在2019年8月份托福考试改革之后，在听力测试的话题内容中除了常见的艺术，生物，天文学和心理学之外，偶尔也会出现一些比较陌生或考生不曾接触的话题内容。例如：物理学中的爱因斯坦相对论，政治科学中的美国政治结构等都是让考生比较头疼的话题。由于这些冷门话题的层出不穷，本期学科知识就带大家探讨下关于American Political System的背景知识以及跟政治系统有关的相关知识拓展。
一，相关背景补充
The United States is a federal country, the form of political organization for the presidential republic, the implementation of the separation of powers and balances of the political system and the two-party system.
美国是联邦制国 家，政权组织形式为总统共和制，实行三权分立与制衡相结合的政治制度和两党制的政党制度。
The United States political system was built on The Declaration of Independence article. The Declaration was ratified by the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia on July 4, 1776, which later became Independence Day.
美国的政治制度建立在《独立宣言》的基础上。《独立宣言》于1776年7月4日在费城举行的第二届大陆会议上获得批准，后来成为独立日。
The Declaration of Independence consists of four parts. The first part is the preface, which sets forth the purpose of the Declaration. The second part elaborates the political system thought, namely the natural right theory and the sovereignty in the people thought; The third part enumerates the crimes of the British oppression of the colonial people in North America, explaining that the colonial people were forced to take up arms under the intolerable circumstances, to fight for the legitimacy and justice of independence; In the fourth part, and in the last part, the United States of America solemnly declares its independence.
《独立宣言》由四部分组成。第 一部分是前言，阐述了宣言的目的。第二部分阐述了政治制度思想，即自然权利理论和人民思想中的主权;第三部分列举了英国对北美殖民地人民压迫的罪行，说明殖民地人民被迫在不可容忍的情况下拿起武器，为独立的合法性和正义而战;在第四部分和后一部分，美利坚合众国庄严宣布了它的独立。
U.S. House of Representative（众议院）
The Speaker of the House of Representatives is elected by the members of the House and is traditionally the leader of the majority party. However, the Leader of the Majority is held by the second most important member of the same party. According to U.S. presidential succession rules, the speaker of the House of Representatives is the third most important political leader in the line of succession after the vice president, who also serves as president of the Senate.
众议院议长由议员选举产生，传统上为多数党之领导人。然而多数党领 袖（leader of the majority）另由该多数党在院内的第二重要议员担任。据美国总统继位条例，众议院议长继任总统的顺序仅次于兼任参议院议长的副总统，是政坛上第三重要的领 袖人物。
Many of the framers of the Constitution sought to make the Senate (initially elected by state legislatures) a counterweight to the popularly elected House of Representatives. Thus the "advice and consent" authority (such as the power to ratify treaties) is exercised by the Senate alone. The House of Representatives also has its own powers: the power to initiate revenue bills, to impeach government officials, and to elect a president in the event of an electoral college deadlock. However, all of these powers can be counter-checked by the Senate.
宪法制定者中有很多人企图让参议院（一开始是由州议会选举）成为众议院（公民直选）的制衡机构。于是“建议与同意”权（如批准条约的权力）授权仅由参议院单独行使。众议院也有其独有的权力：倡议岁入法案之权、弹劾政府官员、以及在选举人团僵持不下时选举总统。然而，所有这些权力都可由参议院制衡（counter-check）。
United States Senate（参议院）
The Senate is admittedly more prudent than the House; The Senate has fewer seats and longer terms, allowing academic and partisan views to be more detached from public opinion than the House. The Senate has several powers listed in the Constitution that are not delegated to the House of Representatives. The most important of these is that the President of the United States, when ratifying treaties or appointing important persons, must "take the advice and approval of the Senate" (Chapter 1 of the U.S. Constitution).
