What constitutional principle ensures that the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government can limit each other’s powers?

The principle that ensures the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government can limit each other's powers is known as Checks and Balances. This system was designed by the framers of the Constitution to prevent any one branch from becoming too powerful and to promote a balance of power within the federal government.

Each branch has specific abilities to monitor and limit the functions of the others. For example, the executive branch can veto legislation passed by the legislative branch, while the legislative branch has the power to impeach members of the executive branch or approve judicial appointments. The judicial branch has the authority to interpret laws and can rule legislative acts as unconstitutional, serving as a check on both the legislative and executive branches.

The emphasis on checks and balances is foundational to the structure of the U.S. government, reflecting the belief in safeguarding liberty by providing mechanisms that ensure cooperation and accountability among the branches.

The other constitutional principles mentioned, such as Separation of Powers, address the distribution of governmental power among different branches, but they do not encapsulate the reciprocal limitations that checks and balances represent. Federalism, on the other hand, refers to the division of power between the national and state governments, while Checks on Government is not a formal constitutional principle and lacks the specific mechanisms outlined