govt

The Congress of the United States, the nation's lawmaking body, is made up of two houses, the House of Representatives and the Senate. The main power of Congress, as set forth in the U.S. Constitution, is to make laws that, when signed by the president, become the law of the land, governing American life. Congress also has the responsibility to determine that public policies are being administered by the government in accordance with the law and as efficiently and effectively as possible. Moreover, because Congress is intended to represent the nation's citizens, its members are expected to provide assistance and services to their constituents the people back home in their states and districts. The news reporting of congressional hearings, debates, and other activities provides citizens with much information about what their government is doing. Congress sometimes is required to perform specialized judicial and electoral functions. It acts as a judicial body in the process of impeachment and removal of the president, and it has the power to choose the president and vice-president should no candidate gain a majority of electoral votes following a presidential election. Membership The Constitution restricts the membership of Congress by requiring House members to be 25 years of age and senators 30. House members must have been U.S. citizens for at least 7 years, and senators for 9. Today the average member is in his or her fifties, but the number of younger members has increased in recent years. Almost all members of Congress were born in the United States. Although members of the House are required only to be inhabitants of their states, and not necessarily residents of the districts from which they are elected, in fact, local residency has become an unwritten, or customary, requirement for success at the polls. From 1955 to 1995 a majority of the members of Congress were Democrats. In 1980, Republicans gained control of the Senate and reduced the Democrats'majority in the House, but Democrats recovered control of both houses in 1986. The pattern of Democratic control of the Congress while Republicans occupied the White House persisted until Democrat Bill Clinton became president in 1993 and the Republicans took over both houses of Congress in 1995. In 2000 the Republicans captured the presidency as well in the person of George W. Bush though their majorities in Congress were reduced. In fact, in January 2001 the 107th Congress convened with an evenly divided Senate 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans although the Republicans could use Vice-President Richard Cheney to break tie votes. That political configuration changed in May, however, when Vermont senator James Jeffords switched from the Republican party to become an Independent, leaving the Senate with 50 Democrats, 49 Republicans, and 1 Independent. In the 2002 congressional elections the Republicans took back control of the Senate with a one-vote majority and added to their majority in the House. Congressional Elections Each state gets one House member regardless of its population. Beyond that the states are given representation in the House of Representatives on the basis of their population. The House is reapportioned every 10 years, after the federal census. Within states congressional district boundary lines are drawn by the state legislatures. All House members are elected in single-member districts, the total number of which has been set by Congress at 435. Today, each House member has an average of about 600,000 constituents. House members are elected every 2 years. The Constitution awards each state two senators. Senators are elected to 6-year terms, and one-third of the seats come up for election every 2 years. Incumbency is important in congressional elections. A high proportion of members of Congress seek reelection, and an overwhelming proportion of them succeed. The incumbent possesses several reelection advantages: the perquisites of the congressional office are available to the incumbent; he or she is likely to be well known in the state or district; and the incumbent is better able to raise campaign money. Still, the turnover of the congressional membership is high because of deaths and retirements, because some run for other offices, and, increasingly, because some do not win reelection. Congressional Organization Congress is organized in three notable ways: its party organization and leadership, its committee structure, and its staff. Party Leadership. Both houses of Congress are organized into majority and minority political parties, each with its own leadership, but the House and the Senate are organized differently. In the House the leader of the majority party serves as the Speaker, who is the presiding officer of the House. Because the Speaker controls debate in the House, has an important role in the selection of committee members and chairpersons, and can influence the scheduling and dispensation of legislation, the Speaker possesses substantial power. The majority party organization is provided by the majority leader and his or her assistants (called whips), along with specialized party committees. They are chosen by the majority party caucus, made up of all the party members in the House. Similarly, the minority party chooses a minority leader, party whips, and members of its own party committees. In the Senate the presiding officer is not an important leader and does not exercise influence over proceedings under most circumstances. Although the vice-president may preside over the Senate, that person is not, in practice, required to do so. Usually, senators take turns presiding over the body in a nominal and routine way. The leadership of the Senate is provided by the majority leader, who is selected by the majority party caucus. In turn, the minority party chooses its minority leader. Although the majority leader manages the business of the Senate, he or she does so in consultation with the leader of the minority party. Committees and Subcommittees. Whereas party organization and leadership are not insignificant in Congress, the most important