The Category P Features, Projections, Interpretation

207
.
The DOC (65b) is of special interest here. Following the analysis of the DOC in
Appendix to chapter 4, the (structural) Case of the verb which can be affected by
Case-removing operations (e.g. passive) is Dative (66) (its Accusative is inherent):
(66) a. The children were given many presents.
b. *Many presents were given the children.
Now, note that the DOC resists externalization of either the Theme or the Goal
arguments (67) (cf. Fiengo and Lasnik 1974):
(67) a. *The children are easy to give many presents.
b. *Many presents are easy to give children.
On the assumption that Accusative of the verb in the DOC is inherent (Larson
1988), it cannot be removed, and the ungrammaticality of (67b) is expected. The
ungrammaticality of (67a), however, is puzzling. Note that it cannot be claimed that
(67a) is ungrammatical because externalization targets the Goal. Clearly, the Goal
argument of give can be externalized upon P-stranding (68) (recall that English Ps are
assumed to check Accusative). The ungrammaticality of (67a) is accounted for on the
assumption that the structural Case in the DOC is Dative, but to, unlike the passive
morphology, can remove only Accusative. If Dative in (67a) is not removed, the Opchain
is Cased and assigned the Goal theta-role. An assigned theta-role cannot be
externalized.
(68) The children are easy to give many presents to.
To summarize, to in English object gap constructions, like Hebrew le-, is P pred ,
namely it is not associated with φ-features. It removes Accusative and suppresses the
external argument of the verb. The internal theta-role of the verb is assigned to a
phonetically null element (Op). It is externalized, as the Op-chain in the PP is
Caseless.