AP U.S. Government and Politics · Past multiple choice · Question 8, Effective Fall 2014
Agency powers
Name the constitutional principle at risk when one agency writes rules, enforces them and settles disputes over them.
Lessons this question tests
1 Read the question
The question is College Board's: sample question 8 in AP Government and Politics: United States Course Description. It starts on page 17 of the PDF.
Open Question 8 (PDF, page 17)
2 Pick your answer
3 Check the explanation
Why the answer is D open once you have picked
The Constitution splits government into three kinds of power: making laws (Congress), enforcing them (the executive) and judging disputes under them (the courts). An independent regulatory agency that writes rules, enforces them and decides cases about them holds all three at once.
That concentration is the problem separation of powers is meant to prevent. Madison wrote in Federalist 47 that putting legislative, executive and judicial power in the same hands is the very definition of tyranny.
Each choice
- A. Equal protection concerns treating people differently under the law. Combining powers in one agency is not about unequal treatment.
- B. Fair hearings do matter when an agency judges a case, but the problem named here is one body holding all three powers. That is a separation of powers concern.
- C. Federal supremacy settles conflicts between national and state law. An agency's mix of powers involves no such conflict.
- D (correct). Writing, enforcing and judging the same rules gathers all three branches' powers into one body, which is what separation of powers forbids.
- E. Federalism divides power between the nation and the states. These agencies raise a problem within the national government, among its functions.
Question and answer key: College Board. The title and summary are ours, and so is the explanation.