Running Head: AMERICAN POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS: PROCESSES, FLAWS, AND REFORM

American Political Institutions: Processes, Flaws, and Reform

Anthony Peel

University of Michigan-Flint
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Introduction

The challenges that America and it’s citizens have had to face have drastically changed

since the Constitution was ratified in 1789. In the over 200 years, the country bloomed into the

world’s most powerful superpower in the wake of two world wars. Technology has changed the

entire globe- connecting humans everywhere and at the same time polarizing our ideals. These

changes in the human experience have created problems that the founding fathers never could

have imagined. We have political institutions and governments to solve the problems that our

people face but does the current American political institution and government stand up to the

controversies of our time? Do we need to tear it down and start from scratch?

Some would say that American democracy is doomed and we should start over. Ygelsias

(2015) argued that zero-sum conflicts are on the rise. The author stated that polarization around

principles instead of control has created deadlock in all of our institutions. On the other hand,

others have said that American democracy has withstood the test of time better than any other

comparable country. Edwards (2012) claims that American democracy has “weathered hard

times by doing exactly what our Founding Fathers hoped we would do: we have spoken up and

expressed our outrage.” Federalism, or power shared by both national and state governments,

and our representative democracy are touted by Meyerson (2016) as the true strengths of the

American political system.

However time has shown the answer to our questions. Congress is plagued with

partisanship, gerrymandering, and deadlock. The presidency has become a political party chief

who is expected to wield executive power to create change the office was not intended to. The

Judiciary branch has life term justices who are slow moving and, many would say, out of touch
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with the needs of the system it supports. The appointment of Justices to the Supreme Court has

become a circus. The American political system certainly does not stand up to modern

controversies- but the system is not something that we need to tear down and start completely

from scratch.

Congress

The House of Representatives and the Senate make up the legislative branch of the

American government. The 435 members in the House are apportioned based on the population

of the state. There are much less in the Senate, 100 with two per state. Together, the two sides

create and pass bills through a lengthy process of sponsorships, committees and vote whipping.

Representatives from the House have 2 year terms while Senators are in their position for six

years before they run for office again. The power of Congress has fluctuated throughout time

from centralized, with the power in the hands of a majority party or speaker, to decentralized,

where power is dispersed to individual members and committees, and somewhere in the middle.

Intending for Congress to be the most powerful branch of the three, the Founding Fathers

laid the foundation for what has historically been “the despised branch.” Unyielding ideology,

gerrymandering, and endless filibusters frustrated Indiana Senator Eban Bayh (2010) to such an

extent that he left his seat. He believed that it was not the people that were the problem in

Congress but the “institutional and cultural impediments to change that frustrate the intentions.”

Polarization of the institution is a direct reflection of American citizens’ polarization built around

principles, as stated in Ygelsias. In Republic 2.0, Sunstein (2007) states that one powerful reason

for this polarization is the increasing power the people have to choose what news they

experience. The ability to filter what news a person experiences tends to eliminate viewpoints
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they disagree with which creates an echochamber and a less informed population as a whole. In

Bayh’s reasons for why he stepped down from the Senate, the politician from Indiana left some

advice for improving Congress. The most important point to him was repairing the “chemistry”

among Senators, especially those in separate parties. The fractured relationships and

all-or-nothing approaches need to be fixed for the sake of the nation. The American Political

Science Association (1950) circulated ​Toward A More Responsible Two Party System​ which lists

extremism as just one danger of having stagnant two party system.

Individual politicians face problems getting and staying elected. This impediment is

highlighted by Fenno (1973) in “Home Style and Washington Career.” The author states that

there is “a natural tension between being a good representative and taking an interest in

government.” Sometimes Congress representatives have a difficult time finding the balance.

Many spend so much time getting themselves re-elected that getting the work done they were

elected to do is difficult. Mayhew (1974) states that “Congress must constantly engage in three

basic kinds of activities related to reelection: advertising, credit claiming, and position taking.”

Reforms for Congress

Koser (2017) argues that the process for fixing Congress does not rely on looking into the

past but changing the expectations for the future Congress men and women. In our attempt to

reform our system in the Class Constitutional Convention, Curtis Holt focused on addressing the

issue of Home Style and Washington Career by requiring Representatives from the House to live

and work in the states that elected them and Senators to live and work in Washington D.C. This

would help create a more balanced work life focused on doing the job they were elected to. I feel
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like we address one major part of the flaw with Congress but needed to do more to encourage

interaction between separate party candidates.

Presidency

The President of the United States was not meant to be the most powerful branch of the

government- and yet many see it as such. Nominated by a political party and voted into office by

the people of the United States who are represented by an Electoral College, the P.O.T.U.S.

serves a four year term in office. The President may only serve two terms in office. The

President’s powers, as laid out specifically in the Constitution, mainly deal with appointments,

budgets, treaties, and acting as Commander-in-Chief. Neustadt (1960) describes “presidential

power” as the President’s influence and views the president as mainly “an invaluable clerk.”

