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Legislature
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the Politics series
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A legislature is a type of representative deliberative assembly with the power to adopt laws. Legislatures are known by many names, the most common being parliament and congress, although these terms also have more specific meanings. In parliamentary systems of government, the legislature is formally supreme and appoints the executive. In presidential systems of government, the legislature is considered a power branch which is equal to, and independent of, the executive. In addition to enacting laws, legislatures usually have exclusive authority to raise taxes and adopt the budget and other money bills. The consent of the legislature is also often required to ratify treaties and declare war.

Contents

Chambers

The primary component of a legislature is one or more chambers or houses: assemblies that debate and vote upon bills. Most legislatures are either bicameral or unicameral, although historically there have also been rare incidences of two separate chambers, usually described as an upper house and a lower house, which may differ in duties, powers, and methods for the selection of members.

In most parliamentary systems, the lower house is the most powerful house while the upper house is merely a chamber of advice or review. However, in presidential systems, the powers of the two houses are often similar or equal. In federations it is typical for the upper house to represent the component states. For this purpose the upper house may either contain the delegates of state governments, as is the case of Germany and was the case in the pre-20th century United States, or to be elected according to a formula that grants disproportionate representation to smaller states, as is the case today in Australia and the United States.

Power of legislatures

The British House of Commons in the early 19th century.
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The British House of Commons in the early 19th century.

The power of legislatures varies widely from country to country. Rubber stamp legislature is a derogatory name for a legislature that has no real power but simply approves, by unanimous or near unanimous votes, bills put before it by other institutions. For example, the legislatures of many Communist states were often derided as mere 'rubber stamps' for decisions of the ruling party. The term is not usually used to describe legislatures of parliamentary systems. Although the final draft of legislation introduced by the government almost always passes, these legislatures are generally not labelled "rubber stamps" because legislators are involved in the drafting and amendment of bills.

List of titles of legislatures

National Historical State Regional

See also

 

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