Idea of Federalism - Free Essay Example

Federalism is the idea that the US, governmental powers is divided between a large main government and the government of individual states. In a federal system, the national government takes care of some things like delivering mail and making treaties with other countries. The state government takes care of other things like driver’s licenses and other business license. They also share powers such as taxation on both a federal and state level. Anti-Federalism is apposed to giving power to the federal government. They fear the government has too much power under the constitution. They want states to have the most power not a national government because they believed they were only protecting the wealthy aristocrats. Federalism has many positive attributes such as practicing pragmatism, creating laboratories of democracy and ensuring separation of powers. The united states is a large country with many diverse cultures, ideas and options. Practicing pragmatism allows power to be closed to the people. When an issue can be solved by state or local officials it saves time and can be viewed by people that live in the area and might see this issue in affect, whereas, people living in Washington DC may not even recognize this issue as a problem at all. Another great thing we do with federalism is create laboratories of democracy and what I mean by that is, w e use states as guinea pig. We have seen this most recently with the legalization of marijuana in a few select states. It has also been done with regulations and welfare policies according to the heritage foundation website. Other states watch to see the results of this experiment before deciding if that is something they want to do in their states. I think this is a cool idea because it allows states to experiment without forcing things upon the entire country. Also, federalism has many checks and balances to ensure people’s rights and prevents the federal government from becoming to powerful. It’s a mixture of power between the people, the state, and the federal government. I believe this gives a solid foundation to the system and prevents tyranny. Some weaknesses of Federalism are uniformity is lacking, unclear rules of power in the constitution, and duplicate services prevent accountability. Even though I listed local differences as a pro to federalism it can also be looked at as a con. While local control may keep government closer to the people is also causes confusion and complexity. Each state can have different tax codes and regulations. This can be very challenging for people that own nation-wide businesses. Also, because the constitution can be unclean about some things issues can arise between the power or the state and power of the federal government. I remember there where issues when the government enacted Obama Care because the state thought they should be the ones make that choice. Also, there is a dilution of accountability when the state and local government collide. For example, people may encounter local police officers, state troopers, or the FBI, DEA, and other forms of federal police organizations. So, who is held responsible when there are so many duplicate services? Anti- federalist argument strength and weakness Anti-Federalism argued that the central government would be too powerful federal government would be dominated by special interest over the interest of the small farm owner, and lengthy term limits and rotations could cause dictatorship. It would also restrict the power of the people and not allow their voices to be heard. Anti-Federalists feared that the rich white landowners wouldn’t care about the people that lived in rural areas. They specifically noted the lack of term limits and rotation of office. If a president could stay in office for a long period of time it could become a dictatorship. They didn’t want people to stay in office long enough to feel invincible. Also, another issue they saw was taxation. Both the state and federal government are able to tax the people, and this can infringe on people’s freedoms. They really wanted to protect the rights of common folks, so they came up with a compromise which was a bill of rights. They wanted protection from the government to make sure they didnt abuse their power. Essentially, they wanted the federal government to have very little responsibility and most of the power goes to the people. The issue with this is that people are ignorant of policies and procedures. Not everyone wants to be involved in government so putting that on the people could end badly. There could be a lack of organization and understanding. Also, if the federal government had no power we would all be very divided. Each state would have their own currency and army making everything very complicated and, in a way, dangerous. Unity makes a nation strong and with us divided anyone would be able to conquer us. My opinion is that both sides have valid points. I think we do need a strong central government made up of small states, but the government should not infringe on my rights. I think todays federalism works well for us but we could have some clarification in the separation of powers between federal and state. This would cause less conflict and confusion amongst people, local govt, state govt, and federal govt. I think we do a great job with our separation of powers in the federal system. We have many checks and balances that keep a dictatorship from arising, but they are also strong enough to protect the country. I like that we have both a state and federal system because it allows both small and large issues to be addresses. It’s a perfect balance of power because if the government was weaker we could be taken over by a third party or we would break apart from disagreements. If they were any stronger then we would have an issue where the president’s political party could take over. I think that both parties have valid points and when one overshadows the other they don’t care about the good points the other side had. To conclude, both federal and anti- federalists have strengths and weaknesses. Federalists have an issue with being vague and causing confusion, but they do have a strong and diverse system. Anti- federalist wants to protect the people but would make the federal government to weak to protect us from invaders. Federalism uses pragmatism, laboratories of democracy and separation of powers to make us strong. Anti-Federalism wants to limit terms, set protected rights, and limit govt power to keep us free. I think over time we made a great compromise. We have the bill of rights which we can thank the anti-federalists for and we have a strong central government that keeps thinks running smooth which we can thank federalists for. Feder alism has its downside as well, uniformity is lacking, unclear rules of power in the constitution, and duplicate services prevent accountability. Same for anti-federalism not uniform, unclear, not strong. Overall I believe that federalism is the way to go.