y13 US politics

Question 1

what are the principles of the US constitution?

Answer 1

• federalism
• checks and balances
• limited government
• separation of powers

Question 2

what is federalism?

Answer 2

federalism is a system of shared soveregnity where the federal government has power over some elements of political life and state government has power over other elements of political life. federalism helps to limit the power of the federal government (links to another principle of the US constitution which is the practice of limited government) and state governments through the division of political power.

Question 3

what is limited government?

Answer 3

• limited government is where a government is subjected to restrictions with regards to the amount of power that they can exerscise over their country and citizens
• the foundling fathers wanted to include this in the US constitution because it helps to ensure that the new form of democracy in the US didn’t become similar to that of parliament in the UK due to the independance war of (1775-1783) with the us achieving independance from great britan

Question 4

what are checks and balances of government?

Answer 4

checks and balances mean that each branch of federal government has the power to oversee the powers of the other two branches and can even act in order to prevent another of the separate branches of government from acting.

• this is to ensure that a balance of power is achieved

Question 5

what is a governmental separation of powers?

Answer 5

A governmental separation of powers means that there are three separate branches of government, the executive (the president and the vice president), the legislaiture (made up of the house of representatives and the senate to form congress) and the judiciary (the supreme court)

Question 6

why did the foundling fathers feel that after the articles of the confederation (1777) there was a need for a stronger form of federal government?

Answer 6

• there had been rebellions against the new government after the war of independance (1775-1783)
• the war of independance had highlighted the weaknesses of the articles of the confederation (1777)
• the articles of the confederation created a weak federal government which initially prioiritised the soveregnity of the states

Question 7

what is dual federalism?

Answer 7

• dual federalism is the period from 1789-1937 where the states had much less power than the federal government
• the states and the federal government rarely had overlapping powers and responsibilities and were seen to operate in very different spheres
• seperate layers of government means that dual federalism is sometimes refered to a layered cake federalism with each layer having different powers and responsibilities

Question 8

what did the 13th amendment do? (1865)

Answer 8

• banned slavery within the USA
• was the actual legislation which followed the emancipation proclaimation made by Abraham Lincoln during the American Civil War (1861-1865)

Question 9

what did the 14th constitutional amendment do ? (1868)

Answer 9

• established that everyone born or naturalised in the United States was a citizen of the united states
• meant that some of the freed slaves in the north were now classed as citizens