Image by Nina Paley
Focus Question: What are the institutional arrangements of political and governmental power in the United States?
Topics on the page
Congress (the Legislative Branch)
- How Should Congress Spend Your Taxes?
- Citizen Legislatures in the United States
- Women in American Government
- African Americans in American Government
- Hispanic Americans in American Government
The President
- Can A President Be Indicted for a Crime?
- The Vice President in American Politics
US History Cross-Links:
Bureaucracy
Federal Courts
Government Cross-Links
eBook Connection: The Roles of Congress, the President and the Courts
Congress (The Legislative Branch)
- Bi-cameral
- Two bodies: the Senate and House of Representatives
- Create laws
- Declare war
- Power to tax
- Establish and control courts
- Establish post offices
- Regulate commerce
- Create currency
- For a full list of powers, click here.
Locate Members of Congress at Congress.gov from the Library of Congress
The Power of the Purse
The Federal Power to Spend, from Exploring Constitutional Conflicts
The Power of the Purse, National Archives
There are two types of federal spending: Mandatory and Discretionary
Mandatory: Required spending on entitlements and interest on the national debt
Discretionary: Everything else, including
- The Military
- Federal judiciary and law enforcement
- Infrastructure
- Education
- Agriculture
- Science and technology
- Environment, wilderness, National Parks
- Foreign Policy
- National Weather Service
- Police the border
- Explore space
- Develop energy resources
- Ensure Safety of foods, drugs, airlines, consumer products, banks
America's Indefensible Defense Budget, Jessica T. Mathews, The New York Review of Books (July 18, 2019), p. 23
Who Sets Fiscal Policy--the President or Congress? Investopedia (August 19, 2018)
The National Priorities Project
- Northampton, Massachusetts-based organization dedicated to making the federal budget accessible to citizens
- Online tool for seeing how your taxes were spent
For more, link to Revenue and Expenditures for Local, State and Federal Government
A Day in the Life of US Congressman John Carney from Delaware on YouTube, February 12, 2012.
Click here for a video from PBS about The Congress of the United States of America.
For a fun singing bill becoming a law, click here.
Women in the American Government
- Article from The Nation pondering why the US still has so few women in government.
- Shirley Chisholm was the first African-American woman in Congress, and this podcast from How Stuff Works provides a beautiful biography.
African Americans in the American Government
Hispanic Americans in the American Government
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Keith Ellison, First Muslim Congressman |
Faith on the Hill: The Religious Composition of the 114th Congress from Pew Research Center (January 5, 2015)
Is the legislative branch becoming corrupt? This article from The Hill explores this question.
For a timeline of all U.S. presidents, click here
- Commander in Chief of the armed forces
- Veto legislation
- Grant pardons
- Appoint people to cabinets and courts
- Can issue "executive order"
- Foreign policy
- For a full list of powers, click here.
Read here about Barack Obama, America's first African American President.
- In The Undefeated 44 read how Barack Hussein Obama grew into the influential man he is today.
Read here about John F. Kennedy, America's first Roman Catholic President.
PDF of the past female candidates for President and Vice President.
Click here for more on presidents, including information, games, lesson plans, and other cross links
One Observatory Circle, Official Residence of the Vice President
Public Domain
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/1OC2003.jpg
The Vice-President
Vice-President of the United States (President of the Senate)
The Vice President's Residence & Office
Pictures of the nation's 48 Vice Presidents from John Adams to Mike Pence
Fourteen of the former vice presidents became president of the United States—more than half of them after a president had died.
- One defeated the sitting president with whom he served.
- One murdered a man and became a fugitive.
- One joined the Confederate army and led an invasion of Washington, D.C.
- One was the wealthiest banker of his era.
- One received the Nobel Peace Prize
- One composed a popular melody.
- One served as a corporal in the Coast Guard while vice president.
- One had cities in Oregon and Texas named after him. Two resigned from the office.
- Two were never elected by the people.
- One was the target of a failed assassination plot.
- Another was mobbed in his car while on a goodwill mission.
- Seven died in office—one in his room in the U.S. Capitol and two fatally stricken while on their way to preside over the Senate.
- And one piano-playing vice president suffered political repercussions from a photograph showing him playing that instrument while a famous movie actress posed seductively on top of it.
Background Information on Indicting a President for a Crime
In 2012, reviewing evidence that was not available at the time of the break-in, reporters Woodward and Bernstein suggested that Nixon did commit crimes for which he could have been tried in a court of law. In 1974, Gerald Ford, the Vice President who became President, ended any opportunity for future criminal prosecution by issuing an “absolute pardon” to Nixon for any crimes he may have committed as President.
