Notes

US government is based on five basic principles now the first three of those we find the ideas for them within the Declaration of Independence all right natural rights are first the idea that there are certain things that you have the right to just by virtue of being human so these are things that you are simply born with popular sovereignty is the idea that people are the source of governmental power not the other way around so it's not that governments allow people to do certain things but rather it's that individual citizens people like you and I give some power to governments and I'll them to do certain limited things in social contract is the idea that when people create that government they then create that
government for a certain purpose and that purpose is to protect the rights of the people so the Constitution deals the other two principles of government so this is limited government and republicanism limited government is exactly what it sounds like it's like governments have some power but that power is limited so they can't do anything they want they are not all-powerful republicanism is the idea that we have a representative form of government so in this case people don't directly vote on policies so you don't vote on laws directly but rather what people can do is vote for others to represent them within government next we shift to our models of representative democracy alright so participatory democracy emphasizes broad citizen participation in policymaking so it's the idea of individual people actively having a role getting involved Brutis number one and give us a great example of participatory democracy because he argues that individuals and local governments should be holding power alright so next up is pluralist democracy the idea here is that group based activism leads to good policy results so I want you to think of things like political parties and interest group Federalist number 10 provides us with a great example of pluralist democracy madison emphasizes the role of factions or groups and the idea that if we have a larger public we'll have lots and lots of different groups or factions elite democracy on the other hand emphasizes a limited role for citizen participation so individuals can vote they can do things but there's some kind of filter there's some kind of barrier between the people and the policy is actually getting made so this limits the influence of the masses of the everyday citizen alright so next up is that really important question about well how do we divide power between the states and the federal government Federalist we know wanted a stronger central government and in Federalist number 10 James Madison argues for a larger public to be the best way to maintain majority rule with minority rights basically Madison was worried that if policies are made at a local level it would be very likely that we'd have one majority group that could just simply out vote the minority if we just had a straight pure democracy and he thought that this would lead to a tyranny of the majority where they would oppress the minority so again
his solution was to make that a republic larger and then we'll have lots of groups and no one group will dominate policymaking anti-federalist on the other hand they wanted state sovereignty they wanted a weak central government they wanted to make policies locally and brutish number one again gives us a good argument on their perspective they
thought this federal government would essentially trample states rights leaving nothing for states to do so Brutus says that power should be held on
a local level we should have smaller more democratic governments a republic is okay too Brutus but the ideas that should be held locally not on this larger scale well we should pause and think about what do we have before the Constitution well you know we had the Articles of Confederation which said that a very weak federal or central government and that was intentionally so states remain sovereign and they ultimately had the power so what could Congress do under the Articles and Federation well they could declare war they could make treaties they could raise an army they could borrow money they could coin money so these are powers that are significant but there is one hugely important one missing there and that is the power to Congress could not raise taxes they also could not regulate interstate commerce so we have this really weak federal government Ben Shay's rebellion happens
in this shifts public opinion when people see the slow weak response of the federal government putting down a really minor rebellion an hour at the National Convention and so we have five examples of compromises let's take them one by one quickly so with the great compromise we had large states and small states that we're arguing over what congressional representation should be based on large states wanted it based on population small states that we all got to be equal in this so we come up with a great compromise it creates a bicameral legislature two houses in which one the house the larger one the lower house is based on population pleasing the large states and the small states benefit when it comes to the Senate the upper house of Congress because every state is represented equally in the Senate now the Electoral College again is a result of compromise but some people wanted to present be directly elected by the public others wanted Congress to select the president so again we have compromised neither side gets what they want instead we end up where people can vote for members of the electoral college and then the Electoral College will vote for the president next we have the three-fifths compromise and this is where southern states wanted slaves to count as people for purposes of population northern states are like no way guys you have said all along that slaves aren't people so there's no way that they count when it comes to population for Congress they end up with this compromise where for every five slaves they counted as three people for population purposes for Congress next up is the compromise on the importation of slaves and basically what the Constitution did was it said we're not doing anything and the slave trade cannot be banned for at least twenty years and lastly we have the recognition that the Constitution would need to be changed and altered over time so we do have an amendment process it is where two-thirds of Congress can propose a constitutional amendment and they can then be ratified by three-fourths of the states all right so we continue to debate the role of state governments federal governments and individual rights this would make a great frq so I want you to consider this essay prompt
