Preview

Federalism from It's Beginning to the Present

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
642 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Federalism from It's Beginning to the Present
From its early beginning in the minds of the Framers of the Constitution to its state today. The United States system of federalism has changed greatly through landmark court decisions, congressional decisions, and strong presidential influence. The next few paragraphs will go through the history of federalism in the United States.
The Federal System began when the Framers wrote the Constitution. The Constitution set up the basic outline of the federal system. This system divided the powers between the national government and the state governments. Also, it bound the individual states together under one national government. There were two very important court cases in early federalism. One was McCulloch v. Maryland in 1819. This case upheld the powers of the federal government. It also denied the states the right to tax the bank. This allowed later cases to uphold the expansive powers of the federal government. The other case was Gibbons v. Ogden in 1824, this ruling upheld broad congressional power over interstate commerce.
Soon after we moved into the era of dual federalism. Dual federalism is the belief that having separate and equally powerful levels of government is the best arrangement. One major leader during this era was Roger B. Tanney, who was the head of the Supreme Court. During this era, there was heated political debate on the issue of slavery. The Dred Scott v. Sanford decision in 1857, this was the first decision to take powers away from the national government. During this era, the Civil War occurred. Dual federalism lasted until the 1930s.
After dual federalism came the era of cooperative federalism. Much of this came to be because of the Great Depression. The New Deal, proposed by Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in 1933, proposed a variety of new programs. The New Deal made up a period from 1933 to 1939 and was characterized by intense government activity on the national level. Through the New Deal, FDR, started the Federal Housing Association,

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    In 1787 when the Constitution was created it caused many people to start a grand debate. Of course, there were people that supported the constitution and people that were afraid of the constitution. The Federalists and the Anti-Federalists created documents that are within the Constitution that have shaped United States political parties. The Federalists supported a strong central government because the Articles of Confederation didn’t have strong national power, and was very restrictive.A reason why The Federalist wanted to change the constitution was to add people’s opinion into the Constitution. The Anti-Federalists supported a strong state government because they believed that a strong national government would cause a monarch and they were afraid of who will have the power.…

    • 536 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gibbons Vs Ogden Essay

    • 409 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Federalism is basically a system adopted by a nation that allows two or more levels of government to have power over the same people and area. This, however, can lead to conflicts since the two governments might try to assert power over the same issue. This can be clearly seen in the Gibbons v. Ogden case. In this case, Chief Marshall was able to use the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to make clear that Congress, and not the states, has the power to regulate commerce between the states. Therefore, this conflict between the two levels of government was resolved by this court decision. If the United States had a unitary government, where all power resided the central government, this issue would not have…

    • 409 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The evolution of the United States can be seen over a specific time period. Between 1970 and 1930 the form of government was known as layer cake federalism or dual federalism. There were clear powers divided between the states and the centre and there was sovereignty given in equal measure to both. Between the years 1930 and 1960 the structure was known as Cooperative federalism or marble cake federalism where the state and the central government shared functions and collaborated on issues of national importance and priorities. The 1960s to 1980s were known as picket fence federalism and was characterized by high and overloaded cooperation and regulations which were not only interfering between the powers of the centre and…

    • 828 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “A Revolution In Favor Of Government”, by Max M. Edling, presents the founding period of America. Besides, it focuses on the political and historical facts of the Constitution and the American state. According to Max Edling, the Federalists tried to build a central government, which was based on the fiscal-military of Europe. So, the federal system of government was built when the Constitution was designed by Federalists with fiscal-military power. They had to build a different state, because it was hard to secure adopting the Constitution. The Constitution was designed to protect the liberties and the rights of the American citizens.…

    • 998 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    MidTerm Essay The Constitution divided the powers between the Federal,State and Local governments in a very specific way. Which we now call Federalism,but before this we had the Articles of Confederation. The reason we did not keep the Articles of Confederation was because it was to weak and gave too much power to the states. But it did set up a foundation which helped bring us the division of powers between Federal,local and state governments.…

    • 309 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dual Federalism, from 1789 to 1865, divides nation power into two parts delegated to state governments and federal government accordingly. In agreement, they were not at liberty to interfere with each other. Politicians supported advocating a boundary between federal government and state government. As they proclaimed, “Remain independent from each other, and enjoy supremacy in their own areas of jurisdiction”. Of primary importance in dual federalism is states' rights, which reserve to the states all rights not specifically conferred on the national government by the…

