The Presidency, The Judiciary, And The Bureaucracy

In 1789, the first official government of the United States of America was established. The power was divided into three branches, the executive, legislative, and judicial branches in order to maintain democracy. This system has remained relatively unchanged and is in use today. However, within each of these branches many changes have transpired to accommodate the expanding and fluctuating American society, such as the introduction of Cabinet Departments in the Executive Branch, the establishment of new laws and Amendments by the Legislative Branch, and rulings on issues by the Judicial Branch.

The Articles of Confederation and the Constitution have many differences and a few similarities. The Constitution is stricter than the Articles of Confederation. The writers of the Articles of Confederation believed a utopian society as opposed to the writes of the Constitution who believed in a constitutional society. The Articles of the Confederation went by the motto of friendship. The writers of these documents had different views and beliefs so the documents have many differences.

The U.S. is known for having a bicameral congress, which consist of both the House of Representatives and Senate. After the U.S. declared its independence from England, the U.S. framers of the constitution thought it was best for the U.S. to have a bicameral congress because it settled constitutional dispute over representation and because it is both practical and theoretical. Even though they are known as bicameral congress, both the House and Senate have their differences. The House of Representatives is one half of the houses in the United States Congress, and most of the time it is known as the House.

Congress is an organizationally decentralized unit of the legislature and has more power than any other branch of government. To be decentralized is to “distribute the administrative powers or functions of a central authority over a less concentrated area or to disperse something from an area of concentration.” Congress does so by composing itself of two houses, the House of Representatives and the Senate. It has two houses because “the small states wanted equal representation in a one chamber legislature” and “the more populous states, on the other hand, wanted a two chamber legislature.” (pg.248)

There are two chambers in Congress: the Senate and the House of Representatives. They both share many powers between them as in declaring wars, raise an army and navy, borrow and coin money, regulate interstate commerce, create federal courts, establish rules for the naturalization of immigrants, and make all laws pertaining to the afore mentioned. There are also separate

Both houses need each other in order to function as they are both part of the legislative branch of government however there are many arguments to suggest that senate is more prestigious that the house of representatives.

When first created, the Legislative branch had a lot of power, as a result a system to keep the power in check was created. “no law or resolution can pass without agreement, first of the majority of the people (via the House) and then of the States (represented by the Senate). This complicated Legislative may hinder as well as help” (Hamilton 93). When the Senate comes up with a bill or law it has to be agreed with by the House

The US federal legislature is bicameral, therefore it consists of the Senate and the House of Representatives, and in theory they should both be of equal power. However, in reality it is the Senate which is considered to hold the most power, although there are arguments to in favour of them having equal rights. In order to reach a balanced judgement I will consider both sides of the argument, beginning with the claim that the Senate is more powerful than the House of Representatives.

The Organizational Structure of congress in the United Stated is demonstrated through the fact that we have a House and a Senate that are separated from each other. Congress is a very complex structure that possesses many committees that all handle a variety of topics. The United States Senate is composed of only 100 members that serve six year terms. Some refer to the senate as the “upper house”, and only 1/3 of the members of the United Senate are re-elected every two years. The House of Representatives is composed of 435 members that each serve two year terms. The HOR is known as the “lower house” and all 435 members are up for re-election every two years. The top two leadership roles in the Senate are The Vice President of the United States who presides over the Senate, and required to vote when there is a tie in Senate. Also in the case of a death of a president, the Vice president must step up and preside over the nation. The second most vital role in Senate is the President Pro-Tempore. The President Pro-Tempore is the highest ranked senator as elected by the Senate. The top two positions in the House are The Speaker of the House and the Majority Leader. The Speaker of the House is arguably the most influential single legislator in both houses. The Speaker presides over proceedings on the House floor, designates which bills go to which committees, designates committee assignments for new members, appoints the party 's other leaders , and

This offers the House of Representatives a large scope of power in financial issues abroad and domestically. Impeachment is also another power possessed by the House. If a president or a member of the federal government has been acting illegally or unconstitutionally the House can impeach - formally accuse - them of it. This is then trialed in the Senate, but offers the House a lot of power over the president, and helps congress with it's scrutiny of the executive.

The Executive Branch is run by the President who is commander and chief of the Military. It "carries out federal laws." (World Book 140). It will create regulations that back up the laws that Congress passes. The branch acts as the enforcer of the Government. The executive branch is separated into fourteen departments, each handling a specific Executive business. The head of each department is appointed by the President and approved by the senate. The collection of these departments makes up the Presidential Cabinet. The purpose of the cabinet and its members is as stated,

The book How Congress Works, by Lee H. Hamilton, tells us a brief summary of the interworking’s of congress. The book begins to convey the role of congress in chapter one, the author begins with congresses important roles in our democracy. Which are passing budgets, manage conflicts that arise, debate issues facing the country and most importantly to act within the system of checks and balances. In our government neither congress nor president is supreme, most of the authority is with the citizens. The United States government is balanced into three branches of government: Congress, POTUS, SCOTUS, the House of Representatives and the Senate: also between the Federal Government and the States. The States are broken down into different regions with different issues facing them and different interests eventually boiling down to the bill of rights. Congress has the power of lawmaking, along with what the President’s agenda is, recommending bills to congress, and the power of the President to veto bills. Congress contains the power of the purse in which Congress controls the power of taxation and spending. Congress legislations and policies control some aspects of our lives like taxation or when they regulate us. Our Government

As mentioned before, the U.S. Congress is made up of two chambers-the House and the Senate- that is provided by the constitution as a bicameral legislature. They each cater to different constituencies. The House is known to be more responsive to the people and the Senate is responsive to the elite. They both are elected directly by the people. Four hundred thirty-five of the members of the U.S. Congress are apart of the House and one hundred of the members are apart of the Senate (Lowi, 136). Can you imagine having to make compromises and decisions on thing with five hundred thirty-five people? I can imagine with that many people apart of the U.S. Congress that they dealt with a lot of conflict when having to make decisions.

The executive branch of the Unites States government consists of the President, Vice President, Executive Office of the President (EOP), and the Cabinet (Citation). The President is the highest official of the Executive branch. The powers of the President are wide-ranging and highly substantial but were also drafted in the constitution to be limited by the other two branches of government. The remaining branches of government are the Legislative branch and the Judicial branch. There functions of all the branches are interrelated and the restraints on the amount of power each reserves are also coordinated. This correlation involves the system of checks and balances which was implemented by the framers of the Constitution. The President, as

The Role of the Senate and House of Representatives The Congress of the United States consists of the Senate and the House of Representatives which means the USA is bi-cambial. The Congress of the United States was created by Article I, Section 1, of the Constitution, adopted by the Constitutional Convention on September 17, 1787. The Senate is composed of 100 Members, 2 from each State, who are elected to serve for a term of 6 years.