The American System of Government

Paper Summary:

This paper examines the role of that the American Constitution played, and continues to play in helping to shape the American system of government. The paper begins with a discussion of how a pluralist democracy differs from majoritarian democracy and why the framers of the U.S. Constitution felt it was so important to have a pluralistic form of government. In order to demonstrate this point, the paper presents and analyzes several different articles of the U.S. Constitution which pertain directly to the distribution of power in the government. Some of the examples used in this paper include the Senate's role to advise and consent, the balance between the powers of the federal government and the powers of the individual states and the importance of the first ten amendments to the Constitution. Particular attention is payed to the nature of the Judicial branch and the central role that it has played over the years in helping, but not always succeeding, in protecting the minority from the majority in the United States.

From the Paper:

"Again, this latter pluralist type of provision is part of the balance of powers element in the Constitution. This is in keeping with the form the government finally took as a republic rather than a strict democracy. A strict democracy would by necessity have been a majoritarian system, while a republic is a pluralist democracy, which protects the minority from the majority. John Adams pressed for this type of government as one of the anti-Federalists at the Constitutional Convention. John Adams was the premier theorist of conservatism, and he wrote: "The foundation of every government is some principle or passion in the minds of the people" (Ball and Dagger 33). He saw the republic as the best of governments. In terms of the developing debate over the Constitution, this Anti-Federalist considered a single assembly to be inherently faulty and subject to all the vices and frailties an individual might evince. As a solution he suggested the creation of two bodies, with the smaller elected as a council from the larger. He also recommended the creation of a balance of powers between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches (Ball and Dagger 34-35)."

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