Text B. A SYSTEM OF «CHECKS AND BALANCES»

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The Constitution provides for three equal and separate branches but each is to some extent dependent on the other two and there is a partial interweaving of their functions.

Executive Branch
President suggests legislation to Congress	President appoints federal judges
Issues executive orders, rules and regulations with the force of legislation	May grand pardons from punishment for offences against the United States
May veto legislation passed by Congress

Legislative Branch
Appropriates for Executive	Appropriates funds for the Judiciary
May create or abolish Executive Departments	May create or abolish lower federal courts
May impeach and try members of the Executive Branch	May impeach and try members of the judiciary
May override a Presidential veto	Decides how many justices may sit on the Supreme Court
The Senate must approve Presidential appointments and treaties

Judicial Branch
May declare Congressional legislation unconstitutional	May declare any Presidential or Executive action unconstitutional

The national government’s power is not limited by states’ power. The only powers the states have are those the Federal government has not reserved for itself. But in a dispute the Federal government can and will use military force if necessary, e. g. integration of schools in Little Rock, Arkansas in the 1850s.

The powers of the national and state governments are limited by certain constitutional guarantees of civil liberties for individual citizens. These guarantees are known as the Bill of Rights. They are amendments to the original constitution. They forbid the government from restricting or limiting such civil liberties as freedom of speech, of religion, and of the press, and they guarantee to all citizens (at least in principle) certain legal procedures and rights.

The powers of the federal (national) government include the right to declare war; the right to tax; the right to borrow and coin money, and to regulate its value; the right to regulate commerce between the states; the right to maintain a postal system.

Every state has its own constitution. It also has the three-branches-of--government structure. State chief executives are called governors, and state legislators are usually known as representatives and senators.

The powers of the state are to control education, regulate corporations and businesses within the state, determine most election procedures, and regulate local governments. The states also make and administer civil (citizens’ private rights) and criminal laws.

The Constitution has been amended 26 times. An amendment may be proposed by the federal legislature or by a constitutional convention, or a meeting of representatives from two-thirds of the states. In either case the amendment must be approved by three-fourths of the state legislature.

5. Выпишите из текста эквиваленты следующих слов и выражений: принять конституцию; исполнительная власть; законодательная власть; судебная власть; осуществлять власть; система контроля и сдерживания; осуществлять контроль над какой – либо ветвью власти; гражданские права(свободы); гарантировать правовые процедуры и гражданские права; частично совпадать.

6. Выпишите из текста 2 предложения, содержащие сказуемое в активном залоге. Подчеркните сказуемое и определите его видовременную форму. Измените предложения таким образом, чтобы сказуемое имело все возможные грамматические формы.

7. Выпишите из текста 2 предложения, содержащие сказуемое в пассивном залоге. Подчеркните сказуемое и определите его видовременную форму. Переведите предложения на русский язык.

8. Составьте резюме, используя образец стр. 27.

КОНТРОЛЬНАЯ РАБОТА №1

Вариант №4

Выполните следующие задания:

1. Образуйте форму множественного числа следующих существительных: head, policy, party, term, agency, source, servant, staff.

2. Поставьте все личные местоимения в объектном падеже и напишите соответствующие им формы притяжательных местоимений.

3. Образуйте степени сравнения следующих прилагательных: large, important, quick, many, new, high, strong, common.

4. Прочтите и переведите тексты. Текст A (абзацы 1, 2, 3, 5) переведите письменно.

Text A. THE EXECUTIVE POWER

1. The President, as chief executive, is the most important government figure. The president negotiates foreign treaties and appoints government heads. He commands the armed forces and sends and receives diplomatic officials. In effect, he makes foreign policy. As head of the executive branch he sees, to it that laws enacted by the legislature are carried out. He is also the leader of his political party. The president and the vice-president are the only officials chosen in a nation-wide election.

2. According to the Constitution a president’s office is limited to two terms of 4 years each. It also describes how a president can be removed from office (impeachment procedure).

3. The executive branch consists of 13 departments and many independent agencies. The department heads (most of them called secretaries, except the Attorney General) form the president’s cabinet. The president has many sources of advice and assistance – both private and public, including representatives of the departments and agencies. He also relies very much on members of his own White House staff.

