Question

What is preventing margin bottom from working here?
http://jsfiddle.net/cq8VC/1/

I just want the active one to be jumping up in the air about 10px.

Answer 1

Ok, by adding a span around the internal elements of the list items as follows:

<div id="navigation"> 
    <ul id="links"> 
        <li><a href="index.html"><span>Home</span></a></li> 
        <li><a class="active" href="projects.html"><span>Projects</span></a></li> 
        <li><a href="whyme.html"><span>Why Me?</span></a></li> 
        <li><a href="contact.html"><span>Contact</span></a></li> 
    </ul> 
</div>

And by changing your CSS to the following you should end up with the desired result:

#navigation ul#links li a.active{color:#1161A5; }
#navigation ul#links li a.active span { position: relative; top: -10px; }
#navigation ul#links li a{ font-family:LeagueGothicRegular;color:#ADC060;text-decoration:none;padding-left:10px;border-left:2px solid #1161A5;}
#navigation ul#links li a:hover,#navigation li:active{color:#1161A5;}
#navigation ul#links li:first-child a{border-left:none;}
#navigation ul#links li{float:left;font-size:1.5em;margin-left:10px;}