It is well known that the United States have been seen internationally as a key actor, for better or worse, when it comes to the field of universal human rights. At the same time, recent events have shown a disassociation between the words and actions of the nation. Despite the fact that these rights are supposed to be constitutionally-protected, the United States has been criticized for repeatedly violating them not only in the past but in recent memory: criminalization of poverty and homelessness, violation of the privacy of citizens all over the world, racism, police brutality, the prison-for-profit system, mistreatment or even torture of the prisoners. These are just some examples of the most common forms of human rights violations …show more content…
Not only does it make a society conducive in the world realm, as opposed to a closed state like North Korea, but it stands as a shield from the abuse of power. Freedom of expression has almost always been and continues to be a defining characteristic of United States society and politics. The country was quite literally built on the idea of having basic freedoms in life. In fact, it was these same principles in which the United States operates around the world, beneath the guise of bringing the same values in other, less fortunate countries. Which only leads to emphasize the manner in which some so called freedoms are often challenged within the social and political spheres of the United States. Freedom of expression is not only an essential part of human rights but it is also important within the social and political institutions of the United States specifically. Therefore, not only are whistleblowers within their right when publishing material to a public forum, they are contributing to the public discourse on security, transparency, and civil liberties.
In this country the Freedom of expression, which encompasses speech, media, and public assembly, is considered as an important right, and as such is given special protection: having its recognition by the First Amendment of the constitution. The Amendment was adopted on December 15, 1791, and it states:
“Congress shall make no law
The U.S. Constitution was a set of fundamental laws and certain rights that each American citizen was meant to live by. The Constitution was signed by delegates during the Constitutional convention in Philadelphia on September 17, 1787. The constitution was created because many belived that the current governing document (The Articles of Confederation) were weak and allowed the states to operate like independent countries. At the Constitutional convention, the delegates created a plan for a stronger federal government that included three branches–executive, legislative and judicial. They also included the system of checks and balances to ensure no single branch would have too much power. The Bill of Rights–10 amendments guaranteed basic individual
In the United States, the people matter. They are free, and can control what happens in government. The people have certain rights that allow them to do things that make them people, for example, thinking, speaking, and acting. The Founders of the US wanted to protect people’s basic rights as much as possible through the constitution. The Constitution explains, in great detail, that the people are sovereign.
Created September 25,1978 and ratified December 15, 179, the Bill of Rights was imputed into society as a tool to establish law,order, and morality. James Madison, a political theorist, was known as the father of the Bill of Rights. One of the most important amendments in the Bill of Rights is the right to freedom of speech, expression and media. In the Bill of Rights, the First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” The First Amendment guarantees the citizens of America that they have the right to freely express themselves about anything, including political arguments and views. This amendment also guarantees the press/media the right to overtly publish their ideas on any topic in the newspaper. The purpose of this amendment is to assure America’s people that they shouldn’t worry about being censored or punished for the expression of their feelings because they are human just as everyone else.
The First Amendment of the United States Constitution protects the right to freedom of expression from government interference. Freedom of expression consists of the rights to freedom of speech, press, assembly, the right to make a
Contraceptives are widely used throughout the United States in today’s age and age, but in the early 1950s, Connecticut and Massachusetts were the only states in the union that still had anticontraception policies such as the 1879 Connecticut statute prohibiting the distribution of contraceptives (Johnson 6). Estelle Griswold accepted a job as executive director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut, and began a fight to give access for women to use contraceptives legally. It was very predictable the verdicts for the lower court cases during Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) as many judges took the side of the 1879 precedent. However, by the time it reached the Supreme Court, the main issue focused was the right to privacy which
The Bill of Rights is easily one of the most important sections within constitution, and this is because of the way that it protects the citizens of the United States from the government. One of the items therein the Bill of Rights is the 4th Amendment which states that, “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” Broken down, this one sentence gives the people the right to be secure and not be violated by the government when it comes to their property, papers and effects. This keeps them from being searched or having items seized without a warrant. This warrant that can be created has to be specific about the places that are going to be searched and the items that will be seized. This article will be divided into multiple sections that overall encompass the meaning of, how it came to be, and why it is important. The importance of this specific amendment is absolutely endless, and without it, our country would not be in the place that it is today.
What is a bill of rights? What is an amendment? How are the different? A bill of rights is a formality such as the Declaration of Independence and it is the outline of what the citizens feel their born rights are as people of a union. An amendment is the changing or altering of a legal or civil document. Specifically amendments in the United States Constitution include the changing or detailing of what the people need. These two phrases differ in what their purposes are. The bill of rights was set as a clean-up for the Declaration of Independence requested by the general population used to form a more structured government. An amendment is used to overcome a specific objection like slavery or details are government processes.
