read some stuff for Rich

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+FDR during a fireside chat recommended the American public to read and
+reread the constitution.
+
+Its language isn't particularly complex, but it is often deliberately
+ambiguous and increasingly settled by jurisprudence and precedence.
+Its context sometimes helps clear things up:
+- Notes kept by Constitutional Convention participants
+- Federalist papers
+- Correspondences of delegates and leaders
+- Anti-Federalist tracts
+
+Believed deeply in political theory
+- Social contract, government by the consent of the governed
+- Legitimacy for self-government from constitution
+- Wanted civil liberty (freedom except detriment to common weal)
+- Used written constitutions to ensure consent of governed
+
+Even anti-federalists were committed to republicanism and personal
+liberty.
+Both sides accepted political science and the multiple interests in
+government and the importance of preserving public opinion.
+Anti-federalists feared the absence of a bill of rights, "unrestrained
+power," and the possible development of an aristocracy, that helped make
+the Constitution a good compromise.
+
+- Happiness an important factor
+Social contract:
+    - People govern the people
+        - Didn't want to be "enslaved" by the British (Lockean analogy)
+    - Actual slavery was a huge compromise
+        - When James Madison's sealed notes released after 50 years,
+          (1788+50 -> 1840) it was revealed that huge compromises were
+          made for SC and GA.
+
+American Constitution is oldest national constitution in the world.
+- Essentially an usurpation of authority by the Phil. Convention
+- Incredibly stable, not even second convention because of worries about
+  weakening it
+    - Permanent in the minds of citizens
+    - State constitutions, by contrast, are unstable, long, and lightly
+      changed
+- Ambiguities that were left in constitution -> judicial leeway (room
+  for much more fluid changes than a constitutional amendment)
+- Tested by constitutional crisis of 1860 (civil war/secession)
+
+Democratic constitutionalism implies concerted effort of the citizens.
diff --git a/rich/10_electoral_connection b/rich/10_electoral_connection
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+"Congress: The Electoral Connection" by David R Mayhew
+
+The Congressman's primary goal is to get reelected.
+Their "electoral needs" are serviced well by the structural institutions
+of Congress:
+- There is very little zero-sum conflict in Congress, so congressmen can
+  make headway for their constituents' issues without infringement
+- Congressional offices provide a useful base of operations for campaign
+  management and for developing platform/research. Staffed evenly.
+- Committees act severally
+    - Position-taking committees: let congressmen claim platform
+        - House Un-American Activities Committee
+        - House Education and Labor Committees
+        - Foreign Policy Committee
+    - Particularized benefits:
+        - Diffuse cost, concentrated benefits (taxes -> farm, e.g.)
+        - Usually universalist: everyone gets their share of spending on
+          urban renewal, or tax cuts, or public works
+    - Divide up labor and allow credit-claiming:
+        - "I put that bill through committee"
+        - "That was my amendment."
+        - Also allows speaking on the floor based on bills
+- Parties
+    - Fluid bodies that help with bloc-making.
+    - Party leaders are brokerers and agenda-setters
+    - But individual congressmen "vote their constituencies."
+
+Edmunk Burke's Speech to the Electors of Bristol
+
+He wasn't elected by the people, instead by his friends in the
+government, since the people don't have a vote and power flows from the
+crown.
+But he does feel responsible to the people in a half-related sense.
+He will deeply consider their issues and consider their opinions with
+weight, but he will exercise his own judgment for he believes the
+parliament is a body of deliberation, not inclination.
+
+Burke also believes that national weal takes a front seat to local
+interests, so he is also disconnected from his voters in that way.
+
+The American system somewhat models this, but is now more direct.