At the request of some European friends I am going to try
and explain the US government. Let’s
start with the original US government, the articles of Confederation. My European friends may find this
constitution very similar to the current EU.
The Confederation was formed in 1781 during the revolutionary war and it
was the government that signed the peace treaty in 1783.
It didn’t take long for it to become obvious that the
national government didn’t have enough power to operate as a government because
the 13 sovereign colonies were not at all sure they wanted to give up their own
authority. The second continental
congress convened in 1787 (I think) and wrote a new and much more federal
constitution which brought much more power to the central government at the
expense of the state governments. In
order to get it accepted, in 1791 the first 10 amendments were added which we
call the “bill of rights”. That
substantially limited the role of the federal government.
I am going to use the
British government for comparison as if it was still a sovereign government (as
it will be again in the near future).
The model seems to be similar for most European governments. Practically speaking, the House of Commons IS
the UK government and the members represent about 100000 people each. The Prime Minister is the leader of the
majority party in the House of Commons. If there is no party with a clear majority,
then whoever can put together a coalition becomes the prime minister. Since there are currently 11 parties who have
seats in Parliament that can and does happen.
No party other than the Democrats and Republicans hold seats
in either house of the US government.
It would appear that since the prime minister is also the
leader of the majority party in the UK he has considerable power to make laws
and run the government. Theoretically,
the sovereign has overall power but I am under the impression she doesn’t
actually wield any real power.
The US system is more different than I realized. For instance, the President is the head of
the government and he is elected directly by the public. The two houses of congress, commonly called
the house and the senate exercise approximately equal powers. Generally it requires agreement between both
houses and the President for a bill to become law. Members of the House represent approximately
733,000 people and are directly elected by those constituents. Members of the Senate represent the states
and are elected by the states at large.
That is, all citizens of a state vote for both Senators. (Each state has two senators) Senators are
elected for staggered 6 year terms with 1/3 of them elected every two
years. That plan was to provide
stability to the government. Members of
the House of Representatives are elected every 2 years in hopes of making them responsible
to public wishes.
The function of the third arm of the government, the Supreme
Court is to compare laws made to the constitution.
The US Constitution
provides very specific guidelines as to what powers are held by the Federal
Government and which are NOT. Probably
the most important of these guidelines says in essence that the Federal
Government has ONLY those powers specifically granted to it and all other
powers are maintained by state and local governments and the populace. (10th
amendment)
That’s about it, I will add that to this day the biggest
difference in political opinion has to do with the authority granted to the
federal government. There are those who
want it to take a smaller role (conservatives) and those who want a larger role
(liberals).
Anyway, that’s how I see it.
