Bill of Rights Purpose

[Moe Bedard]

The Bill of Rights plays a central role in American law and government, and remains a fundamental symbol of the freedoms and culture of the nation.

A Bill of Rights is basically a list of the rights of the people from which the government is forbidden from interfering. Bills of Rights were nothing new at this point in history. The Magna Carta, signed in 1215, forced King John to respect certain rights of those in his kingdom, such as their right to writs of habeas corpus (meaning their right to appeal unlawful imprisonment), and forced him to admit that his actions must be controlled by the law.

The English Bill of Rights of 1689 guaranteed certain rights to the people as represented by their members of Parliament against the King, such as freedom to petition the government, freedom from taxation without legislative approval and freedom from cruel and unusual punishment. Many of the states had enacted their own bills of rights to protect their own citizens as well.

Right from the start there were problems with the Articles of Confederation. Recall that the American people were extremely concerned about their government abusing their rights. This was the whole purpose of the Revolutionary War. Because of this fear, the Congress and colonies that adopted the Articles of Confederation made the government purposefully weak.

These Rights prohibits Congress from making any law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, forbids infringement of "...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms...", and prohibits the federal government from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.

In federal criminal cases, it requires indictment by grand jury for any capital or "infamous crime", guarantees a speedy public trial with an impartial jury composed of members of the state or judicial district in which the crime occurred, and prohibits double jeopardy. In addition, the Bill of Rights states that "the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people,"[3] and reserves all powers not granted to the federal government to the citizenry or States. Most of these restrictions were later applied to the states by a series of decisions applying the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was ratified in 1868, after the American Civil War.

The first 10 amendments to the US Constitution that were introduced by James Madison in 1789 and supported by Thomas Jefferson. Basically, Madison proposed these amendments as an attempt to maintain the sanctity of the US Constitution that was being threatened by the struggle between the Federalists and the anti-Federalists.

The amendments were in response to the claim that the US Constitution should not be ratified because it did not comply with the principles of liberty. Thus, the primary purpose of the Bill of Rights was to introduce moderate changes to the constitution to ensure the security of the rights of citizens.

Here are the basic components of the Bill of Rights:


First Amendment:

• Freedom of speech
• Freedom of religion/secular government
• Right to assembly
• Freedom of the press
• Grievance redress

Second Amendment:

• Right to arms

Third Amendment:

• Elimination of the mandatory quartering of soldiers

Fourth Amendment:

• Ban against the unreasonable search of an individual's house, person and papers

Fifth Amendment:

• Ban against self-incrimination and double jeopardy, with regards to an infamous or capital crime

Sixth Amendment:

• Right to counsel and a fair trial

Seventh Amendment:

• Right to trial by jury in civil cases

Eighth Amendment:

• Ban on bail and/or corporal punishment

Ninth Amendment:

• Protection of those rights that have not been mentioned, such as the requirement for less than a ratio of one is to 40,000 for representation in Congress

Tenth Amendment:

• Preservation of people and state powers

In summary, the Bill of Rights was developed to protect the citizenry from the abuse of basic rights that is made available by the Constitution. The concept of people having natural rights was emphasized in the final draft of the Constitution. These rights affirmed the power of the people to intervene in the democracy and in preventing abuse by government officials.



Sources:

1. United States Bill of Rights - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
2. History Bill of Rights