The intention of the Constitution was not to disregard the opinions of the public, rather to provide restrictions to prevent an individual or group of people from rising to absolute power. Instead of limiting the rights of American citizens, the Founders were trying to protect their liberties. All the systems put into place were for the protection of the people the government has served for many years. Although the government does not advertise the fact that America is not a true democracy, it does not hide that we are instead a federal republic or indirect democracy. An unintended consequence of this might be that various elites have gained more power than they should and will be dealt with by the court system which was created to have fair …show more content…
The United States of America was a great image of democracy and equality for the early revolutionary governments, but the massive size of the country makes it illogical to assume each person should be completely involved in the government. All citizens are encouraged to vote in local, state, and federal elections. The key to our representative democracy is voting. Albeit not directly, but when voting for a particular candidate, the citizen is voting for his or her set of beliefs. When decisions are made at a later date, they are made by the representatives chosen by the public. Therefore, if an American chooses not to vote during an election, then they are choosing not to vote for any policies involving the candidates, and in turn involving the whole community. A democracy is most notably known as freedom. Freedom to choose. Americans can choose to vote and participate in the government created to protect that very freedom or they may choose not …show more content…
George Washington intended for the leaders of the union to have the most knowledgeable people at their disposal, to create a well rounded and thoughtful decision making process. When Thomas Jefferson became president, he replaced all the federalist officials in his new office (“The Development of the Bureaucracy”). This created a new and “long tradition of filling government positions through patronage” which benefits political allies who have given their support (“The Development of the Bureaucracy”). As time has gone on, the government has become more corrupt creating a distrust of the government by the people. But, that does not concede that the government was founded on mistrust of the people of America. Following in the snowball effect of patronage, President Garfield’s assassination in 1881 was the result of an unhappy supporter who wasn’t granted a government position after the election. The Pendleton Act was made shortly after this, to provide an exam that would level the field and fill jobs based on merit. To ensure even more fairness a “three-member Civil Service Commission” was created to administer this new system (“The Development of the
After the American Revolution, America had earned it’s freedom from Britain. In order to govern this new country the Articles of Confederation was created. This document was flawed by the colonists fear of putting too much power into a central government. Knowing the document needed to be fixed a constitutional convention was called. The document created at this convention has been our constitution ever since. But even the Constitution was meet with criticism. One major concern when writing the constitution was how to protect the citizens rights. The Constitution did this through the preamble, the legislative process, the limit of presidential terms, the judicial branch, and the bill of rights.
First, one reason why Americans should be required to vote is that it will educate the citizens. Evidence supporting this reason is in “Unequal Participation: Democracy’s Unresolved Dilemma, American Political Science Review” Aaron Lijphart stated that “By compelling people to vote, we are likely to arouse in them an intelligent interest and to give them a political knowledge that do not at present possess.” This evidence helps explain why Americans should be required to vote because when citizens are required to vote it gives them a political understanding that they didn't have before voting. Most citizens will research
Everyone is always happy in the ‘50’s. With the picket fence, perfect family, fresh cut grass, it is no wonder why everyone wished they lived in the ‘50’s. In Ginsberg’s poem, Howl, pages cut through the fantasy to deliver us the background of this media-portrayed lifestyle. The communism, failed education system, and corruption of the government – a century filled with enough injustice to drive one into madness. Sharing the same perspective as Ginsberg, Howl illustrates the corruption in education and government that remains indifferent to the present time.
The Founders built certain protections for individual rights into this country's founding documents. The United States Constitution was one such document. In particular, such protections guard Americans who hold minority viewpoints from those who side with the majority. For example, the First Amendment protects the right of free speech to ensure that people who hold unpopular views have just as much freedom to express those views as do people who tend to agree with the majority. The United States Constitution, therefore, was intended to protect the individual rights of Americans from a tyrannical government and majority. However, today, the Electoral College does not represent the vibrant democracy into which the United States has grown.
When the Declaration of Independence was drafted, our forefathers were defying the laws of Britain. It was an act of treason for men to declare a separation from Britain and to create a newly formed government for America. These men acted in civil disobedience because the laws were unfair to Americans. Under the new government, they immediately drafted the Bill of Rights, rights that they believed were unalienable for all men. The government's role was not to control our lives, as the British rule had done, but to prevent chaos and protect us from those who tried to take our freedoms. Man is naturally power hungry, and those who run the government may attempt to take away the public's rights as stated under the Bill of Rights. Because of such cases where those in government have created laws to...
The United States of America is a republic, or representative democracy. Democracy, a word that comes to us from Greek, literally means the people rule (Romance, July 8). This broad definition leaves unanswered a few important details such as who are the people, how shall they rule, and what should they rule on (July 8). Defining the answers to those questions means defining a model for a democratic system. William E. Hudson defines four such models in his book American Democracy in Peril: the Protective, Developmental, Pluralist, and Participatory models of democracy (Hudson, 8-19). Of these models, perhaps Participatory comes closest to an ideal, pure democracy of rule by the people (16-19). In practice, however, establishing a stable ideal democracy is not entirely feasible. In a country the size of the United States, it quickly becomes unwieldy if not impossible to have direct rule by the people. To overcome this, the compromise of the representative system allows the people to choose who will rule on a regular basis. The political culture that defines American politics shows that despite this compromise, America is still very much a democratic society.
