Thursday, February 10, 2011

How much do elected officials know about their government?

For five years now, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute has been conducting a national survey to gauge the quality of civic education in the country. Elected officials who took the test scored an average 5 percentage points lower than the national average (49 percent vs. 54 percent), with ordinary citizens outscoring these elected officials on each constitutional question. Examples:

•Only 49 percent of elected officials could name all three branches of government, compared with 50 percent of the general public.
•Only 46 percent knew that Congress, not the president, has the power to declare war -- 54 percent of the general public knows that.
•Just 15 percent answered correctly that the phrase "wall of separation" appears in Thomas Jefferson's letters -- not in the U.S. Constitution -- compared with 19 percent of the general public.
•And only 57 percent of those who've held elective office know what the Electoral College does, while 66 percent of the public got that answer right. (Of elected officials, 20 percent thought the Electoral College was a school for "training those aspiring for higher political office.")

Overall, our sample of elected officials averaged a failing 44 percent on the entire 33-question test, 5 percentage points lower than the national average of 49 percent.

What do you think about this? Should our elected officals know more about our government?

17 comments:

  1. I find this to be astounding! It goes to show the individuals that we put in office. Elected offcials should definitely be knowledgeable in these facts. It seems silly that ordinary citizens have been found to know this information more often than the elected officials. Maybe our country should start looking at just who we are putting into office and know that they are knowlegeable in our government. How can they run government effciently if they don't know this key information? I definitely think that elected officials should know this information.

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  2. I do think that our elected officials need to know more about our government because they are representing us. It's stupid that they are 5% lower than the general public. What is that saying about our government in general. Maybe that should be part of being an elected official is that you should have a government test to see how much you actually know. It's dumb. Know what you are going into.

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  3. I think this is slightly funny. These people are supposed want or are part of our government and they don't know the answeres simple questions about it. It's quite ridiculous. We're supposed to vote these people in government? It doesn't suprise me that the people know more. We are a democracy country and our people get to vote. So we all would like to know what stuff mens before we start to vote. It's just sad that we vote for these people who know less the us. Dumb.

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  4. Its quite sad that the people that we elect to run our governement know less than we know. They should have to know these kind of questions to be able to hold such an honorable office.

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  5. I think it is ridiculous that the elected officals, who we should trust to understand the aspects of government to be able to run it efficiently, are receiving lower scores on constitutional questions than the general public. Shouldn't they be just as educated, if not more since they are actively invovled in the government? I find it silly.

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  6. I think it is riduculous that these people are in charge of our government and yet they know less about it than the general public. I think the should know more because it is their line of work and they are running our country. They should be educated about their work.

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  7. That is just crazy to think that these are the people that are representing and leading us. But the quiz was probably created to make elected officials look bad anyways and something tells me that the random citizens weren't really that random.

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  8. I think that this information is sad! We elect officials, but they know less about general government/constitutional questions than the average person surveryed. I agree with Dannon that to hold such honorable office, they should know the answers to these questions. Also, these officials are getting payed to be part of our government, but know less than the average person. This is ridiculous! Our government officials definetly should know more about our government.

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  9. Haha they arent smart! thats crazy the people we elect...know less then us. Maybe we should just vote on every little thing that comes up because why should we leave anything up to people who know less than you

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  10. retards but we elect them so we are retards to not paying attention to who we elect. this shows we need to be more informed.

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  11. I think it's funny about the statistics. I think they should know more than the average public, but shouldn't be required to know everything. I mean we don't why should they, besides the fact that they are more involved with the government than we are and that's their choice.

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  12. haha wow... they are not that smart. We need to elect someone who knows whats up. Maybe we gotta buy some foreign guys who knows more than us.

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  13. That is crazy that they don't know that much about our government. But I do think that they should know a little more than what they do know considering they are our government officials and we have them there to help run our government but this shows that alot of other people know more than the people we have there.

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  14. I agree with Ben we don't have to elect these officials. Although, it is ironic that politicians don't know basic government facts.

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  15. This is interesting how is this possible? How can the people know more about these things than the peole who are acctualy in office that this is what they are all about? This is great for us knowing that we may be smarter than all the guys who are in office. I think that they should know more about basic government information, doesnt everyone learn about it in school?

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  16. I think this retarded because I think they dont know anything [stupid politicians ]

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  17. This is crazy, our elected officals don't know common facts about the business they work for. We, the people, are also in the wrong for electing these officials. Also, when it says the general public doesn't that mean an average? Which means that although there might be people who are excellent at the government system, there are also quite a few people who don't know much either.

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