8/23/12

civics assignment for August 23, 2012

1. Define the Constitution…..in your own words in a PARAGRAPH (3-5 sentences)

           

            The Constitution of the united states is the supreme law of the united states of america. The first three articles of the constitution establish the rules and separate powers of the three branches of the federal goverment: a legislature,the bicameral congress an executive led by the president and a federal judiciary headed by the surprime court. The last four articles frame the principle of federalism. The tenth amendment confirms federal characteristics.

 

2. How would your life be without the constitution ?  There would be no order in the goverment and everybody would do whatever they wanted and the united states would crumble because we would fight within the state and be no leader.

3. Define the following words:

Ratification:the act of ratifying; confirmation; sanction.

Faction:a group or clique within a larger group, party, goverment, organization, or the like: a faction in favor of big business.

Federalism: the federal principle of government.

Federalist/ Antifederalist :an advocate of federalism.

 

Compromise:

a settlement of differences by mutual concessions; an agreement reached by adjustment of conflicting or opposing claims, principles by reciprocal modification of demands.

The Great Compromise (Connecticut Compromise): The Great Compromise joined the Virginia Plan, which favored representation based on population, and the New Jersey plan, which featured each state being equal.The compromise proposed two houses: a lower house which was elected in proportion to population, and an upper house, where the people of each state, regardless of size, collectively would have equal representation. This resulted in the current United States House of Representatives and U.S. Senate.

Checks and Balances:The system of checks and balances is an important part of the Constitution. With checks and balances, each of the three branches of government can limit the powers of the others. This way, no one branch becomes too powerful. Each branch “checks” the power of the other branches to make sure that the power is balanced between them. How does this system of checks and balances work?

Demrocratic rebublic: is the name used by political scientists to describe the political Party organized by thomas jefferson and james madison in 1791. People at the time (and historians) call it the rebublicain party. Historians also use the term Jeffersonian republicans.

Reserved Powers of the State Governments:Reserved to the States:To ratify amendments to the U.S. ConstitutionTo select U.S. Senators in the legislatures of the States (until the U.S. Constitution was amendmend to allow for popular election of U.S. Senators)Not reserved to the Federal goverments  and therefore are reserved to the States:Establish local govermentsConduct electionsRegulation of Intrastate commerceEducation establishments

Separation of Powers:often imprecisely used interchangeably with the trias politica principle, is a model for the governance of a state. The model was first developed in ancient Greece and came into widespread use by the Roman Republic as part of the unmodified Constitution of the Roman Republic. Under this model, the state is divided into branches, each with separate and independent powers and areas of responsibility so that no branch has more power than the other branches. The normal division of branches is into an executive, a legislature, and a judiciay.

Civil Liberties:certain inalienable rights retained by (as opposed to privileges granted to) citizens of the United States under the Constitution of the United States, as interpreted and clarified by the Supreme Court of the United States and lower federal courts.Civil liberties are simply defined as individual legal and constitutional protections from entities more powerful than an individual, for example, parts of the government, other individuals, or corporations. The liberties explicitly defined, make up the Bill of Rights, including freedom of speech, the right to bear arms, and the right to privacy.There are also many liberties of people not defined in the Constitution, as stated in the Ninth Amendment