United States Constitution and the Implementation

C. United States Constitution and the Implementation

of Extended Republicanism

This part will be about understanding US Constitution in brief through 5 key concepts, and to see how amazingly durable this document has served the needs of US citizens since the day it has been ratified. The purpose of this part is to know what US Constitution really is, as well as to depict the implementation of Madison‘s This part will be about understanding US Constitution in brief through 5 key concepts, and to see how amazingly durable this document has served the needs of US citizens since the day it has been ratified. The purpose of this part is to know what US Constitution really is, as well as to depict the implementation of Madison‘s

Craig (2009) mentioned that understanding basic structure of United States Constitution is quite easy. The total length of US Constitution is over 4,500 words. About 4,000 of these words describe how the three branches of government are to operate. And another 400 words describe relationship between the states and the process of making amendments to the Constitution.

United States Constitution‘s Preamble is the most important part in the Constitution. This opening 52 words out of 45,000 is not many yet the most important

part of the Constitution. It explains the six core purposes for which the Constitution was written, and these six core purposes serve to define and limit the remaining words of the Constitution. The first 52 words, or known as the Preamble, stated: ―We

the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, 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. ‖ (U.S Constitution – Preamble from http://www.usconstitution.net/xconst_preamble.html ). From this 52-words- Preamble, we can infer six key aspects that ―We, the people of the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, 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. ‖ (U.S Constitution – Preamble from http://www.usconstitution.net/xconst_preamble.html ). From this 52-words- Preamble, we can infer six key aspects that ―We, the people of

Preamble

Interpretation We the People of the United States, in Order: - To form a more perfect Union - To establish Justice - To ensure domestic Tranquility - To provide for the common

defense - To promote the general Welfare - To secure the Blessings of Liberty

to ourselves and our Posterity

We the people of the United States, in order:

- To connect states - To establish justice - To ensure peace - To provide for defense - To promote the general welfare - To secure liberty now and for

future

To form a perfect union can be interpreted into to connect states, for the Union was very fragile at that time, it was divided based on interest. And worse,

Congressional membership was equal regardless of the population. And this caused chaotic condition for people brought varied interests with them. This conflicting interests in Congressional body could not be solved easily under the Articles of Confederation, thus James Madison along with Edmund Randolph suggested the Virginia Plan or Large State Plan where Congressional membership is determined also by the amount of population of the states.

We simply understand the next three points stated in the preamble which are establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, and provide common defense. The fifth point among six important keys that defines US Constitution is to promote the general welfare. To promote the general welfare as understood in 1787 do not mean the modern welfare government program as US government have today, but that means to create equal economic opportunity for all the citizens of United States. And the last point is to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity which can be interpreted as to secure liberty for now and for future. Everything else in the Constitution is supposed to serve only these six purposes.

One defining character of the Constitution is the Checks and Balances. It gives the power for each branch to exercise some form of power over the other

branches. ―For example, justices of the Supreme Court (judiciary) are appointed by the president (executive), but their appointments are subject to the consent of the U.S. Senate (legislative). Likewise, the judiciary can strike down as unconstitutional laws

passed by Congre ss and signed by the president.‖ (―Checks and Balances‖. U.S.

this example we can see that no single branch of government exercise too much power.

The next part of the Constitution will be the Articles encompassing the three branches of the Government, The Executive, Legislative, and Judiciary branch.

(Seibert, Craig. 2009. ―Understanding the U.S. Constitution part 1- 5 Key Concepts Everyone Should Know ‖)

The first branch that is listed in Article One of the Constitution is the Legislative branch, called Congress. Congress consists of The House of Representatives and the Senate.

Article 1 of the Constitution gives Congress many exclusive powers: to declare war, to maintain armed forces, to impose taxes and duties, to borrow money and pay debts, to spend money, to regulate the money supply, to Article 1 of the Constitution gives Congress many exclusive powers: to declare war, to maintain armed forces, to impose taxes and duties, to borrow money and pay debts, to spend money, to regulate the money supply, to

We need to underline the fact that the Founders believed the House of Representatives would be slightly more powerful than other branches of government, since House of Representatives is the closest to the People. This needs to be linked back on the history of United States‘ Congress. Before ratifying the US Constitution,

under the Articles of Confederation Congress was unicameral body in which each state had one vote. Constitutional convention discussed about Con gress‘ lack of power, and hence opened proposal debate between James Madison‘s Virginia Plan and William Patterson‘s New Jersey Plan.

Essentially, the Virginia Plan proposed a strong national government that could make and enforce laws, and collect taxes. The people would be governed by two governments - the state and national. A system such as this is known as a Federal system of government. Additionally, both houses of the legislature would feature proportional representation; basically, this means that the more people a state has, the more representatives it gets in the legislature. Clearly, larger states favored this plan. (Chin & Stern, 1997, par.1)

The opponent of this plan, the New Jersey Plan and states supporting the plan was panicking, thinking of the possibility of Virginia Plan getting approved by the Convention. If this plan passed, the smaller states would not be as powerful as big states in the government.

