Praxis Social Studies: Government, Civics, and Political Science
The Constitution, federalism, rights, elections, and political ideas for middle and high school civics.
Teacher certification exams are administered by testing organizations. FreeExam is not affiliated with those organizations, and these questions are original practice, not an official test.
Praxis is a trademark of Educational Testing Service. FreeExam is not affiliated with Educational Testing Service, and these questions are original practice, not an official test.
1.Under the Articles of Confederation, why did Congress struggle to pay soldiers and public debts?
2.Why was amending the Articles of Confederation so difficult?
3.Which feature of the Constitution answered the Articles' lack of a separate person to carry out the laws?
4.Under the Articles of Confederation, where did most day-to-day governing power rest?
5.What did the Articles of Confederation fail to create for disputes between states?
6.What did unrest among indebted farmers in Massachusetts in the 1780s reveal about the Articles?
7.In the Congress created by the Articles of Confederation, how did states vote?
8.How did the Constitution change the national government's ability to raise money?
Practice Note: Two Plans for the Clubs
A civics class compared two made-up plans for the same group of school clubs. Plan A was a league. Each club kept its own money. The league could ask a club for funds, and the club could say no. The league had a meeting of delegates and no separate person to carry out decisions. It also had no panel to settle a fight between clubs. A change to Plan A counted only if every club agreed.
Plan B was a charter. Clubs still chose their own meeting times and their own service projects. The charter added three shared tools: a council that could require a small fee, a chair who had to carry out the council's votes, and a panel that heard disputes between clubs. A change to Plan B needed a large majority of the clubs, not every one of them.
The teacher told the class to use the plans as practice models only. They are not the text of any real constitution. The task was to notice which jobs a joint government cannot do when members can withhold money, block every change, or refuse a shared referee.
9.In the practice note, why could Plan A not collect a fee from a club that refused to pay?
10.In the practice note, why could one club stop a change to Plan A?
11.In the practice note, which part of Plan B carries out decisions the council has already voted?
12.In the practice note, Plan B still lets each club choose its own service projects. What is that model meant to suggest?
13.Before the Constitution, states often taxed goods from other states. Which power lets Congress set rules for trade that crosses state lines?
14.What bargain at the Constitutional Convention settled how the states would be represented in Congress?
15.How did the Three-Fifths Compromise count enslaved people?
16.How did the Constitution say it would be ratified?
17.What does separation of powers mean in this Constitution?
18.Students are restating, in their own words, an argument linked to Montesquieu. Which restatement fits?
19.Which plain-language claim matches the idea that a government is legitimate only when the people agree to live under it?
20.In that same plain-language account, why do people form a government at all?
21.Supporters of the Constitution said a large republic would deal with factions better than a small one. What was their point?
22.What worried many opponents of the Constitution while the states were deciding whether to ratify it?
23.Why was the Bill of Rights added so soon after the Constitution was ratified?
24.Which pair of ideas says that authority comes from the people and that government has only the powers they grant?
25.A bill has passed both houses. What check lets the president stop it unless Congress acts again?
26.After a veto, what must Congress do if it still wants that bill to become law?
27.The president has named someone to lead a cabinet department. What must happen before that person takes the office?
28.A president has negotiated a treaty. What vote does the Constitution require in the Senate?
29.Which pair of duties is the impeachment process?
30.How can Congress check a president who wants a program the House and Senate refuse to fund?
31.What can a court do when a statute in a case conflicts with the Constitution?
32.Which limit is part of the president's pardon power?
Practice Note: Two Plans for the Clubs
A civics class compared two made-up plans for the same group of school clubs. Plan A was a league. Each club kept its own money. The league could ask a club for funds, and the club could say no. The league had a meeting of delegates and no separate person to carry out decisions. It also had no panel to settle a fight between clubs. A change to Plan A counted only if every club agreed.
Plan B was a charter. Clubs still chose their own meeting times and their own service projects. The charter added three shared tools: a council that could require a small fee, a chair who had to carry out the council's votes, and a panel that heard disputes between clubs. A change to Plan B needed a large majority of the clubs, not every one of them.
The teacher told the class to use the plans as practice models only. They are not the text of any real constitution. The task was to notice which jobs a joint government cannot do when members can withhold money, block every change, or refuse a shared referee.
35.Which description fits a federal system, as distinct from a unitary system or a confederation?
36.What is an expressed power of Congress?
37.The Tenth Amendment speaks to powers the Constitution neither gives to the national government nor forbids to the states. Where do those powers remain?
38.Which power is used by both the national government and the state governments?
39.A state law conflicts with a valid federal statute. Which rule decides which law prevails?
40.What does the Necessary and Proper Clause allow Congress to do?
41.A state tried to tax a bank created by Congress. What limit came out of that dispute?
42.What does the Full Faith and Credit Clause ask of each state?
43.A citizen of one state travels to another. What does the privileges and immunities rule protect at a basic level?
44.Which pair of actions does the Constitution forbid to the states?
45.Which freedoms does the First Amendment protect?
46.Each morning a public high school principal reads a prayer written by the district and tells students to stand quietly. What is the constitutional problem?
