Civics Primer

I am amazed by how little people in the United States understand how Governemnt works when it comes to the three Branches of Governemnt. A democracy can not function with a ill-informed population.



That is what we have. In 2006 a Zogby poll was taken and "sixty-one percent of people could not name any justices"(1) of the Supreme Court. Also in another Zogby Poll "only 42%(of US respondants) could name the 3 branches of the United States government: executive, legislative and judicial." After reading all the posts on the FISA dust up, it is not hard to believe.



But just naming the three branches of Governemnt is not really enough though. One really needs to understand what the roles of each branch are and how they work together, even in opposition, to make government work.



First, the Constitution sets up the rules for how Government is constituted. It says who gets to do what. To get the votes of enough states to ratify the Constitution, a set of ammendments, known as the Bill of Rights, was attached because people in 1789 feared abuse of Gevernemnt.







(1)http://www.elsblog.org/the_empirical_legal_studi/2006/08/the_polls_name_.html