Citations:grasstops

grass tops

 * 2003, "Polk With a Vision", The Ledger, 22 August 2003:
 * Larry Skidmore, Polk's director of human services, said that's exactly what was planned: "If it's just grass tops and not grassroots, we won't get a good result."
 * 2007, Roger H. Davidson, Walter J. Olezek, & Frances E. Lee, Congress and Its Members, CQ Press (2007), ISBN 9780872893573, page 399:
 * Mass mobilizations have become so common that some firms specialize in "grass tops" lobbying.
 * 2007, Susan J. Ferguson, Mapping the Social Landscape: Readings in Sociology, McGraw-Hill (2007), ISBN 9780073528076, page 423:
 * Along with the ads, industry worked to mobilize local politicians and business executives in what business groups called a "grass tops" campaign.
 * 2010, Chuck Sudetic, The Philanthropy of George Soros: Building Open Societies, PublicAffairs (2010), ISBN 9781586488222, page 74:
 * In 2010, after an intense grassroots and "grass tops" campaign by the U.S. PWYP movement, with support from George Soros as well as U2's Bono and his ONE campaign, the transparency movement secured its biggest victory.
 * 2012, Joe Durwin, "New Mass. Arts Lobby Presents Platform to Cultural Leaders", iBerkshires.com, 17 October 2012:
 * "We need to have the muscle, the political strength, and the united community to get what we want," said Wilson, who added that most of the political advocacy for the arts in Massachusetts over the past decade has been more "grass tops" than grass roots, the bulk of it done by leaders and boards of cultural institutions.

grasstops

 * 2004, Richard G. Shell, Make the Rules or Your Rivals Will, Crown Business (2004), ISBN 9781400053773, page 39:
 * A variation on Household's vote-getting efforts is something called the "grasstops" campaign. Rather than try to get all the way to the grassroots level of the individual worker, a grasstops campaign engages middle managers — leaders of plants, factories, and divisions within larger corporations — to lobby their local representatives.
 * 2004, Peter H. Stone, "Business Readies Its Battle Plans", The National Journal, 7 February 2004:
 * Depending on the circumstances, the roundtable is looking to help its favored candidates in as many as two dozen districts through issue ads and "grasstops" efforts that involve reaching out to political, business, and civic leaders in the community.
 * 2007, Carla Marinucci, "Obama’s team oozes optimism", San Francisco Chronicle, 12 November 2007:
 * Schwartz said Clinton’s campaign in California — which has been heavy on endorsements and organization — is more “grasstops” than “grassroots,” while the Illinois senator has “a campaign of inspiration and not obligation.”
 * 2010, Tom Wolff, The Power of Collaborative Solutions: Six Principles and Effective Tools for Building Healthy Communities, Jossey-Boss (2010), ISBN 9780470490846, page 176:
 * The grasstops group worked to bring the issue of education to the forefront of the city's major institutions (the Chamber of Commerce, clergy, and so on) and get their support for the ambitious goal.
 * 2011, Mark Totten, "Viewpoint: Promoting the potential of The Promise", Kalamazoo Gazette, 1 April 2011:
 * But the response is not just grasstops; it's also grassroots.

grass-tops

 * 2003, Tom Palmer, "Leaders' Retreat to Focus on Budget", The Ledger, 16 August 2003:
 * "If it's just grass-tops and not grassroots, we won't get a good result," he said.
 * 2003, Cara Gardner, "Prepping For Surgery", The Pacific Northwest Inlander, 6 November 2003:
 * "Some of the work is grassroots," he said, "and some of it is grass-tops -- like this summit."
 * 2011, Jim Newton, "California foster-care system: Secrecy that hurts kids", Los Angeles Times, 8 March 2011:
 * "Foster kids don't have a union," testified one witness, Ed Howard, from the Children's Advocacy Institute. "They don't have a Chamber of Commerce. They can't vote. They don't have PACs. They aren't hiring PR firms. They don't do grass-tops or grass-roots organizing."
 * 2013, Petra Bartosiewicz & Marissa Miley, "The Too Polite Revolution: Why the Recent Campaign to Pass Comprehensive Climate Legislation in the United States Failed", page 68:
 * “The approach was very grass-tops,” said Greenpeace’s Phil Radford.

grass tops

 * 2008, David Dempsey, Great Lakes for Sale: From Whitecaps to Bottlecaps, University of Michigan Press (2008), ISBN 9780472116492, page 34:
 * The environmental grass roots had delivered a powerful message to the grass tops.
 * 2008, David G. Smith & Judith D. Moore, Medicaid Politics and Policy, Transaction Publishers (2010), ISBN 9781412807371, page 234:
 * They also had important connections to advocacy groups and the local "grass tops."
 * 2010, Alan Khazei, Big Citizenship: How Pragmatic Idealism Can Bring Out the Best in America, PublicAffairs (2010), ISBN 9781586487867, page 258:
 * Develop a comprehensive strategy that engages both the "grass tops" and grassroots and that leverages the collective reach of the coalition.
 * 2011, Leslie R. Crutchfield, John V. Kania, & Mark R. Kramer, Do More Than Give: The Six Practices of Donors Who Changes the World, Jossey-Bass (2011), ISBN 9780470891445, page 221:
 * Hire staff with adaptive leadership skills including proven ability to work across sectors, a commitment to creating systems-level change, and finesse at motivating leaders at the grass tops and individuals at the grassroots to act collectively to solve problems for themselves.

grasstops

 * 2008, Christine Mahoney, Brussels Versus the Beltway: Advocacy in the United States and the European Union, Georgetown Univeristy Press (2008), ISBN 9781589012035, page 43:
 * For example, Bacheller (1977) suggest that large mass-membership groups will be more likely to use the grassroots while non-membership groups will be more likely to use the grasstops.
 * 2010, Joshua W. Busby, Moral Movements and Foreign Policy, Cambridge University Press (2010), ISBN 9780521768726, page 168:
 * Here, I focus on elite messengers, or what in policy circles are known as the "grasstops."
 * 2010, Wendell Potter, Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR IS Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans, Bloomsbury Press (2010), ISBN 9781608192816, page 35:
 * Or, when just the 'grasstops' are needed, we recruit just a few of a target's key friends or contributors to join us.

Noun: "a lobbying strategy which aims to involve people with power or influence at a local level"

 * 2000, Elizabeth Drew, The Corruption of American Politics: What Went Wrong and Why, Overlook Press (2000), ISBN 9781585670499, page 78:
 * As the "grass roots" method became widely used, a still newer approach was added, as was a new term in the lobbyists' liturgy, "grass tops."
 * 2004, Jeffrey H. Birnbaum, "Lobbyists Try to Parlay a Presidential Campaign", The Washington Post, 12 April 2004:
 * The companies specialize in a cutting-edge form of influence peddling called "grass tops," which attempts to get prominent local citizens and organizations to lobby on behalf of interest groups.