How Did Baron De Montesquieu Separate The Powers Of Government

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Nobody can do anything by themselves. Everyone and everything needs help at one point. By creating a system that will continuously be helping each other, we can be successful. Almost 300 years ago, the United States Constitution was written with ideas influenced by a French lawyer by the name of, Baron de Montesquieu. He thought of an idea to separate the powers of the government. This helped to set up the framework for freedom in the United States of America. Montesquieu’s ideas of Separation of Powers started when he realized how to secure liberty and keep the government from becoming corrupt. He warned, “Were the executive power not to have a right of restraining the encroachments of the legislative body, the latter would become despotic; …show more content…
They took the ideas from Montesquieu and Aristotle into consideration when doing so. In the Constitution it states that the government will be separated into three different branches to serve as the foundation. These branches created were the Legislative, Judicial, and Executive Branches. The Legislative Branch includes the Senate and the House of Representatives and makes laws and changes existing laws based on the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The Judicial Branch consists of the United States Supreme Courts, Appellate Courts, Trial Courts and other Federal Courts. In the Judicial Branch, they study and interpret the law. Finally, we have the Executive Branch that is made up of the President, Vice President, and the President’s Cabinet. They execute the laws. This system makes sure that not one branch has more power than the other and that they are all …show more content…
A real life issue involving this happened back in 2007. Xavier Alvarez claimed that he was a retired Marine and had been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. However, he was found to being lying about all accusations made and was charged with two counts of violating the Stolen Valor Act. Alvarez claimed that these charges were unconstitutional for violating his First Amendment right of Freedom of Speech. Initially, the Legislative Branch passed the Stolen Valor Act of 2005. This punished those who falsely stated that they have received high military honors. However, with the system of Checks and Balances, the Judicial Branch took ruled that Alvarez was correct and the Stolen Valor Act was unconstitutional because it infringed on the right of free speech protected by the First Amendment. The Executive Branch then took actions and established a government-funded national database of medal citation to enable verification of military honors. With the ability to check each branch and balance their power, they were able to create the Stolen Valor Act of 2013 that narrowed the original legislation to make sure that it is in line with the
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