest groups that use a combination of money and the voting tendencies of their members to shape the outcome of both the electoral process itself and the subsequent actions of elected officials.  Though each of these external influences have a significant impact upon both the electoral and legislative processes, this paper will focus on Political Action Committees, the contemporary name given to those groups characterised as "organised interests."
     This paper will examine the very crucial role of PACs in the American political system which Hedrick Smith has examined in depth in his book The Power Game.  This paper will also look in some depth at the history of the Political Action Committee (PAC), the nature of its membership and role in the electoral and legisla-tive processes, the type of actions that PACs are in-volved in, the effects of PACs, and the return on PAC investment to the interest groups they encompass. It is the thesis of this paper that the influence of the contemporary PAC is enormous, and that an analysis of the financial contributions made in recent years by PACs to specific candidates and elected Senators and Congressman will, when compared to the voting patterns of those officials, demonstrate the inherent power of the PAC in shaping national political policy.
  History of the Political Action Committee
     The American penchant for joining groups was ob-served long ago by the French chronicler Alexis de Toqueville, who wrote in 1825 that Americans of "all ages, conditions, and minds, daily acquire a taste for association and grow accustomed to the use of it."  By 1988, 70.5 percent of the American population belonged to at least one organisation; among the most popular organisations support...

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