    • 538 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In grant in aid, national government funding provided to state and local governments, with special instruction that how to use funds where as in a block grant, national government funding provided to state and local governments have few restrictions or requirements on spending. Aid don’t have any restriction it is best.…

    • 1125 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dual Federalism

    • 520 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Federalism is a governmental system in which authority is divided between two sovereign levels of government: national and regional. This notion of federalism was the founding fathers’ solution to the difficulty of creating a nation out of thirteen sovereign states. For instance, the United States government and Ohio government share powers, such as creating and collecting taxes, but others belong solely to one.…

    • 520 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    political party dbq

    • 668 Words
    • 3 Pages

    In 1787 there was an issue of ratifying a new constitution. This new constitution was in favor of a “national” government which gave more power to the national government and less to the states, strong single person executive, establishment of the Supreme Court, and more economic power for Congress. The political parties that were made dud to this were the Federalist’s and the Anti-Federalist’s. The Federalists favored the constitution and it’s division of power.…

    • 668 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    We Federalist’s believe that the government needs to be divided into three parts, with equal powers and balances and checks, for it to work effectively. Now the Anti-Federalist’s believe that we are trying to give all power to the larger states in the North and ignore the needs of our brethren the South states. We are not. We are just trying to create a fair government.…

    • 565 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In this case, the spheres of responsibility were clearly defined. A layer cake can best describe the division of power between the two levels of governance. At the time, different courts had different interpretations of federalism. The Marshall court supported expansive federal powers. This court had a major influence on how power was shared between the national and state governments. Two cases that were key in defining dual federalism are McCulloh v. Maryland of 1819 and Gibbons v. Ogden of 1824. The Taney Court on the other hand had a different view of federalism. The court supported two equally powerful levels of government (Lee, 2010). The court was of the view that the national government should not exceed its powers beyond the constitutionally accepted levels. The court was influential in limiting the control that the national government had on the issue of slavery and civil rights. One key case at the time was Dred Scott v. Sandford of…

    • 1024 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Federalism in the United States has had several different concepts throughout our history. Dual federalism ran until around the Great Depression of the 1930s. Dual federalism has very distinct and rather clear lines of power for the national government as well as the state or local level of government. At times, it is referred to as “layered cake”. The national level very distinct and rule over much smaller, local, or state governments. There is a balance of power between the two, each maintains sovereignty that should not impact the other. Both national and state should work together, but still question the other to operate effetely. Dual federalism for This Nation seemed to cause more tension between the national and state levels than anything else. McCulloch v. Maryland is an early example of dual federalism. When the state of Maryland argues that the U.S. Constitution did not give the national government the power to make a National Bank since it was not an enumerated power and was unconstitutional. However, the court concluded that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land and that if the end goal is legitimate than what the national government is trying to do is constitutional.…

    • 657 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    John Marshall Federalism

    • 1322 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Throughout U.S. History many different types of government were created in an attempt to govern and unify the people. One such government, federalism, divided the balance of power between the states and the national government. Federalism caused a lot of controversy throughout the history of the United States. One time period in which there were significant debates about federalism was the Supreme Court under John Marshall (1801-1835) due to his rulings based on his federalist views. The other time period was the Extension of Slavery (1820-1860) which also caused much debates between federalism and state rights. Landmark Supreme Court decisions involving federalism were decided in both of these time periods.…

    • 1322 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Double Federalism is the point at which the force of the state is partitioned into two groups the "elected" and the "state government". The state government practices its obligations towards the state without the elected group meddling. It's kind of a plan on both sides however both have sovereign forces.…

    • 303 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Sovereignty, which is the authority to govern has three main categories, federalism, confederacy, and unitary system. Federalism limits the power of the government by dividing the national, and the state government. State and Federal power is then again divided into legislative, judiciary, and executive branches. This all keeps no one group maintaining all of the power, it is a constant check and balance. The power of the state is what the national government does not have, and also has to be deemed as legal. Both the state and federal government have denied powers, which are as you can guess powers that are denied to them. The history of federalism in the United states started off as a dual federalism in which the power of the federal government was limited to enumerated, which was an overall state centered form.…

    • 281 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays