assignment, Writer’s Choice

Instructions For this assignment, you will prepare an essay in which you will reflect upon the material you have studied in this unit. Make sure that your paper answers the following questions:  What is the structure of the federal bureaucracy? In your opinion, should the federal bureaucracy be considered, as it is by some, as the “real government”? Why, or why not?  What is the structure and role of the judiciary system? Give at least one example of how the judicial system can curb the power of the bureaucracy and one example each of how it can curb the power of the executive and legislative branches.  What is the iron triangle, and how does it affect the creation of government policy?  What has this unit taught you about the inner workings of the federal government? Your paper must be at least three pages in length, be in APA format, be double-spaced, and typed in 12point Times New Roman font. You must use at least three academic references, one of which must come from the CSU Online Library, for the development of your paper. Make sure that all sources are cited and referenced using APA guidelines.
Unit Lesson The term bureaucracy refers to the hierarchical system of government and its administration. Most of us associate a bureaucracy with inefficiency, inaction, and piles of paperwork, often referred to as red tape. Interestingly, the term red tape was derived from the actual red tape used in Great Britain and the colonies to bundle legal and official documents. Today, the proverbial red tape represents to most Americans the challenges associated with navigating governmental procedures and processes. In the United States, the bureaucracy is comprised of three major administrative agencies, the Executive Office of the President, the 15 cabinet departments, and the independent agencies. As discussed previously, the executive office and cabinet bear the brunt of the responsibility for governing the country. Indeed, the main purpose of the federal bureaucracy is to execute the policy decisions of the president and Congress. The independent agencies operate beyond the powers and scope of the cabinet and include regulatory commissions such as the Federal Communications Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission, government corporations such as the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and independent executive agencies (Farshtey, n.d.-b). Among the more noteworthy of the independent agencies are the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
Most people try to avoid any interaction or encounters with the federal government. Most government agencies prefer to remain off the public’s radar and only gain attention when something goes horribly wrong. One example was the situation involving Hurricane Katrina and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 2005. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the devastation along the Gulf Coast of Mississippi and Louisiana led to an extreme example of the type of media coverage federal agencies wish to avoid. FEMA should have stepped in to guide the federal response and provide assistance to those areas affected by the storm because of the declared state of emergency. FEMA, however, failed to do so for several days, leaving thousands of people stranded with no resources. Kathleen Blanco, governor of Louisiana at the time, said that an effective emergency response was blocked by government bureaucracy and too much red tape (Shoup, 2005). A review of the response, or the lack thereof, revealed that FEMA had possibly placed too much emphasis on training and response to terrorism, and that caused a breakdown in communication and lack of leadership (Shoup, 2005). Ultimately, the head of FEMA resigned only weeks after Katrina (“FEMA Director Brown Resigns,” 2005). Memorial wall in the lobby of the CIA Original Headquarters Building, Langley, Virginia (Central Intelligence Agency, n. d.) FEMA is an independent agency that handle disasters like Hurricane Katrina. (Winer, 2005)
PS 1010, American Government 3 UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title The red tape of a bureaucracy may serve as the focal point for criticism, but a country as large as the United States needs a bureaucracy to effectively manage its issues even if the bureaucracy itself creates problems. In the beginning, the federal government was small and in touch with the needs of the people because those involved with the government split time between taking care of local matters and taking care of issues facing the federal government. By the end of the 1800s, politicians began to spend more and more time away from home, taking care of the business of the government, and the federal bureaucracy began to grow. One of the first agencies created was the Department of Agriculture in 1889, which focused on research and commodity production and prices (“Department of Agriculture,” 2003). From there, agencies grew slowly until the 1930s and Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal programs.
The government saw another growth in the 1960’s with Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society (Independence Hall Association, n.d.-a). All agencies live or die by their budgets. Without money, no agency program can exist, and only Congress has the mandate to tax and spend. As a result, the budget process is a long, arduous task involving multiple departments, agencies, and entities. The entire process takes one and a half years. The budget process both begins and ends in February when the president submits a detailed budget request for the fiscal year beginning October 1 (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 2016). Though the budget is submitted in January or February for Congress to begin deliberations, discussions actually begin the prior spring when the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the president consult on agency needs. Each agency is given a spending ceiling that it cannot exceed (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 2017). Agencies work through the summer and submit their budget requests to the OMB for review and finalizing in September. The president submits the budget proposal to Congress in January, and it gets divided and sent to committee. By April 15, Congress should adopt a budget resolution and by September should have completed work on appropriations bills in time for the president to sign or veto it for the fiscal year beginning on October 1st. If all does not go well, and a budget is not passed, as has been the case in recent years, Congress must pass temporary funding measures in order to maintain government operations (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 2017). Despite a lack of a budget or continuing resolution, the president, with help from the treasury secretary, can keep vital federal services and functions operating for some time. While bureaucracy is constrained by the budget, it gains power from the broad discretion it is afforded in decisions regarding the implementation of policy. Members gain power for their agencies and, in turn, play politics to protect their programs and power. Clientele groups, groups who benefit directly from an agency’s programs, are more than willing to lobby on behalf of the agency during program or funding reviews. The budget process is far from simple and by its very nature demands oversight. The president, Congress, and the court system assume most accountability for bureaucratic agencies. The judiciary, or the federal court system, wields considerable power within the bureaucracy of the federal government with a primary role of ruling on the laws passed by Congress. Judicial review, the ability of the court to review acts of other branches of government and the states, is considered to be one of the judiciary’s greatest powers. In Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court first declared that a court can state that an act of Congress is unconstitutional (History.com Editors, n.d.). This landmark decision established that the Supreme Court has the ability to ensure that other branches of the government adhere to the Constitution of the United States (Legal Information Institute, n.d.).
