Essay On California Government

The article “The Fourth Branch of Government”, Thomas Helgerman discusses how direct democracy plays an important role in state governments. He presents the information in the form of an essay in which he explains his argument and analysis as a student of math and economics as well as a member a parliamentary debate team. The essay will review Helgerman’s analysis and arguments of direct democracy and how it leads to irresponsible legislation that is not subject to inspection of the US political process. In the article, Helgerman explains how direct democracy came to be used in state government and used the state of California as an example.

to 1988 (with the exception of the 1964 presidential election in which Democratic candidate Lyndon B. Johnson won the state of California). Furthermore, as recently as 1988, the last time Californians voted for a Republican was in 1988 when they voted for H.W. Bush for president and Republican Pete Wilson for U.S. Senate but that was the end of it. California has not voted for a Republican for the presidency or for the Senate since that year.

Political machines and the reformers who rallied against them had incredible influence in urban politics in the 19th and early 20th century. Each, however, has been labeled as corrupt monopolies and are seen as selfish towards their own goals. While there are tactics that worked to help cities grow stronger, the value of equal voting for all citizens was compromised in each regime’s quest for power.

The initiative process is a great example of direct democracy. In California, for the ballot initiative process, citizens draw up

This week’s topic focused on the executive branch of California, more importantly, we discussed how California executive branch is different from the federal government’s executive branch because California has a “plural executive”. A “plural executive” is when the power of the executive branch just doesn’t go to one person it is split between elected individuals that are within the branch (CA Executive Branch.1:05-1:26). This differs from how the executive branch on the federal level because the president gets to pick who is in the executive branch with him/her. While the “plural executive” give more power to the people and allows us to choose who we would like to see with tour state’s executive branch. This can be both a positive and negative because

The legislative framework of a country refers to the process of creating, utilization, and governing of laws. In the United States, the government of each of the 50 states is structured in accordance with their respective constitution and although not required, each are modeled after the federal government, consisting of the three branches: Executive, Legislative, and Judicial. Each of the state governments are also organized as a presidential system where the governor is the head of the state. Due to each state having their own governor as their representative, their legislative framework will vary with each state. For this paper, I will be comparing the legislative framework of Florida with the state of California.

Although vastly different in their characteristics and motives, the Populist and Progressive era was chiefly caused by the lack of control among the masses and the government. With power revolving around large corporational bosses, individuals of this era sought to enact alterations in order to return order and strength to the people by attempting to limit the authority of corruption. With Progressivism focusing on the purification of American politics, social reforms, such as Women’s Suffrage and prohibition, and the implementation of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth amendments were the main results of the Progressive era. For followers of the Progressive era, eliminating the political corruption of the United States government would only be achieved following the amelioration of their social standards and the unity of the masses. On the other hand, Populists focused their efforts on the repairment of America’s economy. Consisting of frustrated farmers who felt that their agrarian society was threatened by the rise of industrialism. With political machines relying on industries, such as steel and railroads, for their economic needs, the American economy eventually lost the focus on farmers. In order to regain the respect and power previously held, the Populist party called for alterations including an increase in currency and a revenue tariff. Ultimately, Populism and Progressivism acted as a direct representation of the anger and desperation felt by Americans towards those involved in the corruption that shaped America’s

From 1881-1920 the progressive movement was inspired by the populists movement years later. They moved to improve living conditions by using three methods. These methods are to help regulate business, make government more responsible, and social changes. Their main goals were to change the industrialization and urbanization of cities. They found that fundamental change is the perceived function of the federal government. In order to enforce and create these goals they had economic, social, and political reforms to show the importance of this movement and the extension of reformers’ ideas and their programs from 1880-1920.

The book, California Politics and Government: A practical Approach, helps students understand the government and politics. It describes the principles used in the state government and the relevance of these to the nowadays students and the future ones. The book has clear examples and explanations that help the students understand the California politics. It includes budgetary politics and policies, California law and court cases, government regulations, policymaking and elections in terms of political parties and interest groups. It addresses the economic, educational, immigration and social issues and theireffecton the politics. Students are able to familiarize with the public policy coverage; hence, make a connection between the effects and practical applications of legislation and the government.

Society’s individuals show their political resources when they perceive the specific issues of their day and adjust their mutual political standards to take care of those issues. The Progressives hence perceived a problem in American federalism where their ancestors believed there wasn’t any. In the Progressives' determination, American federalism must be revamped to clear a path for two new features of the rising American political consciousness. To begin with, citizens were slowly but discernibly exchanging their political fidelities from the local states to the federal

In 2008 California was faced with a huge budget crisis and governing crisis as the state governing was not nearly as efficient enough to respond to changes and problems that were happening in the state. This was due to a lot of poor laws that related to taxation and to the way our state government worked. There is also unique differences with California than other states, like our direct democracy system, and many of our laws are compromises that don’t work well between liberal and conservative ideologies. Our politicians are also not well motivated to serve the people and would rather server their own special interests that benefit their own career. While there are still a lot of problems that California needs to deal with, we did make adjustments

In 2009, Jerry Roberts and Phil Troustine wrote an article for the Los Angeles Times, titled, “How California Became Ungovernable.” The authors of this article stated six main factors, or rules, that have greatly contributed to California’s lack of governability. Governability is enabled by rules that allow for the ability to pay for governmental expenditures and get political decisions made in a timely manner. Many of the rules that Roberts and Troustine have mentioned in their article have been revised to ultimately make California become more governable. In this essay, I will review what rule changes have taken effect since this article was written, and also state my opinion on if these changes have made California more governable.

The initiative process is a system designed to put lawmaking power in the hands of the people. The initiative allows voters often in an organized group to collect signatures to put a new law or a change to the state constitution before voters on the ballot. I feel the initiative process was designed to make politicians more responsive to voter needs. Some believe that the initiative is an important tool for good government and that the initiative process, while sometimes weak, is still effective. Others worry that the initiative process often no longer works the way it was designed, and that special interests have taken over the very process meant to limit their power.

     Progressives are activists in a political reform movement known as progressivism, which is a broadly based reform movement that reached its height early in the 20th cent. In the decades following the Civil War, rapid industrialization transformed the United States. A national rail system was completed, agriculture was mechanized, the factory system spread, and cities grew rapidly in size and number all because of this newfound movement. The progressive movement arose as a response to the vast changes brought by industrialization. Progressives were often frustrated, however, because state legislatures, controlled by railroads and large corporations, obstructed the municipal struggle for their rule. Throughout all of the reform movements, progressives began to play a major role in politics and the creation of a new political party known as the

The US national government and California state governments each have their fair similarities and differences. For instance, they are very similar involving the president and governor. As the United States of America has a president, California has their own governor as well. Even though they are not entitled to the same exact responsibilities, they each have a huge importance to their people. The citizens of the United States look up to the president, as the residents of California look up to their governor. The governor is essentially seen as the “state’s symbolic leader” whereas the president is seen as the “nation’s symbolic leader” (Spitzer, 2015, p. 93). A huge advantage that California carries is that the state constitution is typically known for creating a stronger governor than in other states. In some cases, even, the governor can be just a strong as the president. As they are both important members in congress, they each have the ability of making executive and judicial branch appointments. In addition to this similarity between the national and state government, they are also alike in having to do with women’s level of involvement in the legislature. The amount of females working in the legislature is not as common than it is for males. Unfortunately, men have a huge advantage over women in this aspect of the government. On the other hand, there has actually been a significant amount growth of women working in the state legislature since 1975. Even though it has