Power`s Separation Essays - Constitutional Law, Philosophy Of Law

Power`s Separation It has proved true, historically, that there is a natural tendency of governments to assume as much power as possible. To prevent this from happening in the United States, the framers of the Constitution divided the functions of the federal government among three branches: the executive branch, legislature or the lawmaking branch and the judiciary. These should be separate and enjoy equal power and independence. This separation of powers is in direct contrast to the government in Britain. Their Parliament is the single governing unit. Members of the executive--the Cabinet and the Prime Minister--are members of Parliament. The highest court of appeal is the House of Lords. The separation of powers was also in contrast to the government under the Articles of Confederation. The Articles provided for no separate executive branch. The president was the presiding officer of the Congress. There was no national court system at all. The framers of the Constitution decided on a government in which the three main functions would be held by three separate branches. The Congress was empowered to make laws. The president was empowered, through the departments and agencies of the executive branch, to enforce the laws. The president is thus the head of the bureaucracy--the non-elected officials of government. The Supreme Court was established as the highest judicial authority. John Adams referred to this three-part arrangement as a system of checks and balances that protect the people from authoritarian or arbitrary rule. In addition to distributing power among the three branches of the federal government, the Constitution also distributes it among the states and the people. The Tenth Amendment specifically reserves all "powers not delegated to the United States" to the "States respectively, or to the people." Within each state there are many other governmental units. Each local government, from the smallest village to the largest city, has its necessary powers. There are taxing bodies, such as school districts, that have the authority they need in order to operate. Before continuing to mention how the separation of powers is applied in the United States presidential system, let me briefly explain the structure of the presidential system. The Presidential System United States Government The federal government of the United States was created by the Constitution, which went into operation in 1789 when the first Congress convened and George Washington took the oath of office as president. The government is called federal because it was formed by a compact (the Constitution) among 13 political units (the states). These states agreed to give up part of their independence, or sovereignty, in order to form a central authority and submit themselves to it. Thus, what was essentially a group of 13 separate countries under the Articles of Confederation united to form one nation under the Constitution. When the Declaration of Independence was issued in 1776, it used the term United States of America. Until the Constitution was adopted and ratified, however, the 13 states did not really form one nation. They each held onto so many powers individually, including conducting foreign policy and trade negotiations, that the Continental Congress could only do what the states allowed. The Articles were never the law of the land to the extent that the Constitution is. In essence, the United States as a nation did not come into existence until the Constitution began to function as the framework of the government. Once the Constitution was in place, tension between the states and the federal government did not automatically cease. Many political thinkers believed that the states were really the supreme authority. According to this viewpoint, states could nullify acts of the federal government that were disagreeable to them. One of the strongest proponents of this view was John C. Calhoun, senator from South Carolina. His chief opponent was Chief Justice John Marshall. Calhoun's position, called states' rights, has persisted to the present. It was seriously undermined, however, by the American Civil War. Since that war the federal government has gained much power at the expense of the states. The best known characteristic of the presidential system is the separation of powers. The three principal functions of the government are the formal promulgation of the law, its administration, and its adjudication. These are established in separate and co-ordinate branches. We call them the legislative, the executive and the judicial; they are independent of one another, but are at the same time made interdependent. (The judicial branch enjoys a considerable degree of independence in all nations subscribing to the Anglo-American tradition of jurisprudence, regardless of whether they have adopted the presidential system.) CONGRESS: The Legislation

