US political system

The political system of the United States was defined in 1787 by the US Constitution , as well as by amendments to the Constitution and other laws. The US Constitution embodies the principle of separation of powers, according to which the Federal Government consists of legislative, executive and judicial bodies operating separately from each other. At the moment, the Constitution consists of a preamble, in which 85 main objectives for the adoption of the Constitution, 7 articles and 27 amendments (the first 10 of which form the Bill of Rights ) are highlighted .

The highest legislative body is a bicameral parliament - the US Congress : the US House of Representatives and the US Senate .

Each state has exactly two representatives in the Senate (senators). The number of members in the House of Representatives from each state is determined every 10 years, depending on the population of each state (the larger the population compared to other states - the more representatives). Each state has at least one representative, regardless of the population.

Senators are elected for a six-year term, representatives for a two-year term. Both senators and representatives can be re-elected an unlimited number of times.

The highest court of the United States is the Supreme Court . Theoretically, his competence is strictly limited to the US Constitution (Article III, Section 2 ^[1] ). Thus, the competence of the Supreme Court includes cases arising on the basis of the Constitution, laws adopted by the United States Congress and international treaties. The court may also consider cases involving ambassadors, admiralties and maritime jurisdiction. Additionally, the court may consider cases in which one of the parties is the United States; affairs between two or more states; affairs between any state and citizens of another state, between citizens of different states and countries. In fact, the Supreme Court has enormous power, since its decisions can formally invalidate any laws and decrees of the president and can be revised only by passing an amendment to the constitution . In addition, members of the court are elected for life (with the exception of extremely rare cases of impeachment ) and can hardly be subjected to political pressure from the president, congress or voters. In court, 9 members, its chairman - the chief judge of the US Supreme Court - has a small additional powers. The members of the court (as well as the candidate for the position of chief judge, even if he is already a member of the court) are nominated by the president and approved by the senate .

As a rule, the senate recognizes the president’s right to nominate a judge of the same views as the president himself, even if the senate is controlled by the opposition. However, in this case, the candidate must adhere to mainly centrist views, at least publicly. This right of the president is one of the main arguments that voters cite as the reason for voting for the personally unpleasant (but ideologically correct) presidential candidate.

The power of the supreme court is limited by the fact that in most cases the court can consider only appeals to legal actions. This means, in particular, that in order for the Supreme Court to declare the law unconstitutional, someone whose rights are violated by this law must sue the federal government and the lawsuit must go through all necessary instances.

The President of the United States is the head of state, government, and commander in chief of the armed forces.

The President of the United States is elected for a term of four years, moreover, he can be elected to this post no more than twice, and no more than once for those who have acted as President of the United States instead of another elected President for two or more years (according to the 22nd amendment to the US Constitution, adopted in 1951).

The president and vice president are elected through indirect (two-stage) elections with the help of an electoral college .

US Presidents

In January 2017, Donald Trump, who won the 2016 presidential election, took the presidency.

Powers of the President of the United States:

• Supreme Commander of the United States Armed Forces,
• supreme representative of the country in the international arena,
• the appointment of federal judges, including members of the Supreme Court, ambassadors, and senior officials of the executive branch
• convening extraordinary congress sessions,
• pardon persons convicted under federal law
• emergency powers in crisis internal and external situations
• the formation of the legislative program of the administration (messages to Congress),
• budget presentation to congress
• issuance of presidential orders having the force of law. etc.

Preliminaries (Primaries)

Primaries - the procedure of primary elections for candidates for elective positions in the field of legislative and executive power in the United States.

In the US, the organization of the election campaign involved the party. They have experience, staff, finances, connections and everything necessary to promote their candidates. Therefore, in order to have a real chance of winning the election, the candidate must usually be supported by one of the two main parties. Independent candidates sometimes succeed, but this rarely happens. For the support of parties, especially such influential ones as the republican and democratic ones , several candidates usually fight for nomination to elective posts. For their democratic choice were created primaries .

Compared with Europe and some other countries, the ideological component of parties is much less pronounced.

At the same time, for some groups of voters the personal candidacy of the candidate does not play a big role - first of all, the party to which he belongs is important. In the states where one party traditionally dominates, the candidate who won the primary election of this party is almost guaranteed to win in the main elections, and it is for the primaries in these states that a serious struggle develops between the main candidates.

The first state to pass the law on primaries was Wisconsin ( 1903 ). Before the primaries system was established in the country, candidates were selected at party congresses.

The primaries, in fact, arose as a reaction of voters to attempts by party leaders to remove the process of nominating candidates from the control of ordinary party members.

By 1927, all states had already passed laws for the mandatory conduct of such elections. Primaries are used to select candidates for local elections, as well as to nominate candidates for the Senate and House of Representatives of the US Congress and State Congresses.