organizational feature of the House and Senate is the structure of their committees. Early in the 19th century the congressional houses used few committees. As legislative business became more varied and complex the division of labor among members became more complex as well. Ultimately, committees and their subcommittees came to provide the locus of most congressional work. Congressional committees are organized along substantive policy lines. Generally, they correspond to the major departments of the executive branch. Thus both the House and the Senate have created committees concerned with agriculture, defense, housing, commerce, science and technology, education, government operations, international relations, judiciary affairs, and service veterans. The work of each committee is further subdivided so that it can be considered by subcommittees. "Congress in committee is Congress at work," Woodrow Wilson once wrote. Today one might more accurately say that Congress is mainly at work in its subcommittees. Especially in the House, major bills are often considered by a number of subcommittees of different committees. The most powerful committees of Congress are those concerned specifically with government finance. Both houses have budget committees whose job it is to set expenditure targets for each fiscal year and to establish the authorized level of the national debt. In addition, both houses have appropriations committees that consider the budget requests of executive agencies in detail and recommend budget legislation to their respective houses for approval. Moreover, both houses have committees on taxation the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee. These two committees are concerned with government revenues and recommend the tax bills to their own houses. Because the power of the purse is the most formidable of congressional powers, these committees exercise great influence; hence membership on them is much sought after. Membership on House and Senate committees is ultimately determined by party caucuses in the two houses. House Democrats are assigned to committees upon recommendation to the party caucus by the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee. House Republicans receive committee assignments through the Republican Committee on Committees. Senate Democrats are assigned to committees by the Democratic Steering Committee, and Senate Republicans, as do their House counterparts, have a Committee on Committees for this purpose. The partisan composition of committees is established by party ratios that differ to some extent from committee to committee but are roughly equivalent to the party makeup of the houses themselves. The growing workload of congressional committees, and the proliferation of subcommittees, until 1995, was paralleled by a remarkable growth in congressional staffing. However, Republicans, who in the 1994 elections won control of Congress for the first time since 1954, abolished 3 of the 23 committees the Post Office and Civil Service, Merchant Marine and Fisheries, and District of Columbia committees and cut about one-third of the remaining committees'staffs. In 2001 there were 19 standing committees and 3 joint committees in the U.S. House. Staff. Congress is served by a staff of more than 10,000 employees. It receives research and information services from major agencies. The Congressional Research Service, an arm of the Library of Congress, provides wide-ranging research services for members and committees. The General Accounting Office supplies reviews of the economy, efficiency, and effectiveness of government programs. The Office of Technology Assessment provides policy analysis in science and technology. Finally, the Congressional Budget Office, working with budget committees of both houses, furnishes fiscal and economic research. The Legislative Process In Congress The legislative work of Congress begins when a bill is introduced by a member. A bill is merely a document drawn up to specify the details of a proposal of law. Public bills concern general questions of policy and become public laws if they are passed by Congress and signed by the president. Private bills are concerned with such individual matters as claims against the government or cases having to do with immigration and naturalization. House members introduce bills simply by dropping them in the hopper at the clerk's desk in the House chamber. Senators introduce bills by making a statement offering a bill for introduction and sending it to the desk of the secretary of the Senate. Once introduced, bills are referred to committees and, in turn, to subcommittees. After subcommittees complete their review of bills, they are returned to the full committees for recommendation as to their passage by the full house. When a committee sends a bill to the full house membership, it sends along a report, or written explanation of its action. After a bill is reported from the committee that has considered it, it is placed on a calendar, the agenda for floor consideration of bills. Most House bills are funneled to the floor for debate and voting by special rules worked out by the House Rules Committee. In the Senate, bills are normally taken up on the floor by requests for unanimous consent to do so. Debate on bills in the House is regulated by a number of rules that place limitations on the number and duration of members'speeches. The Senate, on the other hand, normally practices unlimited debate on bills, although a procedure called cloture exists for putting an end to prolonged speechmaking, or filibustering. During floor debate, amendments may be offered that change or add to the bill. After debate on a bill is concluded, and voting has taken place on all amendments offered, the bill is up for final passage. In the House, voting on amendments and final passage may occur by a voice vote, although a roll-call vote is the normal procedure on major bills. House members vote during roll calls by using the electronic voting system in the House chamber. Forty-four voting stations are located throughout the chamber. Members cast their votes by inserting