subject-verb agreement

mbahunt · Posted: Sun Aug 06, 2006 9:54 pm Post subject: subject-verb agreement

From Kaplan's GMAT Premier Program 2007 Edition, Sentence Correction:

15. The newly elected baseball commissioner has asked _________ to go on strke, and the lawyers representing major league franchise owners.

B. that a federal arbitrator mediate negotiations between representatives of the umpire's union, which have threatened

E. a federal arbitrator to mediate negotiations between representatives of the umpire's union, which has threatened

A, C and E are obviously wrong.

The Kaplan answer guide states that both are idiomatically acceptable, but that the subject-verb agreement in choice B is incorrect because it uses "the plural verb have with the singular subject union."

My question is this: aren't the representatives of the union threatening to go on strike, not the union itself? If so, shouldn't B be the correct answer since have is used with representatives?

dblazquez · Posted: Mon Aug 07, 2006 12:18 am Post subject:

Thats a very common trap on SC; whenever you see a "which", check the sustantive inmediately before.

Which modifies always the inmediately before sustantive, not the action, not the subordinate

My question is, ask is not one of those subjuntive mood verbs that require to remove the "to" from the verb?? just like "request" or "advice"

venkat8103

Its the union, which has threatend.
union is Singular.

(Ofcourse, union is a group of reps).

To give some more egs,

The public - Singular

Group of Students / Student's group -Singular

(Could any one pls confirm about "Group of Students"..i think depending on the usage it can be plural also)