Article Review:America and founding Assign Essay
The research question that informs Thomas’s (2000) article, which is in the form of a speech, is why federalism matters. The author tries to expound more on the necessity of federalism, and he bases his explanations on the American Constitution which he believes is the most powerful compared to other Constitutions. From his understanding, Thomas (2000) outlines the principles that have greatly supported the American constitution, including incorporating universal principles that can serve all people. After assessing the speech, Thomas (2000) uses explanatory research design as its methodology to investigate why federalism matters to the United States as a nation. That is because explanatory research aims at answering the how and why to give an enhanced understanding of certain phenomena where it is the issue of federalism (Bentouhami et al., 2021). Therefore, Thomas (2000) clarifies why federalism matters where his input can be essential for future research.
The data presented to support Thomas’s (2000) notion of the importance of federalism in the United States include the use of the Founding Fathers’ statements as listed in the federalists’ acclamation. For instance, Thomas (2000, p. 234), the author uses James Madison’s acclamation as indicated in the Federalist No. 5 to prove that individual liberty is a right within the government. In such a case, the author believes that federalism, like the different governments with different powers, comes to a consensus that protecting the people also has the same agenda of protecting the people’s rights. Hence, the reason why federalism matters is based on the fact that it has similar roles to power separation, limited government, judicial federalism review, and the Bill of Rights to the country. Hence, all leaders must embrace federalism to check and balance the provided liberties to ensure that the Founding Father’s work will be put into practice and never diminish in the future.
Rubin, Edward L. “Puppy Federalism and the Blessings of America.” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 574, no. 1 (March, 2001): 37–51.
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Rubin (2001) provides a clear illustration concerning federalism and the aspect of decentralization. He is among those authors who were against federalism since they believe that federalism does not complement the Founding Father’s initial intentions in most instances. Rubin (2001) generally indicates that federalism refers to a governmental organization system that provides the definitive polity subunits the right to go against the central government. Hence, through federalism, these subunits maintain the policies and norms that differ from those of the central government. That means Rubin (2001) aims to answer the research question on how federalism differs from decentralization which the central government uses to implement its policies and norms effectively. From his point of view, Rubin (2001) believes that the United States is one blessed country with a very strong national unity sense which makes federalism not an essential factor for it. The author argues that if the federalism case happened before the Civil War, it would have been a different case, but at the moment, he believes that the adopted federalism is more of puppy federalism. Just like Thomas (2000), Rubin (2001) engages in an explanatory research design to explain why he believes that federalism does not matter so long as America has a constitution. The data incorporated in the article is backed up by other scholars’ journals and textbooks that share similar ideologies as one to support his notion of puppy federalism and the need to concentrate on the American Constitution. Rubin (2001) believes that legal scholars should never support federalism since even the Republican Congress does not support federalism.
Article Synthesis
Thomas (2000) and Rubin (2001) share different ideologies on whether the United States needs federalism. During the creation of the United States Constitution, the Founding Fathers had one intention, which was to ensure that the government would manage to work at a national level. However, its limited powers would never allow it to risk fundamental rights. The article synthesis will address whether the Founding Fathers addressed federalism in the constitution using Rubin and Thomas’s articles.
Federalism is a religious idea that arises from the explanation of the relationship that the Israelites and God had in those days and the governmental relationship between the twelve Israel tribes and their covenantal national government. For instance, in Genesis 35:11, God tasked the children of Israel with multiplying the earth, and that from such generation will results to the rise of many nations (He et al., 2018). That means federalism in an American context regards the relationship established by the constitution and the American people and that of the different states and the national government, which acts as the epicenter of the policies and rules. From Thomas’s (2000) perspective, the author believes that federalism matters since it helps evaluate the constitution’s effectiveness, thus ensuring that the country observes the law as outlined by the American Founding Fathers.
Thomas’s (2020) perspective is supported by Fry (2019), which accentuates that federalism matters because it enhances political participation and policy innovation and allows the space to improve diversity. An example of the effectiveness of federalism in policy innovation concerns how Louis Brandeis, a Supreme Court Justice in 1932, indicated that it would be possible for one state to engage in laboratory tests, especially when its state members agree to such laboratory trials on either economic and social experiments without posing any risk to other parts of the country. The ruling was indicated under New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann, 285 U.S. 262. Just like Thomas (2000), Brandeis’s provision indicated that an individual state would not necessarily have to rely on the national government to implement policies that can benefit its citizens (Fry, 2019). That is possible since what may be essential for one state may not be a priority in another. For instance, a state like California has inspired the creation of fuel emission standards and other essential environmental laws. Also, when evaluating factors like health insurance exchanges, Washington, Rhode Island, and Kentucky state serve as successful models that other states that may want to improve their health exchange performances can easily emulate (Scheffler, 2019).
