Political Science 120 - Essay Example

Firstly, the legislature exercises checks and balances on the executive by shutting down presidential vetoes through voting against them with a two-thirds majority. The legislature checks on the executive by either approving presidential appointments or new treaties. The legislature also has the power of impeaching a sitting president out of office by passing a vote of no confidence. On the other hand, the legislature checks on the judiciary by either approving or declining appointed judges, creating lower courts or impeaching a judge out of office.

Secondly, the judiciary exercises checks on the legislative branch through declaring formulated laws as unconstitutional. On the other hand, the Judiciary, through the judicial review checks on the executive by declaring some deeds by the executive as unconstitutional. Thirdly, the executive exercises checks on the judiciary by nominating the persons to be appointed in the Supreme courts and the persons to be appointed in the federal courts. Additionally, the executive will check on the legislature by exercising a veto power against some legislations and recalling congressional sittings.

The system of checks and balances had the objective of ensuring that no single branch of government becomes powerful that the other, which would lead to oppression of the citizens and a lack of justice. The system of checks and balances was put in the constitution with the intention of seeing to it that the rule of law prevails (Brannen & Lawrence, 2005). Question # 2 Cooperative Federalism Through Cooperative Federalism, the responsibility of governing people in a society is shared by the state and the national government.

The different levels of government consult on which level is best suited on taking a particular responsibility in relation to governing and policy formulation. Cooperative federalism focuses on the idea that the overall governance of a nation is a partnership between the state and the national government. In essence, cooperative governance entails different levels of government exercising power in the same area (Hueglin & Fenna, 2006). Federalism works in a manner that the state governments are limited in terms of the powers that they can exercise in their states.

This is contrary to the power that the national government can exercise. For instance, the state government cannot coin out currency, declare war, formulate immigration laws or raise an army. However, the national government has the power to coin out currency, declare war, formulate immigration laws and raise an army or a navy (Hueglin & Fenna, 2006). Cooperative federalism is different from dual federalism in that, in dual federalism the state and national governments are sovereign and equal partners.

In dual federalism, a lot of power is directed to the states while the national government’s power is only spelt by the constitution. In cooperative federalism, the national government, through the constitution under article I in section 8 can exercise powers, which the state government cannot. The above fact was not possible under dual federalism (Hueglin & Fenna, 2006). Cooperative federalism came as a result of Congress’s intention of regulating trade and commerce in the whole of the United States.

Another reason that led to cooperative federalism is the idea of eliminating the aspect of competition between the state governm