To expand on Josh's point, the constraint faced by the writers of the Constitution was exactly what Sam points out: the sovereignty of the states vs. a Federal government. Without a strong executive to enforce what the federal government needed or wanted to do, the states could simply ignore Congress. A messy compromise was always in the cards if we wanted one nation.
To expand on Josh's point, the constraint faced by the writers of the Constitution was exactly what Sam points out: the sovereignty of the states vs. a Federal government. Without a strong executive to enforce what the federal government needed or wanted to do, the states could simply ignore Congress. A messy compromise was always in the cards if we wanted one nation.
That’s true. As I started this essay, I wanted to be incendiary about the Founders and, as I was reading more about the compromises they made, found myself acknowledging that the vast majority of them really were very intelligent. The states/federal parallel system in the US probably is more successful than not. What I don't have any real sense of is how it compares to other systems of government. Lots of countries, of course, have governors and robust systems of local government overlaid across a national administration. My hunch is that the US system is a bit clunkier than many of those in Western Europe, but I might be wrong.
To expand on Josh's point, the constraint faced by the writers of the Constitution was exactly what Sam points out: the sovereignty of the states vs. a Federal government. Without a strong executive to enforce what the federal government needed or wanted to do, the states could simply ignore Congress. A messy compromise was always in the cards if we wanted one nation.
That’s true. As I started this essay, I wanted to be incendiary about the Founders and, as I was reading more about the compromises they made, found myself acknowledging that the vast majority of them really were very intelligent. The states/federal parallel system in the US probably is more successful than not. What I don't have any real sense of is how it compares to other systems of government. Lots of countries, of course, have governors and robust systems of local government overlaid across a national administration. My hunch is that the US system is a bit clunkier than many of those in Western Europe, but I might be wrong.