When the United States Constitution was written in September of 1878, Article I. specifically called for a legislative branch. This “most numerous Branch” of government would consist of two bodies: a House Of Representatives, and a Senate. The House’s membership originally had 65, and each state would send representatives proportional to their population (roughly 1 for every 30,000 residents at that time). Today the body has grown to have 435 members, selected proportionally to state population (but every state gets at a minimum of one member if they have a very small population). Those members would serve for 2-year terms of office. The Senate is composed of exactly 2 members from each state. Its members serve for a 6-year term of office. …show more content…
They were originally voted on by the state legislature, but the seventeenth amendment changed this so that the voting was to happen by the people. These two bodies are given the power to change and create laws, override the president’s vetoes, impeach officials, and approve treaties, making the legislative branch the most powerful of the Government. Though argued that the executive and judicial branches have the greater power, but if the majority of the legislative branch wants to pass a law, the executive and judicial branches have limited voice. One of the powers given to the legislative branch is the power to approve treaties.
Treaties, in general, tend to seem insignificant, but in the long run, they are crucial for the benefit the people, government, and industry. While it is the main job of the president to ratify treaties, the Senate has the power to approve or disapprove treaties. The legislative branch can stop the president from making ludicrous decisions or strongly encourage them to make a better decision. So in the end, this gives the legislative branch has the ultimate power to determine our allies and our potential …show more content…
enemies. Another power given to the legislative branch is the power to impeach officials. Every once and a while we end up with a terrible leader who is, in reality, a spy or a criminal, it doesn’t have to be the president. It could be argued that the judicial branch is mainly given this responsibility since they are the people who go to court and convict them of their crimes, but ultimately the vote of the legislative branch is what keeps it in power. While impeaching officials doesn’t happen very often, it can only be done by the legislative branch, making it the most powerful. This last power is to change and create laws.
This is explicitly why the legislative branch is the most powerful. The judicial and executive branches play only brief roles in the process of making laws. The executive branch just has the president veto or approve the law, and the judicial branch only decides if it’s constitutional. The legislative branch, however, actually drafts the law and its consequences. They proceed to vote and if the house of representatives and the Senate agree, then it goes to the president. If he approves the law it becomes a law, if he vetoes it goes back to Congress. Even if the president vetoes a law, Congress can override it with a two-thirds vote and still make the law, giving Congress the upper hand. In short, Congress has more power and say in what our laws are then the executive and judicial
branches. So in the end, the most powerful branch of the government is the legislative branch. The legislative branch has the power to impeach officials, ratify treaties, and change and create laws. And while all of the branches are crucial to a functioning government, the legislative branch is what keeps it all together. Bibliography History.com, A&E Television Networks, www.history.com/topics/legislative-branch/videos/the-legislative-branch. “About the Legislative Branch.” US Gov, www.usa.gov/about-the-legislative-branch. “Citation Machine™ automatically generates citations in MLA, APA, Chicago, Turabian, and thousands more!” Citation Machine: Format & Generate Citations – APA, MLA, & Chicago, www.citationmachine.net/. History.com Staff. “Legislative Branch.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 2017, www.history.com/topics/legislative-branch. “Legislative Branch.” The White House, The United States Government, www.whitehouse.gov/. “Library Guides: U.S. Government: Legislative Branch: U.S. Congress.” U.S. Congress - U.S. Government: Legislative Branch - Library Guides at Penn State University, guides.libraries.psu.edu/legislative.
Under the Articles each state could send between 2 and 7 delegates to Congress. In the Constitution each state was allowed 2 members in the Senate and 1 representative per 30,000 people (this number has now increased greatly) in the House of Representatives. As I stated earlier each state wanted to be represented according to different factors. The states with bigger populations wanted representation to be based solely off of population. The states with smaller populations wanted there to be a fixed number of representatives per state, regardless of size or population.
The legislative branch is responsible for making laws and includes Congress, the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Senate has 100 members, two from each state. The house of representatives is made up of 435 members, and the larger the population of the state is, the more representatives it will have. The House and the Senate are also known as Congressional Chambers, and they both have particular exclusive powers. The consent of both chambers is required to pass any legislation. But it can only become law if it is signed by the President. The President has the power to veto a bill though, which will deny the legislation and kick the bill back to Congress. It may then only be passed if 2/3 of both houses of Congress vote to pass the bill.
Our Legislative Branch has two chambers or as some will call it bicameral. The chambers consist of the Senate and the House of Representatives just like the National Legislative Branch. In our Senate we currently have a total of 31 members and there are 150 members in the House of Representatives. Senators hold their seat for 4 years and their election years are spread out while the House of Representatives are elected for two-year terms. In our Texas Legislature we have a few authority figures. “The Texas Constitution provides that the lieutenant governor shall serve as president of the senate, the presiding officer of that body. The lieutenant governor is elected statewide by voters of Texas and is the second-highest ranking officer of the executive branch of government”. (Texas Medical Associaton) In the House of Representatives we have a Speaker of the House who is chosen in each time a new legislature starts by its own members. “The speaker maintains order during floor debate, recognizing legislators who wish to speak and ruling on procedural matters.” (Joe Straus Speaker) There are also many committees who act as important gatekeepers and shape the proposed legislation. (University of Texas at Austin). The main pu...
