Separation of Powers (Essay Sample)

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Separation of Powers
The concept of federalism has its hinges on the division of powers to govern. Most commonly, these powers are divided between one central governing body and the various entities such as States or Provinces that are tied together by the jurisdiction of the central authority. These political entities exercise some level of autonomy in crafting laws and dealing with governing issues of their local governments. The United States, Canada, Mexico, Nigeria, Australia and India are some of the countries that practice the Federalist system of governance. Conventionally, the distribution of these powers is laid out in the Constitutions of these countries. Types of federalism include the Dual federalism where the federal government hold more power than the constituent political units; the Cooperative federalism that shares power equally between State and Nation; the Fiscal federalism, which interestingly, overrides the other systems as the controller of the National budget has more power than the rest. In the United States, the U.S Congress holds such a position, as noted by May and Ides (2007). Other forms include the New federalism and Creative Federalism.
Vile (2006) noted that Power struggles between regional and national governments have been commonplace ever since the introduction of this system. ‘Delegated powers’ of the Nation (U.S) and the ‘Reserved powers’ of the States have collided on several fronts that include State governance, enactment of laws and bi-laws, the judicial system among others where the procedure usually dictates that the federal government intervenes in the alleged excesses of the State government or to put it in different light, protects the citizenry against perceived harsh characteristics of an individual State’s legislation. In such cases, the National government invokes the "supreme law of the land" bestowed to it by the Constitution. These conflicts have also existed in the interpretations of parts of the constitution on the separation of powers, with each entity quoting from time to time the parts that favor them against the other. Article 1 of the American Constitution gives powers to the Congress to formulate and enact laws that serve the general interest of the people of America with a dotted line that disregards the opinion of individual State legislations as opined by May and Ides (2007). Through the judicial system, the Nation can use the ‘judicial review’ to strike down State laws it deems unconstitutional as exemplified in the examples below.
The federal system is wont to conflicts arising from implementation and legislation. Vile (2006) detailed some of these cases that have pitted the federal government against the State governments. A good case in point is the implementation of the gun laws in Washington D.C. The State carries the reputation for the strictest laws as pertains to handling of firearms. The prohibition of private gun ownership was overruled by the U.S Court of Appeals on grounds that it was unconstitutional and it undermined people’s right to defend themselves as per the 2nd Amendment. Here, the judicial system overruled the State’s regulation against private ownership of guns. The tenth amendment was invoked in the 1997 case of Printz vs. United States, where the federal law was barred...