Federalism
Federalism is a form of rule in which the power is divided between a central authority and constituent political units. So in terms if the United States, it is the division between the national government and the state governments. When the founding fathers wrote the constitution they created a federal system of government. But the government that they envisioned has changed much since 1787. Since 1787 the federal government has gained more and more power over the state governments. The government does this through categorical grants and federal mandates. In the last thirty years, the government has issued many mandates and rules about the environment that gives them more power over the states. But also, recently since Ronald Reagan states have been gaining more power. Examples of this include the Tenth Amendment, block grants and the Welfare Reform Act of 1996.
The government has changed much since the founding fathers wrote the constitution. The most drastic change is that the federal government has gained so much more power over the state governments. The federal government does this by different means. One way the federal government gains more power is through categorical grants. This is money that has been given by the Congress. But this money has restrictions and can only be used by the states in certain ways. The federal government has also gained more authority through federal mandates. These are laws set by the government that forces a state or local government to abide by with a certain rule. This is the federal government’s way of working around a restriction for making new laws. These two things are just two ways in which the federal government has gained more power since the time of the founding fathers.
Mandates are used frequently in order for the federal government to accomplish their objectives. There are many examples of federal mandates. One would be that by law the states should be allowed to choose the drinking age of...