Why Was The Bill Of Rights Important

The United States Bill of Rights came into being as a result of a promise made by the Fathers of Confederation to the states during the struggle for ratification of the Constitution in 1787-88. A great number of the states made as a condition for their ratification, the addition of amendments, which would guarantee citizens protection of their rights against the central government. Thus, we have a rather interesting situation in which the entrenchment of a bill of rights in the American Constitution was done by the virtual demand of the states, they themselves fearing a central government which was not legally constrained and restricted as far as its powers were concerned.

Need for a Bill of Rights --No defined bill of rights, no ratification-enough states refused to sign -The bill of rights limited federal government power. The Constitution and Slavery - Jefferson proposed an anti-slavery clause for the Constitution -Enough states were opposed that it would not be ratified if it contained any antislavery wording -Each slave was counted as 3/5 of a man when determining the population of a state. -By agreement, no laws/amendments regarding importing slaves could be considered until 1808 -By constitutional agreement escaped slaves going to a non-slave state would be returned to their owners in the South The Motives of the Framers Economic Interests at the Convention -The men writing the constitution worked really hard to represent their states interests as opposed to their own economic

The people are the basis for any power that the federal government preserves and must always protect those who empower them. The written Constitution they created was not to define the rights of the people, but to limit the powers the national government would hold over the people. The Constitution would create a National government that would create a strong federal government, while safeguarding the rights of the people, and conserving checks on power it holds. The framers did not believe in cataloging individual rights in the constitution. They believed it would be threatening to define the rights that the people hold. Alexander Hamilton specifically believed that the Constitution had no power to infringe on the natural rights that all people have. However, the Bill of Rights was created from a compromise and thus, created the first ten amendments to the Constitution. These rights listed protections from the National government. These rights have proven to be security against the federal governments use of an enumerated power that they might hold. It is important for this very reason to have a written Bill of Rights in the United States Constitution. It does not define what rights the people hold, it defines what the government is entrusted to protect: the people. It is for this reason that I agree that the Bill of Rights was necessary to be written in the

Federalists argued that the Constitution did not need the Bill of Rights. Anti- Federalists (Thomas Jefferson) argued it was necessary to guard the individual citizen. The Federalists wanted to be the superior government over the state government, where as the Anti-federalists wanted the opposite. Thomas Jefferson thought that if the Federalist were the superior government, that the individual citizen wouldn’t have a voice to speak for themselves; that they couldn’t be entitled to their own opinion. This is why the Bill of Rights was put into place. The Amendments make up the Bill of Rights to separate government and

The Constitution did not include the Bill of Rights, the Anti- Federalists believed that this was yet another example of there being no limit on the centralized government’s power, and there was no protection for the

The Anti-federalists opposed the Constitution because they believed it did not secure their rights and gave the government too much power. (2) Patrick Henry, an Anti-federalist from Virginia said that the constitution took away the states rights to be individual and to make separate decisions as well. (4) The Federalists saw the Anti-federalists complaint and realized that in order for the Constitution to be passed, they would need a Bill of Rights. (6) This Bill of Rights would give rights to the people and the states. 12 amendments were submitted for ratification by congress, but the states only ratified 10 of them. They became know as the Bill of Rights which made most

On one side, many of the framers, who called themselves Federalist, did not want to add a bill of rights to the Constitution. The Federalist feared that a bill of rights would do the opposite of protecting our freedoms. They also believed that a bill of rights was essentially showing that we get our natural freedoms from government. However, in reality

The Bill of Rights was like a pinky promise made between the new government and the States. One of the more well known promises made by the Bill of Rights was the second amendment which protected the rights of the populace preventing the federal government from infringing on “the right of the people to keep and bear arms.” (Bill of Rights, 1791). This was originally intended to preserve the ability of the people of the United States to once again overthrow tyrants if the need arose. Not coincidentally, George Washington himself was afraid that even he could become a tyrant.

In 1791, the Bill of Rights was drafted by congress after arguments ensued over whether the Constitution would uphold the rights of the American people. James Madison proposed twelve Amendments so to limit the power of government, allowing for a more stately and locally controlled system but, only ten were ratified. The ten amendments to be ratified were created to give American citizens freedoms they did not have under British rule. However, in current society the freedoms protected in the Bill of Rights are conflicted by the federal government and the confliction are justified as being beneficial for the general public. The altered interpretations of the Bill of Rights have forsaken freedom of speech, allowed unjustified search and seizure,

The bill of rights is a popular document that was not originally in the US constitution, but anti federalists wanted a bill of rights really bad because supposedly they were afraid of a strong central government. They did not want another king so some states refused the constitution until there was a bill of rights. Along with being afraid of a central government they wanted a limited government so that government could not control them. The anti federalists also thought the government would not protect their individual rights enough so they wanted a bill of rights.

The American population has been ruled by different documents over time. When a document did not work, the Americans moved on to a different one, such as the Articles of Confederation to the United States Constitution. The Bill of Rights was added for the benefit of Americans, it was a good compromise between the Federalists and Anti-Federalists, and that it is still relevant today.

Upon creating the U.S. Constitution, the framers of America believed that “in order to form a more perfect union,” we required a government that would “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” They sought to form a political entity that would take the necessary steps to ensure that the people of the nation would have the freedom to act and speak according to their own free will and guarantee their future generations the entitlement to that same liberty. The bill of rights, laid out as the first 10 amendments in the Constitution, guarantees citizens a number of personal freedoms that the government cannot infringe upon. Through the process of incorporation, the amendments not only apply to the federal government, but also to the states and local government. Therefore, allowing for the reservation of powers to the states and the people that were not notably allowed to the federal government.

In 1787 amidst much turmoil in the new American colonies, delegates of the Continental Congress drafted a brand new document. Our Constitution was written with the intent of providing a strong centralized government which had not existed previously under the Articles of Confederation. One thing lacking in the Constitution was statement of citizens rights. Under British rule, enforcement of rules such as the Stamp Act were often without reasonable suspicion and left colonists feeling as though the British could do whatever they wished. It took a few years for this to finally be changed and when completed, the Bill of Rights was a protection of citizen 's “unalienable” and “natural” rights.

The First Amendment, (the entire Bill of Rights) was not included in the Constitution when it was written 1787. Those supporting the Constitution argued that many state constitutions already protected individual rights and that the failure to list the rights did not mean that they did not exist as natural rights, beyond government authority. Viewing the consequences that could happen and conflict it may stir many officials decided that it was fair to truly go over the matter and sort out all of main focuses of the First

Secondly, the Bill of Rights did not address every foreseeable situation. One failure of the Bill of Rights was the first amendment of the original Bill of Rights. The amendment concerned the number of constituents for each Representative and was never ratified. It said that once the House has one hundred members, it should not go below one hundred, and once it reached two hundred, it should not go below two hundred (Mount 1). Another failure was The Anti-Title Amendment. This amendment said that any citizen who accepted or received any title of nobility from a foreign power, or who accepted without the consent of Congress any gift from a foreign power, by would no longer be a citizen (Mount 1). Basically, this said that if someone received or accepted something from a foreign power, that person would no longer be a citizen. The Anti-Title Amendment was submitted to the States in 1810 and was ratified by only twelve states, the last being in 1812 (Mount 1). Thirty-eight states are required to ratify to add an amendment. The Slavery Amendment was another failure of the Bill of Rights. This amendment was not ratified because the House did not want any amendment to be made to the Constitution which would authorize or give to Congress the power to abolish or interfere, within any state, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of