CONSTITUTIONAL LITERACY TEST WHICH EVERY CITIZEN SHOULD MASTER
Prepared by Bruce Fein
1. Article 1, section 8, clause 11 of the Constitution empowers Congress to declare war. Which of the following is true?
(a) The President is also authorized to commence war as commander in chief of the armed forces and entrusted with the safety of the nation.
(b) Not only war but any offensive use of the military requires congressional statutory authorization.
(c) President George H.W. Bush was right when he told the Texas State Republican Party, “I didn’t have to get permission from some old goat in Congress to kick Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait.”
(d) The President can initiate war based on a treaty obligation to defend foreign nations from attacks such as NATO.
2. President Barack Obama negotiated the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) as an Executive Agreement to constrict Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Which of the following is true?
(a) The JCPOA was valid because the Constitution entrusts plenary authority over national security and foreign policy to the President.
(b) The JCPOA was valid because partisan politics has made it too difficult to obtain two-thirds Senate majority to ratify treaties.
(c) The JCPOA was unconstitutional because a treaty within the meaning of the Constitution reaches any undertaking between nations like the JCPOA and thus it required a two-thirds Senate vote for ratification.
(d) The JCPOA was valid because Congress failed to enact a resolution of disapproval.
3. Article I, section 9, clause 2 provides that, “The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in case of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.
Which of the following is true?
(a) The President may suspend the writ by declaring a national emergency.
(b) The President may suspend the writ during wartime.
(c) Only Congress may suspend the writ.
(d) The writ does not extend to territories outside the United States such as Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.
4. Article I, section 1 entrusts all legislative powers to the Congress.
Which of the following is true?
(a) If Congress becomes gridlocked for partisan purposes, the President may step into the breach by issuing executive orders under inherent executive power acknowledged in Article 2.
(b) Congress may delegate legislative powers to the President without restriction if the subject matter is politically or technologically dicey, for example, line-item veto authority.
(c) Congress may endow the President with limitless discretion to waive enforcement of particular laws to advance national security or foreign policy ends.
(d) Congress may only delegate legislative power with standards that narrowly confine executive discretion to the molecular.
5. The Constitution endows Congress with inherent authority to oversee and investigate the executive branch.
Which of the following is true?
(a) Congressional subpoenas for testimony or documents may be enforced only through court orders or criminal prosecutions by the executive branch for contempt.
(b) Congress is endowed with inherent contempt power to imprison or fine for defiance of a congressional subpoena without seeking the assistance of a court.
(c) Congress is constitutionally prohibited from compelling the President or a former President to testify pursuant to a subpoena.
(d) Congress can compel the Department of Justice to criminally prosecute persons who defy congressional subpoenas.
6. Article VI of the Constitution provides that treaties made under the authority of the United States “shall be the supreme law of the land.”
Which of the following is true?
(a) Treaties may override rights or powers conferred by the Constitution.
(b) Treaties cannot be preempted by statutes enacted by Congress.
(c) Treaties can only be revoked by the President.
(d) Treaties can be nullified by statutes enacted by Congress.
7. Article II makes the President commander in chief of the armed forces.
Which of the following is true?
(a) Congress is powerless to limit the President’s discretion to deploy troops abroad.
(b) Congress may prohibit the President from stationing troops outside the United States except as specially authorized by statute.
(c) Congress is prohibited from banning the President’s use of military force against named countries or territories.
(d) Congress is prohibited from banning the President’s resort to covert action in named countries.
8. Article II vests “executive power” in the President of the United States.
Which of the following is true?
(a) Executive power includes plenary presidential authority to withhold from Congress, the judiciary, and the American people any information that is characterized as a “state secret”
(b) The state secrets privilege is a creature of the federal judiciary that can be overridden by a statute or abandoned by the United States Supreme Court.
(c) State secrets cannot be invoked to handcuff congressional oversight or the supremacy of Congress in national security or foreign policy.
(d) The state secrets privilege was used by President Richard Nixon to prevent the Washington Post and New York Times from publishing the Pentagon Papers revealing industrial scale executive deceit about the Vietnam War.
9. Article II empowers the President to appoint principal officers of the United States with the advice and consent of the Senate, but to appoint inferior officers without Senate approval.
Which of the following is true?
(a) The national security adviser is an inferior officer who may be appointed by the President alone.
(b) The White House counsel is an inferior officer who may be appointed by the President alone.
(c) Special counsels in the Department of Justice tasked with investigating the President or former Presidents must be confirmed by the Senate.
(d) The United States Ambassador to the United Nations is a principal officer whose appointment must be confirmed by the Senate.
10. The Constitution entrusts the power of the purse to Congress.
Which of the following is true?
(a) Congress may prohibit the expenditure of any funds of the United States to collect, store, or analyze intelligence that is not shared with any Member of Congress upon request.
(b) Congress may prohibit the expenditure of any funds of the United States to prosecute a Member or former Member of Congress.
(c) Congress may prohibit the expenditure of any funds of the United States to pay the salaries of executive branch officials which Congress has identified as unpatriotic.
(d) Congress may prohibit the expenditure of any funds of the United States to obtain judicial warrants to surveil named individuals.