Pick one:
Option 1
If you are playing an administration figure or witness in the Congress simulation, you may write your paper about the individual you are portraying. Explain what you did in the simulation, and why you did it. Cite your own notes or prep memo. Quote from what you said in the simulation, and the questions you received from simulation senators.
Most of the paper should focus on the person in real life. What issues matter most to that person? What political advantages and constraints does this person have in achieving her or his goals? How does this person interact with Congress, and with what effect?
Option 2
Choose one currently serving Trump-appointed Supreme Court justice, executive official, or Republican congressional leader. Analyze the relationship between this individual and President Trump. Specify where it has aligned and where it has diverged. Identify specific instances (decisions, votes, public statements, or policy actions during the second Trump administration) in which your chosen figure has clearly pleased President Trump. and disappointed, resisted, or diverged from Trump. What formal and informal tools does Trump have to shape this person’s behavior? Anchor your analysis in primary sources such as speeches, interviews, social media posts, Congressional Record entries, hearing transcripts and judicial opinions.
Option 3
Choose your favorite movie (not TV series) in which a U.S. president (real or fictional) is a central character. It can be a serious historical drama about an actual president (e.g., Lincoln (2012) or Frost/Nixon) or a fictional film with a president as protagonist (The American President, or the 2025 Netflix film A House of Dynamite). The only rules: the president must drive the story, and it must be about the person's actions as president, not a pre-presidential career (e.g., The Apprentice, Young Mr. Lincoln).
Dissect how the film got the presidency right, where it went Hollywood-wild, and what it teaches -- or misleads -- us about executive power, leadership, and politics. This is your chance to blend pop culture with serious political science. Rewatch the movie like a scholar, apply course concepts, and back everything up with evidence.
In your essay, explain what drew you to this film and how you initially reacted to it. Does it seem different to you now that you are studying the presidency? Give very specific examples of what it got significantly right and wrong, with citations. Overall, does it enlighten or misinform?
Option 4
Propose and defend a specific constitutional amendment that alters presidential power. Your task is not just to suggest a reform, but to design it precisely, justify it historically, and evaluate its real-world consequences. Write your proposed constitutional amendment in formal amendment-style language (and you may use an existing proposal, with citation). It must modify one or more presidential powers and include implementation details. Identify the specific problem your amendment is to solve, anchoring your argument in at least two presidential actions since 2000. Explain how your amendment fits within (or departs from) constitutional principles, citing sources such as The Federalist and key Supreme Court cases. Using data from polls and legislative vote studies, assess whether your proposal could pass Congress and achieve ratification. And throughout, use primary and scholarly sources.
Option 5
Devise your own topic, subject to my approval and revision.
The specifications:
- Essays should be typed (12-point), double-spaced, and no more than six pages long. I will not read past the sixth page.
- Please submit all papers in this course as Word documents, not Google docs or pdfs.
- Read Strunk & White and my stylesheet (with links to model papers). Watch my writing lecture.
- Cite your sources. Please use endnotes in the format of the Chicago Manual of Style. Endnotes do not count against the page limit. Please do not use footnotes, which take up too much page space.
- Misrepresenting AI-generated content as your own work is plagiarism and will result in severe consequences
- Watch your spelling, grammar, diction, and punctuation. Errors will count against you.
- Return essays to the Canvas dropbox for this class by 11:59 PM, Friday, April 17. (If you have trouble with Canvas, simply email it to me as an attached file.) I reserve the right to dock papers one gradepoint for one day’s lateness, a full letter grade after that.
