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Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them!
Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them!
Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them!
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Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them!

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In the last generation, the federal government and Supreme Court have gained an enormous amount of power at the expense of individual and state rights. Americans have become increasingly ignorant of their constitutional freedoms, so much so that most people don't even realize it when a legislative or court decision blatantly violates their rights. Understanding your rights as an American citizen is vital to preserving America as we have known it. An increasingly loud subset of Americans are openly advocating for a totalitarian government in which the all knowing, all wise government employees and judges determine how the rest of us should live.

The Founders were used to a totalitarian government. The monarch of England and the British Parliament were reigning over their American colonies with absolute power. The colonists weren't represented in Parliament. They had no power to change unjust laws by legislative means. They had to revolt and fight with arms to overturn an unjust system.

Today, fortunately, we do have the power to vote. The government is still in the hands of the people and we can change it if we want to. All powerful courts and dictatorial edicts from Washington are the law of the day, however, because we have allowed it. We have placed people into office who usurp local authority, tell us the laws passed by our legislatures are "unconstitutional" and violate our rights everyday.

The key to changing this is our own education concerning political matters. We must learn the principles in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. We must read them and understand the proper roles of the President, Congress, the Supreme Court and the States. We must learn about the limited list of powers given to Congress in the Constitution and know that all other rights and powers are given to the states and to the people.

In "Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them!" you will learn about the basic rights guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution. You will learn about their history, why they were important to the Founders and how they impact you on a daily basis.

Understanding these rights is the key to slowing and reversing the power grab from Washington. Let's understand our rights and put people into office who will preserve them and reverse the trend before it is too late.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateApr 11, 2012
ISBN9781476408569
Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them!
Author

Revolutionary War and Beyond

Revolutionary War and Beyond is dedicated to teaching you about the American Revolution and the founding period of the United States. You will find information about the Declaration of Independence, Founding Fathers, US Constitution, Bill of Rights, Revolutionary War Facts, Revolutionary War Quotes and more. Subscribe to American Beginnings, our bi-weekly newsletter and join our American History Book Club and read along with us as we read books about the Founding Fathers.

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    Understand Your Rights Because You're About to Lose Them! - Revolutionary War and Beyond

    UNDERSTAND YOUR RIGHTS

    BECAUSE YOU'RE ABOUT TO LOSE THEM!

    Understanding the Bill of Rights and

    What You Have as an American

    By

    Revolutionary War and Beyond

    Smashwords Edition

    Copyright 2012 by Revolutionary War and Beyond

    www.revolutionary-war-and-beyond.com

    Smashwords Edition, License Notes

    This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

    All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

    Disclaimer: This book is meant to be informative, but its opinions do not constitute legal advice and are not meant to advise you in particular legal situations. If you are facing legal questions and situations you should retain the assistance of a competent attorney.

    TOC

    Cover

    Title Page

    Prologue

    Chapter 1 - The First American Government

    Chapter 2 - The Need for a Bill of Rights

    Chapter 3 - Are Our Rights Eroding Away?

    Chapter 4 - The First Amendment

    Chapter 5 - The Second Amendment

    Chapter 6 - The Third Amendment

    Chapter 7 - The Fourth Amendment

    Chapter 8 - The Fifth Amendment

    Chapter 9 - The Sixth Amendment

    Chapter 10 - The Seventh Amendment

    Chapter 11 - The Eighth Amendment

    Chapter 12 - The Ninth Amendment

    Chapter 13 - The Tenth Amendment

    Chapter 14 - Conclusion

    Appendix

    Assize of Clarendon

    Magna Carta

    English Bill of Rights

    Declaration and Resolves

    Lee Resolution

    Virginia Declaration of Rights

    Declaration of Independence

    Articles of Confederation

    Annapolis Convention Report

    United States Constitution

    James Madison Speech to Congress, June 8, 1789

    Bill of Rights

    Fourteenth Amendment

    List of Images

    End Page

    We refer to many different documents, such as the Magna Carta, Declaration of Independence, US Constitution and Bill of Rights, throughout this book. For your convenience, these documents are printed in their entirety at the end of the book. You will find links to these documents in many places throughout the book, so you can click through and read them if you like.

