Affirmative Action
Affirmative action had its beginnings in March 1961, less than two months after President John F. Kennedy assumed office. It began when Kennedy issued…
Johnson, Lyndon B.
President Lyndon B. Johnson (1963–69) had a dramatic impact on federalism through a series of policy, regulatory, and fiscal initiatives broadly defined as the…
Civil Rights Act of 1964
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law on July 2, 1964. It was the first substantial civil rights…
Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)
See Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) [P.L. 111-148], commonly known as Obamacare, is a federal response to nationwide health care problems in…
Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations
The U.S. Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (ACIR) was established by Congress on September 14, 1959 (P.L. 86-380) and defunded by Congress in 1996.…
Admission of New States
Under the Articles of Confederation, the original 13 states were “admitted” to the union based on what historian Peter Onuf calls the “doctrine of…
Reconstruction
The Civil War is commonly regarded as having split the nineteenth century, and indeed all of American history, in half. The loss of life,…
Civil War
The experience of the Civil War compelled citizens to make significant changes in the structure of American federalism, but these changes emerged in unexpected…
Jefferson, Thomas
Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, is an ironic political figure in the development of American federalism. Though Jefferson favored a…
Louisiana Purchase
Negotiated in Paris during the spring of 1803, the Louisiana Purchase added approximately 828,000 square miles of French territory to the United States. This…
