22 Steven Franks
Another important factor in differentiating approaches is the question of whether
all infinitival clauses are of the same size, i.e. CP, or, in the spirit of Wurmbrand (2001),
there are several sizes and these enjoy distinct mechanisms for expressing subjects.
The earliest account of the SD to argue for different sizes can be found in Franks and
Hornstein (1992). There we assumed a PRO subject in all infinitives but contended that
PRO could be either an anaphor or a pronoun – the former amounting to OC – and
then attempted to derive anaphoric status through government. Since government was
blocked by an intervening C, CP-infinitivals forced pronominal PRO whereas smaller
TP/IP-infinitivals led to anaphoric (OC) PRO. This size distinction is inherited by
MTC approaches, assuming movement of the subject NP is facilitated by being inside
a bare TP but inhibited by the presence of CP. Babby (1998, 2009 ) takes this contrast
one step further, rejecting PRO entirely for OC and instead assigning the infinitive’s
external theta-role directly to the controller.^9 Landau (2008) on the other hand follows
mainstream minimalism in treating all infinitivals as CPs.3.1 Vertical binding
For Babby (1998, 2009 ), PRODAT is needed for the semipredicative to agree with in full
clauses, but elsewhere, under OC, PRO can be eschewed in favour of smaller infinitival
structures. In Babby (1998) these are S and VP. As shown in (15), S has a PRODAT sub-
ject and VP does not. Vertical binding means VP passes its external theta role up the
tree to be eventually discharged directly to the controlling matrix subject NP (together
with the external theta role of the matrix V). What is crucial for agreement with the
subject of the matrix verb is thus that the infinitival VP combine directly with that
verb, as in (15a).
(15) a. SNP VPVFIN VPINFb. SNP VPVFIN SPRODAT VP- In this respect, Babby’s VB approach is conceptually similar to the LFG model of Neidle
(1988), where only “grammatical control” involves a bare infinitive.