special identification cards in a slot on the voting device and pushing the yea or nay buttons. With this system, 435 House members can cast votes in a short time. The Senate has no similar system; senators respond to roll calls by answering yea or nay when the clerk calls their names in alphabetical order. Bills passed by a majority vote of the members of the House and Senate are sent to the president for approval. If the president vetoes a bill, the disapproval may be overridden by a two-thirds vote of both houses. If the House and the Senate pass bills in different forms, a joint conference committee consisting of representatives and senators is appointed to work out the differences. Agreements of a conference committee must, in turn, be approved by both houses. Congress and the Executive The legislative and executive branches of government are separate and independent, but Congress and the executive do not work in isolation from each other. Only members of Congress may introduce legislation, but the president provides leadership to Congress by recommending a legislative program. He thus influences both Congress's agenda and the substantive content of its day-to-day policy decisions. Congress, however, scrutinizes presidential proposals and often changes them substantially. Moreover, Congress itself initiates much important legislation. The most important leverage the Congress has over the executive stems from its fiscal powers. Executive agencies may not spend money unless the expenditure has been authorized and appropriated by Congress. Congress greatly strengthened its budgetary powers by the Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, which provided for a congressional budget, created new committees to consider overall budget outlays, and established the Congressional Budget Office. The law also limited the president's power to rescind or impound the spending of money appropriated by Congress. Initiatives in foreign policy usually are taken by the president, but Congress is also involved in the making of foreign policy through its power to tax and spend, to finance foreign policies, to declare war, and to ratify treaties (which require the approval of two-thirds of the Senate). Congress placed unusual limitations on the conduct of foreign relations in 1973 when it passed the War Powers Act, restricting the president's authority to commit U.S. troops abroad. In various other ways, Congress influences the work of the executive branch. Senate confirmation is required for presidential nominations of cabinet officials, ambassadors, federal judges, and certain other officials. Congressional committees investigate executive agencies and officials and regularly review the administrative implementation of congressionally enacted programs. Ultimately, Congress has the power to remove the president from office through impeachment, a process in which the House investigates alleged wrongdoing and votes on the charges, and the Senate tries the president on these charges. In 1868, Andrew Johnson was impeached by the House and tried by the Senate, narrowly escaping conviction. Richard M. Nixon resigned in 1974 after the House Judiciary Committee recommended impeachment charges. Bill Clinton was impeached (December 1998) on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice but won acquittal in the Senate by a comfortable margin. From time to time Congress sets up special committees to investigate subjects that do not fall directly in the jurisdiction of its standing committees. Its power of investigation is considered one of the essential functions of Congress. Special committees have been created to investigate criminal charges against members, to study social and economic problems, to probe into unethical political activities, and to publicize controversial issues. Famous special committees were the House Committee on Un-American Activities, set up in 1938 to investigate fascist, Communist, and other extremist political organizations, the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities (commonly known as the Watergate committee), set up in 1973, and the House and Senate select committees investigating the Iran-contra affair in 1987. In the 1970s, Congress accelerated its use of the legislative veto, a device originated in the 1930s by which provisions were written into a law requiring the executive to seek congressional approval before taking actions authorized under that law. By the 1980s, legislative veto provisions had been included in more than 200 laws, including the War Powers Act. This practice came under mounting attack from presidents and other executive branch officials, and eventually it was challenged in the federal courts. In 1983 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the legislative veto was an unconstitutional intrusion by the legislature into the executive sphere. A line-item veto, by which a president could veto isolated portions of a law, was enacted by Congress in 1996 but ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1998. Congress and the Public Members of Congress live and work under great pressure. House members, whose terms are only two years, must start planning for their next campaign as soon as they are elected to the first one. Members commonly travel weekly to their districts, maintain staff and offices there, send newsletters to their constituents, and campaign vigorously for reelection even when their districts are considered "safe" seats. They make extensive use of free postal services and the printed reports of the Congressional Record to show their constituents that they are active in their behalf. Members are also constantly canvassed by lobbyists representing special-interest groups. Under pressure from the public to open up its deliberations, the House in 1979 authorized television coverage of its proceedings on C-SPAN, the public-affairs network. The Senate followed suit in 1986. In the early 1990s, Congress also took up reform proposals relating to campaign finance and lobbyists'contributions. In 1993 the House banking facility was closed after revelations of members' overdrafts.

