Welcome to the fourth activity of the Give Me Liberty awards program. In our last activity, we talked about what tyranny, or complete control, and anarchy, or complete freedom are, and how the founders knew it was important to strike a balance between the two to guarantee people their rights to life, liberty, and to pursue their talents and try to be a better person. They set up our American system of government to do just that.

In this activity, you’ll learn how our system works. Let’s start by watching this short video.

Transcription:

Imagine you're having a great time with your friends and you all get hungry. Your best friend says, “Let's go to a restaurant.” You all think that's a great idea and suggest different places to eat. After talking it over, you all agree on a restaurant and pick someone to drive you there. Once you're there, everyone has a great time.

Our Government has three parts or branches: the legislative branch, the executive branch, and the judicial branch. Each branch has a special job. Here’s how it works.

Your group of friends is like the Legislative Branch. You work together to create solutions to problems that affect everyone, like “We’re hungry, so let’s go to a restaurant.” You can't force everyone to do what you want, so you have to persuade your friends to agree with you.

The founders made the legislative branch the most powerful because it represents the people. It is supposed to listen to the people and make laws, as long as it doesn’t violate the Constitution or Bill of Rights. The Legislative Branch also raises taxes, controls spending, declares wars, and ratifies treaties. It's a big job!

The driver is like the executive branch or the president. The driver ensures everyone gets to the restaurant safely and on time. It wouldn’t be right for the driver to take detours or take everyone to a restaurant they didn’t agree to.

The Founders called the president the head of the executive branch, but maybe they should've called it the “doer” branch. The president’s job is to make sure that when Congress passes a law, it gets done. They are the top “doer.”

The third branch is the Judicial branch which is led by the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court tells Congress if the laws they pass or the way the President carries out those laws break the rules of the Constitution. When that happens, they have to come up with new ideas and laws that solve the problem without breaking the Constitution’s rules. The Supreme Court clarifies the rights our founders shared in the Declaration of Independence and protected in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

So, imagine you get to the restaurant and it’s closed. Now you all have to pick another place to go.

In our next activity, we'll show you some easy ways you can do your part and protect your freedom