The Founding Fathers limit the power of government in the Constitution utilizing many different tactics, many more than even the aforementioned. Their main intent was to make the nation less democratic and to keep the government small. The Constitution has accomplished the Founding Fathers' goal until now, and will hopefully continue doing so in the future.
While we have a constitution that lays out our clear cut civil liberties and all the rights we possess, other countries chose to restrict those freedoms. Due to the many advantages the Constitution gives each American citizen, the US has been able to keep this document intact as long as they have while other countries have to constantly restructure their government principles. This stability leads to greater efficiency in our legislative process and a strong sense of national pride. For a nation filled with differences and mixed opinions, the Constitution is a perfect fit. It was written as unbiased as possible to ensure that it was not limiting anyone or anything, instead, giving each citizen the ability to keep their government in check and grant freedom to everyone. During the time the document was written was when the Colonist knew exactly what it felt like to live in a world of oppression and unjust government. As a result, Madison and the other leaders at the time made it a goal to put the power in the hands of the people and make freedom an utmost priority. With an Unbiased approach to government that gives no advantage to one group or another, and with amendments that only help citizens take control, the Constitution is what the early colonist left Europe and died
The beginning of the Constitution provides a basis for one to question the righteousness of the Framers intentions. The Constitution starts by saying, “ We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” This was not a true statement. That phrase excluded black people, women, and men who lacked wealth. Government under the British did the same thing; all the power was made accessible to only the rich. The American Revolution was aimed at acquiring equal and fair representation in government for everyone. Next, the Constitution established a Supreme Court. The Supreme Court was a group of selected people who would make major legal decisions for the country. These people were not elected or chosen by the people, they were chosen by the government. This placed a form of power over the people of the United States that had been held by King George. The Supreme Court had the power to ma...
Throughout history, there has been countless times where a country is ran by tyranny, and countless times where tyranny negatively affects the country. Our country, the United States of America, was one of those countries at one point, but we thankfully got out of it from war. Since our country didn’t want to go back to tyranny, people had to create a system, and a set of principles that would prevent that from happening. So, the Constitution was made. Tyranny is a government ran by one person, or a small amount of people, and the United States got out of it, but we still had to establish a way to prevent it from happening again. The constitution did it’s job and protected against tyranny by the small states vs. large states, federalism, separation of power, and checks and balances.
The men who wrote the American constitution agreed with Thomas Hobbes that humans were naturally evil. Therefore, they agreed that in order to prevent a dictatorship or monarchy, the citizens should have influence in the government. The writers wanted a more ideal constitution, but they realized evil human motives would never change. One of the main goals of the constitution was to create a balanced government that would allow the citizens to prevent each other from being corrupt. The writers wanted to give citizens liberty, but they did not want to give people so much liberty that they would have an uncontrollable amount of power. The writers agreed that a citizen’s influence in government would be proportionate to that individual’s property.
The American government prides itself on the foundational principle of democracy which allows individual voices to be heard. Afterall, the roots of power in our nation stem from the people. The Constitution was established to ensure the balance of powers among the federal government, state legislature, and the common people. Time, however, has worked against the American people in the battle towards democracy. The idea of a governing body drawing its power directly from its constituents has been undermined by the corrupt nature of modern politics where politicians act out of self-interest. While the Constitution and later amendments had every intention of securing basic liberties, certain limitations later undermined the original intentions of the founding fathers to give power back to the people by placing the larger majority of power in the hands of the state.
“America when will you be angelic?”, Allen Ginsberg says in his poem America, which is one of his most controversial pieces. Ginsberg is mocking all of the things he’s seen wrong in America. He is asking the sinister being of America to become an angelic place. The opposite happens to Dean Moriarty in On the Road by Jack Kerouac. Dean gradually becomes a sinister being representing the devil, after once being viewed as iconic and angelic. He becomes a burden that Sal has to bring along. Misconception of time leads to the constant need to be moving. Dean never breaks away from the journey to evaluate his decisions he just keeps moving. Sal after suffering an illness that he won’t speak of. This illness that he suffered makes him want to travel west because of the ideology of what is the “west”. He starts traveling and never stops with Dean who makes sure that Sal never stops going.
Our nation gave us the right to vote. If we do not vote, our opinions would not be heard. This is because our politicians represent the people and express the people's opinions.
The world throughout history has constantly been making evolutionary changes; this is no different for the United States Democracy. There are many models of democracy, such as protective democracy, developmental democracy, pluralist democracy and participatory democracy. However, most of these democracies if not all are governed by the elites in our governmental society, thus they are privileged with more access and benefits from the United States Government. Nevertheless, this has been changing year by year, as we face multidimensional crisis and lead our government into an inclusive democratic system.