参议院公认较众议院更为审慎；参议员名额较少而任期较长，容许学院派看法与党派之见，较众议院更容易自外于公共舆论。参议院拥有若干表列于宪法而未授予众议院的权力。其中重要的是，美国总统批准条约或任命重要人事时，须“采酌参议院之建议并得其认可”（美国宪法第 一章）。
The power relationship between the federal and local governments联邦政府和地方政府权力关系
The United States of America from 1776 to 1787 was a federal country. In 1787, the Constitution of the United States of America changed the structure of the country to a federal system. On the basis of the establishment of a unified federal government, the states still retain a wide range of autonomy.
1776-1787年的美国为邦联制国 家。1787年制定的《美利坚合众国宪法》改国 家结构形式为联邦制，在建立统一的联邦政权的基础上，各州仍保有相当广泛的自主权。
The Federation has the highest legislative, administrative and judicial organs, but has unified laws and laws, is the main body of international exchanges; Each state has its own constitution, laws, and government institutions; If the state constitution and laws conflict with the federal constitution and laws, the federal constitution and laws prevail over the state constitution and laws. The U.S. Constitution lists the powers enjoyed by the federal government, such as raising taxes, borrowing money, minting money, maintaining armies, conducting foreign affairs, and regulating interstate and international commerce. Other powers not enumerated in the Constitution are reserved to the states, except those expressly prohibited by the Constitution from being exercised by the states.
联邦设有高的立法、行政和司法机关，但有统一的法和法律，是国际交往的主体；各州有自己的宪法、法律和政府机构；若各州的宪法和法律与联邦宪法和法律发生冲突，联邦宪法和法律优于州的宪法和法律。美国宪法列举了联邦政府享有的权力，如征税，举债，铸币，维持军队，主持外交，管理州际和国际贸易等。不经宪法列举的其他权力，除非宪法明文禁止各州行使者外，一概为州政府保留。
The powers of a state are mainly to deal with matters within the state, such as taxing taxes in the name of the state, regulating industry, commerce and labor, organizing security forces and maintaining public order, and so on. The specific powers of the federal central and local authorities have evolved over the past 200 years.
州的权力主要是处理本州范围内的事务，如以地方名义征税，管理州内工商业和劳工，组织警卫力量和维持治安，等等。联邦中央和地方的具体权限，200年来不断有所变化完善。
二，托福听力相关真题链接（听力真经6，听力真经4和TPO材料真题）
1) Federal system联邦制（听力真经6 T1L2）
Professor: United States has what’s called “a federal government.” In a federal system of government, the power to make laws and regulations is divided between a national government and smaller political units – states, in this case. There are two views of how those powers interact with one another.
One view is called “Dual federalism.” Dual federalism holds that the national and state government both have clearly defined powers, though the national government’s power is quite limited. The other perspective is “Cooperative Federalism.” Cooperative Federalism asserts that the national government’s power over the state is not so clearly limited. In fact, it is not clearly defined. At times national and state governments work together cooperatively, but the national government can also impose its power over the states. After all, the United States Constitution spells out the power of the national government.
美国的政治系统由地方政府和联邦政府组成，分别提出“双重联邦制”和“合作联邦制”两种政治观点。针对“双重联邦制”认为地方政府和联邦政府的权力是相互分离的，联邦政府可能在权力上受制于地方政府。另外一种观点认为美国政治是属于“合作联邦制”，其中描述两者的政治权力界线比较模糊，联邦政府可以在某些时候给地方政府施压。
2）Irish Independent War/Easter Rebellion （听力真经4 01-12）
Ireland was formally made of part of Great Britain in the Act of Union 1801, until then, Ireland had its own parliament, but, after the passing of the act, the Irish Parliament was closed down, and the Irish were given representation in the British Parliament. Over the next Century or so, various attempts were made to grant Ireland something called home rule. This basically meant that Irish Parliament would be revived, thereby giving the Irish some degree of autonomy. Unfortunately, all attempts at home rule failed.
This in turn led to more radical forces in Ireland starting to push for an armed insurrection to throw British out of the country. The most significant event in the Irish struggle for freedom took place in 1916 at the height of World War I. This became known as the Easter Rebellion, or the Easter Rising. They knew something was going on, but since it was Easter, they felt that nothing would happen then.
