Federalist No. 51

Liberty: The Preservation Then and Now

I. Preface

“If men were angels, no government would be necessary” (Madison, 1). Madison uses this example to express that men need a strong government. The previous governing document of The United States, The Articles of Confederation, emphasized the freedom from national authority but ultimately failed. People, mostly the Antifederalists, were scared for a document that put such a great amount of power back into a national government; the last thing they wanted was a tyranny. As a matter of fact, the purpose of Federalist No. 51 was to make the audience understand the proposed structure for the United States Government would make liberty possible. James Madison used Federalist No. 51 to expressly defend

Separation of Powers

Initially, the Constitution’s first way to prevent majority rule is the tripartite division of power in the national government. This is also known as separation of power. The national government is split into three powers or branches. The Constitution lists these branches as the legislative branch, the executive branch, and the judicial branch. Each branch has its own certain powers. The framers separated these powered because they did not want any one branch of government to become too powerful.

The legislature’s chief purpose or main power is to make the laws. Being the biggest branch, the legislative branch is split into two houses to keep it from becoming too powerful. The executive branch executes the law and is made up of the President, Vice-President, and the United States Departments. The judicial branch contains all the federal courts and the Supreme Court. Its main job is to interpret the laws and explain what they

Checks and Balances

Secondly, the separation of power provides a system of shared powers or checks and balances. By that I mean, that each branch has the power to limit or check the other two. The Constitution gave the most checks to Congress or the legislature. They did this because the framers did not want the president to gain enough power to become a tyrant.

A few legislative checks include; the ability to impeach the president or judges, override a presidential veto, pass laws to overthrow supreme court decisions, and propose amendments to the Constitution. The executive had far fewer checks due to the fear of a tyrannical leader. In turn, the President can veto laws, call congress into session, and pardon people evicted by the courts. The last branch, the judiciary, was given the least amount of checks. The judiciary checks consist of the capacity to declare laws made by congress or executive acts unconstitutional and the right to proceed over impeachment