    This book is dedicated to those who have gone before us who sacrificed everything they had to give us what we have.

    Prologue

    During the last generation, a great change occurred in America that would be quite alarming to the Founding Fathers if they were to become aware of it. Americans yielded an enormous amount of power to the federal government and to the Supreme Court. Decisions that were once handled by elected legislatures are now regularly handled by Congress and the handful of judges that sit on our federal courts and in Washington DC.

    It is a common event for the Court to throw out laws made by state legislatures, calling them unconstitutional. Who gave them this right? Thomas Jefferson said, Our judges are as honest as other men and not more so. They have, with others, the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps. They don't possess some superior virtue to the rest of us.

    This book will endeavor to explain to you the basic rights that are guaranteed in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Some of them you may never have even heard of before. Others you will be quite familiar with. All of them, however, are important.

    You will learn not only about the rights themselves, but also their history. You will learn why the Founders believed they were important and wanted to guarantee that you would have them.

    The Founders carefully crafted a document that would allow the new government to successfully function, but with one important caveat… the people were to be protected from it.

    Protected from it growing to powerful. Protected from it stealing their individual rights away from them. Protected from it stealing governing power away from their local state governments. Protected from a small handful of bureaucrats, judges and politicians ruling over their lives.

    Our rights are under fire today. We have a large group of Americans now openly advocating for a totalitarian society in which the all wise government employees tell the rest of us how we should live.

    Others advocate for an independent judiciary and say things like, We can be represented as well in Congress as we can in our states, so let's just let Congress do it all.

    Thomas Jefferson said:

    It should be remembered as an axiom of eternal truth in politics that whatever power in any government is independent is absolute also... Independence can be trusted nowhere but with the people in mass.

    In other words, the smaller the group of people that has the authority, the more they will trample on the rights of the masses. The only real place of safety Americans have is when their local legislatures make decisions that govern them, not far away courts and politicians.

    Let this book be a wakeup call to you to be informed of your rights as an American citizen. When a politician or court exceeds its constitutional power, it should automatically stand out like a glaring light bulb to us because we are so familiar with their defined roles in the Constitution that we can't help but notice their flagrant power grabs.

    It may sound alarming, but your rights have been so weakened in the last generation that America as you know it is really only hanging by a thread anymore. It is quite possible that we could see the United States go the way of Rome within a short period of time.

    If you will take to heart the message of this book, which is to be educated about your rights in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and help spread the word of individual freedom to your generation, we can see this slide and deterioration of America stopped cold. We will have individual freedom not only restored, but secured for the rest of our lives and the next generation, as well.

    Chapter 1

    The First American Government

    During the American Revolution, many colonists began to look into the future to a day when the war would be over and a new American government would be formed. If they were successful in throwing out the British government, a new one would have to take its place.

    Richard Henry Lee was a delegate from Virginia to the Continental Congress. In 1776, he submitted the resolution to Congress that called for a declaration of independence from Great Britain. This resolution was accepted by the full Congress who then had a committee write up the formal Declaration of Independence that we know today.

    Many people are unaware, though, that the Lee Resolution also called for a plan of confederation to be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation.

    Congress also approved of this idea and appointed a committee to draft a document that would govern the new nation made up of the thirteen former British colonies – a united government. The final document was known as the Articles of Confederation. The Articles were submitted to the states in November, 1777.

    Virginia was the first state to accept the Articles of Confederation in December of 1777. Nine other colonies accepted them in the following four months. The remaining three, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland accepted them over the course of the next few years. It took those last states so long to accept due to the war, internal disagreements about whether or not to join the union and reluctance to give up land claims in the West. When Maryland finally approved the Articles on March 1, 1781, the union was complete and the United States of America was born.

    Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom

    National Archives - Washington DC

    Home of the Declaration of Independence,

    Articles of Confederation and

    United States Constitution - 1

    The Articles of Confederation

    The Articles of Confederation purposefully created a weak central government that lacked the power to do much. Why would the Founders create a weak government? The simplest answer is that they did not want to create another tyrannical government to replace the one they were trying to overthrow! Instead, they envisioned each state as its own sovereign territory that could make its own laws and govern itself however the people of that state saw fit.

