Identify and explain the organization of the Legislature
-America has a bicameral legislature, meaning it has two different houses. one being the Senate, which consist of 100 people 2 people representing every state in the US. the other being the House of Representatives consist of 435 representatives who are elected into office. they are appointed a district based on population, while the Senate is appointed disregarding population. the Senate is led by the vice president while the house is led by the speaker of the house being the representative with seniority.
Identify and provide an example of the powers of the Legislature, both formal and informal.
-formal powers are those explicitly given in the first article of the constitution. an example of a formal power is impeachment. thus it was used against Bill Clinton in 1994. informal powers are applied from the elastic clause, where they stretch the definition of the constitution, for example they set the minimum wage laws. as they see that to be necessary and proper.
Identify and explain how Congress shares powers with the Executive, Judiciary, and bureaucracy.
-congress shares powers with the Executive, Judiciary, and bureaucracy in the way that they all serve as a check and balance for each other, such as the congress has power of the purse as the executive branch has the power of the sword meaning congress has the money but cannot imply and enforce the laws as the executive branch can, and the judiciary is the one who interprets the laws.
Discuss the implications of Congress sharing powers with each of the following: Executive, Judiciary, and bureaucracy.
-this sharing of powers was used so that no one branch has power over any other branch. they use the system called checks and balances, meaning they all have powers that affect one another and they have to get approval from one another. this makes it so that the president does not make all the decisions since he is not as close to the people as the congress is because there is a lot more of them.
Discuss the functions that Congress performs.
-congress serves as the voice of the people as they represent a certain district with a fixed population. they also serve as the people who write bills according to how proper and necessary they view the bill as being. congress is the branch that is meant to be directly controlled by the people of the united states.
Identify how the power of the Congress has/may evolve gradually.
-congress evolves along with America and the technological advances. congress has begun to become less and less powerful but at the same time more powerful as they have the power of the purse, meaning they control the amount of money people get payed, they have lost the power to declare war. congress suffers too much gridlock being that if one representative does not get his bill passed he will hold a grudge and not want people who vote against his bill to succeed neither.
Identify how the power of the Congress has/may changes dramatically as a result of crisis.
-congress was made to be a slower processor due to the fact that it consists of a lot more people, in a crisis they usually have less power, that is why they no longer have the right to declare war. the executive branch takes over the congress's position in times of crisis.
Identify and discuss the ties between the Congress and political parties.
-congress is ran by two different political views, being the republicans and the democrats. the republicans are the more conservative of the two meaning they are more likely to enjoy laws that benefit them only. as the democrats are more liberal, meaning that they tend to vote for laws and bills that are for the greater good of the majority. having a split government has both its pros and cons, the pros being that there is more input being put into the bills that are written so that there is no bias and the cons being that a split government will not stand strong hence there is a lot of gridlock.
Identify and discuss the ties between the Congress and interest groups.
-interest groups are groups of people who are interested in protecting their rights or want laws made giving them rights to certain interest hence they are called interest groups. interest groups fun a congressman's candidacy so that they can be heard of and elected into office to go through with what the interest group wants.
Identify and discuss the ties between the Congress and media.
-the media and the congress work together to solve the problems of the average american. the media can also be used by the government to publicize their political view and have people brainwashed into following and thinking that, that political view is the right one. the media is also used to publicize national issues to the government so they know what to work on and how they can approach the issue.
Identify and discuss the ties between the Congress and state and local governments.
-Every state is separated into districts based upon population and congressmen are responsible for representing their district on capital hill; congress and local governments must respond to the desires its people.