1801年的《联合法案》使爱尔兰正式成为大不列颠的一部分，在此之前，爱尔兰有自己的议会，但法案通过后，爱尔兰议会被关闭。在接下来的大约一个世纪里，人们做出了各种各样的尝试来给予爱尔兰所谓的地方自治。不幸的是，所有国内自治的尝试都失败了。这反过来又导致爱尔兰更激进的势力开始推动武装起义，把英国人赶出爱尔兰。爱尔兰争取自由斗争中重要的事件发生在第 一次世界大战激烈的1916年。这被称为复活节起义或复活节起义。
3）Absolutism and Feudalism（专制主义和封建主义）（听力真经4 10-08）
Absolutism: is opposed to democracy concept, refers to a person or a handful of authoritarian regime organization form, embodies in mercy for life and hereditary throne, its are main the feature is the emperor arbitrary decision-making by an individual's dictatorship, collection of supreme power, from decision-making to exercise military and political finances have arbitrariness and informality.
Absolutism专制主义：是与民主政体相对立的概念，指一个人或少数几个人独裁的政权组织形式，体现在帝位终身制和皇位世袭制上，其主要特征是皇帝个人的专断独裁，集 国 家高权力于一身，从决策到行使军政财政大权都具有独断性和随意性。
Feudalism: A social ideology in which society is determined by human consciousness. The social form on which this ideology depends is feudal society. The concept of feudalism is: the whole country (the country) is not a public, divided into a vassal nobles, or as the Greek tribes into their own. Centralization in feudal society was a system of central contracts, local tributes, taxes, and donations, formed through wars or alliances of tribal city-states
Feudalism 封建主义：是一种社会意识形态，就是人的意识决定社会。这种意识形态赖以存在的社会形态便是封建社会。封建的概念是：天下（江山）不为公，分封给一个个诸侯贵族，或如希腊部落自成割据。封建社会的中央集权是通过战争或部落城邦的联盟而形成一个按中央契约、地方纳贡、收税、派捐来运转的体系
4）American Frontier （TPO57 Lecture 4）
The other main area of challenge by the new western historian was that turner really in their view, underestimate the role of federal government and large corporation in shaping economic life of the frontier. I mean just for instance, federal government to this day is the largest landowner of west of Mississippi river. And people’s lives when they got to the frontier were really dictated by market forces beyond, pretty much beyond their control.
当时美国西部的土地主要受联邦政府控制，当地居民没有任何的独立和自主的权力。
三，话题词汇补充
separation of powers 三权分立
two-party system 两党制
The Declaration of Independence 独立宣言
congress /ˈkɑːŋɡrəs/ n. 国会
Independence Day 独立日（美国国庆节7月4号）
sovereignty /ˈsɑːvrənti/ n. 主权
enumerate /ɪˈnuːməreɪt/ v. 列举
oppression /əˈpreʃn/ n. 压迫手段
colonial /kəˈloʊniəl/ a. 殖民的
House of Representative 众议院
succession /səkˈseʃn/ n. 继承权；连续
elect /ɪˈlekt/ v. 选举
ratify /ˈrætɪfaɪ/ v. 批准
treaty /ˈtriːti/ n. 条约
Senate 参议院
partisan /ˈpɑːrtəzn/ a. 党派的
autonomy /ɔːˈtɑːnəmi/ n. 自治
parliament /ˈpɑːrləmənt/ n. 议会；国会
legislative /ˈledʒɪsleɪtɪv/ a. 立法的
administrative /ədˈmɪnɪstreɪtɪv/ a. 行政的
judicial /dʒuˈdɪʃl/ a. 司法的
constitution /ˌkɑːnstɪˈtuːʃn/ n. 宪法；章程
四，总结
纵观托福考试改革之后的趋势往往还是不乏出现一些较为特别，陌生和较难的话题内容。尤其是像美国政治和爱因斯坦相对论这些话题建议考生们可以课下多去总结积累，尤其是多通过BBC和Wikipedia网站了解一下有关自己薄弱环节和不熟悉话题的背景知识的补充，也希望大家能攻克难关拿到自己理想的托福分数
