The notion of a “territorial federalism” 1. ... After all, conventional accounts of federalism as a structure of government connote distinct and sovereign political entities jointly exercising governmental power over a given geographic region, with each entity acting as a check on the others' actions and ambitions.
Federalism in the United States is the constitutional division of power between U.S. state governments and the federal government of the United States. Since the founding of the country, and particularly with the end of the American Civil War, power shifted away from the states and toward the national government.
