Constitutional roots of the fragmented state
Exploring how the US constitution made the fragmented state possible; and the constitutional ambiguity and flexibility can be (and has been) exploited for the benefits of the US government.
Before investigating the reputation of America as a “fragmented state”, let’s remind ourselves that the opposites of fragmentation are unity and cohesion. America is a country of immigrants with different races, genders, sexualities, and religions. The population composed of groups of diverse interests and identities end up having different political stances, which is why American people are always debating politics. Though people agree on basic principles such as liberty, equality, and self-rule, they debate about negative or positive liberty, freedom at the cost of equality or vice versa, and self-rule via democracy or republic. The United States is not a homogenous society, but it is united by an effective and powerful central government and a sense of solidarity. To unite and protect this population with diverse identities and divergent interests, the constitutional framers designed the America political system that could include people’s paradoxical ideas by framing a constitution that features checks and balances, flexibility, and ambiguity.
The Constitution framed a strong and prosperous state with powers balanced and checked through the separation of institutions. The constitutional framers learned from their experiences of confederation and of British colonization that a government either too powerful or too feeble could not perfectly protect people’s rights. The government needs to be strong enough to protect citizens’ rights from democratic chaos. However, checks and balances need to be installed within the government branches to prevent power concentration in any branch. Hence a powerful but not harmful government could effectively carry out the functions without stripping people of their rights and freedoms. Thus, the framers incorporated indirect election and separation of powers into the Constitution. Separation of legislative, executive, and judicial branches set out to avoid tyranny. Indirect elections via the Electoral College, Senate, and the House of Representatives protect the system from democratic chaos by keeping people “at arm’s length from their government”. The separation of powers and institutional checks and balances protect the representation of a diverse population.
The constitutional framers have defined the duties of every governmental branch but have left some ambiguity when defining the limits of their power. The Necessary and Proper Clause gives Congress a creative and flexible use of their legislative power while leaving the boundary of the congressional authority for scholars to debate. Article 2, “The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States,” expands the presidential executive power without clarifying how far the power extends. Article 3 extends the Supreme Court’s judicial power to all cases arising under this Constitution. Besides the ambiguity within constitutional boundaries of legislative, executive, and judicial powers, the evolving definition of federalism also renders the division of state and national power ambiguous. The complexity and ambiguity within the Constitution have left space for interpretation and debates, which ensures the flexibility and sustainability of the Constitution.
The ambiguity in the Constitution protects a complicated and diverse population by making space for different interpretations. The nation’s founders have considered their limitations when framing the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson understood that “laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind.” The constitutional ambiguity has left space for interpretation in the contemporary realistic context, which enables it to evolve with the progress of public opinions. In 1944, when the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was fighting segregation, a Democratic Supreme Court sympathetically struck down various forms of segregation and radically promoted national desegregation. The Constitution didn’t explicitly ban segregation; the Supreme Court, however, judged the segregation unconstitutional with its judicial power expanded by the vagueness in the Constitution. This inspirational case implies that the constitutional ambiguity could be used as a political tool to protect the civil rights of a minority group as long as it wins the support of one governmental branch. The ambiguity in the Constitution ensures that constitutional interpretations could be a progressive vehicle that reflects public opinions and promote social transformation.
The Constitution framed a federal system of shared and overlapping powers between national and state governments. From the initial Dual Federalism to the current Progressive Federalism, every political regime has put forth its interpretation and application of federalism. Today, federalism has been involved in almost every major conflict in American domestic policies. The ambiguity in federalism results in constant disputes about where to place authority and responsibility. Both Republicans and Democrats have found federalism a useful political strategy for promoting their desired policy outcomes. Though federalism, as a political weapon, may exacerbate the warfare of partisan polarization, it still protects democracy by deliberately building the debates into the federal institutions to give advocates on both sides various political venues to address problems, challenge policies, and assert rights.
To protect citizen’s self-rule and to balance the representation of big states and small states, the Constitution places Congress at the center of the American government. However, people’s complaints about the fragmented state usually center around the legislative gridlock of Congress. The constitutional framers established two chambers in order to check government power and ensure social stability. The various veto points such as filibusters and legislative holds are also intended to protect democracy and slow down the legislative process. In practice, however, the imaginary democratic nobility of one-man veto is usually exploited by narrow-minded issues. Originally intended to guarantee conscientious legislation and protect minority rights, today’s senate filibusters block legislation without making any decision to protect anyone’s rights. The growing inability of Congress to address societal problems such as immigration, healthcare, and global climate change doesn’t result from bad actors, as the high re-election rate of individual senator attests. In addition, Congress used to be capable of making remarkable and popular collective decisions such as Medicare and Social Security. The important question is whether such legislation gridlock has been expected and intended by the Constitution or precisely reflects the constitutional limitation.
The constitutional checks and balances made the divided government possible, which is a traditional source of legislative gridlock. Divided government occurs when “each party holds at least one of the three nationally elected branches”. The governmental standoff and noncooperation result in policy stalemate and low productivity. Political scientists have argued that divided government could worked more smoothly in the past and that it’s exaggerated by the recent partisan polarization. Indeed, the current social context has been drastically different from when the Constitution was framed. On the positive side, Constitutional flexibility transformed society by incorporating a diverse population. On the negative side, growing economic inequality and divided social class deviate from the original economically equal American society, which exaggerates the social fragmentation. The divided government might be intended to check and balance more efficient and smaller-scale decision-making, and the Constitution may be designed for a more homogeneous society. By the time when only a selective group of white males could govern, their agreements and disagreements were centered around their common interests. Now that political participants are composed of different interest groups, their opinions lead the government in divergent directions, and the checks and balances only exacerbated the political fragmentation.
The constitutional framers have prepared an adaptive Constitution by incorporating ambiguity and checks and balances into the Constitution, but their preparation may still be insufficient to cope with the current social change. The answer to the question “who are we” in American politics has changed dramatically since the establishment of the Constitution. The fuller democracy and social openness are made possible by a Constitution that evolves with social progress; meanwhile, the legislative gridlock and partisan polarization also find their roots in the Constitution. It’s paramount to consider how to protect the constitutional tradition of self-rule while addressing the pressing political fragmentation. The future of the American government will rely on the reflective practice of the Constitution.
(Note: Written in my sophomore year 2019 as the first essay for “American Politics”.)