background preloader

Transcript of the Constitution of the United States - Official Text

Transcript of the Constitution of the United States - Official Text
The Constitution of the United States: A Transcription Note: The following text is a transcription of the Constitution as it was inscribed by Jacob Shallus on parchment (the document on display in the Rotunda at the National Archives Museum.) Items that are hyperlinked have since been amended or superseded. The authenticated text of the Constitution can be found on the website of the Government Printing Office. We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. Article. Section. 1. All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives. Section. 2. Section. 3. The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. G°. Related:  Voices for JusticeGovernment And Social Stuff

Panopticon Prison design The panopticon is a design of institutional building with an inbuilt system of control, originated by the English philosopher and social theorist Jeremy Bentham in the 18th century. The concept is to allow all prisoners of an institution to be observed by a single security guard, without the inmates knowing whether or not they are being watched. Conceptual history[edit] The word panopticon derives from the Greek word for "all seeing" – panoptes.[3] In 1785, Jeremy Bentham, an English social reformer and founder of utilitarianism, travelled to Krichev in Mogilev Governorate of the Russian Empire (modern Belarus) to visit his brother, Samuel, who accompanied Prince Potemkin.[4]: xxxviii Bentham arrived in Krichev in early 1786[5] and stayed for almost two years. Bentham thought that the chief mechanism that would bring the manager of the panopticon prison in line with the duty to be humane would be publicity. Prison design[edit] Architecture of other institutions[edit]

Men and mass murder: What gender tells us about America's epidemic of gun violence Another week (or day) in America, another mass shooting. Another mass shooting, another flood of liberal attacks on gun culture, the Second Amendment, and the NRA. And another round of conservative pushback asserting some version of "guns don't kill people; people kill people." And another Barack Obama press conference railing at our failure to "do something" to stop the violence. And on and on and on. Not long ago, I made my own contribution to the conversation, expressing despair that anything can significantly change this horrifying facet of our national life and culture. But realism (or fatalism) doesn't preclude trying to understand why it keeps happening. More Perspectives James Poulos How TPP cements Obama's corporatist legacy Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry China's tyrannical new 'credit score' is a warning to America Murder is an overwhelmingly male act, with the offender proving to be a man 90 percent of the time the person's gender is known. We don't lack for explanations.

United States Constitution Supreme law of the United States of America The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America.[3] It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution. Originally comprising seven articles, it delineates the national frame of government. Since the Constitution came into force in 1789, it has been amended 27 times, including one amendment that repealed a previous one,[5] in order to meet the needs of a nation that has profoundly changed since the 18th century.[6] In general, the first ten amendments, known collectively as the Bill of Rights, offer specific protections of individual liberty and justice and place restrictions on the powers of government.[7][8] The majority of the 17 later amendments expand individual civil rights protections. Contents Background First government From September 5, 1774, to March 1, 1781, the Continental Congress functioned as the provisional government of the United States. Congress was paralyzed.

A Republic, Not a Democracy by Ron Paul by Ron Paul Recently by Ron Paul: Meaningless Words in Politics Listen to Ron Paul Last week marked the conclusion of the grand taxpayer funded spectacles known as the national party conventions. It is perhaps very telling that while $18 million in tax dollars was granted to each party for these lavish ordeals, an additional $50 million each was needed for security in anticipation of the inevitable protests at each event. At these conventions, leaders determined, or pretended to determine, who they wished to govern the nation for the next four years amidst inevitable, endless exaltations of democracy. Democracy is majority rule at the expense of the minority. Sadly, the constitution and its protections are respected less and less as we have quietly allowed our constitutional republic to devolve into a militarist, corporatist social democracy. This is why increasing importance is placed on the beliefs and views of the president. See the Ron Paul File September 12, 2012 Dr.

Declaration of Independence - Text Transcript The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776. The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.] 16 April 1963 My Dear Fellow Clergymen: While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities "unwise and untimely." Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against "outsiders coming in." But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self purification; and direct action.

How Star Trek Explains The Decline Of Liberalism Leonard Nimoy’s death in February brought to a close his unusual career continually playing a single role for half a century. Between 1966, when the television show “Star Trek” premiered, and 2013, when the movie “Star Trek Into Darkness” hit the screens, Nimoy portrayed the franchise’s beloved first officer, Mr. Spock, in two TV series and eight films. As he acknowledged, the key to “Star Trek’s” longevity and cultural penetration was its seriousness of purpose, originally inspired by creator Gene Roddenberry’s science-fiction vision. Modeled on “Gulliver’s Travels,” the series was meant as an opportunity for social commentary, and it succeeded ingeniously, with episodes scripted by some of the era’s finest science-fiction writers. Yet the development of “Star Trek’s” moral and political tone over 50 years also traces the strange decline of American liberalism since the Kennedy era. Captain Kirk and the Cold War This could have been declaimed by Captain James T. For Freedom of Choice J.

The U.S. Constitution By September 1787, the convention’s five-member Committee of Style (Hamilton, Madison, William Samuel Johnson of Connecticut, Gouverneur Morris of New York, Rufus King of Massachusetts) had drafted the final text of the Constitution, which consisted of some 4,200 words. On September 17, George Washington was the first to sign the document. Of the 55 delegates, a total of 39 signed; some had already left Philadelphia, and three–George Mason (1725-92) and Edmund Randolph (1753-1813) of Virginia, and Elbridge Gerry (1744-1813) of Massachusetts–refused to approve the document. James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, with assistance from John Jay, wrote a series of essays to persuade people to ratify the Constitution. Beginning on December 7, 1787, five states–Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut–ratified the Constitution in quick succession.

Related: