I looked at some of the government web sites that I have been using for info and this is what I found from usembassystategovThe federal government of the United States consists of three parts  the executive legislative and judicial branches The  from wwwinfogovDescribes 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 youll find a general description of the state and local govs again taken from the usinfostategov site