Congressional Ethics
Representative James A. Traficant, Jr. was charged of ethics violation after having been convicted of 10 federal charges involving the commission of the crimes of tax evasion, bribery and racketeering. Traficant was found to be guilty for receiving favors and monetary gifts in exchange of performing official acts that will be in favor of the donors. He is also known to receive kickbacks from staff and engaged in racketeering activities. In 1999, he subscribed a sworn US Individual Income Tax Return which he jointly filed with his wife with a verified declaration under the penalties of perjury. After investigation, he was found to have filed a false tax return. Traficant was held liable for acting in a manner that does not reflect creditably on the House of Representatives in violation of Clause 1 of the Code of Official conduct under the House Rule 23 and was found to have acted to evade the laws and legal regulations of the United States in violation of Clause 2 of the Code of Ethics for Government Service (United States 79th Congress Report, 2002).
The expulsion of Representative Traficant from the House of Representative is just and reasonable considering the guilt of evidence is strong. First, the members of the House of Representatives are public servants and they represent the votes of the electorates who placed their trust and confidence in their services. The importance of legislative ethics is very crucial in maintaining the credibility of the government leaders. Second, any unethical behavior among the members of the House of Representatives will erode the democratic process because ethical conducts generally reflect the democratic nature of the institution (Herrick, 2003). The failure of the body to impose sanctions to the unacceptable behavior of its members will have a significant impact on the trust and confidence of the people to the House of Representatives as an institution. The need for the imposition of different sanctions like fines, expulsion from the house, suspension, reprimand, censure and admonition are necessary to show the public that the legislative leaders are burdened with the responsibility of maintaining credibility when rendering public service. The expulsion of Traficant from the house, for example, has the effect of reaffirming my trust to the members of the Congress because the body imposes strict ethical regulations on the ethical conduct of its members. The imposition of sanctions demonstrates reassurance to the public that unethical conducts are not condoned in the House of Representatives.
Third Party Candidates
It is notable that in American politics, the two-party system dominates the political arena and third party candidates are often left behind the limelight and do not play any major roles in the election. A third party candidate is generally a party who does not belong to either the Democratic and Republican party. While there are some few third party candidates who managed to win public offices, they are rarely given significant roles in the federal government. A third party candidate has never been successful in taking the presidential office for two political reasons. First, third parties are faced with the barrier of the winner take all election format and they rarely have the access to the machineries needed to launch a nationwide presidential campaign. The winner take all system for the presidential candidate provides that the presidential candidate with the highest percentage of votes will enjoy all of the state's electoral votes. A third party candidate for example needs to launch a broad statewide political campaign to win the highest percentage of votes in order to get all of the state's electoral votes. With limited resources and machineries and the lack of support and loyal political followers, third party candidates have a slim chance of winning. Second, the foundation of political loyalty to the two major parties, the Republican and Democratic, has been rooted for centuries and the people feel that voting for third party candidates will be wasted votes. For example, there is the sense of illegitimacy for third party candidates to take part in the presidential election (Nelson, 1996) and third party candidates are rarely regarded as option for the voters to vote.
In the current political system in the United States, third party candidates hardly manage to win the presidential elections. However, should a third party candidate manages to win the elections, it may have a significant political impact to the two major political parties, namely the Republican and Democratic. Third party candidates can potentially influence either of the two major political party in taking up some issues that may not normally be an issue to the other party. There is also the possibility that the third party can determine the outcome of an election by pulling votes from one of the these party candidates that may result in a spoiler effect (Schmidt, Bardes, Maxwell and Crain, 2008).
Federal and State Authority
One of the biggest sources of debates that become a controversial issue confronting the US congress today is the comprehensive immigration reform. The issue on immigration has become broader that it extends to affect the policy makers within the executive, judicial and legislative branches to the extent of pushing the debate to involve the local and federal authorities. A major issue involves border security concerns where illegal aliens are growing in numbers with many immigrants seeking asylum in the US being suspected of spreading violence and possibly terrorism activities. This issue has a significant impact on policy making in terms of the enforcement of immigration law within the federal and state levels. Debates arise whether the state or local authorities should be involved in the enforcement of the immigration law, taking the same outside from the exclusive jurisdiction of the federal authorities.
Strengthening security boarders is a major issue among the policy makers and the Obama's immigration reform policy includes granting the local law enforcement access to information that are available to the federal authorities. The local authorities can now share fingerprints of arrestees in the federal immigration and customs enforcement agency to help them examine the criminal records of suspects to determine the possibility of deportation. The enforcement response of immigration laws within the federal and state jurisdiction has reached the court with questions on the constitutionality of the measure employed of engaging the enforcement of immigration law within the state level. The constitution provides the federal government an authority to administer and enforce immigration policies. The administration of the immigrant admission and removals is primarily vested upon the federal authorities and the state and local authorities have no enforcement authority of the federal civil immigration policies and laws (National Immigration Forum, 2007).
States are precluded from taking actions that are otherwise within their authority, especially when it is repugnant to the supremacy clause of the constitution that establish federal laws and treaties as the supreme law of the land. Under the delegation power of the Congress, express authority was given to the local authorities to make arrests and transport aliens to federal custody. The state authorities are granted with the limited power for of immigration law enforcement by virtue of Section 133 of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 that delegates such authority to the state and local law enforcers (Garcia and Manuel, 2012). With this legislative enactment, constitutional constraints or barriers were removed that allowed both the federal and state responses to address the current issues involving the immigration law in the United States.
References:
Garcia, M.J. and Manuel, K.M. (2012). Authority of State and Local Police to Enforce
Federal Immigration Law. Washington: Congressional Research Service.
Herrick, R. (2003). Fashioning the More Ethical Representative: The Impact of Ethics Reforms in the U.S. House of Representatives. London: Praeger.
Nelson, M. (1996). Guide to the Presidency. New York: Routledge.
Schmidt, S., Bardes, B., Maxwell, W. and Crain, E. (2008). American Government and Politics Today - Texas Edition, 2007-2008. California: Thomson Higher Education.
United States 79th Congress Report (2002). United States Congressional Serial Set, Serial No. 14785, House Report No. 594. Washington: Government Printing Office.
