Civics In A Year
What do you really know about American government, the Constitution, and your rights as a citizen?
Civics in a Year is a fast-paced podcast series that delivers essential civic knowledge in just 10 minutes per episode. Over the course of a year, we’ll explore 250 key questions—from the founding documents and branches of government to civil liberties, elections, and public participation.
Rooted in the Civic Literacy Curriculum from the Center for American Civics at Arizona State University, this series is a collaborative project supported by the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership. Each episode is designed to spark curiosity, strengthen constitutional understanding, and encourage active citizenship.
Whether you're a student, educator, or lifelong learner, Civics in a Year will guide you through the building blocks of American democracy—one question at a time.
Civics In A Year
Madison's Blueprint: Understanding Federalist 51 and Separation of Powers
Dr. Alan Gibson returns to examine Federalist 51, Madison's definitive document on separation of powers and checks and balances within the American governmental system. Madison's argument across Federalist Papers 47-51 culminates in a sophisticated explanation of how to preserve liberty through proper distribution of governmental authority.
• Separation of powers is described by Madison as "a sacred maxim of free government"
• American system differs from parliamentary systems where executive emerges from legislature
• Madison argues branches should remain distinct but with "partial agency" in each other
• Separation involves dividing government functions according to their nature
• Common misconception: framers did not intend to "deadlock democracy"
• Separation of powers was designed to allow for energetic, active government
• Madison explicitly stated legislative branch "necessarily predominates" in republican governments
• Madison worried most about legislative branch invading other branches' powers
• Federalist 51 offers Madison's solution for maintaining proper separation
For AP Government students studying Topic 1.6 on principles of American government, having a copy of Federalist 51 on hand while listening is highly recommended to follow along with Dr. Gibson's analysis.
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School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership
Welcome back everyone. I'm very excited again to have Dr Alan Gibson. If you have not listened to the Federalist 10 episodes, highly suggest it. Dr Gibson is back with us. So for all of our friends who are learning about AP government or studying for the test, right now we are going through Federalist 51 and within the AP government, ced, we're on topic 1.6, which is principles of the American government, and Dr Gibson is going to talk to us about kind of the argument of Federalist 51 and how Federalist 51 supports the idea of both checks and balances and separation of power. So, dr Gibson, thank you again so much. Friends, if you are going through this, I highly suggest having a copy of Federalist 51 with you, much like in our Federalist 10 episode. I will have mine up because I feel like it helps me as Dr Gibson talks about it. It helps me to actually see the document alongside. So, dr Gibson, I'm going to pass it on over to you.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, thank you again. Again, I'm pleased to do this and it's enjoyable. It's good to sharpen and to revisit my thoughts on all of these issues. Separation of powers Madison calls it a sacred maxim of free government. Of course, federalist 51 is the signature writing on separation of powers in the Federalist Papers. Actually, in the Federalist Papers, federalist Numbers 47 to 51 deal with the issue of separation of powers and I want to look at very, very briefly each of those to describe how Madison unfolds an argument that culminates in Federalist no 51. You really need to understand Madison's argument in 51 is the culmination of those five total papers in there.
Speaker 2:A few other general background thoughts on this. It was absolutely imperative that the defenders of the Constitution establish that the Constitution integrated the concept or maxim of separation of powers into the government. The government was formed or based upon this foundational assumption about how you preserve liberty and about how you promote good government. That separation of powers is integral to this system. It's still it's interesting that separation of powers remains, I think, probably the signature feature of the American political system over other political systems in the world, and that includes even the other democratic form, which is parliamentary forms of government. In parliamentary forms of government. Of course the executive is chosen by the legislative branch and executive officers also come out of the legislative branch. And there's, you know, there are, you know, just these agendas that come out, and the executive and the legislative branch are instrumental in forming together those agendas. And so there is no real separation of powers in other kinds of parliamentary systems the way there is in our political system. Across the world there's increasing hybridization of forms of government, but with that said, that distinction still remains between parliamentary and the separation of powers of presidential models of government that the United States is principally responsible for.
Speaker 2:Separation of powers comes down to a couple of different things. One of them is self-evident and quite obvious, and that is the idea that the legislative, executive and judiciary departments ought to be kept separate and distinct. That's right out of the language of Federalist no 47. And distinct, that's right out of the language of Federalist no 47. That's just a definitional or even kind of foundational proposition about separation of powers. But, if you'll remember, in all of these Federalist Papers, madison says you can't keep them completely separate. Indeed, you don't want to keep them completely separate. You want to give each branch some degree of partial agency in the other branches. So you do want to keep them distinct, but only to a degree, and you need to give each of the branches some partial agency in the other so that they can exercise some kind of constitutional control over this. And that foreshadows the ultimate thesis of separation of powers that set forth in Federalist no 51, which is it is an internal combining or intermingling of powers that maintains the system of separation of powers in the federal's papers. A second thing that is integral here is that separation of powers actually makes it possible for government to execute the distinct capacities or functions for which it is charged with. Doing so, separate institutions exercising separate powers allow for the execution by the national government of legislative, executive and judicial functions. Separation of powers, in other words, involves a division of labor about what government does. It involves that application to the principle of government, and so you're trying to ensure that the powers of government are distributed among these branches based upon their nature, that the legislative branch exercises legislative powers, that the executive exercises executive powers and that in combination all of the powers of government are exercised that are necessary for what Madison calls in the Federalist no 37, good government. So that's an important feature of this as well, real quickly.
Speaker 2:A couple of fallacies about separation of powers that are common. One of them is that the framers thought they were deadlocking democracy or wanted to deadlock democracy. I don't think that that well. I know that that is not true in their intention. There are some reason to believe that that is the effect of separation of powers today, but that's only because of the introduction of political parties into a system that was not originally conceived for it. That's something of an aside, but the primary point I'm trying to make here is that separation of powers was, in the framers' mind, consistent with an active and powerful national government. The system would become checked if, in fact, the policies were unwise or one of the branches was trying to exercise the power of another branch, acting unconstitutionally in some way. But otherwise separation of powers allows for an energetic government, an active, energetic government. The other fallacy is that all of the branches under separation of powers are supposed to be equal, or the phrase is sometimes used as co-equal.
Speaker 2:Madison says very explicitly that in Republican governments the legislative branch necessarily predominates, and that's directly out of Federalist no 51. And there are similar statements to that about legislative supremacy. The supremacy itself refers to the proximity of the legislative branch to the people, the fact that they will identify more with the legislative branch, and also it refers to the legislative branch's tendency to usurpate powers exercised by other branches. So you've got to worry most about invasions of power from the legislative branch, not from in Madison's estimation the executive or the judiciary. There are a lot of changes between the time that we have today and the time that this was written and you may ask yourself whether Madison was right in predicting that the legislative branch would be the primary branch, the one that would be most likely to invade the powers of the others.
Speaker 2:But you have to understand that in the context in which he was writing, legislative branches were doing that. That seemed to be their natural tendency, that that seemed to be their natural tendency. He had a lot of experience with that. Anyway, the real topic, the primary topic of Thurlis 47 to 51, is about how you create and maintain separation of powers, more than why you have separation of powers. So in Federalist no 47, 48, 49, and 50, well, federalist no 47 does something different, but 48, 49, and 50 all look at ways that you might create or maintain separation of powers and it rejects those ways. And then Federalist no 51 gives you this distinct answer to that question.
