Not exactly. A provincial Lieutenant-Governor is the Queen’s representative to the province, fulfilling the same role as the Governor-General does to the country; but they do not represent the federal government. As Northern Piper points out, they give assent to bills that have been passed by the provincial legislature, just as the GG does to federal legislation. However, you are correct that they can refuse Royal Assent to a bill (what we call it instead of a veto), and that this never happens.
So, if let’s say Nebraska decided to form a despotism where one man ruled with an iron fist, terrorizing women and children and instituting a reign of terror against friend and foe alike, the Supreme Court will say that is a political question for Congress to deal with?
Yeah, but the Supreme Court would also not interfere with the federal government guaranteeing the people of Nebraska a republican form of government through the use of federal troops.
They will intervene on civil rights issues, and it’s hard to imagine a despotism not involving civil rights issues. The question of a parliamentary system versus a congressional system does not involve civil rights (at least not directly). But, if you have a system where no one had an effective vote, or people were punished without a fair trial, that’s civil rights – not just a political issue.
What in the Constitution dictates that the states should divide powers in a manner similar to that of the Federal government - or at all?
I don’t think it does. However, I suspect that some would interpret “republican government” to include separation of the three branches. The Supreme Court might even accept that argument, but go on to say hat it’s a political issue that they won’t get involved in.
You are correct that the provincial Lieutenant-Governor is the Queen’s representative to the province, but I do recall hearing that they also represent the federal government. And in some cases, constitutional convention declares that they may have to follow the prime minister’s advice’s over their premier’s, although I don’t know if that ever happened in Canada. (You’ve taken constitutional law classes, I believe? Does this ring a bell?)
Also, the federal parliament has the right to disallow a law of the provincial legislature.
At the federal level, there is also an option for the assent to be communicated in writing to the speakers of both houses, with no ceremony at all. I think that’s how it’s done most of the time now. I’m not sure if any provinces have that option.
With all this talk aboot Canada (sorey), why don’t we consider non-monarchial Parliamentary systems? I believe that Israel follows a Parliamentary system but does not have a monarch. India too, if I am correct.
Japan has a Parliamentary system, but they have a monarch.
A parliamentary system is completely independent of whether the head of state is formally a monarch or something else.
All jokes aside, Texas state government is unusual, but it’s not quite a parliamentary system.
The governor is not a mere figurehead, but in many key respects, the lieutenant governor (who presides over the legislature) is MORE powerful (many liberals will tell you that Democrat Lieutenant Governor Bob Bullock was “really” running the state while George W. Bush was governor).
In terms of his powers, the lieutenant governor is more like a Prime Minister than a President. But the big difference is, the lieutenant governor is elected directly by the voters of Texas, NOT by the legislature.
In a parliament, the Prime Minister will almost ALWAYS belong to the majority party. But Texas voters can elect both a Democrat Lieutenant Governor and a Republican legislature (and they have).
Yes, I’ve studied constitutional law, and it does ring a bell. You’re talking about the federal paramountcy doctrine, where (very broadly speaking), the feds can render provincial legislation inoperative to the extent that the provincial legislation conflicts with the federal; and I seem to recall that it is technically true that the federal government can strike down provincial legislation even if there is no conflict, such as when provincial legislation somehow frustrates federal policy. Paramountcy cases have certainly occurred, as the Wikipedia cite states, but what is interesting is that some of them deal with provincial laws–which, incidentally, had been given Royal Assent by the L-G–which had to go to court before being struck down owing to a conflict with federal legislation. This is leading me to believe that the L-G may not represent the federal government quite as much as may be thought: after all, if the L-G represented the feds, shouldn’t he or she have stepped outside the vice-regal role (where the assent is a given), assumed a federal representative’s role, and stopped the bill before assenting to it and creating a law?
At any rate, for run-of-the-mill incidents where there is no conflict with federal legislation, where the constitutional division of powers is adhered to by the province, and where the provincial legislation does not frustrate the purpose of federal policy, it is doubtful that the federal government would invoke the paramountcy doctrine, and step in; either at the assent stage or after.
Just because I’m curious–where did you hear that the L-G also represents the federal government?
I’m not sure. Probably here actually, but it’s quite vague in my mind. Maybe Northern Piper will have something more to say. I searched on Wikipedia, and all I could find was this:
So it’s quite possible that it is no longer the case.
Although I think the Wikipedia article you linked to refers to something different than what I was describing. I was thinking more (at least in my second paragraph) about the principle of disallowance and reservation, about which Wikipedia says:
(bolding mine)
Since I didn’t grow up, I recall clearly that someone (who did) told me that and I had no reason to doubt it. It never came up in the citizenship study guide.