State laws determine whether only registered party members (closed primaries) or all voters (open primaries) are eligible to participate in the primaries.

The nomination of presidential candidates is held at party congresses, but since 1968 congresses have not been elected, but in fact only confirm the candidature of a leader who was supported by the majority of party members for the primaries.

Currently, there are 50 states in the USA, the last two of which were incorporated into this country in 1959 (Alaska and Hawaii).

Each state has its own Constitution , Legislative Assembly , Governor , Supreme Court and Capital. The administrative division of states is spelled out in their constitutions. Like Congress, state legislatures are bicameral (except Nebraska ), and, in most states, are modeled on the US Congress . Also modeled on the federal congress, the lower house is usually called the House of Representatives, and the upper is the Senate. In a number of states, lower chambers are also referred to as general assemblies or chambers of delegates.

As a rule, the state legislature is elected for a two-year term; its specific duration and number of chambers vary greatly from state to state.

The order of formation of branches of government in the states is in many respects similar to the federal, with the exception of the judiciary. In 8 states, the supreme judges are appointed by the governor, in 4 - elected by the state legislature.

At the same time, in 16 states, the supreme judges are not appointed, but are elected for a long term in non-party elections, in 7 - in party elections. In addition, 15 states follow the "Missouri Plan" ( en: Missouri Plan ), according to which the nominees of the supreme judges are drawn up by a special commission, and approved by the governor. This commission consists partly of professional lawyers, members of the bar association, partly of citizens selected by the governor. In 3 states, the Missouri Plan is modified.

The specific duration of the term and the number of high judges varies from state to state in accordance with the local constitution.

At the head of each state is the governor, elected by the population of the state. In most states, the governor may be elected for no more than two four-year terms (the number of terms is not limited in the states of Connecticut, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, North Dakota, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin).

At the same time, a vice-governor ( lieutenant governor ) is elected, who may belong to another political party. In the states of Arizona, Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon, Tennessee, West Virginia and Wyoming, local constitutions do not provide for the positions of vice-governor, and the corresponding functions are assigned to the president of the state senate. In addition, in the states of Tennessee and West Virginia, lieutenant governors are elected by the state senate.

The basis for building a state system in the United States is that it is built from state to federation, and not vice versa, and each state has complete sovereignty on its territory, except for what was transferred to the federal government. Therefore, the states make their own laws and have their own taxes, and the constitutions of many states are much longer and more detailed than the US Constitution. However, the Constitution and state laws should not conflict with the US Constitution.

Thus, US law has two main levels: state and federal. According to statistics, annually in state courts up to 27.5 million cases are considered, while in federal courts only 280 thousand. The total number of levels of judicial authority differs from state to state. In particular, the state of Texas has 5 levels of courts (magistrates, municipal courts, county courts, district courts and appellate courts), and the state has at the same time two higher appeals instances - the Supreme Court of Texas and the Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas.

Some states hold referendums .

In Louisiana there is Romance-Germanic law , while in the rest of the states there is English ( Common Law ).

The competence of the states is all except that it was transferred to the jurisdiction of the federal government. The states are in charge of such areas as education , including the financing of public schools and universities and their management, the construction of transport infrastructure, the issuance of licenses to entrepreneurs and specialists, the provision of public order and criminal justice, the issuance of driving licenses and marriage permits, supervision of funded government hospitals and nursing homes, park management, election supervision (including federal elections), the leadership of the state national guard . In most states, budgets are required to be balanced, except for the special situations listed in the State Constitution.

The most typical state administrative units are counties and cities. These districts also have their own charters, legislative, judicial and executive authorities, which are formed through elections. Although each of the self-government bodies is relatively small in size, their total number is such that out of half a million elected officials in the United States, less than 8,500 belong to the federal and regional levels. The rest work in local governments. In many districts, the sheriff , the prosecutor , the judge, the magistrate, the coroner , the head of the tax service, and the auditor are elective offices. In cities, municipal councils and mayors are elected, and in some cities, police chiefs as well. In some districts and cities, the highest executive powers are concentrated in the hands of a professional manager who is appointed (that is, hired) by representative bodies of self-government.

Along with counties and cities, there are special territorial-administrative units of states that are responsible for water supply, saving water and natural resources, fire safety, emergency assistance, transportation, and which are financed by separate taxes. Their leadership in some cases is elected, in others appointed by the state. Public schools are administered by the respective school district's education councils, which consist of either elected officials or guardians.

In 33 of the 50 states, the capital is not in the most populated city. Thus, the capital of the state of California is not in Los Angeles, but in Sacramento , and the capital of the state of New York is in the city of Albany . As a result, the five most populated cities of the United States are not the capitals of the United States or individual states (only the sixth most populous city of Phoenix is the largest capital).

