- •I. Us government
- •1. Read and translate the text:
- •II. Executive branch: president, vice-president and the cabinet
- •Vocabulary notes:
- •Duties of the President and Vice-President
- •Federal departments (the cabinet)
- •5. Match the departments (left column) with their responsibilities (right column):
- •Speak on:
- •III. Legislative branch: the congress
- •1. Read and translate the text:
- •6. Speak on:
- •IV. The judicial system of the u.S.A.
- •Read and translate the text:
- •Vocabulary:
- •1. Give the English equivalents for the following words and word combinations:
- •Match each word on the left with the definition on the right:
- •Unit II
- •Vocabulary:
- •Give the Russian words with the same stem:
- •Find the English equivalents for:
- •Write these sentences in the Passive Voice form and translate them into Russian:
- •Read the text without a dictionary and try to catch the main idea:
- •Answer the questions:
- •Read and translate the text: us constitution II
- •Vocabulary:
- •Complete the following text with the words and phrases using them in the appropriate form (you may use the text above):
- •10. Find the English equivalents for:
- •11. Speak on:
- •The bill of rights
- •Read and translate the text:
- •2. Answer the questions:
- •3. Discuss the following questions:
- •III. Checks and balances
- •1. Read and translate the text:
- •Vocabulary:
- •1. Give the English equivalents for:
- •2. Choose the correct answer:
- •3. Shorten the text above writing out the key sentences from it and try to retell it.
- •4. Read the text without a dictionary. Try to catch the main idea: the separation of powers in state government
- •Vocabulary:
- •5. Say if the following statements are true or false (see the text above):
- •Unit III.
- •Major political parties
- •1. Read and translate the text:
- •Vocabulary:
- •2. Give the English equivalents for:
- •3. Match each word on the left with the right definition on the right:
- •4. Answer the questions:
- •Read the text without a dictionary. Try to catch the main idea:
- •Vocabulary:
- •6. Say what party is spoken about in each sentence:
- •7. Speak on:
- •Elections
- •1. Read and translate the text:
- •Supplementary reading federalism: state and local governments
- •Political attitudes
- •Courts in the united states
- •Cost of government
- •The constitution as a supreme law
- •The lawmaking process
- •Power in international relations
- •Elections
- •Библиографический список
The lawmaking process
One of the major characteristics of the Congress is the dominant role committees play in its proceedings. Committees have assumed their present-day importance by evolution, not by constitutional design, since the Constitution makes no provision for their establishment.
At present the Senate has 16 standing (or permanent) committees; the House of Representatives has 22. Each specializes in specific areas of legislation: foreign affairs, defense, banking, agriculture, commerce, appropriations and other fields. Every bill introduced in each house is referred to a committee for study and recommendation. The committee may approve, revise, kill or ignore any measure referred to it. It is nearly impossible for a bill to reach the House or Senate floor without first winning committee approval. In the House, a petition to discharge a bill from committee requires the signatures of 218 members; in the Senate, a majority of all members is required. In practice, such discharge motions only rarely receive the required support.
The majority party in each house controls the committee process. Committee chairmen are selected by a caucus of party members or specially designated groups of members. Minority parties are proportionally represented on the committees according to their strength in each house.
Bills are introduced by a variety of methods. Some are drawn up by standing committees; some by special committees created to deal with specific legislative issues: and some may be suggested by the president or other executive officers. Citizens and organizations outside the Congress may suggest legislation to members, and individual members themselves may initiate bills. After introduction, bills are sent to designated committees which, in most cases, schedule a series of public hearings to permit presentation of views by persons who support or oppose the legislation. The hearing process, which can last several weeks or months, opens the legislative process to public participation.
(2009)
Power in international relations
The United States must recognize once again, and permanently, that the power constellation in Europe and Asia is of everlasting concern to her, both in time of war and in time of peace. The U.S. will continue to depend primarily on its own national strength, for the failure of a great state to consider power means its eventual destruction and conquest. It has meant the downfall of all the empires that have been tempted by the flabby ease of unpreparedness. States are always engaged in curbing the force of some other state.
In a world of international anarchy, foreign policy must aim above all at the improvement or at least the preservation of the relative power position of the state. Power is in the last instance the ability to wage successful war, and in geography lay the clues to the problems of military and political strategy. The territory of a state is the base from which it operates in time of war and the strategic position which it occupies during the temporary armistice called peace. Geography is the most fundamental factor in the foreign policy of states because it is the most permanent. Sound foreign policy, and the design of its effecting instruments, can flow only from a secure grasp of appropriate premises for thought, declaration, and action.
There are many possible frameworks for the attempted understanding of international relations; all are not of equal worth for the comprehension of the more important features of world political processes. The academic study of international relations has taken off into self-sustained growth in a direction very largely irrelevant to what one must call the real world. This easily-demonstrated fact does not detract from the importance of other processes, sometimes only distantly related, that are eroding familiar structures in international relations.
(1829)