For many years, SCOTUS refused to get involved in political questions. They said that only the voters could decide these questions. Trouble was that the voters in question were partly disenfranchised. Where I did grow up (the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania), no redistricting of the state legislature took place later than, IIRC, 1901. In addition, the state constitution stated that Philadelphia (where I lived) could not have more than a certain percentage of the legislative, a percentage well below its actual population. Needless the representatives of the over-represented rural districts had no incentive to either redistrict (which was required by the state constitution) nor the specified under-representation of Philadelphia (and maybe Pittsburgh). I recall reading that one New England state (VT?) had a state senatorial district whose total population was 4 and a lower house district with 2! The state senate of NJ consisted of one senator from each county. So Salem County (where my wife partly grew up), total population a few tens of thousands, had the same representation as did Bergen county with millions. Although this mirrored the US constitution, NJ was not a confederation of sovereign counties so the analogy is flawed. Not that I think the equal representation in the US has worked well, but that is for another posting.
The point is that SCOTUS said it was a political matter, but the argument was inherently flawed by the fact that the wronged voters were exactly the ones with the weakest voices, while the advantaged ones had the strongest. All this changed abruptly in the middle 60s when SCOTUS got into the political thicket after all. It also shows that while precedent is important, precedents can be overturned. See Brown v. Board of Education. At some point facts get in the way of principles.
So, while I think SCOTUS would be reluctant to get involved in a case that involved a real dictator, they eventually would. There is at least one precedent for non-involvement, though: Huey Long in LA.
Not that it will ever happen, but if it did the entirety of Atlantic Canada (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, & Prince Edward Island) would almost certainly be admited as one state. All together they have a population of 2,346,286 (as of July 2010); a respectable size for a state. PEI has less than a 150,000 people; there’s no way in Hell it’d ever get 2 Senate votes. Even Guam has more people.
South Africa not only has a non-monarchial parliamentary system it was one without seperate heads of state and government. The President of South Africa is both HoS & HoG, but he’s selected by the lower house of parliament, must answer to them along with his ministers, and can be dismissed by a vote of no confidence just like a Prime Minister can be. The South African provinces have the same setup with a premier and a provincial legislature. So do a bunch of island states in the South Pacific.
The guarantee of a republican government states that “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government.”
However, it does not state which branch of the United States government is responsible for enforcing that clause.
In Luther v. Borden, the Supreme Court held that it was a political question, to be decided by Congress, not by the courts. So it is enforceable, just not justiciable.
You’re both right!
When the Constitution Act, 1867 was drafted, it was with the model where the colonial Governors had real authority to represent the Imperial Government, even though they were also subject to the principle of responsible government for most purposes of the colonial government. The drafters of the 1867 Act assumed that pattern would continue: the GovGen would be a responsible governor for most purposes, but would still take instructions from the British Government for matters that affected Imperial policy. So the GovGen had two separate roles, which had the potential to collide in a particular case.
Similarly, the Lt Govs of the Provinces, appointed by the Gov Gen, were considered to be primarily local governors, subject to the principles of responsible government and thus exercising their powers on the advice of the elected majority in the provincial Assemblies, but subject to instructions from the federal government on matters that affected matters of federal policy.
And, in the early years of Confederation, the federal government did instruct the Lt Govs to use the constitutional power of reserving a provincial bill for consideration by the federal government, which then had the power to advise the Gov Gen not to give royal assent to the provincial bill. That power is in addition to the federal power to disallow provincial legislation.
However, just as the principle of responsible government and autonomous government gradually became the dominant feature of the federal government, with the GovGen ceasing to be an agent of the Imperial government and instead being a pure responsible Governor, so too at the provincial level: the Lt Govs came to be seen purely as local responsible governors, not agents of the federal government. The federal government no longer gives instructions to the Lt Govs to reserve any bills for consideration by the federal government.
It’s an interesting example of a shift in the constitutional conventions surrounding the GovGen/LtGovs, without any change in the formal text of the Constitution Act, 1867.
I opened this thread to respond angrily that, of COURSE a state can’t have a paramilitary government!
Never mind.
I suspect the historical reason why it did not - the Israel/Italy model of an elected HOS is much newer than most state governments. When the state governments (or at least, 13 of them) were being formed, the parliament was not exactly a toy of the monarch, but certainly paid a great deal of attention to what the monarch wanted; quite often IIRC the monarch ahd a say in who was PM and then tried to get the hose to do what he wanted. I suspect that was not the form of government most states wanted. Meanwhile, the executive government running the show with approval from the legislature was probably the model most states built on, rather than the legislature picking the executive. It matched what was imposed from England.
Realisticly the only scenario where this option would ever be used again would be if the National Assembly of Quebec attempted to unilaterally declare independance against Ottawa’s wishes.