I intended to post weekly updates about where we have been and where we are going in class at the beginning of the semester. It just took me a while to get on it.
This week, we finished a two week run looking at the principles with the US Constitution as originally written. All involved carving up power in some way, which of course makes actual governing difficult. The founder's concern - at that point in time - about the negative influence of democracy and the threats posed by ambitious leaders, along with the compromises necessary to get the document ratified by the states, explain why we are a republic, have a system of separated powers, are a federated system, and have a Bill of Rights.
What we do not yet know as of yet is what commitment existed to equality. That's not really true, we do know, there was no egalitarian content in the document at that point, and we would hardly recognize the governing system at that point as being democratic. But this process would begin immediately after ratification and pick up steam - and is still underway. We will look at this process soon enough, but next week I want to begin to look at the institutions established in the first three articles of the Constitution.
We will begin with the legislature and will look at its history, how it is designed in the Constitution, and how it has changed over time. My hope is that by this time next week, we have a strong understanding of why the institution looks the way it does, and why we can the type of behavior we see within it happens.
I'll start posting a handful of stories on activity in Congress, and when I do, try to put it in context. All of this will illustrate some type of content within the three sets of slides I want you to read next week. Here are some news sources that I'll likely pull material from:
- The Hill
- Roll Call
- NYT: Congress
- WP: Congress
If you've been following the blog, you'll note that I've already posted material on a variety of congressional topics and many have been tagged in order to make it easier to locate them. Here are a few that should help you search through the material.
- 113th Congress
- filibusters
- checks and balances
- Congress
- House of Representatives
- Senate
There's more, but looking through these should give you a good handle on where we are going next week.
