Federal Government Vs Enumerated Powers Essay

“The accumulation of all powers..in the same hands, whether of one or many (is) the very definition of tyranny.” (James Madison, Federalist Paper #47, 1788) ( Background Essay) This quote explains the reasoning for one of the framers, (B) Separation of Powers. The framers of the constitution were created to prevent tyranny and create a stronger government that would hold the nation together. Tyranny ultimately means harsh, absolute power in the hands of one individual-- like a king or dictator. The constitution guarded against tyranny in 4 ways: (A)Federalism, (B)Separation of Powers, (C)Checks & Balances, and (D)Small State-Large State.

“The accumulation of all powers… in the same hands, whether one, a few, or many… may be justly pronounced the very definition of tyranny. ”-James Madison. Fifty-five delegates, from the thirteen states, met in Philadelphia in May of 1787 to discuss and revise the Articles of Confederation. The chief executive and the representatives worked to create a frame for what is now our Constitution. The Constitution guarded against tyranny in four ways; Federalism that creates a State and Federal government, Separation of Powers that gives equal power to the three branches, Checks and Balances that create balance in the three branches by checking each other and being checked and the Small States vs the Big States ensures an equal voice for all states no matter what their size.

“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,

If anyone was to do even a little research about the United States in 1787, one would find that the states were not very unified and life was not easy. Men like, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and George Washington had one thing in mind, to reunite the United States. The book, A Brilliant Solution by Carol Berkin, very clearly depicts the obstacles and adversity that the men attending the constitutional convention had to overcome. Due to a plethora of factors, the men attending the constitutional convention encountered many complications during the convention, ranging from travel issues to a lack of power to even do anything necessary to change the “United” States. The book shows this by describing the story of the men as a “story of anxious

The public schools’ content, discipline, and amount of religiosity differed due to the early influences, general demographics, and the three sections. All states in America had free public schools by 1870, but attendance was not completely mandatory. Into the twentieth century, as it became a known fact that the more educated a person was, the more productive they could be, laws were established that required all foreigners to be americanized so that American education was able to expand and be unified as one

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.

These authorities that the national government should have, were all up to the states to decide under the Articles. With the taking away some of the states rights in the Constitution, Anti-federalists feared that this would leave the states too weak, resulting in more problems. Under the new Constitution, many powers that were now in the government 's hands are: the power to levy and collect taxes, the power to regulate interstate commerce, the government set up a national court system consisting of district, circuit, and a supreme court, the government could enforce laws, there was now a house based on population, and a senate based on equal representation (two votes per state), to amend the Constitution, a ⅔ vote of Congress was needed, and a ¾ vote of the states were needed, and a majority rule was needed to pass bills. These new powers and abilities of the national government helped to create a strong, new

This is evident in document A, where it shows you a Venn diagram of which powers are given to the states and which powers are given to the federal government. For one thing, this shows how “a double security arises to the rights of the people”, which means that when the power is distributed between the states and the federal government, neither is able to gain absolute power over the country. Federalism also comes in handy by specifying what the states get to control and what the national government gets to control, which is meant to prevent conflict between the two powers. For example, the task of declaring war is meant for the national government only. If that wasn’t specified, there would likely be a lot of cases where states declared war, and the national government had to clean up the mess.

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.

Ernie Law Zink 3° US History 15 September 2016 DBQ Essay When the delegates met in 1787 they aimed to fix the national government. The previous governmental charter, the Articles of Confederation, failed because it was just too weak and wasn’t getting the job done. Under the Articles of Confederation, there was no court system, no chief executive, and there was no particular way for the central government to force states to pay their taxes. By creating the Constitution, it would build a stronger central government and would be able to hold the nation together.

Although its power was limited, Congress was given the power to “declare war and make peace, to make treaties and alliance, to coin or borrow money, and to regulate trade with the

American schools were set up for religious purposes commonly only teaching to read and understand the Bible. Many states did not require public schools, Massachusetts being the only one in the early 1800s. In most states one had to be rich to get a good education where if one was poor there was no education outside of their homes causing many to not know how to read and write. Horace Mann took control of the education reform stating, “if we do not prepare children to become good citizens; if we do not develop their capacities, if we do not enrich their minds with knowledge . . . then our republic must go down to destruction as others have gone before it,”(418).

SIMULATED CONGRESSIONAL HEARING SPEECH QUESTIONS Unit Three - What happened at the Philadelphia Convention? 1. Because of different economic systems, Northern and Southern states had different interests. These conflicting interests led to disagreements at the Philadelphia Convention. • Describe at least two disagreements between Northern and Southern states at the Convention.

The reserved powers of the States is noted in the 10th amendment. The purpose of reserved powers is to make sure the federal government doesn’t become too strong or authoritative. Examples of reserved powers include: setting speed limits in areas, building highways, marriage laws, divorce laws, conducting elections, and setting up local governments. In sum, there are numerous differences between enumerated, implied, and reserved powers.

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.