U.S. Constitution

The U.S. Government is a democratic system, with an elected officiate that governs of the people, by the people, and for the people. All elected officials have the sworn duty to protect the U.S. Constitution, the overriding legal text that outlines the civil rights, liberties, and duties of the American people and its elected government. From Freedom of Speech guaranteed by the 1st Amendment to the 15th Amendment protecting civil liberties for minorities, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are only legal text. Without the diligent monitoring of U.S. citizens, many of the rights and civil liberties protected by the Constitution and Bill of Rights are undermined by government officials and/or agencies. Therefore, it is not the two actual documents outlining American’s rights that protect those rights, but it is the perceptions, beliefs, and actions of individual Americans that do so.

While many of the abuses that occur to the protections of the Constitution do so behind closed doors in subtle ways, often such abuses are glaring and well-documented. The 2000 Presidential Election showed how vulnerable the U.S. Constitution can be if the American people do not aggressively monitor actions taken by politicians, courts, and other agencies. For example, in Florida and other places across the country there was significant harassment of minority voters. While the overall election received enormous m

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tion or Bill of Rights. Yet, even if American beliefs and perceptions lean toward the feeling that the 2000 Presidential election was fair, this does not mean it was fair. For instance, we live in a democracy where the people are to elect the president in a popular vote. In addition to the numerous irregularities reported by thousands of voters, the actual Florida voting process and counting process came under heavy scrutiny. As a result of one of the biggest debacles in American political history, the Supreme Court basically judicially appointed an American president. This is the first time in the nation’s history that the judicial branch of the government, not the people, elected the nation’s president. While the Constitution makes some provision for such matters, the Supreme Court should have allowed all disputed ballots to be counted. According to FAIR, if all of the ballots that were rejected and disputed in Florida had been counted, the winner of the 2000 Presidential election as decided by the people would have been Al Gore. As FAIR reports, “Since voters are supposed to decide elections rather than lawyers or judges, the state’s electoral votes appear to have gone to the wrong candidate. Given that the outcome in
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Approximate Word count = 1241
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)

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