FEDERAL NATURE OF THE
CONSTITUTION AND STATES
RIGHTS
LARGE STATES VS. SMALL STATES
Connecticut or Great
Compromise
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New Jersey Plan favoured by small
states
Virginia Plan favoured by states with
larger populations
Convention thus deadlocked
Compromise involved having two
chambers one, where states would be
represented proportionally to population
Great Compromise
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Other house, states would be represented equally,
regardless of population
President is also elected state by state, and some
states have more influence over the presidential
primaries despite their small size (front-loading)
Constitution can only be amended with threequarters of state legislatures agreement
The three-fifths compromise
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Who did best out of this compromise??
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FEDERALISM
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‘A theory of government by which
political power is divided between a
national government and state
governments, each having their own
area of substantive jurisdiction’
Why is federalism suited to
the USA?
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Because country is so diverse
Because of its size
Because of the history – the states
came first
Federalism is not mentioned in
the constitution but is written in
the following ways:
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Enumerated powers
Implied powers
Federal and state governments are
given concurrent powers
10th Amendment
Supreme Court to be umpire of any
disagreements between federal and
state governments
CHANGING FEDERAL AND
STATE RELATIONS
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Federal-state relations have changed as
America has changed
Initially, following Independence, the state
governments exercised most political power
However, in the last part of the 19th and early
part of the 20th century the role of the federal
government steadily increased
What caused the federal
government’s role to grow?
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Westward expansion
Growth of population
Industrialisation
Modern methods of communication
The Great Depression
Foreign policy
Supreme Court decisions
Constitutional amendments
PHASES OF FEDERALISM
1. DUAL FEDERALISM (17801920) or Layer-Cake Federalism
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The period when state governments had
most power
Focus was on states rights
Federal government role was restricted to
money, war and peace.
Little known presidents e.g. Ulysses Grant
and James Polk
Federal and state governments had distinct
areas of responsibility
CO-OPERATIVE FEDERALISM or
Marble-cake federalism (19301960)
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Federal and state governments co-operated to solve problems of
poverty, health, education, transport and national security
4 Democratic Presidents during this era: Roosevelt, Truman, JFK
and Johnson
New federal depts: Defense (49), Health, Education and Welfare
(53), Housing and Urban Development (65) and Transport (66).
Federal government allocated categorical grants – schemes
where it was stipulated how federal tax dollars were to be spent
by the states (measures had a centripetal effect)
By the Clinton era, the federal government was giving $200
billion to the states, over 90% in the form of categorical grants.
NEW FEDERALISM
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Since the 60s we have the rise of block grants
- i.e. money given to the states by the federal
government to be used at their discretion
within broad policy areas (measures have a
centrifugal effect)
Era of 4 Republican presidents: Nixon, Ford,
Reagan and Bush
During Clinton’s 1996 state of the union
address he stated: ’The era of big
government is over’
Why did ‘big government’
become unpopular?
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Was felt federal government programmes had
not worked and were wasteful
Social problems like drugs, gun crime etc had
not been solved
A general distrust of ‘Washington politicians’
since Watergate and Vietnam
Supreme Court decisions started to turn away
from federal government
Republican presidencies
Federalism under GW
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How has Bush brought the trend of
Republican presidents with regards to federalstate relations to an end?
Give the 5 main reasons for this expansion of
federal government and include examples of
the policies
Give details of the other 3 examples of ‘biggovernment conservatism’ in recent times.
CONSEQUENCES OF
FEDERALISM
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Legal consequences
Political consequences
Economic consequences
Regionalism
Pro’s and cons
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PROS
Permits diversity
Creates more access points in
government
Better protection of individual rights
States become ‘policy laboratories’
Well suited to a geographically large
nation
CONS
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Can mask economic and racial
inequalities
Frustrates the national will, making
solving problems harder
Source of conflict and controversy
Overly bureaucratic