Essay On Bill Of Rights And Amendment

In America, two terms that you may hear frequently are the Bill of Rights and Amendments. We hear them being referenced to in news stories and in daily conversations. But whether or not the typical or average American actually knows what either is, is questionable. It is important for people to be informed about the structure of our government and important features of the government as well. Amendments and the Bill of Rights are definitely two very important aspects of the American Government. An Amendment is an adjustment or specification to the United States Constitution. In today’s world, it may be added to the Constitution to further define something that the framers of the Constitution could have never dreamed of being an issue. For example, in modern times, many people are calling for a Constitutional Amendment that would define marriage between a man and a woman, prohibiting same sex marriage. This was not a common issue in the 1700’s and so it was not defined in the Constitution that way. There are two ways that an amendment to the Constitution may occur. The

These amendments outline basic, natural human rights given to all “American citizens irrespective of race, color, creed or gender, and what state they may live in.” (Amending the Constitution). The Bill of Rights did not come to be without controversy, though. There were two groups at the time, the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists. The Federalists believed that the Constitution already protected the citizens and their natural rights. However, the Anti-Federalists believed that without the Bill of Rights, too much power would be given to the Federal government. If today’s political parties were one or the other, Democrats would be Federalist and the Republicans would want to limit the power of the federal government and thus be