...

Parliament

The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the legislative body of that nation. Formally, Parliament consists of the monarch, the House of Commons, and the House of Lords. In common usage, however, the term refers to Commons and Lords only. Virtually all power rests with the House of Commons. The power exercised by Parliament is unlimited, making it in fact the sovereign of the nation. The House of Commons has 659 elected members. The maximum period between elections is five years, but the actual timing of an election is usually decided by the prime minister. The total membership of the Lords is about 1,200, but the majority of the nation's peers take no active part in the proceedings of the house. Members of the Lords traditionally included hereditary peers, life peers, the 10 senior judges, the archbishops of Canterbury and York, and 24 bishops of the Church of England. (The right of the 758 hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords was abolished in 1999.) Both houses, and especially the Commons, are organized along party lines. Normally the largest party in Commons forms the government, and the leading members of this party are appointed to senior ministerial positions (the cabinet). They must explain and defend their policies and acts to Commons. All important legislation is introduced into Parliament by the government. The House of Lords no longer has the power to kill a piece of legislation. It can initiate amendments on bills (except money bills) and delay legislation. Because the government usually has a majority in Commons, it can normally ensure that its major policies are accepted by Parliament. Party loyalty and discipline in Commons are strong. When the government, however, does not have an actual majority in Commons (because of third-party members), it must enlist enough support from minority members to get legislation passed. When such coalitions fail on an important vote, the government falls. The prime minister and cabinet resign, and if no other party leader is able to form a government, Parliament is dissolved and a new election is called. History Parliament evolved from the Curia Regis, or Great Council of the Realm, which began in the Middle Ages as an advisory body to the monarch. Originally it comprised the great landholders, the chief nobles, and the church prelates. Beginning in the 13th century the monarch occasionally would call up representatives of the other classes, mainly the knights, the lower clergy, and the burgesses. The two bodies met separately, however, and eventually evolved into, respectively, the House of Lords and the House of Commons. Parliament's history is one of long competition with the monarchy, and eventual supremacy. Important milestones in that competition include the early Commons'assertion of control over grants of revenue to the monarch; the English Civil War, during which Parliament ordered the beheading of the king; the Glorious Revolution of 1688, during which Parliament succeeded in establishing its sovereignty over the crown; the growing dependence of the prime minister on Parliament (instead of on the monarch) during the 18th century; the great reforms of the 19th century, which extended suffrage to most of the adult male population and established the secret ballot; the Parliament Act of 1911, which abolished the veto power of the Lords; and the Representation of the People Acts of 1918, 1928, 1948, and 1969, which extended the suffrage to women, established the principle of one person one vote, and lowered the voting age from 21 to 18. In January 2000, after the exclusion of the hereditary peers, the Wakeham Royal Commission issued a plan for the reform of the House of Lords, calling for a chamber of 550 members, between 20% and 40% of whom would be elected by regional proportional representation. The remainder would be appointed by an independent commission. A certain number of seats would be reserved for women and ethnic minorities. A "spiritual bench" would have 16 seats for the Church of England, 10 seats for other Christian churches, and 5 for non-Christian religions. The plan was widely criticized as not going far enough in the direction of democratizing the Lords. In April 2001 the House of Lords appointments commission named the first 15 "people's peers," chosen from more than 3,000 applicants.

