I looked at some of the government web sites that I have been using for info and this is what I found from usembassy state govThe federal government of the United States consists of three parts the executive legislative and judicial branches The from the basis of the government of the US Federal State and local governments are explained and compared Those sites make a distinction between the government of the United States being all three versus the federal government being just well the federal government BTW In the Politics section you ll find a general description of the state and local govs again taken from the usinfo state gov site