Essays on Federal Power

The New Deal is arguably the single most transformative moment in American history. The Great Depression came hard and it impacted everyone in the United States to almost an unthinkable level. The depression was widespread and it affected the lives of everyone but it particularly hurt workers and even more so farmers. African Americans were in large part before the Depression living in the South mostly as very small farmers or even worse as debt riddled sharecroppers. These people who were already struggling to make a living and existed in the worst possible conditions under Jim Crow and the ...

Introduction

One of the earliest tenets of the American government is the need for checks and balances in order to maintain a sense of equality and fairness in the choices being made for the American people. The US Constitution implements the separation of powers and checks and balances through the use of various overriding powers that each branch of government has over the other. For example, while Congress can approve a bill for legislation, the president has the opportunity to veto it if he does not like it. Congress, meanwhile, can impeach the president if they feel he is not performing according ...

The following is a review article on two Environmental Case opinions of two different panels of judges. The first case is related with an expansion plan for a nuclear energy based energy distribution company to which certain Environmental Groups raised issues of inconsistency of data provided by the company for permissions to acquire and keep land for future purposes. The second case is related to a natural gas distribution company that wished to lay a pipeline through United States area, although the pipeline would supply from one Canadian state to the other. The first case (470 F.3d 676, *2006 U.S. App. LEXIS ...

<instructor’s name> <date submitted> - The Federal Power to Tax The federal power to tax is outlined clearly in The Taxing and Spending Clause - Article 1, section 8, clause 1: “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States” (I.8.i). In essence, in order to pay for needed services and infrastructure provided by the federal government, the ...

Explain the following key provisions of the US Constitution: (1) federal power to tax; (2) federal (only) right to mint coins; (3) federal regulation of trade among the newly constituted states; and (4) federal sovereignty over foreign affairs, treaties, and tariffs.

Federal Power to tax

Taxing as elaborated in article1, section 8 in the constitution of United States in clause 1 it gives the federal government its power of taxation. According to constitutional text, the congress shall enclose power to lay and collect Taxes, Impose Duties on Imports and Exercise payment of national Debts and make funds available for common Defense and United ...

The ratification or enactment of the American constitution was the pinnacle of defining authority lines between state and federal governments. Over the years the Supreme Court and political developments have redefined the historical relationship between federal and state governments. Federalism, as a principle of governance in the US has been misunderstood by many as it encompasses a system based on sharing and overlapping among all governmental levels (Gerston, 2007). Under this system the government powers are divided between the federal or central government and the states. In the central government the authority is further distributed among various arms of government. The ...

Introduction

The federal government of the United States is consisted of three branches; legislative, executive and judicial. The powers of the legislative branch are listed in Article I of the US Constitution, the powers of the executive branch in Article II of the Constitution and the powers of the judiciary in Article III of the same. Founded on the principle of Federalism, the government of the United States is divided into two sovereign powers; Federal Government and the State Governments. Under Federalism, both state governments and the Federal Government have separate and concurrent powers. The founding fathers of the US ...

The United States is often referred to as a “democracy,” but this is not a strictly true statement. In reality, the United States is a democratic republic that operates under federalist principles; though these two ideas may seem to be the same, in reality they are quite different. In a democracy, every individual has a vote on every issue, but in a democratic republic, individuals vote on representatives who then vote on the issues in their stead (Sutton 18). Because America is a compilation of states that make up one unified government, it can be referred to as a federalist nation (“Separation of Powers and Checks and ...

Introduction

The two cases are celebrated for the framework they laid in terms of tackling issues dealing with the constitutionality of laws. The case laws provide fine and tenuous precedents that effectively and predictably provided the justices of the Supreme Court to give direction on the interpretation of the law. The first case, Marbury vs. Madison essentially shows the central role of judicial review in light of exercise of power by the executive as vested by the constitution and other written laws. On the other hand, McCulloch vs. Maryland lays the foundation that would be applied in interpretation of the ...