Seperation of Powers

The doctrine of separation of powers, which is one of the fundamental principles of the U.S. federal system of government, is generally credited to the French political philosopher Baron de Montesquieu, whose The Spirit of the Laws (1748; Eng. trans., 1750) was highly regarded by the framers of the U.S. Constitution. Montesquieu's basic contention was that those entrusted with power tend to abuse it; therefore, if governmental power is fragmented, each power will operate as a check on the others. In its usual operational form, one branch of government (the legislative) is entrusted with making laws, a second (the executive) with executing them, and a third (the judiciary) with resolving disputes in accordance with the law. As a further protection, the personnel of each branch are selected by different constituencies and procedures for different terms of office. The separation of powers principle contrasts with British-style parliamentary government, where almost all political power rests with the legislative branch. The principle of judicial review is an important part of the checks and balances of the American system, although other governments with separated powers do not include it. One criticism of separated powers is that it can also result in weak government, especially if the legislative and executive branches are controlled by different political parties. Martin Torodash

Constitution of the United States, Part I: Its Genesis and Framework

[Note: This is the first of three articles on the Constitution of the United States. It covers the Genesis of the Constitution and its Framework. The entry Constitution of the United States, Part II provides the text of the Articles of the Constitution, with commentary.] The Constitution of the United States comprises the nation's fundamental law, providing the framework for its governance and the principles under which it must operate. Judicial reinterpretation has given the Constitution the flexibility to accommodate changes in the specific laws subject to its authority. As Chief Justice John Marshall pointed out early in the 19th century, the Constitution was "intended to endure for ages to come, and, consequently, to be adapted to the various crises of human affairs. To have prescribed the means by which government should, in all future times, execute its powers, would have been to change entirely, the character of the instrument, and give it the properties of a legal code." The distinction Marshall made between the Constitution and other law was in keeping with the framers' provision for the supremacy of the Constitution in Article VI, which states: "This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land. . . ." Genesis of the Constitution The first constitution of the United States was the Articles of Confederation, ratified in 1781. Because this document left too much sovereignty to the states, it was defective as an instrument of government. Some leaders felt that the individual states suffered economically from the lack of a strong central authority; commercial barriers between the states seemed particularly onerous. They also felt that the lack of unity among the states was causing serious problems in international relations and the defense of the nation. The weakness of the central government was dramatized by such events as Shays's Rebellion (1786-87) in western Massachusetts and by the ability of one state to block legislation desired by the other 12. The Annapolis Convention of 1786 called for a general Constitutional Convention, which met in Philadelphia in May 1787. Twelve states (all but Rhode Island) named 73 delegates to the Constitutional Convention. Of these, 55 came but only 39 signed the Constitution on Sept. 17, 1787. The leaders of the convention were statesmen who in modern parlance would be called middle-of-the-road: George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay, and Benjamin Franklin. Conspicuous by their absence were the firebrands of democracy, Patrick Henry and Sam Adams, and the author of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson. In his keynote address at the convention, Edmund Randolph said: "Our chief danger arises from the democratic parts of our [state] constitutions. It is a maxim which I hold incontrovertible, that the powers of government exercised by the people swallow up the other branches." Writing later in The Federalist, Hamilton said: "The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right." The prevailing political philosophy of the framers of the Constitution would later be articulated as follows by Madison in The Federalist: It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices [checks and balances] should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence upon the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions. What they sought was a balance that Madison called "mixed government" and "free government," a compromise between monarchy and democracy as they knew them. Despite the consensus among the framers on the objectives of the Constitution, the controversy over the means by which those objectives could be achieved was lively. Controversy developed over the presidency and the way in which the president was to be elected; the relationship of the states to the national government; the relationship of the national government to the people; and the relationship of state to state. The latter conflict was partially resolved