Since World War II no other election has ever involved 65% or more registered voters. Elections for state and local elections are even lower. As we may all know the United States of America is a Democracy. In other words, the people will decide who will lead the country and what the country will do. Why do people still don’t vote and then later whine about who gets elected?
US History 939-943 Victory for Nixon • Vietnam proved a less crucial issue than expected. • Both candidates were committed to carrying on the war until the enemy settled for an honorable peace. • Nixon won one in 1968. • He won 301 of the electoral votes with a 43.4 % of the popular tally. • Nixon was the first president-elect since 1848 to not bring in one house of congress for his party in an initial election.
However, looking at the statistics such as Bill Clintons presidency, in the first 2 years which was a united government, Congress exercised limited oversight, and when needed to, asked softball questions, however , when Republicans took over Congress, things got much harder as they seek to hold the President to account, and after a while, impeach. Although this shows that things are more different when it is a united or divided government, Congress still has a task to do in which they must do oversight on President, so, it being united or divided government should not affect the task Congress are suppose to do, as they are an independent
Illinois has a population of 12 million people and 22 electoral votes. This means have one vote per every 550,000 voters. This is a very unbalanced form of voting, not capturing the popular vote at all. Durbin also points out that we use a direct popular election system for Senators, Governors, Congressmen, and mayors, but not for our President. The Founding Fathers knew during their time that people running for congress lived closer to the people voting for them, so at that time, the people voted directly for them but only for them.
David Greenburg argues that, "presidents are never able to meet" the expectations of transformative change (Canon 221). These expectations are created during campaigns in order for a candidate to win over voters, however many always disappoint. Greenburg believes the expectations and promises made by presidents in our time are far too complicated to reach and to summarize it: no president, from now on, will ever have the chance to be transformational. On the contrary, Richard Lowry and Ramesh Ponnuru view Obama as transformational, but in a negative way. They say, "Obama is the first president to explicitly reject the notion of American exceptionalism--the idea that the United States is historically unique and has always differed from other democracies (Canon 222)."
First a bill must be passed in both houses of Congress with a super-majority of two-thirds. Then it goes to the states, where three-quarters of state legislatures must approve it. Thus it is very difficult to get an amendment proposed, hence why there have only been twenty seven successful attempts to amend the US constitution in over 200 years. This is in great contrast to the manner in which the UK constitution can be changed, where only a simple vote in parliament is required. This rigidity might suggest that to an extent, US politics is still firmly rooted in the political circumstances of the late 1700s when the constitution was devised, and often struggles to adapt to some changes that occur.
The Effects of a Government Shutdown Government shutdowns have been around for what seems like a long time but really, quite hasn’t been. They can come in many different lengths and severities. In this paper I will be researching the causes, effects, and the processes uses to resolve a government shutdown. Causes of a government shutdown may vary slightly but every previous shutdown have been caused by a spending bill or funding issue (Matthews). However, for the most part main causes of shutdowns are quite balanced between a presidents refusing to sign a bill or vetoing a bill and congress failing to approve a budget to propose to the president to sign (Longley).
DBQ: 5 – Growth of political parties In present-day times, the American political system is most frequently associated with the ongoing issues between political parties. The two main political parties that strive for control of the American vote and carry an ongoing debate are the Democrats and the Republicans. But several years ago these political parties did not exist and many of the leaders were pleased they didn’t. Many of them feared that it would weaken the support of the Constitution as well as split the country. Even though many tried to oppose them the political parties began.
|Your Score |___ of 50 | There has been a majority of differences since the elections of the 1800’s. Some examples of things that have changed are political parties and after the war of 1812 the party for the federalist was terminated. After that no political parties were present, the only “ism” that was still alive was “sectionalism” and a lot of the time that would cause fights and disputes between people. There was only a certain “group” of people that could vote during the 1800’s, the only people that could were men, but the catch was that they had to own land to vote. This voting law that only allowed men with land to vote lowered the amount of people who could vote extremely.
Virtually everyone in the U.S. today who knows anything about politics’ knows that there are two distinct party’s “The Democrats” and “The Republicans”. These Parties have two ways that the two have very opposing visions for the country. But, hardly anyone knows that these two groups have basically been around since the beginning of our country. Both parties have very contradicting viewpoints that could make or break at any given time. Back when these two parties were forming they were referred to as the “Democratic Republicans” which is like today’s Republicans, and the “Federalists” which are like today’s Democrats.