4. The Executive Departments

Department	Head of Department
1. State	Secretary of State
2. Treasury	Secretary of the Treasury
3. Defense	Secretary of Defense
4. Justice	Attorney General
5. Interior	Secretary of the Interior
6. Agriculture	Secretary of Agriculture
7. Commerce	Secretary of Commerce
8. Labor	Secretary of Labor
10. Housing and Urban Development	Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
11. Transportation	Secretary of Transportation
12. Energy	Secretary of Energy
13. Education	Secretary of Education

5. Almost three million civilians work in the departments and agencies of the executive branch. This number exceeds the total employed by America’s seven largest corporations. These government employees make up the federal bureaucracy. These are civil servants who are hired under a system in which merit and training are supposed to be the basis of employment and promotion. There are approximately ten thousand civil service job classifications which range from a bridge engineer to a clerk. 10% of these federal employees work in Washington D.C.; 6% work outside the U.S.; the rest are located throughout the states.

Text B. THE LEGISLATURE

The legislative branch of the federal government is represented by Congress. There are two houses of Congress: the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Senate is composed of 100 voting members, two from each of the 50 states. They are elected for a six-year term and the number of their terms is unlimited. The House of Representatives has 435 voting members in addition to two representatives from Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia who are not entitled to vote. The members of the House are called representatives or Congressmen (or congresswomen). They are elected for a two-year term.

Many members of the Congress are regularly re-elected, and so some of them serve for over 20 years.

The number of representatives from each state depends on the state population. Every ten years the U.S. Census reports the distribution of the population throughout the entire country. The congressional seats are then re-distributed accordingly. California claims the largest delegation. New York ranks second. Alaska, Nevada, and some others have only one representative.

Within Congress there exist party leaders who are selected by congressional party caucuses (party meetings).

Either house – the Senate or the House of Representatives may offer a bill (but only the House proposes finance bills). All bills are immediately referred to a legislative committee. These committees are organized by special areas such as education, agriculture, and foreign affairs. Each committee is made up of representatives of both parties and each committee has its own staff.

The committee responsible for a particular bill holds hearings on it. Experts appear before the committee and offer suggestions and opinions about the bill. After the hearings, the committee reports its recommendations to the House. These recommendations may include suggested changes in the bill, or the committee may propose an entirely new one. Committee recommendations are of great importance because, when the legislators vote on a bill, they usually follow the committee report. If a committee chooses not to consider the bill, the bill dies. It is nearly impossible for a bill to reach the House or Senate floor without first winning committee approval.

Following the committee action the bill is debated on the floor of each house. Then the vote is taken. A voice vote, the most common and the quickest, involves a general chorus or Yeas or Nays. The chairperson decides which side has the majority. In a roll-call vote each vote is recorded separately. If a bill is defeated in either house, it dies. If the House of Representatives and the Senate approve similar bills with some different provisions, both bills go to a conference committee, in which selected legislators work to adjust the differences.

The bill becomes law following one or several steps by the president. He may approve the bill and sign it; he may sign the bill with a statement expressing his disapproval; or he may simply not sign the bill, in which case it automatically becomes law after ten days. But if the president wants to prevent the bill from becoming law, he vetoes it. But the proposal may still become law if two thirds of each house of Congress then vote for it, thus overriding, or defeating the president’s veto. This does not happen often. The president may also use the «pocket veto» by withholding his signature within ten days of congressional adjournment.

5. Выпишите из текста эквиваленты следующих слов и выражений: вести переговоры о заключении договора; назначать глав ведомств; командовать вооруженными силами; выбирать президента на общенациональных выборах; снимать с поста; иметь право голоса; открытое голосование; найти компромисс; наложить запрет (вето) на закон.

8. Составьте резюме, используя образец стр. 27.

КОНТРОЛЬНАЯ РАБОТА №1

Вариант №5

Выполните следующие задания:

1. Образуйте форму множественного числа следующих существительных: dependency, framework, assembly, rule, form, principle, tradition, age.

3. Образуйте степени сравнения следующих прилагательных: late, general, quiet, little, brief, old, far.

4. Прочтите и переведите тексты. Текст А (абзац 3) переведите письменно.

Text A. UNITED KINGDOM

1. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a constitutional monarchy and a unitary state which is made up of the island of Great Britain (including England, Scotland and Wales) and of Northern Ireland (which consists of the County Boroughs of Belfast and Londonderry, and the counties of Antrim, Armagh, Down, Fermanagh, Londonderryand Tyrone – being part of the ancient Irish province of Ulster). The common language is English; Welsh and Gaelic are spoken regionally. The British Islands are not constitutionally part of the United Kingdom; these islands, comprising the Channel Islands (of which the principal islands are Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney and Sark) and the Isle of Man are separate dependencies of the British Crown.

