Setting a precedent that lasted more than a century,George

Subjunctive forms of verbs are used to express various states of unreality such as wish, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or action that has not yet occurred. So with verbs such as 'wish', 'suggest', 'insist', you use subjunctive form.
Also, 'insist' will not take a direct object such as 'him'. You cannot insist someone. 'You can insist on something' or 'You can insist that something take place' or 'You can insist that someone do something'.
Therefore, (A), (B) and (E) are incorrect.
(C) is obviously incorrect since one cannot disappoint 'insistence'.

(D) is correct.

Hi,

Did a quick google about the verb insist and came across the following:

1. Insist is an intransitive verb (Unlike a transitive verb, an intransitive verb will not have a direct object receiving the action).
2. "to insist" is a verb that takes the subjunctive construction

I think point 2 above is the reason why E is wrong and D is correct.

we can always say:

I insist that you eat on time

but we CANNOT say:

I insist you to eat on time.

Hope its clear now

can anyone explain why B is incorrect?
insisting is refering to people here it is clear and concise

I think it is because insisting is acting as a present participle here and that "insisting him to" is not a cause of an event i.e. "George Washington disappointed the people". It can also modify George Wahington. So it should be "who" so that it correctly modifies "people" and convey the meaning properly.

I am confused between D & E. Why is E incorrect here?

Thank you Karishma for such great explanation. +1

Insist is used as a subjunctive verb....All of the following verb : Demand, Dictate, Insist, Mandate, Propose, Request, Recommend, Stipulate, Suggest are used in subjunctive form ..Some pointers about Subjunctives

Usage of THAT is must with these verbs ..

The verb which comes after That always takes plural verbs in subjunctive form even with Singular subjects..

The verb which comes after that always takes the simplest form of helping verb "BE"
e.g The manager demanded that workers be present there..
The manager demanded that workers are present there ..wrong usage.

To Verb or Infinitives cannot be used with the subjunctive verbs listed above. There are some verbs like Ask , Beg , Desire which can either be used with subjunctive verb or " To Verb "

Hi Karishma,

Thanks for the clear explanation. +1

I have a doubt here.
You mentioned that "insist" will not take a direct object such as "him". Will this apply to other similar verbs like "wish" and "suggest".
If yes, then what is correct version of "I wish him good luck"?

Thanks.

No. The subjunctive form is not related to objects.

Whether the verb will take an object or not depends on whether it acts as a transitive (takes object) or an intransitive verb (doesn't take object).

'Wish' and 'insist' can act as both transitive verbs and well as intransitive verbs but when insist acts as a transitive verb i.e. takes an object, it is of the form "She insisted that ...".

'Suggest' is a transitive verb and takes an object.

I would suggest you to check out the definition and usage of these verbs on https://www.merriam-webster.com/

Thanks again for the explanation. +1
Will definitely look up the definitions and usage.

insisted that he .... for a third term president. Isn't something missing such as "run".

command subjunctive is preferred but out of the available choices E is best.

Official answer from Veritas Prep.

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Hi Karishma,

In choice D, the subjunctive verb is missing

Setting a precedent that lasted more than a century,George Washington disappointed the people .who insisted that he for a third term as president.

IS it the correct sentence?


I rejected this choice because there was no subjunctive verb with the bossy verb -- insist

"run" should not be underlined is as obvious in the original posting here:
https://gmatclub.com/forum/setting-a-pr ... l#p1291894

I’ll explain the command subjunctive in bit more detail.

Command subjunctive is used with certain bossy verb such as require or propose. Bossy verbs tell the people to do things.

The Subjunctive construction with a bossy verb is always as follows:-

Bossy Verb + THAT + Subject + Command Subjunctive.

Eg- We PROPOSE THAT the school board DISBAND.

Take note of the following incorrect construction.

Wrong: We PROPOSE the school board DISBAND. (You must use the word that)
Wrong: We PROPOSE THAT the school board DISBANDS.
Wrong: WE PROPOSE THAT the school board should DISBAND.

