368 PART FIVE ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES The governing system of the United States,partly by design and partly by accident,embodies elements of both these concepts of. representation.The presidency is a truly national office that inctines its incumbent to take a national view of issues,while Congress is both a national institution and a body that is subject to powerful constituency influence.U.S.senators and representatives are elected from states and from districts within states,so that they are subject to CONGRESSIONAL OFFICE: strong local pressures.Chapters 17 and 18 show how the organization and policymaking of Congress reflect both national and local GETTING ELECTED, influences.In contrast,Chapters 20 and 21 reveal how the president's role,leadership,and power are affected by the office's national STAYING ELECTED political base.Collectively,these four chapters indicate how local and national factors come together in relations between the executive and legislative branches. Popular influence on both Congress and the president begins with the electoral process.It is through their ability to elect their representatives that citizens first acquire a hold over them.As we an open seat. Gary C.jacobson discussed in Chapter 10,elections are a blunt instrument of self-government:they enable the public to choose officeholders,not policies.Thus,to understand the contribution of elections to the American system of government,it is necessary to look not only at voters but also at candidates.Who runs and who wins?What effect do elections have on the relationship between representatives and the people they serve?Chapter 16 focuses on congressional elections, with particular attention to the considerable advantages of incumbency.Chapter 19 examines presidential selection,emphasizing 政肥 Tundreds of pork-barrelprojects were embedded in the60billionannual the lengthy,intricate,and highly political process that,every four Lappropriations bill that Congress passed in late 1987.Through the years,gives Americans their president. ★女★ of Senator Ted Stevens,Alaska fishermen got $2.6 million in federal funds todevelop fishery products."The University of Massachusetts at Amherst received $60,000 for its Belgian Endive Research Center,thanks to the efforts of Congressman Silvio Conte,the ranking minority member on the House Appropriations Committee.Senator James McClure produced a $6.4 million federal grant for development of a ski resort in his state of Idaho. Congress has a long tradition of pork-barrel legislation-laws designed primarily to help members of Congress get reelected by authorizing federal projects that benefit their constituents.The pork barrel has many critics outside Congress and a few inside,but it persists year after year."Ihave spent my career trying to get Congressmen to spend the publie's money as if it was their own, and I have failed,"said Senator William Proxmire of Wisconsin,who retired in 1989 after thirty years in Congress.? It would be a mistake to conclude that members of Congress are obsessed by pork-barrel legislation.But it would be only a slight exaggeration to say that most members of Congress are preoccupied with any and all factors,including pork-barrel projects,that will help them to stay in office.Getting reelected is the .January 18,1988,24. 369