History Essay

History Essay History Essay Hoover’s Response to Great Depression: He believed it was a crisis of confidence not of capitalism. The market is self-correcting. Hoover had a Laissez-Faire approach to the economy. He encouraged organizations of farmers, industrialists, and bankers to share information, bolster one another’s spirits, and devise policies to aid economic recovery. He urged farmers to restrict output, industrialists to hold wages at pre-depression levels, and bankers to help each other remain solvent. The federal government would provide them with information, strategies of mutual aid, occasional loans, and morale-boosting speeches. He relied heavily on volunteerism. Bread and soup lines were very popular during this time. He enacted the Smoot Hawley Tariff in 1930 which raised tariffs by 30%. The idea was that it would protect American farmers from international competition. Because of this world trade plummeted and it deepened depression in Europe, which hurt the US because they were paying back the US for war debts. Then Hoover declared a 1 year moratorium on European war debts which deepened the US depression. He also tried to balance the budget by raising taxes and the US GDP went down. He then created the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in 1932. It gave $2 billion loan to banks, railroads and state governments. He did not give money to the poor. It was a form of trickle-down economics and it was too little too late for Hoover. Roosevelt’s Response to Great Depression: FDR believed strongly that action needed to be taken immediately. He started off with The First New Deal. It was a dizzying array of laws, agencies and programs to bolster the economy. It was experimental in nature not ideological. Its three basic components were Industrial recovery, agricultural recovery, and short term relief for the jobless. One of the first things he did was put a 4 day bank holiday, and called an emergency session of congress. If after the 4 days the bank reopened, then it was deemed in good shape. This restored confidence to the American people and ended bank runs. For industrial recovery he created the National Recovery Act which had many different components for everybody. Examples were lifting anti-trust laws for business, Created jobs by giving money for public works, right to collective bargaining for workers, created the FDIC and SEC for regulation and confidence. For agricultural he created the Agricultura l Adjustment Act which extended credit to farmers. It also bolstered crop and livestock prices by reducing production, by paying farmers to plow over crops and kill livestock. For the jobless he created the Civilian Conservation Corps which created jobs for young men. The built state parks, roads, playgrounds etc. There was also the Tennessee Valley Authority which used dams to create electricity for poor people throughout the Tennessee valley area. There was some criticism of The First New deal and the Supreme Court ruled the NRA and AAA unconstitutional, this led to the Second New Deal. Started out with direct aid to the needy and created the Works Project Administration, which employed 8.5 million people. They were concerned with public works projects, as well as, writing, theater, art and youth projects. Another part of the Second New Deal was the Social Security Act to protect the elderly. It was just the very beginning of Social Security and it excluded many professions. Why Hoover responded that Way: Hoover was a strong believer in Lassiez-Faire economics. He believed that the economy has periods of ups and downs and that when the economy goes down it will eventually come back up again. He believed that the government must intervene as little as possible. As Secretary of Commerce did not want government to control industry but he wanted the government to persuade corporations to cooperate and make things better for industry as a whole. Another reason he may have responded that way is History essay History essay What were the most significant events in helping Indigenous Australians achieve positive change since World War II? World War 2 was an atrocity for many, its crimes spread far and wide including the execution of Jews, and torturing prisoners of war. But in its wake came a call for change, and all through the world people started to see human rights in a new way and improvements were made all round including for our own Aborigines. The first major changes were to come in 1949, which came with Australian citizenship for all Aboriginals. 1949 also brought them the right to vote in federal elections, if they had served in the army during the world wars, or if they were allowed to vote in their state election. This was countered however in Queensland where voting was entirely disallowed for Aborigines, and in Western Australia and the Northern Territory the right was conditional and was rarely granted. 1949 brought several other changes but most were delayed or simply refused, the major changes would have to wait until later. In 1962 the common wealth electoral act Gave Aborigines the option to vote in all federal elections, regardless of state or location. 1965 brought the integration policy which replaced the white Australia policy and sought to end discrimination towards Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, it also allowed the federal government to overrule state policy if they saw that the states were mistreating Aborigines or ignoring their policies. On the 27th of May 1967 the commonwealth referendum to have aboriginals counted in the national census. It also made changes to our constitution removing section 127 of the constitution which stated â€Å"In reckoning the numbers of the people of the Commonwealth, or of a State or other part of the Commonwealth, aboriginal natives shall not be counted.† And changed section 51 paragraph 26, which then allowed the federal government to make laws regarding the Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders. On the 1st of June 1975 the Racial Discrimination Act was passed allowing the federal government to History Essay History Essay For writing History essays such as US history essays, American history essays, European history essays and world history essays, the first thing that is obligatory is the knowledge of the historical topic on which on which you have opted to write. For gaining that knowledge, you can read the history books, journals and articles depicting any historical event or incident. In a history essay, you have to concentrate on only one topic and have to write paragraphs dealing with that topic only. Remember that you should not include irrelevant information in history essays, as it will spoil your history essays. The paragraphs that you write in your history essays should be connected to each other and should be continuous until the argument is over or until the historical essay topics on which you are writing are justified. In a history essay, you have to deal with a number of paragraphs and each of these paragraphs deals with a particular idea or thought. No paragraph should discuss more than one idea or thought or it will look like a rambling paragraph that will have nothing particular and precise. History essays should be written with a clear idea in mind. First of all, an outline should be made that can help you arrange your ideas in a particular format. Before writing the final copy of your history essay, always write a draft. A draft will always inform you about your mistakes and errors regarding to the essays on history. For writing essays in history, students should gather relevant and authorized information from authorized sources to write a history essay. World history essays require enough hard work from the student, as they are very crucial and should not contain any mistake in terms of factual information. In case of delivering incorrect information, the history essays are completely rejected. World history essays require a lot of researching and analysis for the final drafting of a history essay. You have to arrange all the paragraphs using the format of introduction, body and conclusion. The introductory paragraph should introduce the topic fully while the conclusi on should summarize your stated information and the results that you have obtained from all your research. The history essay should be concluded in such a manner that it gives the writer and the reader a sense of completion. The body paragraph of history essays should contain all the information that you want to discuss in your history essay. Art history essay should also be written by following the same format that is described above. The above stated details must have added to your knowledge related to history essay writing. 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