that's on the screen and what I want you to do is write a thesis for it down below in the comments can kind of compare each other's thesis statements can let you know if they look
good help you prepare for that fr Cuse frq number four so the next question needs to be adjusted the federal government is how do we prevent it from being too strong
well James Madison in federal in favor of separation of powers and checks and balances important these are not the same thing do not use them interchangeably separation of powers are first the idea of giving each power and assigned a specific job so the legislative branch they make laws the executive branch they enforce laws and the judicial branch interprets laws now checks and balances involves the idea that each branch has some ability to women or influence one of the other two branches so this would be the president can veto a law that Congress has passed or Congress can override the President's veto so again with checks and balances we see some kind of interaction between the branches so now we get to federalism
the division of power between the national or federal state and local governments so what's the federal power and what's left of the states well we have delegated powers and these are
powers that are given to the federal government and here we can think of things like declaring war raising anarmy regulating interstate commerce Reserve powers are kept by the states
for themselves essentially everything left over that wasn't specifically mentioned the Constitution or wasn'tdelegated to the federal government is reserved to the states and lastly we
have concurrent powers these are powers held by both the federal government and the state governments the things that they can both do so they can both tax they can both borrow money again this doesn't mean they do these powers together it just means that they both have the power to do them all right so with federalism we have two different
models of federalism we have dual and we have cooperative dual federalism is kind of the old-fashioned original type this is like layer cake where the state and federal governments were totally separate each supreme in their own sphere each had certain jobs and they handle those jobs with no influence from the other layer of government cooperative is more like a marble cake where there's this mixing this mingling there's this blurring of the lines between what is truly federal and what is a state role so this leads to an increase in federal government power because now they are getting involved in areas that they weren't formally involved in and the
biggest way that this has happened over time is through the increase of federal grants to the state so the federal government gives money to the states and this gives them some influence over the policies that these states are then making so let's talk about four things have led us towards this cooperative federalism that we have today all right one is called federal revenue sharing this no longer exists but the AP exam once you don't know it and the idea here is the federal government would give money to the states with no strings attached basically the states could do whatever they wanted to do with that money on the other end of the spectrum are federal mandates these were rules that the federal government would make and tell the states they had to comply with and this is regardless of whether or not the federal government gave them money so an unfunded mandate the federal government doesn't give money and tells the states that you have to do something so states really don't like unfunded mandates block grants are money for a broad purpose the states so they have a lot more freedom and leeway over what to do with that money this would be money for things like education and then the state could use that money for anything that they want within the area of education so they don't have total freedom but they have a lot of influence about what they do with that money categorical grants on the other hand
that's money for a specific purpose so it's not just for education it's for building a high school in a certain town City location saying this is exactly what you have to do that money all right so let's consider this multiple choice question about the topic we just talked about all right I want you to answer down below in the comments for me all right again so staying on this topic of the balance of power between states and the federal government let's look at a few things that have moved us in one direction or the other the tenth amendment reserves rights the states it says everything not delegated to the federal government or specifically denied to the states by the Constitutionare reserved to the states so states rights or anti-federalist would prefer this image all right so the Commerce Clause it starts off really simply it says that Congress has the power to regulate interstate commerce what's happened is that the interpretation of the Commerce Clause has expanded and changed till today we now say that only Congress can regulate anything affecting interstate commerce so it does not directly have to be interstate any longer but Congress can still regulate it if it affects interstate commerce the Necessary and Proper Clause it says that Congress has the power to make laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying an execution there are foregoing powers so we have this list of congressional powers and then the last line says and by the way they can make other laws too if they think it's necessary for them to do the other jobs they do have speaking of that we have a couple terms enumerated and implied powers the
enumerated powers are explicitly written in the Constitution implied powers are more of a great area and this is where arguments break out and we know that the Necessary Proper Clause has been used to expand congressional power and allows them to now make legislation over things like economic environmental and social issues all right and lastly let's briefly consider our required cases again check out the video that's about them so you can actually the details you need to write the essays but McCulloch versus Maryland this is going to be one that expands federal power it rules in favor of Congress it uses the Supremacy Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause to say that Congress could create a National Bank and say that states could not tax it US versus Lopez on the other hand is a victory for states rights because it limits the power of Congress through the Commerce Clause and
it does say yeah it's true that Congress can regulate anything affecting interstate commerce but guess what not everything affects interstate commerce and so this victory for states rights does alter the balance of power between states and the federal government