State and Local Governments Influence the Federal Legislature: All state governments are modeled after the federal government and include the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. Most state and local government officials usually seek to influence the content of national policies, primarily by generating intergovernmental lobbies (Steier, 1985). There is an increase in professionalism in state and local governments that provide units with the basic knowledge and ability to meet with legislators and provide information that can influence legislation. Additionally, the growth of federal grants to state and local governments allows programs to regulate the behavior of state and local governments. Additionally, many regulations and requirements that federal programs impose on states and localities are sometimes open to change, giving discretion and power to state and local officials. Local government is mandated by its own state constitution and is subject to the legal environment created by the state's structure and laws, much like how state government should not conflict with federal law. State governments reflect the federal government as they have an elected head of the executive branch who is the governor, an autonomous judiciary, and a commonly elected legislative division. The question of whether judges are elected or appointed is: Judges should be elected rather than appointed. This is because members of congress usually engage in agenda setting because they want to satisfy their constituents (Arnold, 2004). Therefore, since many voters care about crime, it is easy to please the voter by focusing on crime. For elective positions... half of the paper... approves the appointments of judges. 2) Can remove judges through impeachment and 3) Create lower courts. The Executive Branch has the power to execute laws and has some checks on the Legislative Branch such as: 1) Ability to call special sessions of Congress. 2) It can recommend legislation and 3) it can appeal to people about legislation (Arnold, 2004). The judicial branch has the power to interpret laws and control the executive branch such as: Courts can rule executive actions unconstitutional through the power of judicial review ReferencesArnold, A. (2004). About America. How the United States is Governed Marion, N & Oliver, W. (2012). The public policy of crime and criminal justice, second edition. Steier, R. (1985). Cybercrime and security: A congressional retrospective. Communications of the ACM, 28(12), 1275-1276.