through the great compromise that gave small states equal representation with the large states in the Senate but apportioned representation according to population in the House of Representatives. Other compromises involved the slavery issue; each slave was to be counted as three-fifths of a person in determining representation and in apportioning direct taxes, and the migration or importation of slaves was allowed to continue until 1808. Generally, sectional interests were also protected by compromise. Northern interests were upheld by giving the new government the power to regulate trade and commerce, and the South was protected against export taxes and the immediate prohibition of the slave trade. Southern and Western border interests were reassured that their territorial rights would be protected by the requirement that treaties be ratified by two-thirds of the Senate. After it was signed, the Constitution was offered for ratification. By its own terms, "the Ratification of the Conventions of nine States" was required. This was achieved on June 21, 1788, and by 1790 all 13 of the original states had ratified it. Ratification was vigorously opposed by the Anti-Federalists, who feared that a powerful central government would minimize the role of the people in governance and threaten individual rights and local interests. The effort to counter the arguments of the Anti-Federalists led to intense campaigning, including the writing of The Federalist by Madison, Hamilton, and Jay. The significant and lasting accomplishment of the opponents was to get the Bill of Rights added to the Constitution. Framework The framework of government established in the Constitution emphasizes four overriding concepts: popular control without majority rule; the limitation of governmental power; federalism; and a tripartite government. Popular Control but Not Majority Rule. The framers provided for ultimate control of the government by the people through the electoral process. Such control, however, was not to be exercised either easily or immediately, except perhaps over the House of Representatives. Originally, senators were to be chosen by the state legislatures and the president by the electors in the electoral college. Since the state legislatures controlled the selection of senators, and presidential electors and seats in the state legislature were won in popular elections, it was assumed that the popular will would eventually have an effect on the choice of senators and presidents. It could also be argued that the people would have a voice in the choice of federal officials appointed by the president, with the advice and consent of the Senate, but this could be true of federal judges only in the long run, since they were given virtually lifetime tenure. The framers, with their complex views on government, felt that the popular majority must be represented in the federal legislature. At the same time, they felt that they must not give over all legislative power to a popular majority. Consequently, they approved an arrangement by which one house of the legislature represented majority will and another house served as a check on the first. Power Limited and Circumscribed. Despite the framers' anxiety over governmental power, their experience with the Articles of Confederation taught them that the national government must have the power needed to achieve the purposes for which it was to be established. In The Federalist, Hamilton described these purposes: The principal purposes to be answered by union are these — the common defence of the members; the preservation of the public peace, as well against internal convulsions as external attacks; the regulation of commerce with other nations and between the States; the superintendence of our intercourse, political and commercial, with foreign countries. The first objective, then, was to spell out and grant the power necessary for what Hamilton called "energetic" government, while at the same time making explicit the limits of that power and creating safeguards to ensure that the new government did not exceed those limits. The framers granted 18 specific powers to Congress but in Article I, Section 9, listed a rather large number of things that Congress was not allowed to do. Evidently the framers wanted to make it clear that certain powers were emphatically denied to Congress. The specific powers of the president were enumerated in Article II, Sections 2 and 3. Several presidents have interpreted the clause in Article II, Section 1, "the executive Power shall be rested in a President" to mean that they had much broader substantive powers, and the courts have sometimes supported these claims. The phrase executive power, however, had a more exact and limited meaning for the framers, as Hamilton explained in The Federalist: The essence of the legislative authority is to enact laws, or, in other words, to prescribe rules for the regulation of society; while the execution of the laws, and the employment of the common strength, either for this purpose or for the common defence, seem to comprise all the functions of the executive magistrate. Presidential power was limited in other ways. The 4-year term, thought of primarily as a term long enough to ensure presidential independence, was also viewed as a limiting device. In addition, the president was made liable to impeachment proceedings. Although it was subsequently argued that the constitutional provisions for the grounds