Devolution and the legislation policies enacted by Obamas and Bush Essay

Devolution and the legislation policies enacted by Obamas and Bush administration that increased the federal government powers - Essay Example Nixon’s role The idea of devolution in the USA can be traced back to as far as Richard Nixon’s New Federalism. Immediately Nixon came into power, a notable shift towards devolution intensified. He broke the tradition in The USA by shifting federal programs from categorical grants to block grants. The first shift was the Comprehensive Employments training act of 1973 (Patterson 43). The community development block grants (CDBG) in 1974 followed the Act. In this way, Nixon’s contribution to devolution comprised of the federal government delegating some control without suspending its financial responsibilities. Reagan’s role Some of the moves by Nixon came to an end when Reagan came into power. However, some programs remained, however, in more devolution manner. Funding and control at the local level emerged. As the closure of general revenue sharing indicated, the Reagan administration continued the progressive change toward pure devolution (Patterson 39). Reagan’s twist on New Federalism focussed control and fundraising of home programs at the state and local level. The idea was to reduce the size of the federal government in the face of a budgetary deficits level. Additionally, Reagan’s new initiatives were many. As funding from general revenue sharing came to an end, laws produced by the federal government continued, establishing many situations where state and local governments were needed to implement policies without the funding to do so.