Texas Legislature
The term for a legislature with two chambers, such as the Texas House and Senate
Bicameralism
The legislative chamber in which Texas revenue bills must begin
The Texas House of Representatives
The length of a Texas governor’s term and the limit on the number of terms
Four years; no term limit
The two officials who head the Texas House and Senate, respectively
The House speaker and the lieutenant governor
The branch of law that usually handles private disputes over relationships, obligations, and responsibility
Civil law
The number of calendar days in a regular session of the Texas Legislature
140 calendar days
The principle requiring legislative districts to be roughly equal in population
One person, one vote
The governor’s significant power to select people for Texas boards and state agencies
Appointment power
Texas’s chief civil lawyer, who represents the state and state agencies in lawsuits
The attorney general
The person or party who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit
The plaintiff
The years in which regular sessions of the Texas Legislature take place
Odd-numbered years
The political group whose electoral success partisan gerrymandering seeks to maximize
The majority party
The legislative chamber that confirms appointments made by the Texas governor
The Texas Senate
The official who collects state taxes and estimates revenues for the Texas budget
The comptroller of public accounts
A serious criminal offense that can be punished by a prison sentence
A felony
The state official who can call a special session of the Texas Legislature and set its agenda
The governor
The committee that works out differences between House and Senate versions of a bill
A conference committee
The governor’s authority to reject specific items from an appropriations bill
The line-item veto
The only appointed, rather than elected, position in the Texas plural executive
The secretary of state
The standard of guilt that a criminal jury must meet to convict a defendant
Beyond a reasonable doubt
The term for a legislator helping a resident solve a problem with a state agency
Constituent services (casework)
The vote required in each legislative chamber to override a regular gubernatorial veto
A two-thirds vote in both chambers
The system that divides executive authority among several officials, making the Texas governor structurally weaker
The plural executive
The commission that reviews whether state agencies should continue operating
The Sunset Advisory Commission
Texas’s highest civil court and highest criminal court, in that order
Texas Supreme Court; Texas Court of Criminal Appeals