Federalism

Brittany Sikora Intro to American Gov.
3/12/12 Essay # 1
Due to the immense power of our federal government, people often argue that it is too
powerful and should be lessened. Since the 1990’s there has been an effort to shift power
from the federal government to the states. States’ rights have been an issue since our
country was first founded, and even now we can’t seem to please everyone’s requests at
equal power.
This country was founded with the attempt to separate the federal government and
the state government, known as federalism. The goal of federalism is to divide the power
of state and federal governments, protect the rights of the state (through the 10th
amendment), prevent tyranny of the majority, and have a government that is close to its
people. An example of federalism would be the freeways. They are owned and operated by the states, but the federal government sets down some basic guidelines that all states must follow and also provides funding.
Federalism has certain advantages to it such as, state governments have the freedom to adopt policies which may not be followed nationally or by any other state. For example, same-sex marriages are not recognized by the federal government but they are given legal status within the states of Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont, etc. This is an advantage because this gives the state some freedom from the national government. If the federal government controlled every little thing that the state governments do then the states would riot out on certain polices that they do not believe in. Another advantage is division of work between the central and the regional government’s leads to optimum utilization of resources. The central government can concentrate more on international affairs and defense of the country while the provincial government can cater to the local needs. If the national government was trying to handle everything states would get pushed to the side as less important.... [continues]

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