First there is the House of Representatives. The House is the lowest level of what makes up the United States Congress. Members of the House are made up of state officials. The number of House representatives that each state gets is directly affected by the state’s current population, and so the number changes with each state. There are many duties formed by the House some of which include; introducing bills, bringing up resolutions, offering amendments, and serving on committees. Members of the House are voted for directly by the people of state from which they come. Each representative must be at least
1. The legislative branch is composed of the House of Representatives and the Senate, as a whole they are referred to as Congress. There are 435 elected officials in the House of Representatives
...09). Congress is supposed to enact laws, and the ability of judges to modify them with court decisions shows how their power may extend past what the system of checks and balances had intended. The last aspect that shows how powerful this branch may be is the judges. Originally, the lifetime appointment was supposed to relieve them of pressures when deciding cases, but this serves as a double edged sword. Judges without fear of retribution shows the amount of power that they posses. Overall, the development of judicial review, judges lifetime appointment, and ability to modify laws has led to an unbalance of power by the Judicial Branch among the three branches of government.
Legislative vests its power in Congress, which consists of the Senate and House of Representatives. Executive to the President of the United States, and Judicial is invested in the Supreme Court. Our constitution outlines these ideals. Each branch does not overrule another, and all are equal. Doc B.
The Legislative Branch is Congress, which has just two branches - the House of Representatives and the Senate. To understand the power held by the Legislative Branch, we should refer to the Constitution itself. Per Section 8 of Article I, Congress may only act within the powers granted to them explicitly in the Constitution, these are called enumerated powers. But this doesn’t mean the powers granted to them were diminutive. The entire legislative power was constitutionally delegated to Congress. The House and Senate serve, for the most part, to work together (though not necessarily in harmony) on passing laws, and both House and Senate must approve all bills. The framers began with the forming Article I: The Legislative Article for a simple reason; law making is an extremely important function for our government. I believe they dug their heels in here first because they intended for it to be the longest, most thorough article in the Constitution, and every word truthfully serves a divine purpose of laying out the structure of how our Legislative Branch should run. With a mere 2,...
The backbone of American politics is derived from the concept of democracy, where the people govern themselves, understanding this concept is vital to the policy making process. The president and congress should have equal jurisdiction in policymaking, Constitutional checks and balances were created by the founders to keep one branch from gaining unequal power over the other. Under very specific circumstances, such as , powers of each branch may be altered. The constitution can be interpreted in many ways and each interpretation has sparked debate over whether the president or congress has more influence over policy making.
Congress has helped develop the Presidency as we know it today. This is because Congress argues over proposals and legislation proposed by the President. They are a major determent in whether bills turn into laws. But it’s not easy. One reason for this is because there are many powerful groups out there who argue about what should be discussed such as air pollution with the EPA or jobs.
The legislative branch consists of the Senate and the House of Representatives also known together as Congress is the only branch that has the power to create new laws. Furthermore the legislative branch employs an amazing amount of power. However the members of this branch are likely voted out of office if their objectives are not acceptable to the people. In addition the legislative branch is looked at the branch that is connected to the people. (Phaedra Trethan, 2013)
There are only a few things keeping the Legislative branch from getting out of control and that is its size and the implied powers that they have given to the other branches. Currently the United States congress is comprised of two houses, The Senate, and The House of Representatives. In which the senate is made up of one hundred people, fifty from each state. And the House of Representatives is made up of four hundred and sixty five publicly elected officials. With so many conflicting ideologies, because of geography and other factors, it is hard to please enough people to sway into deci...
The legislative branch the first branch of the three, consist of two branches establishing Congress, the House and Senate. Each of these components elected by residents of each state has specific requirements that they must follow. The House objectives has several powers assigned exclusively to it, including the power to initiate revenue bills, impeach federal officials, and elect the President in the case of an electoral college tie (Quote GCU). The Senate objectives are managed by the Vice President of the country, known to be the President of there group. Under the President the Senate confirms appointments that requires consent and ratifies treaties (Quote GCU). This helps the entire branch with duties that are performed.
17 May 1787 -. The Senate is composed of 100 Members, 2 from each State, who are. elected to serve for a term of 6 years. Senators were originally chosen by the State legislature. This procedure was changed by the 17th amendment to the Constitution, adopted in 1913, which made the Constitution. election of Senators a function of the people.
The legislative Branch is a powerful part of our governmental system. One of the strengths of it is that it has powers that no other branch has. The legislative branch, including both the House of Representatives and the Senate, is given extensive powers by the Constitution. The legislative branch is the only branch that can create laws or change existing laws. In addition to creating and changing laws, the legislative branch has an array of powers such as: the power to declare war, confirm or reject many Presidential appointments, impeach a federal official, to include the president or a justice of the Supreme Court, create annual federal budgets and direct how federal monies are spent, and extensive investigative powers. Essentially, one of the legislatives branches’ greater powers to creating and changing laws do not yield there; additionally, if the President vetoes a bill, they may override his veto by passing a bill again in each chamber as long as the chambers can get at least a two-third voting in favor of the bill. An example would if the President wants to create a program and/or a system, he will have to go through Congress for approval of the