The United States is composed of national and state governments that all unite to help the people of this country. Under U.S Constitution a federal system was created declaring the National Government as the possessive supreme political authority. States are also allowed to be sovereign, deriving their power from people through their state’s constitution. The federalist system allows that each state has its own constitution, but they must comply with the U.S Constitution. The differences between the National Government and a State Government are seen in the laws and powers described in a state constitutions and in the U.S Constitution.
State Constitution clearly explain the source of power and authority, delegate and specify how the power
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While the National Government takes charge of printing money, declaring war, establishing an army and navy, enter treaties with foreign governments, etc. The State Governments are given the power to create establish local governments for specific areas, such as known counties in the Gulf Coast area like, Harris, Matagorda, Jackson, Brazoria, Liberty, Matagorda, etc. State Governments are also in charge of issuing licenses whether it’s a drivers or marriage license. They are also responsible for providing public health and public safety, such as police departments, fire departments, and hospitals. Another power that is given to state governments is the transportation of the people. This includes building highways, streets, rails, and providing public transportation. Also, something different that differs national government and state governments that that each state has its own rules of the rate of income state taxes they collect. In Texas we only collect federal taxes, but New York, California, Louisiana, and other states are taken federal and state income taxes.
The national government and state government share power in many areas, but in order to control the power given to the executive branch the Tenth amendment in the Bill of Rights, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people” allowed equal power to the federal government, the state government and the people. By distributing this power it allows higher authority and the citizens to take charge of this country and its
Separation of power protects against tyranny because all the branches of government checks each other. Checks and balances are “ A principle of the united states constitution gives each branch the power to check, or limit, the other branches. The constant aim is to divide and arrange the several offices in such a manner as they may be a check on the other. Checks and balances protect against tyranny because the legislative branch can approve presidential nominations, the executive branch can nominate judges, and the judicial branch can declare laws unconstitutional.
This specific system of government is described by the 21st Century American Government and Politics textbook as, “The allocation of powers and responsibilities among national, state, and local governments and the intergovernmental relations between them.” When deciding whether the Framers intended for federal or state governments to be supreme in the federal system, a divided answer among the Founders surfaces. If one was to present this question to Alexander Hamilton and his fellow Federalists, he would undoubtedly express his support for a strong federal government. Conversely, Thomas Jefferson and the anti-federalists were in favor of state government supremacy in the federal system and even resented the ratification of the Constitution.
“James Madison’s idea of the division of power between central and state governments is known as federalism.” (James Madison, Federalist Paper #51, 1788) The state governments have the power to make local decisions such as establishing schools, passing marriage and divorce laws, and to hold elections. Whereas the central government has the power to make decisions that affect the country such as, to provide an army and navy, set up post offices, and regulate trade. As James Madison said, “The different governments will each control each other, at the same time that each will be controlled by itself.”
The central government has enough power to help some of the country’s major needs and the state government has enough power to help the state’s needs because the state’s needs may be more specific. From this, you may conclude that dividing powers between the central and state governments prevents
In document C, there is a very useful chart that shows one way that each of the three branches of government (executive, legislative, and judicial) holds a little bit of power over the others. This is good because it means that no one part of government is above or below the others in terms of power, and there is always a way for one of them to be “checked” if they are becoming too tyrannical. For example, the President (executive) can veto Congressional legislation, but Congress (legislative) can impeach the President if necessary. Being able to “check” each other is one of the ways that the Constitution kept one group from having too much power. Another benefit of having the checks and balances system is that none of the three branches is so far apart from each that they have no power over the others, but they are far enough apart to prevent the power from accumulating.
In the United States, the government of all 50 states is structed in accordance with its individual constitution. Each state constitution must be grounded in republic principles, “Article IV, section 4, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution” tasks by the federal government with assuring that each states government is so organized. All states are shaped after the federal government and are made up of three branches; Legislative, Executive, and Judicial. All governments are also shaped by the presidential systems where the governor is both head of the government and head of the state. There aren’t two states in America that are the same, and each state is its own self sovereign entity and is made appropriate based on the people who live
Federalism breaks apart the powers given to the central (Federal) government and those powers given to the states. As seen in document A1, a source from James Madison from Federalist Paper #51, 1788; Madison states, “In the compound republic of America, the power surrendered by the people is first divided between two distinct governments, and the portion allotted to each subdivided among distinct and separate departments.” This idea from Madison is the idea of the division of power between the Federal Government and State Governments. Federalism provides a “Double security,” that protects the rights of the citizens of the United States of America. As the governments will be controlled by itself, the separate governments will also control each other.
Central Government has the power to regulate trade, declare war and print money. States have the power to establish schools, regulate in-state businesses and to hold elections. These two sectors also share some
The national and state government both have power which the people can appoint to represent them. It imposes laws to keep corruption and illegal behavior from those that can hurt citizens. Under the constitution we have checks and balances. It distributes power onto the Executive, Judicial, and Legislative so no one is more powerful than the other. Our government has created laws to keep peace and order within its borders.
Therefore, power has been justly distributed between each division of government. Checks and balances are yet another form of separation of powers in the government. As the Constitution was initially written, there were checks and balances preventing any one branch of becoming too powerful. Since we still follow the same Constitution (with a few amendments) those checks and balances are still used.
This country was founded with the attempt to separate the federal government and the state government, known as federalism. The goal of federalism is to divide the power of state and federal governments, protect the rights of the state, and prevent tyranny of the majority. Throughout the years, federalism turned into dual federalism where the state and federal government were completely independent of each other and only shared a dependency on the Constitution. The united states suppressing now to cooperative federalism, the national government has assumed even more power, overruling the states with Supreme Court decisions and actions, and executive Orders. Furthermore, the Federal government should grant their state governments more power, due to the connection the state governments hold with their local people.
Such as: conduct of local, state and national elections, established republican forms of government, criminal laws and insurance laws, build and maintain infrastructure, administer family laws, provide education, tax estate and inheritance, protect public health, safety, and property rights, regulate occupations, professions, intrastate commerce, bank, credit, charity and land use, and conduct public works. States have more intimate connections to the land they govern and to the citizens of the
To protect it’s people from tyranny the Constitution uses federalism, separation of powers, and checks and balances. An important tool the Constitution uses is Federalism to share power. Federalism is when a country has a compound government, which includes a central government and state governments. James Madison explains that power will be divided between the central government and state governments; the said power will then be split between discrete departments.
“The different governments will each control each other at the same time that each will be controlled by itself.” (Doc A, Madison,James, Federalist Paper 51, 1788). Each part of the government had there own jobs to do, for example the central government has the power to regulate trade, conduct foreign relations, provide an army and navy, while the state government set up local governments, holds elections,
Federalism Federalism is a system of government in which power is divided between federal government, state government and provinces government. While federalism has many benefits, among them is checks and balances between the federal and state government, thus reducing the chances of one party getting too powerful and abusing their power. Preventing one party from being too powerful and abusing their powers is a good thing. However, it comes with a price that federal and provinces (state and local) governments do not always see eye to eye and agree with each other, which turns into conflict.