US policy is a prime example of a two-party system from the mid- 19th century . The US Republican Party, the US Democratic Party , as well as various less influential federal and regional parties are participating in US political life.

The two main parties control both the United States Congress and the Legislative Assemblies of all states. Also, Democrats and Republicans win the presidential election and in most cases the election of state governors and city mayors . Third parties only occasionally achieve a small representation at the federal and state levels, most often without the ability to really influence politics even at the local level.

Only in some states there are parties that have real influence on regional politics (for example, the Vermont Progressive Party ), and independent candidates have some chances at the regional and federal levels. In the current 113 Congress there are two independent senators; there are no independent members of the House of Representatives.

Third parties, as well as independent candidates, have been and remain a recurring characteristic, but mostly insignificant force in the American elective life. Practically all the third forces of the federal level tended to succeed in the period of only one election, and then die, disappear or be absorbed by one of the main parties.

In the presidential election since the beginning of the 20th century, the slightly influential and mostly short-lived “third” parties and forces only occasionally achieved at least relatively significant results: second place, 27% and 88 electors in 1912 ( Progressive Party ), 19% and 0 electors in 1992 ( independent Ross Perot ), 17% and 23 electors in 1924 ( Progressive Party ), 14% and 46 electors in 1968 ( Independent Party ).

However, there is evidence that these parties can have a serious impact on the election results. For example, the promotion of Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 as a third party candidate ( Progressive Party ) during the split in the Republican Party took votes from the Republicans and thus allowed Democrat Woodrow Wilson to be elected, although he did not get a majority of votes. And in the 1992 elections, Democrat Bill Clinton also did not get the majority ahead of the Republican rival, largely due to the presence of a strong third independent candidate Ross Perot .

The 1910s were the end times of the so-called. The “Fourth Party System” and “Progressive Era” ( eng. Progressive Era ) were distinguished by high social activity ^[2] , and they can also be called the crisis of the US bipartisan system. “The crisis of the bipartisan system was expressed in the fact that the candidate of the third, progressive party, Theodore Roosevelt, received more votes in the elections than one of the parties of the bipartisan system (Republican), an extremely rare case in American political practice. But very soon the second party that turned out to be in the elections of 1912 (27% against 42% and 23%) again became part of the Republican.

Also, the beginning of the XX century gave a chance to become a real third force in the US party system of the socialist party. At the same elections of 1912, as well as at the elections of 1920, the Socialist Party achieved its greatest success when about 1 million voters voted for it, including the widest range of democratic demands in the election program. ” But it split during the First World War .

Since the 1990s, public opinion polls have consistently shown a high level of public support for the third party concept, but not for any one of the existing third parties. In the 1992 presidential election, who embodied the idea of ​​a third force, independent candidate Ross Perot received the highest result after 1912 (about 19% of the vote). During the preparations for the 2000 election , according to one of the polls, 67% of Americans were for any strong third party that would nominate its presidential candidates and for elected positions in Congress and the states in order to compete with the Republican and Democratic candidates. parties.

Despite the various manifestations of the potential support of the third party, there are serious obstacles to the election of a third party candidate as president. In addition to those already noted, the most significant obstacle is the fear of voters that they will lose their votes in vain. As practice shows, voters resort to strategic voting, changing their initial decision and giving their votes to those who they would like to give them when they realize that a third party candidate has no chance of winning. There is also the phenomenon of voting for candidates of third parties as a protest.

In addition, in the event of a victory in the presidential elections, candidates of third parties and independent candidates would then face a discouraging problem. She, of course, is the problem of management - staffing the administration, and then working with Congress, where Republicans and Democrats dominate, who would have only limited incentives to cooperate with the president, who is not a mainstream party.

In the USA, lobbyism is of great importance, that is, the promotion of various draft laws by special lobbyist organizations that are legal in most states and at the federal level. Lobbying is regulated by a number of laws (both federal and state), and all lobbyists operating at the federal level (as well as in a number of states) must register and submit reports. The lobby can be divided into professional and ethnic. The latter ( Armenian , Greek and others) have a noticeable influence on US foreign policy , as a rule by promoting those laws that are beneficial to their historic homeland. For example, the Armenian lobby was able to achieve the adoption of Amendment 907 against Azerbaijan . Although there are exceptions. For example, the Cuban lobby pursues a policy against the Cuban ruling regime of Castro and supports anti-Cuban sanctions . The significance of lobbying firms is indicated by the fact that even the authorities of other countries — China , Estonia , Georgia, and others — used the paid services of these organizations to promote certain decisions of the American authorities. The revenue of lobbying firms is huge and amounts to billions of dollars a year. In the US, the attitude towards lobbyists is ambiguous. Their activities are in demand, but are under strong control (both state and public).

• US Constitution (Eng.)
• US political system
• US legislative power