Separation of Powers in the United States

[S'task]

The main point of contention is whether the GOP got them aboard through racism, or because the GOP's desire to restrain "big government" liberalism for business reasons meshed with the states' rights ideology of the South, even if it was for different reasons.

IF you look at the state level voting pattern going back well into the 1920s. With some of the upper south states beginning to vote for a Republican as early as 1920 (Tennessee voting for Harding), 1924 (Kentucky voting for Coolidge), and then in 1928 saw the "solid south" be utterly divided with Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Texas, and Florida all going to Hoover. FDR's multiple victories were massive throughout the country and honestly represented a bit of a fluke in the voting patterns of many States he was so popular, a fact which helped carry Truman in the 1948 election. In the 1952 election the pattern of the outer south breaking for the Republican over the Democrat continue, with Eisenhower winning Virginia, Tennessee, Texas, and Florida, and making even further inroad in 1956 adding Kentucky and Louisiana to his list of southern states. In the 1960 election, which the Democrat, JFK won, you saw Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Florida all go for Nixon.

The 1964 election was another fluke election and this is the usual point people like to pretend was where the "southern strategy" originated as some shift, which Nixon supposedly used in the 1968 election to make inroads in the south... however, in '68 Nixon only added South Carolina onto that list of states. He even lost Texas which had been swinging towards Republicans in other elections. Nixon's next election in 1972 can't really be indicative of any major trends anymore than FDR's previous ones or Reagan's 1984 elections can be, he was so popular that he won EVERYTHING BUT MASSACHUSETTS.

But in the 1978 election you saw most of the South revert to the Democrats for the last time, with only Virginia going for the Republicans. The 1980 election is the true tidewater mark for the shift of the south to the Republicans with Reagan sweeping the south save for Carter's home state of Georgia. As mentioned earlier, the 1984 election is entirely uninformative due to well... Reagan winning everything but Minnesota, his opponent's home state.

The entire "southern strategy" story is very convenient for the Democrats as it let's them pretend the Republicans are the racist "bad guys" and they are clean, but it really doesn't align well with the actual historic voting trends. The deep south only ended up switching sides firmly by 2000, as multiple southern states went for Clinton in 92 and 96. Further the upper and outer south had begun to be in play as early as 1920, long before desegregation became a major issue, rather there was something in Republican national politics that was drawing southern voters regardless of their position on segregation (which, it should be noted, the Republican party always opposed).

There's a much stronger correlation to a different trend: growth of the middle class. As a state developed a larger and healthier middle class, the state began to trend more Republican. This is in part why the upper and outer south began the shift earlier than the deep south, as their economies recovered from the legacy of slavery and the civil war earlier as they were less dependent on the plantation economy (and agriculture) than the deep south was (the upper south developing more mining and manufacture and Texas developing their oil reserves). This enabled a more robust middle class, and thus began the shift of those states from the Democrats to the Republicans, as the Republicans throughout the 20th century can strongly be argued to be the party more focused on "middle class" issues.

 

[Scottty]

Separation of powers gets muddled when one branch of government oversteps its proper bounds, and the other branches don't call them on it.

Britain, oddly enough, is a showcase on one branch basically taking all the power for itself (and partially because it also is the bureaucracy) with the House of Commons literally defanging the House of Lords and the House of Windsor -the only two checks on the House of Commons- for decades.

Which raises the question - how were they able to do that?
Either because the monarchy and the lords chose to let them, or because they already had all the power.

Now, a serious weakness in any "separation of powers" system shows up when any part of that system gets to decide for itself what it is or isn't allowed to do.
In the USA, the Judiciary seem to be in that position - if the Constitution means whatever the judges say it does, then they can give themselves any powers they like. At least until the Military shows up at the door and tells them Nope.

 

[Big Steve]

Which raises the question - how were they able to do that?
Either because the monarchy and the lords chose to let them, or because they already had all the power.

A very long, as in centuries-long process.

Essentially, the Glorious Revolution and proceedings during the 18th Century saw the British monarchy reduced in real power, leaving Parliament in effective control. The House of Commons and House of Lords had some checks on each other.

Then fast forward to the beginning of the 20th Century. Campbell-Bannerman's Liberals win the General Election in 1905 after the "Unionist" party (Conservatives plus right-leaning Unionist Liberals opposed to Home Rule) split over Joseph Chamberlain's "Imperial Preference" initiative that would have ended British free trade in favor of a protectionist arrangement that granted favoritism to the Dominions and other parts of the Empire. Campbell-Bannerman's new government starts passing some social reformist laws, including new taxation, that the British elite don't like (especially since most of the HoL was made up of Conservative members), and they start rejecting those laws.

Now in some cases this was part of the system, but in Britain's unwritten constitution there was a long practice: the House of Lords can block all sorts of legislation, but they weren't supposed to touch budget bills.

Yeah, you can guess what they started doing.

This came to a head with David Lloyd-George's famous "People's Budget" that implemented all sorts of reforms, such as old age pensions, unemployment IIRC, and a host of taxes to fund it all. Asquith (this was, IIRC, after Campbell-Bannerman was gone) informed the House of Lords this was a budget bill, and their response was basically "fuck you commoner wanker, you're taxing our stuff now!" and they rejected the bill. This caused something of a constitutional crisis, and Asquith took it to the country in a new election. The Unionist/Conservatives even pledged to pass the bill if they lost.

Well, they lost... and screwed themselves with their successes. They did regain seats, you see, but not enough to become a majority. All they ended up doing is forcing Asquith to go to the Irish Nationalist MPs, and their price was Home Rule, which the Lords would never agree to, so Asquith would have to neuter them. The result was a law that basically ruined the Lords' ability to do more than demand a year's delay on legislation they didn't like. They understandably balked at passing it, so Asquith turned to the King to compel them: pass the law, or King Edward VII would add a mass of new Liberal peers to the Lords, swamping them with numbers sufficient to pass anything Asquith wanted (and doubling the size of said house). When Edward VII died from ill health, George V was brought in and reluctantly agreed to do the same thing. The Conservatives raged at Asquith as a regicide, accusing him of "killing the King" through his actions, but in the end the House of Lords acceded to the new law.

This was only the start, and further laws further altered and diluted the Lords. It was in the 1950s, IIRC, that a new law reorganized the House of Lords by restricting the number of hereditary peers to a small minority, with most members of the HoL to be life peers granted title by the monarch on recommendation of the PM. (For those who don't know, life peerages aren't inherited, they end with the death of the receiver).

 

[Scottty]

Sheesh. British politics is starting to sound like Ministry of Silly Walks all the way down.

 

[Doomsought]

Sheesh. British politics is starting to sound like Ministry of Silly Walks all the way down.

The City of London, not to be confused with London, is a semi-independent municipality which has special privileges simply because it has existed since before anyone remaining records.

 

[Emperor Tippy]

In the USA, the Judiciary seem to be in that position - if the Constitution means whatever the judges say it does, then they can give themselves any powers they like. At least until the Military shows up at the door and tells them Nope.

Nah.

The Judiciary has no mechanism of raising funds and their total military power is the Supreme Court Police (with a grand total of 145 sworn members). Nor can the judiciary originate a cause of action (excepting, perhaps, if the judiciary as a whole is the injured party).

Congress and the President also have a role in interpreting the Constitution (although it rarely comes up). In the US you also need to account for the state/federal separation of powers and how that plays into the federal level separation of powers.