PS 1010, American Government 4 UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title The federal judicial system consists of constitutional and legislative courts. The constitutional courts are the federal courts created by Congress under Article III of the Constitution (Farshtey, n.d.-a). Article III is the shortest of the articles on the branches of government. When issuing rulings, the judiciary has considerable discretion and is a political as well as legal institution. While the Constitution provides for the Supreme Court, it gives Congress the power to create all lower federal courts. The president nominates and appoints all federal judges, but they must be confirmed by the Senate. There are no formal qualifications, and they serve “during good behavior.” This essentially means that the justices serve until death or until they voluntarily retire (Farshtey, n.d.-a). In extreme cases, they can be removed through the impeachment process. The court system structure consists of the Supreme Court with 94 subordinate district courts and 13 courts of appeals. Each state decides the structure of its own courts and how judges will be selected; 95% of all legal cases are decided in state and local courts (Justice at Stake, 2017). The Supreme Court is the highest court in the United States. Congress sets the number of justices on the court at one chief justice and eight associate justices for a maximum number of nine. The chief justice’s vote on a case carries the same legal weight as the vote of each associate judge. The Supreme Court can hear a case through original jurisdiction, that is, it is able to be the first court to hear a case, or appellate jurisdiction, which means that it reviews cases that have been tried in lower courts. In the judicial system, there are two guiding philosophies, judicial activism and judicial restraint. Judicial activism, also known as judicial intervention, holds that the court should interpret the text of the Constitution and assume the role of national policymaker. Judicial restraint holds that the court should limit its power by not striking down laws unless they are obviously unconstitutional (Farshtey, n.d.-a). The Supreme Court only accepts about 100 cases a year and is in session from the first Monday in October until June or July. It uses its cases to set precedent for all lower courts to follow. Four of the justices must agree to hear a case before a writ of certiorari—a demand to the lower court to deliver its records on the case—is requested. During the hearing, both sides present oral arguments lasting no more than 30 minutes each, and each side submits a written brief containing the full argument. Once this is completed, the justices gather to discuss the case and vote. Once a case is decided, an opinion is
written. The vote on the case is not considered final until the opinion explaining the legal basis for the decision is written. The three main sources of law are the Constitution, legislative statutes, and legal precedents. The court system cannot issue a decision except in response to a case presented to it, and it must stay within the facts of the case. While the courts are powerful in their ability to knock down laws passed by legislation, they, too, are bound by the law and must rule within it. With all of these moving parts, it is easy to see how bureaucracy and red tape have become synonymous. Do these entities work independently? Are they impartial? Compounding these concerns is the concept of the iron triangle. The iron triangle refers to the theory that three primary entities influence and dictate what happens in government: interest groups, members of Congressional committees, and agency bureaucrats. These groups rely on one another to provide the other’s needs. This mutual dependency results from one or more of the others within the triangle providing instrumental services, information, or policy that is necessary to the others. Ultimately, this speculation reinforces the fact that there are multiple factors at play with multiple players doing all they can to try and ensure their programs or issues wind their way successfully though the system. Federal court structure (Independence Hall Association, n.d.-b)
PS 1010, American Government 5 UNIT x STUDY GUIDE Title References Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. (2017). Policy basics: Introduction to the federal budget process. Retrieved from http://www.cbpp.org/research/policy-basics-introduction-to-the-federal-budget-process Central Intelligence Agency. (n.d.). CIA OHB lobby memorial wall [Photograph]. Retrieved from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CIA_OHB_Lobby_Memorial_Wall.jpg
Department of Agriculture. (2003). In Encyclopedia.com. Retrieved from http://www.encyclopedia.com/socialsciences-and-law/political-science-and-government/usgovernment/united-states-department Farshtey, K. (n.d.-a). The bureaucracy and the judiciary. Retrieved from http://mrfarshtey.net/apgov_review/bureaucracy-judiciary.pdf Farshtey, K. (n.d.-b). Chapter 15: The bureaucracy; Section 1: The federal bureaucracy. Retrieved from http://mrfarshtey.net/gov_outlines/Mag_Chp15_Outline.pdf FEMA director Brown resigns. (2005, September 12). Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/09/12/brown.resigns/ History.com Editors. (n.d.). Marbury v. Madison. Retrieved from http://www.history.com/topics/marbury-vmadison Independence Hall Association. (n.d.-a). 56e. Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society.” Retrieved from http://www.ushistory.org/us/56e.asp Independence Hall Association. (n.d.-b). The federal court structure [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.ushistory.org/gov/9b.asp Justice at Stake. (2017). America’s courts: A primer. Retrieved from http://www.justiceatstake.org/resources/americas-courts-a-primer/ Legal Information Institute. (n.d.). Judicial review. Retrieved from https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/judicial_review Shoup, A. (2005, September 9). FEMA faces intense scrutiny. Retrieved from http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/government_programs-july-dec05-fema_09-09/
Winer, D. (2005). FEMA help desk [Image]. Retrieved from https://www.flickr.com/photos/scriptingnews/73605378/

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