Every year people from all over the world come to the United States for a myriad of reasons. Some to seek employment, some education, and others to seek safe haven from violence and oppression from foreign governments. Regardless of the reason, the beauty of the United States is that the protections afforded by the constitution apply to anyone within its territory. However, since the terrorist attack against the United States on September 11, 2001, the protections of the constitution have since become a blurred line. Legislation such as the Patriot Act, and methods in which law enforcement conduct operations to combat terrorism have pushed the limits of the constitution. Finding the balance of working within the confines of the constitution is a constant challenge. The growing challenge elicits the potential for legal, policy and ethical issues, which ultimately undermine the very purpose of what the constitution is intended to protect.
From the time that the Bill of Rights was ratified in 1787, the definition of the second amendment had remained the same. In 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected into office and carried a gun rights enthusiast along with him. At the same time a Republican senator from Utah, Orrin Hatch, was handed the reigns of chairman of an important sub-committee. Senator hatch stated that he had discovered proof that individual citizens could rightfully own firearms under the second amendment. The National Rifle Association then began biased studies to corroborate with Senator Hatch’s opinion. After many disagreements and debates, Senator Hatch rose victorious.
The United States Constitution was designed to enfranchise the white men who, in 1787, were the only citizens included in John Locke’s conception of the social contract (outlined in his Second Treatise of Government). At this time in history, women were not invited to be free and equal, in relation to their husbands and fathers or as citizens in the founding fathers’ new republic. Therefore, the Constitution never addresses abortion, contraception, or marriage. Arguments made in laws and court cases on these topics, specifically reproductive rights, have therefore traditionally rested on a right to privacy the court has interpreted as being found in the first, fourth, fifth, and fourteenth amendments to the Constitution, rather than a right to freedom from sex-based discrimination found in the nineteenth amendment. The landmark supreme court cases Griswold v. Connecticut and Roe v. Wade were both won on these grounds, both setting a precedent for the expansion of the right to privacy. This protection has also been affected by the 2003 Partial-Birth Abortion Ban and the Hyde Amendment.
The United States Bill of Rights was created in September 25, 1789 and ratified December 15, 1791. The Bill of Rights are the first ten amendments to the Constitution that were established to defend our rights as individuals and as American citizens. The Bill of Rights describes the rights of its people. The first four articles of the amendments deal specifically with the balance of power between the federal government and state government.
The “Move to Amend” organization has put forth a proposed twenty-eighth amendment, that if ratified to the U.S. Constitution would take the constitutional rights away from all artificial entities such as corporations, and limit all campaign expenditures including the candidate 's own contributions and expenditures. The Supreme Court has ruled on multiple occasions that according to the fourteenth amendment corporations are individuals that have constitutional rights. If corporations have the same rights as individuals, then under the first amendment they have the right to spend their money on political campaigns as they choose. I am against both parts of this proposed twenty-eighth amendment, the Supreme Court has already set precedence and I believe that the addition of this amendment would directly contradict the first amendment since political speech is at the core of the first amendment. If you set limits on campaign expenditures, you are limiting someone’s ability to effectively campaign and get their message out. If a corporation chooses to spend large sums of money on political advertising then that is their choice, most people don’t want to be told how they can spend their money and neither do corporations.
Here in America, people have the right to protest and speak their views granted by the first Amendment in their Constitution. Reading or watching the news lately, there are a lot of protests happening. People are gathering and protesting so many different things all over the world right now and America is no different. However, what the media shows in America are arrests of protestors by security and police, both of which attack them at times, using pepper spray and other brutal methods. How is this behavior allowed? Pauline Maier sums up what the issue at hand is, “The affection with which Americans regard the three “founding documents” of the United States has not been constant over time.” (Maier pg3). American protestors are at times fighting for equal rights as equal citizens. While many others are asking for justice due to corruption in Wall Street, Banks, and American Government; however, the people who don’t hold affection for the first Amendment have been shown in the media as an increasingly violent force against those who support it. Should people be allowed to protest regardless of their cause, and without any execution of force unless provoked? I believe they should have this right and be guaranteed safety in acting on it. With these ideas in mind, America’s first Amendment is being contradicted by US government authority and private authority figures because these same people have enacted numerous assaults on people using their first amendment rights.
constitutional rights. Prison is not a fun place to be even for the most harden criminals, and a correctional system is not an arena for solving the underlying causes of crime. Some states are facing severe budget cuts due to economic struggles and drops in tax revenues; therefore, not all prison facilities in the United States could offer rehabilitation, education, mental health services, and sanitary cells for convicted offenders.
Many people are not aware of their own rights, let along the fact that there are rights for victims. Before this class, I knew of a couple rights for victims, but not very many. I was uneducated in this area. For a long period of history, victims’ rights were not recognized, because they were not seen as necessary. Now there are thirty-two states that have added an amendment to their state constitutions including the rights of victims. However, these laws are not perfect. They do not apply to all victims of all crimes, and they do not always specify at what point after the crime these laws go into affect. In fact, only about half of the country affords rights to all victims, regardless of the crime. This number is too absolutely too low, but because people in general are unaware of this, there is no movement for change.