Who Governs
The framers of the Constitution had a vision for a new nation, and a new government to regulate it. They saw the conditions in which England existed under the monarchy, and decided to construct a different kind of government in which no one faction could hold too much power. Thus, they developed a system of checks and balances to prevent any one of the three separate branches of the government from becoming dominant. Today, the three branches still remain intact, and no single branch has enough power to completely nullify the decisions and rulings of the other two. However, even though the Executive, Judicial, and Legislative branches are fundamentally comparable in their command of the nation, today the Legislative branch exercises the greatest extent of power. Each of the three branches serves a different function. The Legislative branch, which consists of Congress, makes laws for the nation to follow. Congress also creates federal programs and agencies, and appropriates funds to carry them out. The Executive branch, composed of the President and Vice President, most accurately carries out the laws of the nation. This branch is responsible for appointing Supreme Court Justices and other federal judges. The Judicial
Branch is made up of the Supreme Court and other federal courts, and is responsible for interpreting the laws passed by Congress. This branch is endowed with the power to declare laws and other executive actions unconstitutional. Also, the very structure of the federal court system makes it extremely difficult for the Judicial branch to enforce its decisions in many cases. It has no armed forces or police at its disposal, so Judicial decisions are sometimes simply ignored. For example, school systems throughout the country remained segregated long after the courts had ruled segregation to be unconstitutional. In closing, it can clearly be seen that while the three branches of the United States government are essential equal in power, the Legislative branch has the ability to use the powers it has most effectively. Congress gives birth to new ideas and laws constantly, and while the Executive checks protect against the passing of outrageous laws, they still cannot prevent the passage of laws in every case. Yet, even though the Legislative branch does exercise the greatest extent of power, it is far from in control of the government system. The checks and balances included in the Constitution ensure that the government will never become too centralized. Thus, it is obvious that the very foundation upon which our nation was constructed, the Constitution, blocks any of the three branches from dominating the other two. And while it
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Approximate Word count = 976
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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