1. a) Two provisions used in the Bill of Rights to protect individuals who try to influence policy are protected by the first amendment. The first amendment allows freedom of speech and press which are important aspects of policy influence.
b) Grassroots mobilization helps influence over policy by forming a passionate group in order to be heard by the policy workers. Lobbying of government institutions is effective because interest groups can go right to the source, a policy worker, and confront him/her about their interests, instead of leaving voice mails and letters that an official will probably never look at. Litigation is helpful because no company wants to be involved in a lawsuit. Chances are, big companies will prefer to listen to the complaints of interest groups or pay money before they are willing to go to court.
c) A government regulation on interest groups is the registry participants need to fill out with the House of Representatives.
2. a) A key characteristic of the merit system is the idea that each employee should be hired according to their skill level and expertise, as opposed to being hired based on patronage.
b) The structure of the federal bureaucracy helps with independence because they are all designed to carry out the works that the executive branch and even the legislation branch can't do themselves. The complexity of public problems calls for a lot of time and effort to do a decent job in figuring out and the busy officials don't have enough time to deal with it all in a complex manner. The bureaus are made to organize people to dive deep into the various aspects the government needs to deal with. For example, the Federal Bureau of Investigation detects crime and puts criminals away.
c) The congress can check the bureaus by overseeing the appointment of head agency heads and detailing legislation. The courts can check the bureaus by holding hearings to make sure all members are abiding by the law. Lastly, interest groups can check bureaus because they are often involved in an iron triangle with congressional committees. They are all dependent on each other causing each to meet the others halfway in order to keep the peace and ultimately have policy influence.
* you didn't tell us the years so I couldn't give a link*
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