FEDERALISM: The Relationship Between STATES and FEDERAL Government [AP Gov Review, Unit 1 Topic 7]

hey there and welcome back to heimler's history we've been going through unit 1 of the ap government curriculum and in this video it's time to talk about federalism so if you're ready to get their brain cows milked well then let's get to it so in this video here's what we're trying to accomplish explain how societal needs affect the constitutional allocation of power between the national and state governments okay so the allegation of power between national and state governments and there is a word for that and i need to introduce you to it now the word for this sharing of power between state and national governments is federalism let's just pause here for a moment because this term federalism is an endless scourge to ap government students in all times and in all places when your exam or your teacher or whatever asks you about federalism you are going to be tempted oh so tempted to believe that this is referring to the power of the federal government i wouldn't blame you because that's what the word sounds like and just like jesus himself prayed for peter that he might not fall into the temptation of the devil i too pray that you would not fall into the temptation of believing such falsehoods federalism is not about federal power federalism describes the sharing of power between national government and state government that's it don't get confused now why am i laboring over this small detail it's because federalism is a very significant concept in this course and if you don't understand what it's talking about well you burn now in order to understand the sharing of power i need to introduce you to three terms which describe the relationship between state and national government power first is exclusive powers which are powers delegated by the constitution to the federal government alone for example only the federal congress can declare war for the nation and no state can do that because that would be kind of awkward hey guys minnesota here just wanted to let you guys know that we just declared war with canada so can't happen only the national government can declare war then there are the reserved powers and those are all the powers kept by the states now the justification for reserved powers comes in the 10th amendment to the constitution which reads the powers not delegated to the united states by the constitution nor prohibited by it to the states are reserved to the states respectively or to the people so if a power is not explicitly given to the federal government and not prohibited to the states then that power belongs to the states and over time that's included things like policing in hospitals and education and then there are concurrent powers which both national and state governments share taxation is an example of concurrent powers and if you have a job where you get a paycheck you may have noticed that taxes are withheld both for the federal government and your state government okay so now that you understand what federalism is we need to talk about how the sharing of that power shifts between the national government and the state government and how the needs of society affect how that balance is struck over time because it is not always the same now over the course of the last century one of the most significant ways federalism has been manifested is through something called fiscal federalism or federalism via dollars and let me explain so congress can establish national standards and then direct funds to states that comply with those standards and then withhold funding from those who do not and that happens in many ways through grants the first kind of grant that illustrates fiscal federalism is called a categorical grant these grants give federal money to the states as long as they comply with specific federal standards in other words if states accept that money there are strings attached and the state must use that money for the purpose and in the way that is stipulated by the federal government for example the first big step by the federal government into education was during the administration of lyndon b johnson and remember traditionally education is the domain of the state first came the civil rights act of 1964 which among other things prohibited federal funds from being distributed to segregated schools thus if schools wanted federal money which many of them desperately needed they would have to comply with federal school integration laws then came the elementary and secondary education act of 1965 which increased the federal government's control over public education by stipulating further requirements to be met if a school is going to receive federal dollars so categorical grants were very much used to bring states into line with the federal education and civil rights agenda now as you can imagine although many states gobbled up the money from these categorical grants they weren't too happy with the growing power of the federal government so in 1966 the first block grant was created which was a move that returned some of the power back to the states this kind of grant is like a categorical grant money given to the states by the federal government but in this case there are far fewer strings attached in the case of block grants the federal government gives money to be spent in a broad category but the states determine exactly how that money is to be spent within those boundaries so for example congress has established a community developed block grant and gives that money to the states for the purpose of you know community development but the states can decide exactly what kind of community development they want to do with that money they can build sewage plants or redevelop abandoned homes or whatever the point is states like block grants a lot more than categorical grants because they have a lot more decision-making power when it comes to spending the money okay now another way fiscal federalism is played out is through mandates mandates require states to follow federal directives but in a lot of cases the state's budget isn't nearly big enough to pay for such implementation so in this case the federal government gives money toward the carrying out of these mandates for example when the clean air act was passed it created national environmental standards so it put limits on the amount of carbon dioxide emissions that certain entities could emit and in order to comply with those standards the states needed some boom boom to make it happen so the federal government set the standards and because of the supremacy clause in the constitution states were required to comply and the feds gave money to the states in order to help them fall in line with the national standard now there is such a thing as an unfunded mandate and the states hate that worst of all and it's exactly what it sounds like the federal government sets the mandate and then provides no funds to help states comply a good example of an unfunded mandate is the no child left behind act of 2001. it required states that received federal funding for education to give standardized tests to students and if those students were not improving year over year then the law said that the schools must either hire or fire teachers or otherwise work to improve student scores on these tests but and here's the kicker it was the schools who had to pay for their improvement program so to put it mildly this was not popular among the states however starting in the 1980s with ronald reagan's devolution revolution in which power was progressively returned to the states unfunded mandates became even more rare and since that time congress has majored on block grants to give states more discretion on how to spend federal dollars and then it was in 1995 that president clinton signed the unfunded mandates reform act which severely curtailed the federal government's ability to issue unfunded mandate so the point of all this is simple federalism is the sharing of power between state and national governments and over time depending on the issues of the day that sharing of power has shifted back and forth between states and the federal government okay that's what you need to know about unit one topic seven of the ap government curriculum i wouldn't call it a mandate but if you want help getting an a in your class and a five on your exam in may then click right here and grab my review packet if you want me to keep making these videos for you then you can let me know that by subscribing heimler out

Channel: Heimler's History

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Length: 6min 40sec (400 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 24 2021