47.A city bans a practice only because it is religious, while the same conduct is allowed when it is not religious. Which clause is implicated?
48.A student wears a small button protesting a school rule, stays silent in class, and disrupts no one. Officials suspend her only because they dislike the message. Which rule fits?
49.An assistant principal searches a backpack after a credible report that a student is carrying an item the school forbids. How does this differ from a police search of a home?
50.Which protections keep government from forcing a person to confess and require fair steps before liberty is taken away?
51.A person accused of a serious crime cannot afford a lawyer. What right applies in that criminal case?
52.What limits does the Eighth Amendment set on bail and on punishment?
53.How do the Ninth and Tenth Amendments differ?
54.How should a civics class distinguish civil liberties from civil rights?
55.Which duties does the Fourteenth Amendment place on state governments?
56.Why did the Court reject public school systems that assigned students to schools by race?
57.What kind of law is the Civil Rights Act of 1964?
58.How do the Fifteenth Amendment and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 fit together?
59.What did the Nineteenth Amendment change?
60.What did the Twenty-sixth Amendment set, and what did the Twenty-fourth forbid in federal elections?
61.What did the Thirteenth Amendment do?
62.How do most protections in the Bill of Rights come to limit the states, not only the national government?
63.Which pairing of term length and minimum age matches the two houses of Congress?
64.Where must bills for raising revenue begin?
65.Who leads the House of Representatives?
66.Where does Congress do most of the detailed work on bills and much of its oversight of agencies?
67.A senator prolongs debate to delay a vote on a bill. What is that practice, and where does it live?
68.The House and the Senate pass different texts of the same bill. What group usually writes one shared version?
69.After each census, what happens to seats in the House of Representatives?
70.What is gerrymandering?
71.What must happen before a proposed statute is presented to the president?
72.How do the war powers of Congress and of the president differ?
73.Which statement matches the minimum age for president and the two-election limit in the Twenty-second Amendment?
74.How are electoral votes assigned, and how many does it take to win the presidency?
75.Can the candidate with the most votes from citizens nationwide still lose the presidency?
76.How do nearly all states award their electoral votes, and which states can divide them?
77.What can a president do with an executive order, and what can that order not do?
78.How is an executive agreement different from a treaty?
79.What is the cabinet's role?
80.How does the veto power of many governors differ from the president's veto on a spending bill?
81.The vice presidency is empty. How does the Twenty-fifth Amendment fill it?
82.No candidate for president wins a majority of the electoral votes. Who chooses the president, and how are those votes cast?
83.Congress adjourns before the ten days for a signature have run, and the president does not sign the bill. What is the result?
84.Which two duties does the Constitution assign to the president in dealing with Congress and the laws?
85.Who creates the lower federal courts?
86.What shields federal judges from being punished by the other branches for an unpopular ruling?
87.What did the Court establish when it refused to enforce a statute that conflicted with the Constitution?
88.Three opinions come down together. One has the votes that decide the case and the reasons. One agrees with who wins, for different reasons. One rejects the result. What are they, in that order?
89.What is appellate jurisdiction?
90.Where do most criminal trials and ordinary contract disputes begin in the United States?
91.Why do courts usually follow an earlier decision on the same legal question?
92.How does a person become a federal judge?
Practice Note: The Oak Street Hearing
In a lesson on local government, students read a made-up record of a hearing in the town of Cedar Post. The question was whether to paint a bike lane on Oak Street. The city council called the hearing. After the vote, the mayor could sign the ordinance or send it back. The state legislature was not the body deciding this street.
Three organized groups spoke. The shop association wanted to keep curbside parking for customers. The parents' network wanted a lane near the middle school. The transit guild wanted the bus stop left where it was. None of the three ran candidates for office. Each pushed one change in policy.
A student newspaper printed a short account of the speeches and listed the questions council members asked. The paper did not vote. The class was asked to keep four roles apart: the council writes the rule, the mayor can refuse to sign it, the groups argue for a result, and the paper reports what happened.
93.In the practice note, which body is writing the rule about the Oak Street bike lane?
94.In the practice note, what can the mayor do after the council votes on the bike-lane ordinance?
95.In the practice note, why are the shop association, the parents' network, and the transit guild not political parties?
96.In the practice note, what is the student newspaper's job at the hearing?
97.What is the difference between a primary and a general election?
98.What is a closed primary?
99.Why do elections for single seats in Congress tend to sustain two major parties?
100.What can a third party do even when it rarely wins the office itself?
101.Congress sends money to states. One kind must be spent on a purpose Congress names. Another gives a wider choice inside a broad area. What is that wider kind?
102.How is home rule different from a rule that a city possesses only the powers a state statute lists?
103.How is an interest group different from a political party?
104.A congressional committee, an agency, and an interest group all protect the same program year after year. What is that relationship called?
105.A newsroom shows that a city official steered a contract to a friend. What can the press do in that situation, and what can it not do?
106.Some states let voters propose a law, accept or reject a measure passed by the legislature, or remove an official before the term ends. What are those tools?
107.How does a prime minister's hold on office differ from a president's fixed term?
108.What did the Seventeenth Amendment change about choosing senators?