What If the American Political System Were Different? Book

	Preface
	Acknowledgments
	About the Authors
	Introduction
1	What If There Were No Written Constitution and Bill of Rights?	3
	What is a constitution?	3
	A brief tour of the United States Constitution	7
	What if we had no written constitution?	10
	Conclusion	19
	Sources and suggested readings	20
2	What If There Were a Unitary Rather Than a Federal System?	23
	Federal and unitary systems	23
	The American federal system	24
	Truly United States: An American Unitary System	27
	Summary and conclusion	42
	Sources and suggested readings	44
3	What If There Were Three Major Parties?	45
	Political parties in America	46
	Constraints on third parties	48
	A third-party breakthrough	50
	Alternative views	68
	Notes	69
	Sources and suggested readings	71
4	What If There Were No Television?	73
	Political behavior	75
	Governmental institutions	83
	Public policy	87
	Conclusion	92
	Sources and suggested readings	93
5	What If There Were a Parliamentary System?	95
	The Westminster model	97
	The political process	106
	Public policy	124
	Conclusion	144
	Notes	145
	Sources and suggested readings	147
6	What If There Were No Judicial Review?	149
	The idea of a written constitution	150
	Who decides what the Constitution means?	150
	What if there were no judicial review?	154
	Conclusion	162
	Sources and suggested readings	162
7	What If There Had Been No Slavery?	165
	The condition of African-Americans	165
	A brief history of race relations	168
	The legacy of slavery	180
	An alternative scenario	181
	America without slavery	187
	Sources and suggested readings	189
8	What If the 1787 Constitution Had Provided for Equal Rights?	191
	The civic order	193
	Government	198
	The private sector	205
	State laws	208
	Conclusion	211
	Sources and suggested readings	213
9	What If There Were No Welfare State?	215
	Social consequences	216
	Political consequences	227
	For better or for worse?	237
	Notes	239
	Sources and suggested readings	242
10	What If There Had Been No Cold War?	243
	Soviet-U.S. relations, 1917-1945	243
	The cold war	246
	The impact of the cold war	249
	Conclusion	266
	Sources and suggested readings	267
	Index	269