The other advantage that Thomas (2000) states concerning federalism are that it provides two governmental levels that can engage in action. In that case, whenever a proposed policy fails to be passed at one level, it can receive support at another. That way, social movements, groups, and individuals become encouraged to ensure that they participate actively in public policy making. Such acts of federalism can be seen in attaining political office since individuals usually have more national, local, or state opportunities. Hence, once the federal government cannot pass uniform policies in the country, the local and state governments can easily address the issues without no issue depending on their citizen’s interests. That is why one will find that some states have different gun control and alcohol distribution policies
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However, we cannot ignore Rubin’s (2001) notion that the constitution is enough, thus discrediting federalism under the decentralization factor. That is because such decentralization of power tends to bring about various drawbacks, such as economic disparities with states and the inability to take actions that benefit the nation in general. According to Tangel et al. (2019), there are a lot of economic differences across states that have a great effect on the citizens’ well-being. An example happened in Maryland in 2014 after the state found that it had the highest household income median, approximately $73,971 (Tangel et al., 2019). Within the same year, a state like Mississippi had one of the lowest household income medians at $39,680 (Shterenshis, 2019). That way, federalism opponents, the main social justice proponents, believe that federalism obstructs national government efforts to ensure that it balances such disparities. That means, despite federalism proponents viewing it as a form of check and balance, federalism opponents tend to view such activities as more of jeopardizing the federal responses to national issues (He et al., 2019). That can also be seen when President Roosevelt’s efforts in combating the Great Depression scourge were interfered with by the country’s Supreme Court. In conclusion, when evaluating both proponents and opponents of federalism, it is clear that each has defended their stands using credible evidence. However, with the current wave of changes that the country is experiencing in the 21st century, federalism matters since it helps states and local and national governments to be held accountable, especially when implementing policies that affect different areas of jurisdiction.
Bibliography
Bentouhami, Hayat, Lidia Casas, and Joost Weyler. “Reporting of “Theoretical Design” in Explanatory Research: A Critical Appraisal of Research on Early Life Exposure to Antibiotics and the Occurrence of Asthma.” Clinical Epidemiology 13 (2021): 755.
Fry, Vanessa Crossgrove. “Pay for success: Diffusion of policy innovation for social and economic stability.” Public Administration Review 79, no. 5 (2019): 784-790.
He, Baogang, Laura Allison-Reumann, and Michael Breen. “The Covenant Connection Reexamined: The Nexus between Religions and Federalism in Asia.” Political Studies 66, no. 3 (2018): 752-770.
Rubin, Edward L. “Puppy Federalism and the Blessings of America.” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 574, no. 1 ( March, 2001): 37–51.
Scheffler, Gabriel. “Unlocking Access to Health Care: A Federalist Approach to Reforming Occupational Licensing.” Health Matrix 29 (2019): 293.
Shterenshis, Michael V. “Israel: ethnocracy or multicracy?.” Middle Eastern Studies 55, no. 4 (2019): 605-620.
Tangel, Virginia, Robert S. White, Anna S. Nachamie, and Jeremy S. Pick. “Racial and ethnic disparities in maternal outcomes and the disadvantage of peripartum black women: a multistate analysis, 2007–2014.” American journal of perinatology 36, no. 08 (2019): 835-848.
Thomas, Clarence. “Why Federalism Matters.” Drake Law Review 48, no. 2: 231–238, 2000.
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Hello, this essay must have Citations from at least 6 peer-reviewed/scholarly sources and all required readings and presentations. Must provide at least 2 citations from the required course materials and one reference to Scripture. Double-spaced content, Double-spaced. Turabian Format Author-Date style (no footnotes; only in-text citations) in Times New Roman (12 pt.), with margins of 1”. Must have at least 5 years 2017-2022) of Bibliographical citation. Except for required textbook and assigned readings: Elazer: Chapter 3-4, Federalists: NO 44-45 Please see Client upload for detail instruction.