Government

You may be surprised at which states are feeding the most at the government trough.

By Dave Roos

Are there alternatives to the winner-take-all voting system? Ranked-choice voting is one, which supporters say would elect more centrist candidates. But critics worry about the downsides.

By Patrick J. Kiger

A new U.S. president is under pressure to produce in those first 100 days in office. Why is that and does it really matter?

By Dave Roos

Born Melanija Knavs in Yugoslavia, the former model is only the second foreign-born first lady of the United States.

By Christopher Hassiotis

Donald Trump proposed stripping flag burners of citizenship. Regardless of the fact that flag-burning is legal, whether the United States can even do that is tricky.

By Patrick J. Kiger

The intelligence community has been keeping the U.S. president up to date on world events since 1946 with the President's Daily Brief. Why would a president skip it?

By John Donovan

The powers wielded by the U.S. president have waxed and waned over the years.

By Oisin Curran

The law actually says 'yes', but precedent says 'no.' Here's why.

By Dave Roos

Democracy requires citizen participation. But sometimes emailing and signing petitions can feel like shouting into a black hole. What's your best strategy to be heard?

By Patrick J. Kiger

Voting on a Tuesday in November has been a U.S. tradition since the 1840s, but the timing makes it difficult for many people to exercise their right to vote. What are states doing about it?

By Patrick J. Kiger & Kathryn Whitbourne

Donald Trump may be the most prominent Trump, but he's not the only one. His polarizing candidacy is affecting ordinary people who share the surname.

By Christopher Hassiotis

A new study says you may get different treatment options depending on your doctors' political beliefs? What's a patient to do?

By Dave Roos

Think that a debate is intense? When tempers rise, elected officials can land more than metaphorical blows, as these examples from the past year alone show.

By Chris Opfer

A low-level cabinet member becomes U.S. president when everyone else is killed during a State of the Union address. It's the plot of a new TV show — and based in reality.

By Dave Roos

Think the Trump/Biden presidential campaign is the strangest? It'll seem par for the course when you see what crazy things have happened in previous elections.

By Patrick J. Kiger

Think you have an original idea for a Constitutional amendment? Are you sure it hasn't been brought up one of the other 11,000 times?

By Clint Pumphrey

If the millennial generation is behind some of the most innovative developments in tech and business, why not hand these young citizens the keys to the country, too?

By Chris Opfer

What started as a hashtag has gone global. Is the group's loose, ever-evolving structure a benefit or a drawback — or both?

By Chris Opfer

How did the idea of "don't kill the messenger" turn into a modern international standard?

By Laurie L. Dove

Cell phone video has inspired millions of people to rally against issues of police brutality. It's a powerful tool for exposing injustices. And it's not going anywhere.

By Dave Roos

After all, every president who could have lived there has, but is it mandatory?

By John Donovan

Splits with the European Union have happened before, but that doesn't mean the U.K.'s Brexit will be easy, or even have much in common with past instances.

By Patrick J. Kiger

Why does health care cost so much in the U.S.? And why, for all that money, isn't the population any healthier? These are just some of the big questions in the debate over health care costs.

By Melanie Radzicki McManus

Whether it's poll taxes, literacy tests, ID laws or limited polling hours, the U.S. has a long-running history of coming up with ways to restrict citizens' voting rights.

By Patrick J. Kiger & Kathryn Whitbourne

We often think of the civil rights movement as just part of the 1960s. On Martin Luther King Day, we explore some civil rights issues going on in the U.S. today.

By Alia Hoyt