In Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall’s article, “An African American’s Perspective on the Constitution”, he concedes that the founding father’s Constitution contained numerous imperfections. Marshall feels it was a product of time and tremendous courage that brought forth the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees an individual’s Lockean rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Marshall believed the achievements that secured these individuals rights “belongs to those who refused to acquiesce in outdated notions” of life, liberty, and property. Thus, Marshall points out that the progression of time necessitates the modernization of the Constitution. Thomas Jefferson even anticipated the future evolution of our society and substituted the words “pursuit of happiness” for “property” in the Declaration of Independence having realized that someday our values would reshape. As public support for federal involvement has increased overtime, the Constitution is amended to better represent our evolving society. Although current public opinion favors federal support to provide access to healthcare, the design of our government dramatically lengthens the time necessary to implement modernize the Constitution. As the importance in maintaining one’s health has increased in America, the public has demanded the government to provide healthcare, however, the Constitutional prose recognizes the right to health but not the right to healthcare.
The current escalating debt the federal government is accumulating to provide funding for programs like Medicaid is increasing the probability the United States will one day default on it’s debt. America’s primitive system of health care, known for its outstanding...
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Faunce B.Med., Ph.D., Thomas. Who Own's Your Health: Medical Professionalism and the Market State. Baltimore, Maryland: The John Hopkins University Press, 2007.
Marshall, Thurgood. “An African American’s Perspective on the Constitution” in Shafritz, [edited by] Jay M., and Lee S. Weinberg. Classics in American Government. 3rd ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing, 2006.
The Declaration of Independence in Wilson, James Q., John J. Dilulio, and Meena Bose. 2011 American Government: Institutions & Policies. Boston, Mass: Wadsworth Pub. Co.
Ruger, Jennifer Prah. Health and Social Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press, USA, 2010.
Wilson, James Q., John J. DiIulio, Jr., and with Meena Bose. American Government: Institutions & Policies. 12th ed. Boston, MA.: Wadsworth Publishing, 2011.
Holton, Woody. Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution. New York: Hill and Wang, 2007.
During and after the turmoil of the American Revolution, the people of America, both the rich and the poor, the powerful and the meek, strove to create a new system of government that would guide them during their unsure beginning. This first structure was called the Articles of Confederation, but it was ineffective, restricted, and weak. It was decided to create a new structure to guide the country. However, before a new constitution could be agreed upon, many aspects of life in America would have to be considered. The foremost apprehensions many Americans had concerning this new federal system included fear of the government limiting or endangering their inalienable rights, concern that the government’s power would be unbalanced, both within
O’Connor, K., Sabato, L. J., Yanus, A. B, Gibson, Jr., L. T., & Robinson, C. (2011). American Government: Roots and Reform 2011 Texas Edition. United States: Pearson Education, Inc.
“When contemporary Americans cite “The Constitution,” they invoke a concept that is vastly different from what the framers barely began to construct two centuries ago” (Marshall 611). This quote from Thurgood Marshall conveys his message in “Reflections on the Bicentennial of the United States Constitution.” Thurgood Marshall is the first Black Supreme Court justice, and he wrote these reflections in 1987. He does not believe that the Founding Fathers’ idea of The Constitution should be highly celebrated, as it no longer exists in that state. His essay is filled with historical context and substance. Using a clever delivery, his message is conveyed emotionally and with logic. The method of organization allows the reader to better absorb
Groff, Patrick. "The Freedmen's Bureau in High School History Texts." The Journal of Negro Education 51.4
In the making of the United States, there were many events that are important. This paper intends to highlight a few of those events including; Magna Carta, Mayflower Compact, Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation and the Federalist Papers. Many events in America’s history helped to establish the United States as a free and independent country. The Declaration of Independence in particular explains the rights and freedoms that Americans. Each document is like a stepping stones that leads to the next and building upon the pervious document.
Moore, W.D. The fourteenth amendment’s initial authority: problems of constitutional coherence. Temple Political and Civil Rights Law Review. 2014. Vol NN:N. pp101-132.
Jefferson, Thomas. "The Declaration of Independence." The McGraw-Hill Reader: Issues Across the Disciplines. 8th edition, Ed. Gilbert H. Muller. New York: McGraw Hill, 2003. 305-308.
Lowi, Theodore J, et al. American Government Power & Purpose. 12th Ed. New York: W. W.
Goluboff, R. (2001). The 13th amendment and the lost origins of civil rights. Duke Law Journal, 50 (228): 1609
Landy, Marc and Sidney M. Milkis. American Government: Balancing Democracy and Rights. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2004.
Earl M. Maltz is a professor at Rutgers School of Law, who teaches constitutional law, employment discrimination, conflicts of law, and a seminar on the Supreme Court. He has written two books and various articles surrounding the topics of constitutional law, statutory interpretation, the role of the courts and legal history. In his article, “The Fourteenth Amendment and Native American Citizenship,” Maltz argues that the status of Native Americans were considered when writing the Fourteenth Amendment, yet discussions on the topic rarely focus on the role that they played. I think that the topic of Native American citizenship rose separately from African-American citizenship and that Maltz’s use of court cases throughout the text furthered
Landy, Marc and Sidney M. Milkis. American Government: Balancing Democracy and Rights. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2004.
Frederick Douglas, perhaps the most famous abolitionists in history, made it known that after the Civil War, African Americans should be equal to whites. To Douglas, the definition of equality would be the, “immediate, unconditional, and universal enfranchisement of the black man, in every state of the union.” Douglas reasoned that without this specific right that, “he is the slave of society.” Without the right to vote, African Americans would still be second class citizens to whites, and still subjected to white superiority, especially in the South, which would be very much like slavery. Racism was abundant throughout the United States, so the thinki...
McDowell, Gary L. “The Explosion and Erosion of Rights.” In Bodenhamer, David J. and Ely, James W. The Bill of Rights in Modern America. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008. Print.