02-18-2021, 11:45 AM
Forgive me if I mansplain here but as a non-American I'm not sure how much you know about Congress, our legislative body.
For #2, Congress has a House of Representatives and a Senate. The biggest difference between the two is that in the House, the number of representatives (congressperson) each state has is determined by the state's population. So Mississippi has 4 representatives in the House. Texas, which is much much larger and has WAY more people in it has 36 representatives!
In the Senate, each state has two Senators. Period. Doesn't matter how much population each state has, they all have the same amount of Senators.
In the Senate, arguably all states have equal voting power/influence in general. In the House, Texas has WAY more voting power than Mississippi. So the balance of power of each state in the Senate is a lot different than it is in the House. The amount of power an individual Senator has is a lot larger than an individual Representative/Congressperson. 1/100th of a share of power is a lot more than 1/435th of a share of power. Of course that's on paper.
In real life they can form partnerships and make deals and build a caucus or a coalition of people who are all passionate about the same issue and sort of unite for a larger share of power.
So you could do a paper comparing how power is split up differently in the Senate than it is in the House. I'd have to think more on academic sources for it.
For #3, we basically have had the same two parties for about 200 years now. The Democratic Party and the Republican Party. They were originally a single party called the Democratic Republicans. Their opposition party well over 200 years ago were called the Federalists. Once the Federalists collapsed, people in the Democratic Republican Party did not have a common "enemy" to be united against and eventually in-fighting led to a split in 1824. They've been two parties since and have sort of switched values over the years. It used to be the Republican Party was the more progressive party championing human rights and big expansion of government whereas the Democratic Party was the staunch traditionalist party that really resisted change and favored less government. Between the late 1860s and early 1900s they gradually switched to the opposite stance. From the 1930s to present day, Republicans have been the party of generally less government programs (with some exceptions like expanding national security agencies and more military), and resistant to progressive social change. Democrats have generally favored more government programs and push more progressive social policies.
So a paper on political parties could talk about why they completely flipped their values, or "the switch" as it is sometimes called informally. Or you could do a paper on why they went from a single party to splitting into two parties in the 1800s.
Hope this is helpful.
For #2, Congress has a House of Representatives and a Senate. The biggest difference between the two is that in the House, the number of representatives (congressperson) each state has is determined by the state's population. So Mississippi has 4 representatives in the House. Texas, which is much much larger and has WAY more people in it has 36 representatives!
In the Senate, each state has two Senators. Period. Doesn't matter how much population each state has, they all have the same amount of Senators.
In the Senate, arguably all states have equal voting power/influence in general. In the House, Texas has WAY more voting power than Mississippi. So the balance of power of each state in the Senate is a lot different than it is in the House. The amount of power an individual Senator has is a lot larger than an individual Representative/Congressperson. 1/100th of a share of power is a lot more than 1/435th of a share of power. Of course that's on paper.
In real life they can form partnerships and make deals and build a caucus or a coalition of people who are all passionate about the same issue and sort of unite for a larger share of power.
So you could do a paper comparing how power is split up differently in the Senate than it is in the House. I'd have to think more on academic sources for it.
For #3, we basically have had the same two parties for about 200 years now. The Democratic Party and the Republican Party. They were originally a single party called the Democratic Republicans. Their opposition party well over 200 years ago were called the Federalists. Once the Federalists collapsed, people in the Democratic Republican Party did not have a common "enemy" to be united against and eventually in-fighting led to a split in 1824. They've been two parties since and have sort of switched values over the years. It used to be the Republican Party was the more progressive party championing human rights and big expansion of government whereas the Democratic Party was the staunch traditionalist party that really resisted change and favored less government. Between the late 1860s and early 1900s they gradually switched to the opposite stance. From the 1930s to present day, Republicans have been the party of generally less government programs (with some exceptions like expanding national security agencies and more military), and resistant to progressive social change. Democrats have generally favored more government programs and push more progressive social policies.
So a paper on political parties could talk about why they completely flipped their values, or "the switch" as it is sometimes called informally. Or you could do a paper on why they went from a single party to splitting into two parties in the 1800s.
Hope this is helpful.
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