Complicating matters, not every bossy verb uses the command subjunctive. In fact, with some of the most common bossy verbs, such as want, you cannot use the command subjunctive, instead, you must use an infinitive (to+ the bare form)

Wrong- The vice-president WANTS THAT she GO to the retreat.

Right: The vice- president WANTS her TO GO to the retreat.

Which bossy verbs take which construction: subjunctive or infinitive? Unfortunately this issue is Idiomatic.

These verbs take ONLY the command Subjunctive when indicating desire:
demand, dictate, insist, mandate, propose, recommend, request, stipulate, suggest.

Note that propose can take an infinitive when there is no second subject. Eg- the attorney proposed to meet the following day.

These verbs take ONLY the infinitive.
advice, allow, forbid, persuade, want.

We allow HIM TO BE here.

These verbs take EITHER the command subjunctive OR the infinitive.
Ask, beg, intend, order, prefer, urge, require (pay particular importance to require)

We require THAT he be here. (Active Verb) OR We require HIM TO be here. (Passive verb.
Something is required to be done)

A few bossy verbs most notably prohibit, take other construction altogether.
Right: The agency PROHIBITED Gary FROM WORKING on Weekends.

NOTE- A few bossy verbs can be used in a non-bossy ways. Her presence suggests that she is happy. In this context, suggests means “probably”; it is not acting bossy. Kindly pay attention to the meaning!

Coming back to the original question, It will be evidently clear that the answer choice ‘D’ follows the rule of command subjunctive.

Setting a precedent that lasted more than a century, George Washington disappointed the people who insisted(bossy verb)+ THAT (mandatory with this verb) +he(subject)+ run (Command Subjunctive) for a third term as president.

Hope this helps.

Note:- Most of the above note was taken from MGMAT Sentence correction text book.

Lets look a the split here:

1 - word insisting - In this George Washington did not insist, it is people who insted os the usage of insisting is incorrect here.
2 - word and - and is illogical as it is spliting the sentence
3 - word who - who should be the correct split as it refers to people - who insisted George Washington

With this we are left with option choices D and E.

as there is a word - insisted which is a subjunctive word, usage of "that" is required.

Hence, Answer is D

Did you like the answer? Hit Kudos

Bossy verb + THAT + subject Command Subjective
Demand ,dictate , insist, mandate, propose, recommend , request, suggest are some example.

Dear AnthonyRitz,

According to the solution that hazelnut posted above, why does "insisting" create ambiguity?
Note that there is no comma before "insisting".

Apart from the incorrect idiom, I find no other reasons to reject choices A. and B.

In A, "should" is sort of redundant with "insisting" -- they're insisting that he take the action, not that he "should" take the action, right? I mean, they want him to actually do it, not to accept the rightness of doing it. See the below definition of "insisting" to further illuminate why it's very weird to follow it with a word like "should."

In B, the phrase "insisting him to" is a significant issue that goes beyond pure style or idiom and into diction error -- "insist" means "to demand something forcefully," but they're not demanding "him" (they're demanding something of him). B makes no sense.

I can probably get past the participle "insisting" in both answers without tripping too much over modifier issues, but I will note that the relative pronoun "who" is still superior -- it's far firmer, with zero doubt that it refers to the "people" to whom it's directly adjacent. Having to rely on the absence of a comma to clarify the target of "insisting" walks a much finer line. All other things equal (which, as noted above, they are not), I'd prefer the relative pronoun here.
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The actions of GW had occurred in the past and hence if we were to talk about it today, we need to use the past tense. For that reason, we can eliminate (A) and (B)

If we take a closer look at (C), GW disappointed the people and their insistence that he....., we can see that
(i) GW disappointed people
(i) and GW disappointed their expectations - how can you disappoint expectations? You can disappoint people who have expectations.

Hence, (C) is incorrect.

the correct structure that follows 'insisted' is "insisted that". Hence, (D) is the right answer choice.