Class Recap:
Basic Structure
-Federal
-Executive Branch -- President and his/her cabinet
-Legislative Branch -- Congress (House of Representitives and the Senate)
-Judicial Branch -- Federal Courts (including the Supreme Court)
-State
-Executive -- Governor
-Legislative -- State Congress (House and Senate)
-Judicial -- State Courts
-Local
-In most cases, answers to the state, rather than having genuine sovereignty
Federalism as opposed to Confederalism
-Federalism: A system of government where power is shared/divided between a central federal government and sovereign/partially-sovereign state governments (the type of government established by the US constitution)
-Confederalism: A system of government where states retain full sovereignty and deligate power to a central government (the type of government the US had under the short lived Articles of Confederation)
Concepts of Human Nature at the time of the nations founding
-John Locke's Tabula Rasa: People's nature is formed by their upbringing and society. We are born as blank slates, and the right society, education system, government, etc, can lead to genuinely good citizens.
-Machiavelli's Power Always Corrupts: The belief that no one can be trusted with substantial power because all human beings are essentially power hungry and burtal when the chips are down.
-Puritan/Calvinist Christian view: All people are essentially evil and need structure and religion to keep them from being animals.
A Combination of these views motivated the US system of separation of power, and an extensive system of checks and balances.
-Checks: An authority given to one branch of government that can over-rule a decision by a different branch
-Balances: When two separate branches of government share an authority between them, so that agreement must be reached in order to take action
Specific Checks and Balances:
Congress:
-Checks and Balances with the Executive (President)
-Can not pass legislation the president wants
-Can use a super majority to push legislation past the presidents veto
-Can refuse a presidential appointment (Senate only)
-Can refuse a presidentialy signed treaty (Senate only)
-Checks and Balances with the Judicial
-Decides number of courts and jurisdiction of the lower courts
-Can impeach a judge
-Can refuse nominated judges (Senate only)
-Can propose amendments to the constitution (must be ratified by the states)
President
-Checks on Congress
-Veto: The president can veto any bill passed by a simple majority of congress
-Balance with Judicial
-Nominates/Appoints judges
Judicial
-Checks on congress
-determine constitutionality of laws and interpret laws
-Checks on the President
-Can determine that presidential acts are illegal and impeach him/her
Locke's Social Contract Theory:
-Modified version of a theory put forward by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in his book "The Social Contract"
-"Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains" --Rousseau
-The theory is that simply by living in and participating in a society/government we are making an unspoken agreement (contract) which legitimizes the governments ability to make laws, raise taxes, and enforce the law.
Vocabulary
Federalism: A system of government where power is shared/divided between a central federal government and sovereign/partially-sovereign state governments (the type of government established by the US constitution)
Confederalism: A system of government where states retain full sovereignty and delegate power to a central government (the type of government the US had under the short lived Articles of Confederation)
Impeachment: When an elected or appointed official is removed from office either because the population has lost faith in their abilities/motives or because they have committed an illegal act.
Nullification: When a state court rules that a federal law/act is unconstitutional
Duel Federalism: A system of government where states and the federal government have separate realms where each has supreme sovereignty.
Homework:
Reading: Read the chapters called "Elections and Campaigns (Campaigns
and Elections in the brief version)" and "Interest Groups (Political
Parties and Interest Groups in the brief version)" from the Wilson
text.
Let Me Know: Send me an email letting me know which text you have, the
brief version or the normal version. It will say "Brief Version" on
the cover if that is the one you have. Otherwise it is the normal
version. Unfortunately these two different version have some very
different chapters so I want to figure out which of you have which.
Writing: There will not be a writing assignment this week. Use this
time to study up on your vocab and put extra effort into your writing
assignment for your writing class.
Additional Work for CLEP prep: If you are planning to take the CLEP
test, also read the chapter called "The Media (Public Opinion and the
Media in the brief version)"
If you have any questions, you can leave a comment on this post, email
me at dylanhglenn@gmail.com, or call me anytime before 10:00pm at
215-756-5181.
Good luck. I'll see you next Monday,
Dylan Glenn
No comments:
Post a Comment