2. The independent Kingdoms of England and Scotland were first linked by personal union of the Crowns of both countries when James VI of Scotland succeeded to the throne of England (as King James I) in 1603. The political unification of the two countries was only effected more than 100 years later through the Treaty of Union of 1707. The treaty and the subsequent Acts of Union abolished the separate parliaments and established one parliament for Great Britain which was situated in London. Great Britain was united with Ireland by the Act of Union of 1800, which came into effect in the following year. By this Act provision was made for Irish representation in the Parliament at Westminster, as provision had been made for Scottish representation in the Act of 1707. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland existed from 1801 until 1922, at which time, in consequence of the partition of Northern and Southern Ireland, the title was changed to the present one of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Irish Treaty of 6 Dec. 1921 gave Dominion Status to 26 Irish counties under the name of the Irish Free State (Saorstat Eireann); in 1937 the Irish Free State assumed a republican form of government but the new state continued in association with the British Commonwealth until 18 April 1949. Under the Government of Ireland Act, as amended by the Irish Free State Act, 1922, a separate parliament and government, each with limited powers, were established for Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland Assembly Act, 1973 and the Northern Ireland Constitution Act, 1973 established a new constitutional framework to replace that provided by the Government of Ireland Act, 1920. The Northern Ireland Parliament was replaced by an elected Assembly and the government by an executive, the composition of which was to be agreed by the Assembly. The Northern Ireland Act, 1974 dissolved the Assembly, and provided that a Constitutional Convention should be held on the future of Northern Ireland. The Convention has since collapsed, and rule at present is direct from Westminster.

3. English law and Scots law are very different from each other in form and substance. The separate evolution of the two legal systems, both before and after Union, has resulted in different principles, institutions and traditions. Although in modern times Scots law has been greatly influenced by English law, it is still based upon principles of Roman or Civil law and upon rules of Canon, feudal or customary law origin. In spite of the existence of a common Parliament for England and Scotland for over 250 years there has been no assimilation of the legal systems of the two countries. A fusion of law has, however, taken place between England and Wales, as a consequence of the subjugation of the latter country in the middle ages. The law of Northern Ireland, although administered as a separate system, is similar in many essentials to English law.

5. Выпишите из текста эквиваленты следующих слов и выражений: унитарное государство; зависимая территория; последующие документы; отменять; последствие раздела; структура конституции; гражданское право; правовая система; объединение (слияние) закона; существенная часть.

8. Составьте резюме, используя образец стр. 27.

КОНТРОЛЬНАЯ РАБОТА №1

Вариант №6

Выполните следующие задания:

1. Образуйте форму множественного числа следующих существительных: a court, an office, a justice, a judge, a penalty, a committee, a life, a thief.

3. Образуйте степени сравнения следующих прилагательных: high, low, serious, good, important, narrow, wide, rich.

4. Прочтите и переведите тексты. Абзацы 1, 2 текста В переведите письменно.

Text A. CRIMINAL COURTS

There are two main kinds of courts, and two kinds of judicial officers to correspond with them. Courts of first instance are presided over by magistrates, who are normally Justices of the Peace (JPs); higher courts (crown courts) by judges, or in some cases, senior barristers specially appointed to perform judicial functions for part of their time.

Text B. MAGISTRATES’ COURTS

1. Every person charged with an offence is summoned to appear before a local magistrates` court, which may impose a fine up to a general limit of £ 2, 000 or twelve months imprisonment, though for some specified offences the laws prescribe maximum penalties below these limits. With 98 per cent of cases the magistrates on the bench decide on guilt or innocence, and if necessary what penalty to impose. With more serious cases the magistrates can decide only to send them for trial in a crown court. A person accused before a magistrates` court may demand to be sent for trial before a crown court in some of the more serious cases with which in general the magistrates could have dealt themselves.

2. A magistrates’ court normally consists of three Justices of the Peace (occasionally, two or four or more). The JPs are ordinary but worthy citizens who have been appointed to their positions by the Lord Chancellor on the advice of local appointing committees. JPs have no formal qualifications; they are chosen merely for their good reputation, often with the support of political parties or approved voluntary bodies. Once appointed, they are expected to attend courses of instruction about their work. There are 28, 000 JPs in England; each of them works in the court on about 30-50 days a year.

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