for impeachment should be narrowly interpreted, Madison, during the convention debates, made it clear that he agreed with the broad view taken by Hamilton in The Federalist: "The subjects of its [the court for trial of impeachment, the Senate] jurisdiction are those offenses which proceed from the misconduct of public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust." The framers believed they had granted ample but fairly well defined, limited power to the judiciary. They wrote in Article III, "The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish." Judicial power as such was understood by the framers to mean the power to decide cases and controversies. Nothing was said about judicial review of acts of Congress. The limited debate on this issue suggests that the framers did not regard it as a momentous one. It is doubtful that any of them foresaw how important judicial review could and would become. The framers were aware that the aggregate of powers granted to all the branches of the national government was enormous, and they agreed with Madison that it was not "sufficient to mark with precision, the boundaries of these departments [branches of government], in the constitution of the government, and to trust to these parchment barriers against the encroaching spirit of power." The Constitution incorporated ways of circumscribing the power that it granted. What the framers dreaded most, and were most concerned to guard against, was the concentration of power in one person's hands. Thus they provided for a separation of powers and a system of checks and balances. They felt that these principles involved different ideas and that, although they were to some extent complementary, they were also, to some extent, contradictory. Separation was intended to diffuse power, to divide it up systematically so that legislative, executive, and judicial powers would be in separate hands and would be exercised separately. The system of checks and balances required some fusion of powers, however. For example, although the president's power to veto acts of Congress is a check on the power of Congress, it is essentially a legislative power; granting it to the president seems to violate the separation principle. In short, the framers did not rely on parchment alone to limit the power granted the new government. They further circumscribed it by diffusing it among branches designed to be independent and capable of retaining their independence, and by granting some specific powers as a check by one branch on the power of another. The framers also emphasized that the power of the states would serve as a check on the power of the new national government. Federalism as a Basis. Despite their common heritage, background, and homogeneity, the original states were 13 different and distinct political entities, each commanding considerable loyalty from its citizenry. However much the framers wanted a strong central government, they knew that they could establish one only by allowing the states to retain power or by making it appear that they did. They realized, or at least Hamilton did, that, as a practical matter, there could not be a double sovereignty; the framers persuaded the public to accept the Constitution by claiming that sovereignty was indeed divisible. Under the federal system they devised, the national government was given the authority to exercise only the enumerated powers granted it, but it had supreme authority in those areas. State sovereignty was therefore largely a fiction; it was destined to have a stormy future, involving a bloody civil war. Three Coordinate Branches of Government. Throughout U.S. history, the power relationship among the three branches of the federal government has been difficult to define. Woodrow Wilson complained in 1884: "I am disposed to think, however, that the decline in the character of the President is not the cause, but only the accompanying manifestation, of the declining prestige of the presidential office. That high office has fallen from its first estate of dignity because its power has waned; and its power has waned because the power of Congress has become predominant." Although Wilson later changed his mind, at the time he wrote these words he felt that congressional predominance was inherent in the system. At other times the Supreme Court has appeared to be the most powerful branch of the government; even as powerful a president as Franklin D. Roosevelt felt that the Court had wrested inordinate power from the other two branches. And later, especially during the presidencies of Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, many people feared that governmental power had become concentrated in an "imperial presidency." The framers felt that the legislative branch might tend to predominate. Thus they wanted a strong executive, for they believed, as Hamilton wrote in The Federalist, that "energy in the executive is a leading character in the definition of good government." They hoped to establish a government in which the three branches would be coordinate in power, but they felt that in fact the judiciary, though not subordinate, did not actually share in the exercise of real power. [Note: This article continues in Constitution of the United States (II), which provides the text of the Articles of the Constitution, with commentary, and Constitution of the United States (III), which provides the text of the Amendments to the Constitution, with commentary.]