However, implied constitutional powers have risen over the years. The power of

recommendation, usually the initiation or suggestion of legislature the President sees fit.

Presidential persuasion rose during Theodore Roosevelt’s Bully Pulpit era. Executive orders and

actions have increased significantly more than the Founding Fathers intended.

Despite arguably having the least amount of power, the President has become thought of

as all-powerful and the epitome of public leadership. When something goes wrong, citizens

focus their frustrations and emotions on the White House. Orstein (2014) deflates the ideas about

the “all-powerful presidency.” The author states that the environment surrounding the president,

not necessarily the president’s persuasive powers, are what determines the success of the

administration. Each president must have a significant amount of support in order to enact their

agenda, most importantly Congress members on both sides of the aisle willing to work with

them.
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Additionally, The country has become “president-centric” and with the intense focus of

the presidency, as well as widely unrealistic promises from candidates, come high expectations

that usually not met as described by Greenblatt (2013). The troubles of Congress spill over into

the presidency. Divided government, polarized political parties, and low approval rates make the

president’s job difficult. Persuasion is easier when the president is popular and there is a large

majority of their fellow party members in Congress.

Presidential Reforms

Reforming the presidency would be a difficult and complex task. In our Class

Constitutional Convention, we limited the number of executive orders a president can give to

two a month pending judicial review. Also, Camden Forsberg, the author of the amendment,

required presidential candidates to go through “cultural-sensitivity training” before they can

serve in the White House. I believe that these changes would be for the betterment of the

Executive Branch.

Judiciary

The Judiciary branch of the American government was given the least amount of

direction from the Founding Fathers. Left vague, one of the first acts of Congress was to enact

the Judiciary Act of 1789 creating a three tier system consisting of district courts, which are the

most common, circuit courts and the Supreme Court. The act limited most jurisdiction to state

cases and left Congress to define the Supreme Court appellate jurisdiction. Marbury v. Madison

(1803) questioned the Judiciary Act of 1789, particularly whether the Supreme Court could

invalidate a law of Congress. The case decided that “it is emphatically the province and duty of
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the judicial department to say what the law is.” Marbury v. Madison created judicial review, or

the ability of the Supreme Court to determine a law as being unconstitutional review.

Today, the Supreme Court consists of nine justices who make up an important

policy-making institution which acts as an agent of the national government in interpreting,

applying and creating rules, as described by Wasserman (2015). The author also describes the

Judicial check for the Executive branch during the Watergate scandal of the Nixon

administration in which the Supreme Court restrained a President that was far out of line.

Justices of the nation’s most powerful court, appointed by the president and approved by

Congress, serve life terms. Former Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr described the

lengthy procedures that the court follows in the decision-making process which includes

deciding which cases should be reviewed, months or years of debate, changing of minds and

assigning of opinions.

The flaws of the Judiciary branch, particularly the Supreme Court, have become visible.

First and foremost, the system is slow. It is extraordinarily rare that a case goes directly to the

Supreme Court. The case needs to be of national importance- most are not. Many are decided in

the courts below or Justices do not feel they have the votes to get the result they wish. Once

chosen, as described by Brennan, Jr., the cases can last months or years before a decision is

made. Recently the length of time Supreme Court justices serve has been called into question.

The life-term creates extreme pressure on the President to choose someone who will be

appointed and when there is an issue or disagreement- as we saw with the Brett Kavanaugh

appointment- there is an ugly, public political debate. Finally, the Supreme Court is historically

not a diverse group. Mainly the court has consisted of white, Protestant males who attended Ivy
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League schools. The criticism here has become that the Judiciary institution has not and will not

adapt to the modern issues that the country faces if one group of the country is represented on the

court.

Judiciary Reforms

The biggest Judiciary reform that Gavino Kress solved in our Class Constitutional

Convention was the term limits for Supreme Court justices. He changed them from a life-time

serving to just six years. This would solve the main issues that life-terms create, including

lowering the pressure on the appointments because their will be more. The predictability of when

the Justices will leave will help the country be more prepared for change. However, I feel like

our Class Constitutional Convention goes too far. I would be a proponent of 10-15 year terms

with no more than one term. I agree the court needs to be modernized, however, the most

powerful court in the nation should also have greater consistency than the other branches of the

government.

Conclusion

The reforms necessary to fix our political institutions would not be easy to achieve.

Congress needs a revamped culture of bipartisanship to break up gridlock and relieve pressure on

the Presidency. Lowering expectations on the Executive branch will allow the president limit the

use of executive orders. The Supreme Court needs terms limits, which will lower the pressure on

presidential appointments. Each one of these reforms would face considerable scrutiny.

However, they would be worth the debate. The American political institutions have suffered at

the hands of time and are in need of reform.