The question of Presidential immunity from indictment and prosecution has been a central issue during the Trump Presidency. In 2019, as part of two cases related to the release of his tax records, lawyers for Donald Trump argued that a President is immune from prosecution while in office. Responding to state grand jury subpoena for Trump’s tax returns, his lawyers said that the Constitution “prohibits investigating, prosecuting or indicting a President while he is in office” (CNN Politics, 2019). The lawyers contend that legal proceedings would prevent a President from performing his constitutional duties by diverting his time from governing to defending himself in court.
The extent or non-existence of Presidential immunity is a subject with different interpretations. William Consovoy, an attorney in one of the Trump tax return cases, famously said that if the President shot someone on Fifth Avenue in New York City, he could not be arrested and charged with that crime until he was no longer in office. However, in Clinton v. Jones(1997), the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that a President was not immune from a civil lawsuit based on events that took place prior to becoming President. For more information about that case, explore Clinton v. Jones from the Encyclopedia of Arkansas.
U.S. v. Nixon(1974) is a landmark Supreme Court case related to the limits of what information a President can keep secret from the public and the press under the doctrine of “executive privilege.” President Nixon had taped many of his oral office conversations with the Plumbers and others. When asked for the tapes, Nixon refused to deliver them citing executive privilege. Executive privilege is the concept that a President (or other top government officials) has a right to keep information from the public.An issue in this situation was the extent of President Nixon’s executive privilege in regards to information about the Watergate Break-In and the President’s role in devising and carrying out the plans.
In a unanimous decision in United States v. Nixon, the Supreme Court stated that Nixon must hand over the tapes. The decision upheld the longstanding precedent of Marbury v. Madison (1803), which gave the Supreme Court the power of Judicial Review. The Court asserted that it had the responsibility under the U.S. Constitution to interpret the powers of the President. Nixon disagreed with the decision.
The Bureaucracy
- Ensures that policies and programs set by Congress are followed
- Considered part of the Executive Branch
- Execute laws
- Government corporations
- Regulatory commissions and agencies
- FDA
- Federal Trade Commission
- Nuclear Regulatory Commission
- Click here for more information.
Click here
Infographic from USA Gov
The Federal Courts
- Federal courts handle:
- Constitutionality of laws
- Laws and treaties
- Ambassadors and public ministers
- Disputes between states
- Admiralty law
- Bankruptcy
- For more information on the federal courts, click here.
The fourteenth amendments history and why it is so important.
Why Does The Supreme Court Have Nine Justices?
NO
Yes
African Americans in the Supreme Court
The first African American judge on the Supreme Court was Thurgood Marshall.
When he was a lawyer for the NAACP, he successfully argued and won Brown v. Board of Education, the case where the Supreme Court declared segregated schools unconstitutional.
- After Marshall retired, his seat was filled by Clarence Thomas, the second black American Supreme Court judge.
Sandra Day O'Connor, First Female Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, 2011
Women in the Supreme Court
Sonia Sotomayor is the first Spanish Supreme Court judge. Read 8 things you may have not know about her from PBS here.
Sandra Day O'Connor was the first women elected to the Supreme Court and served for 24 years. She was appointed by Ronald Reagan and was the swing vote on many landmark cases as such the case in upholding Roe v. Wade.
Link to more about the Supreme Court
This article from the Washington Post takes an interesting look at Supreme Justice limits (it's the only branch without term limits).
Citizen Legislatures in the United States
Vermont State House, Montpelier
Full and Part Time Legislatures organizes the 50 state legislative bodies into five major categories.
- Green (full-time, well-paid, large staff; average compensation $82,358)
- Green Lite
- Gray (hybrid; average compensation $41,100)
- Gold Lite
- Gold (part-time, low pay, small staff; average compensation $18449)
Debating the Pros and Cons of a Citizen Legislature, a podcast from Vermont Public Radio (February 6, 2012). Vermont does not have a full-time professional legislature.
For more, see Under the Golden Dome: The Stories Behind Vermont's Citizen Legislature: Program 10.
Some Vermonters Can't Afford to Serve in the Citizen Legislature.
State Legislature Session Length from the University of Vermont compares Vermont's citizen legislature to Maryland's professional one.
Vermont's Legislative Process describes the working of the Vermont legislature.
Sources:
1. AP Gov Review
President Abraham Lincoln and General George B. McClellan in the general's tent at Antietam, Maryland, October 3, 1862
Lesson Plans & Teaching Strategies
Click here for a fun, interactive game that educates children on the American government system and the three branches.
The United States Post Office
Delivering the Mail by Dog Sled in Alaska, 1906
Image on Wikimedia Commons/ Public Domain
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?sort=relevance&search=File%3AUnited+States+Mail+dogsled+team%2C+Nome%2C+April+8%2C+1906+%28NOWELL+155%29.jpeg&title=Special:Search&profile=advanced&fulltext=1&advancedSearch-current=%7B%7D&ns0=1&ns6=1&ns12=1&ns14=1&ns100=1&ns106=1#/media/File:United_States_Mail_dogsled_team,_Nome,_April_8,_1906_(NOWELL_155).jpeg
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