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How Does Federalism Guard Against Tyranny

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Becoming the ruler in a dream is much easier than getting all the power in the United States. When dreaming, minds can wander and come up with things like creating a fantasyland where the ruler is yourself. This is a pretty easy goal to accomplish while dreaming. This can not be said though, for the federal government thanks to the Constitution. This mighty Constitution guards against people getting too much power (otherwise known as tyranny) through federalism, separation of powers, checks and balances, and equal representation amongst states. Federalism is one part of the Constitution that helps guard against tyranny by dividing power between two governments. James Madison wrote in Federalist Paper #51, “Different governments will each control each other... and be controlled by itself” (A1). This means that powers are divided between federal and state governments. One of the powers that is given to the federal government is declaring war (A2). The states do not get this power because if all 50 states could declare war on other countries, there could be broken foreign relationships and some states might not agree with the decision of war. This proves that federalism helps the …show more content…

In print, the Constitution says, “representatives… shall be apportioned...according to (population),” (A1) and “the Senate...shall be composed of two senators from each state” (A2). In the House, representatives are based on population. This means that smaller states don’t have as much of a say as the larger states that have a bigger population. If smaller states do not have a say, laws could be made that does not help that particular state. Each state needs to have equal representation in the Senate to make sure they get their point across. Equal representation helps guard against tyranny because it protects the needs of all states and prevents bigger states from getting too much

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