The separation of powers is a theory of government whereby political power is distributed among three branches of government; the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. The doctrine of the separation of powers embodies three basic principles; limited government, which means that the government’s power over its citizens is limited by the Bill of Rights. Secondly is the separation of personnel, meaning that no one person can hold office in separate branches of the government at the same time. And lastly, each branch of government keeps a watch over the other branches of government and in some cases can overrule it to prevent them from becoming too powerful.
Neustadt (1960) wrote that rather it being a government with ‘separated …show more content…

The power of the purse encourages effective government as it limits the power of the president in that he cannot simply spend money on policies without the permission of Congress. However it can be argued that Congress need not to interfere with the Presidents spending plans, as he does not just come up with ideas on his own, he works closely with specialist teams that help him to decide how to distribute money and what to spend the money on, and they aren’t decisions that are taken lightly.
Congress also have the power of investigation. This means that they can investigate the actions or policies of any member of the executive branch, including the president. For example, President George W. Bush’s handling of national security issues both before and after the events of 11/09/01 was investigated by Congress. This helps to uphold an effective government as it means that the actions of everyone are closely monitored to make sure that as little as possible is done wrong, and that what is done wrong, can be put right by whatever means are necessary. While this kind of scrutiny is key to the success of the government running smoothly, people may argue that the Congress should concentrate on more important issues and jobs rather than constantly checking what everyone is doing in case of very minor faults.
These checks and balances are very important for the running of the government. They encourage close cooperation between the two major parties and compromise between the