Should The United States Constitution Reflect The Modern Political System?

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The United States constitution was written roughly 200 years ago and at the time the framers laid out a system of government that they thought would function effectively and represent their vision for the nation. I believe that the modern political system does not reflect the framers vision at all because the relationship between state and federal government has drastically changed, the balance of power within the federal government changed in favor of the executive branch and in the modern system citizenship has been expanded. The framers had a very restrictive attitude towards citizenship. Citizenship in my opinion is the ability of a person to effectively participate in the political process. The framers gave the impression that they wanted the average American to have citizenship. For example, running for office in the House of Representatives required “No qualification of wealth, of birth, of religious faith, or of civil …show more content…

After the Civil War, the 15th amendment gave African Americans the right to vote . On paper this amendment gave African Americans the right to vote, southern states began to implement Jim Crow laws which restricted African Americans from voting through things such as poll taxes and literacy tests. In the North “racism increasingly restricted the lives and opportunities of the growing number of blacks” . Despite racism in the North and the Jim Crow laws in the South effectively restricting African American citizenship, I feel the framers would fear that the 15th amendment would increase the chances that a tyrannical faction would form and that it would make regulating the effects of factions more difficult. Eventually, the Civil rights act of 1964 abolished Jim Crow laws making the process of voting for African Americans easier. I think that any expansion of who can vote is against what the framers intended as the more people who are allowed the vote, the more powerful and larger factions

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