Read this excerpt from The Miracle Worker Act 2. (She drops her eyes to spell into HELEN’S hand, again indicating the card; HELEN spells back, and ANNIE is amused.)

KATE [TOO QUICKLY]: What did she spell?

ANNIE: I spelled card. She spelled cake!

(She takes in KATE’S quickness and shakes her head, gently.)

No, it’s only a finger game to her, Mrs. Keller. What she has to learn first is that things have names.

KATE: And when will she learn?

ANNIE: Maybe after a million and one words.

(They hold each other’s gaze; KATE then speaks quietly.)

KATE: I should like to learn those letters, Miss Annie.

separation of powers, therefore, refers to the division of government responsibilities into distinct branches to limit any one branch from exercising the core functions of another.   the intent is to prevent the concentration of power and provide for checks and balances.  

the traditional characterizations of the powers of the branches of american government are:

* the legislative branch is responsible for enacting the laws of the state and appropriating the money necessary to operate the government.

* the executive branch is responsible for implementing and administering the public policy enacted and funded by the legislative branch.

* the judicial branch is responsible for interpreting the constitution and laws and applying their interpretations to controversies brought before it.

forty state constitutions specify that government be divided into three branches:   legislative, executive and judicial.   california illustrates this approach; "the powers of state government are legislative, executive, and judicial.   persons charged with the exercise of one power may not exercise either of the others except as permitted by this constitution."

while separation of powers is key to the workings of american government, no democratic system exists with an absolute separation of powers or an absolute lack of separation of powers. governmental powers and responsibilities intentionally overlap; they are too complex and interrelated to be neatly compartmentalized. as a result, there is an inherent measure of competition and conflict

minnesota:   minnesota house research,   separation of powers: when statutes and court rules conflict, 2005

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this scroll was the first major biblical manuscript of great antiquity ever to be recovered. the qumran isaiah scroll predated the oldest hebrew text preserved in the masoretic hebrew bible by a millennium.