Legislature - Structure, Qualifications, Terms, And Compensation Of Legislators, Relationship With Executive And Judicial Branches

constituents representatives popular

A representative assembly of persons that makes statutory laws for a municipality, state, or nation.

A legislature is the embodiment of the doctrine of popular sovereignty, which recognizes that the people are the source of all political power. Citizens choose by popular vote the legislators, or representatives, whom they want to serve them. The representatives are expected to be sensitive to the needs of their constituents and to represent their constituents' interests in the legislature.

CROSS-REFERENCES

Congress of the United States; Judicial Review; Legislative History.

Additional Topics

Legislature - Structure

The federal legislature, the U.S. Congress, is bicameral in structure, meaning that it consists of two chambers, in this case the House of Representatives and the Senate. Each state has a legislature, and all state legislatures have two houses, except the Nebraska Legislature, which has only one. State legislative bodies have various official designations, including state legislature, general asse…

Legislature - Qualifications, Terms, And Compensation Of Legislators

Members of the U.S. Congress are chosen to represent a particular state. Each state may elect two U.S. senators. The number of U.S. representatives a state may elect is determined by the population of the state, with a minimum of one. Every state uses a district system to choose its state legislators. Under this system the state is divided into districts, often along county lines, with one or more…

Legislature - Relationship With Executive And Judicial Branches

The purpose of a legislature is to make, alter, amend, and repeal laws. Legislatures are empowered to enact laws by virtue of legislative jurisdiction, which is the authority vested in them by the national or state constitution. The enumerated powers of Congress are provided for in Article I of the U.S. Constitution. In addition to their lawmaking duties, members of Congress also have the power to…

Citing this material

Please include a link to this page if you have found this material useful for research or writing a related article. Content on this website is from high-quality, licensed material originally published in print form. You can always be sure you're reading unbiased, factual, and accurate information.

Highlight the text below, right-click, and select “copy”. Paste the link into your website, email, or any other HTML document.