The Three Eras Of Congress

76) With this in mind the framers carefully and purposefully crafted a Constitution that divided federal powers between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. This division of power gave each branch the ability and authority to control the others through a specific system of checks and balances. One check on Congress was the design of a bicameral system where Congress was divided into the House of Representatives and the Senate. Members of the House of Representatives would be elected by majority popular vote making them the direct representative of their constituencies. Members of the Senate would be elected by state legislatures making them direct representatives of the states, and proponents of the state’s rights and sovereignty. Joseph Story (1833) suggests that one main reason for the mode of appointing the Senate was to introduce a powerful check upon rash legislation, and prevent the national governments encroachment on the powers of the states (p.183). However, in passing the 17th Amendment the mode of electing the Senate as a means of partitioning federal and state power collapsed leaving the states unprotected from abuses of the central government.

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

Oliver Ellsworth, an important American lawyer and politician that lived during the first American Independence day, states his opinion on a new American Congress, “The powers of congress must be defined, but their means must be adequate to the purposes of their constitution. It is possible there may be abuses and misapplications; still, it is better to hazard something than to hazard at all”. In the original United States Constitution, the Framers wanted to make three different and equal branches of government, but today that is not the case. In present day government, Congress is more powerful than the President. The Legislative Branch, or Congress, is the second branch of the United States Federal Government. Congress is made up of two houses called the Senate and the House of Representatives. The main purpose of

Along with the Constitution we have the Articles of Confederation. Under these Articles congress was a single house where each state had 2 to 7 members but only one vote. They selected executive judges and military officers as well as having power to make war and peace and conduct foreign affairs. The ability to have money Congress could borrow and print money, but they could not collect taxes or enforce laws, precisely it had to rely on the states to provide and enforce. Articles of Confederation was written to be a “framework for the government of the United States, it established a firm league of friendship among the states rather than a government of the people.” (book)

Article 1 of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress its powers and limits. Congress is the legislative branch of the government, meaning they are the ones to make laws for the United States of America. The article also creates the two sections of Congress, which is called a bicameral legislature. The first of the two is the Senate, which is made up of two senators from each state. The second is the House of Representatives, which has representatives from each state based on the

Congress is a complex lawmaking function that runs the country. In other words is the legislative body of our country made up of a Senate and a House of Representatives. Difficulties that are involved by the representation function have to do with Congressmen wanting to be reelected, opposition between the two parties, and the lobbying that takes place. These three difficulties are what causes the conflict with the lawmaking function of Congress.

Congress is the legislative branch of our national government and shares power with the president as well as the Supreme Court. It has five fundamental functions, which include lawmaking, helping constituents, performing oversight, and educating the public,

and congress have in our democracy. The people elect members of the House while members off the senate are chosen by state legislators and how members are the house serve a term of two years while members of the senate have a term of 6 years. How congress have the power to rise and regulate the army and the navy, and declare war while the power of the senate can only ratified treaties, accept or reject presidential nominations. The congress and the house of representatives are significant in our democracy and how they continue to play a significant role in our democracy.

One of the Articles of the Constitution is about the Legislative Branch, or the congress. It tells them what they can and can’t do to people. It shows how it will be broken up into 2 houses of government, and what lawmaking abilities they can use. It gives them a certain amount of power, which helps our country. The framers wrote this detailed description for the legislative branch so that always knew

The Federal Government was able to change the way senators were elected. In the past, senators were elected by state legislatures. In a speech by Teddy Roosevelt, February 22, 1912, he said, “I believe in the election of United States senators by direct vote.” (Document D) This helped lead to the 17th amendment, which was passed by Congress May 13, 1912. It was then ratified April 8th, 1913. With this change, people could now cast direct votes for the senators of the United States.

     The first factor that seems to have influenced the operations of Congress is the committee system. Congress has four different types of committees. The four committees are the joint committees, conference committees, standing committees, and select committees. The standing committee has an influence on Congress because of the fact that they have jurisdiction over all the bills of a given type. Select

During the years of 1781 to 1789, the United States was run under the Articles of Confederation which was good for some reasons such as the states having freedom and independence to make important decisions. However, after several years of being run under the Articles of Confederation, the Founding Fathers realized that this was a deficient and ineffective way to run the government especially since there was no Executive and Judicial Branch of government, the government was very ineffective in regard to foreign affairs, and the government could not collect taxes which caused major debt.

THESIS: The Legislative Branch consists of the House of Representatives and the Senate which forms the United States Congress; the Constitution grants Congress the single authority to pass legislation and declare war, the right to approve or reject Presidential appointments, and significant investigative powers.

The president is the foreign policy leader for the United States with an important political, military and economic role in the international arena. If there is collision between the president and congress, can congress restrain the president in foreign policy making?

Congress has many functions to keep it working and functioning. They do many things to make laws, make sure they’re fair, and much more. There are also many committees with important jobs. There are many things that influence congressional elections such as reapportionment, redistricting, much more. There are many people who make up the House and Senate and they have many important jobs to keep things running smoothly.