The debate over the Virginia Plan grew quite heated, and finally the small states asked for time to draw up their own plan, known as the New Jersey Plan. Its legislature only had one house which featured equal representation - each state gets the same number of representatives. This way, smaller states had the same power in the legislature as larger states. (Chin & Stern, 1997, par.2) The debate over the Virginia Plan grew quite heated, and finally the small states asked for time to draw up their own plan, known as the New Jersey Plan. Its legislature only had one house which featured equal representation - each state gets the same number of representatives. This way, smaller states had the same power in the legislature as larger states. (Chin & Stern, 1997, par.2)

The great Compromise becomes the bridge to actualize the ideal and fair Congressional composition of large and small states. ―The Compromise was submitted to the constitutional convention to break the deadlock created by the New

Jersey Plan and The Virginia Plan. The convention decided, after months of debate, that the legislature will be bicameral, meaning there will be two houses, one house will have equal representation, while the other is based on population of the state. ‖ ( Casutto, George. ―The Compromise of the Century: Larger and Smaller States Unite (June 30th, 1787), par.5 ‖). The Great Compromise is also known as the Connecticut Compromise because this idea was initiated by Connecticut delegate, Roger Sherman.

The next branch of government stated in the Constitution after the Legislative branch is the Executive branch. We can see from the chart of the Constitution which is bracketed into such fashion, that the Constitution's list of powers granted to the president or the mandatory of the Executive branch is much shorter than the list of powers granted to Congress. President of United States‘ roles and responsibilities are: The next branch of government stated in the Constitution after the Legislative branch is the Executive branch. We can see from the chart of the Constitution which is bracketed into such fashion, that the Constitution's list of powers granted to the president or the mandatory of the Executive branch is much shorter than the list of powers granted to Congress. President of United States‘ roles and responsibilities are:

four years ,..‖

(http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html#A2Sec1). But then in 1951 amendment restricted any person to only two elected terms as president ( ―The President‖. U.S. Department of State's Bureau of International Information Programs.). Therefore the President of the United States can be elected twice only, with four years term each.

Third part in Constitution after the Executive branch will be the Judicial branch, or Supreme Court. Their responsibilities are: to take appeals from citizens, courts and states, to make principle judgments, to ensure jury trials, and to uphold the

Constitution. In relation to Supreme Courts‘ function in ‗upholding the Constitution‘, there is a common mistake now how people might think that Supreme Court is the only one to be responsible with the contents of the Constitution; whilst in fact all the

three branches of United States government are responsible in upholding the Constitution, not just the Supreme Court.

There is additional part of the Constitution that has been added shortly after the ratification, consists of the first ten amendments named the Bill of Rights. Bill of Rights is the concise listing of the rights of the citizens of the United States as well as

Constitutional Convention.

What is interesting to note is that when the Constitutional Convention finished its work, it did not find it necessary to include a bill of rights in the final version. Several members, notably George Mason, were very disappointed by this decision and refused to sign the document over the issue. The argument was that the Constitution did not give the new federal government the ability to restrict inherent rights, so no list of those rights was necessary. Others worried that if the rights were listed, they would invariably forget some and the list would ever be incomplete. Finally, the argument was that the states each had their own constitutions, too, and that rights were best protected at a state

Rights, from http://www.usconstitution.net/consttop_bor.html )

From all issues that the Anti-Federalist gave when they rejected the Constitution, the lack of Bill of Rights was the most debated one. American people had just fought a war to defend their rights, and they did not want the controlling government take their rights again. Therefore Anti Federalist fought for the rights- listing in the Constitution. Whilst The Federalist thought that listing of rights can be dangerous because it might hamper the non-listed ones. Because there are actually many rights that should be protected, and the founders (Constitution drafters) were afraid if they missed some points o f people‘s rights. So it would be better to list none at all.

Overall, the Federalists were more organized in their efforts. By June of 1788, the Constitution was close to ratification. Nine states had ratified it, and only one more (New Hampshire) was needed. To achieve this, the Federalists agreed that once Congress met, it would draft a Bill of Rights. Finally, New York and Virginia approved, and the Constitution was a reality. (Chin & Stern, 1997, par.5)

Finally, The Federalists agreed to add Bill of Rights to realize Constitution Finally, The Federalists agreed to add Bill of Rights to realize Constitution

faculties. Drafted by Madison, Bill of Rights consists of limitation to the government and listing of certain rights of the people. In summation, it contains what framers thought as the basic important rights of the people, for instance: the freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, freedom of speech and freedom of expression. James Madison actually hesitated to include these first ten amendments since listing people rights could be dangerous enough. He was afraid that the list could be endless, since government needs to consider its people‘s rights carefully in minimalizing the risk of

rights-violation. Yet eventually to reach a concession and to save more energy, Madison agreed to draft the Bill of Rights which ended the debate between Federalist and anti-Federalist.