The term is "checks and balances." They never function in ideal fashion, but they have failed us badly enough in the past to spill a million gallons of our own

The term is "checks and balances." They never function in ideal fashion, but they have failed us badly enough in the past to spill a million gallons of our own blood. I am nowhere near prepared to say they have finally failed us now; for any American so to assume is defeatism, and so to behave is culpable cowardice.