    Consequently, the Articles stated in Article 2 that:

    Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.

    A simple translation of that article is that the federal Congress could only do those things that were specifically given to it in the Articles of Confederation. Every other type of authority was left to each state to decide on its own.

    The Articles of Confederation governed relations between the states and defined the powers of the new government of the United States as follows:

    Congress was responsible for national security – that is, that an attack on one was considered an attack on all and Congress was required to deal with such an attack.

    Citizens of the United States were given the right to freely travel and conduct business in any state as long as they obeyed the laws of the state they were in.

    If a criminal fled justice to another state, he had to be deported to the state from which he fled at the request of the executive of that state.

    Full faith and credit was to be given by each state to the other states’ records, laws and judicial proceedings. This means that a marriage certificate, a criminal conviction or any other such legal matter in one state had to be recognized by the others.

    Each state was given one vote in Congress and could have two to seven delegates attend.

    Only the central government was allowed to engage in commercial treaties and political negotiations with foreign governments.

    Only the central government could declare war or participate in war, except in case of an imminent invasion. The states were not allowed to keep standing armies or navies, but were required to keep a well-armed and trained militia at the ready.

    If Congress needed to raise an army, the states would raise the soldiers and appoint all the leaders with the rank of colonel or lower, Congress would then appoint higher ranking officers and would direct these armies.

    Any expenses for Congress were to be paid by the state legislatures in proportion to the value of the land in each state.

    A committee consisting of one member of each state delegation was set up to run the government when Congress was not assembled. At least nine states had to agree in order for a decision of the committee to take effect.

    If Canada decided to join the confederation, it would be allowed.

    All debts of the states from the war would be incurred by Congress.

    All decisions made in Congress had to have the consent of at least nine states.

    The Articles were perpetual and could only be altered with agreement of all the state legislatures.

    In addition to the provisions listed above, Congress was given the sole authority to do the following things:

    Declare war, appoint ambassadors, create an army and navy, enter into treaties and alliances, make rules concerning military prizes captured on land or at sea, appoint courts for the trial of crimes committed at sea, create a system of weights and measures, create a national post office and be the final arbiter for disputes between the states.

    Notice that the powers given to Congress were quite limited. Congress did not make criminal law or appoint courts to try criminals or resolve disputes, except for crimes committed at sea. Congress did not have any way to compel the states to give them the money it was owed. Congress did not regulate trade between the states or the prices of goods. There was no President, although Congress could appoint a leader in each session. There was no Supreme Court.

    All of this created quite a bit of trouble for the government. Every time it needed money it would ask the states to send some… and they wouldn’t. Trade between states and with other countries was greatly hampered because each state made its own trade laws. One state would allow trade with England and another wouldn’t. One would set the price for cotton at one price and another would complain their prices were being undercut.

    The army was constantly undersupplied because Congress had no money. Foreign ambassadors had trouble creating commercial treaties because they didn’t know whether or not the states would obey them. Congress couldn’t even get its members to attend half the time!

    What would happen the next time a war arose? Would Congress have the power to organize and execute a war effort when it could barely sustain itself?

    You can read the Articles of Confederation here.

    A New Constitution

    All of this weakness and confusion caused many people to believe that a new constitution was needed that would give the central government adequate power to govern the nation.

    Men such as Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, James Madison, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, John Jay and others began to call for the creation of a new constitution with stronger powers given to the central government. They became known as Federalists because they advocated a stronger federal government.

    Others though, were against the idea and they became known as Anti-Federalists. They were perfectly content with their own states being allowed to make all the decisions for themselves. The last thing they wanted was a stronger central government making decisions that would affect their lives and take away power from their states. Men such as Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, Elbridge Gerry, Patrick Henry, James Monroe and Richard Henry Lee, were Anti-Federalists.

    In 1786, James Madison and Alexander Hamilton spearheaded a meeting to address some of the problems under the Articles of Confederation. Delegates from five states met at Annapolis, Maryland to examine how the creation of a nationwide system of commercial regulation would reduce conflict between the states and increase the economic activity of all. The convention became known as the Annapolis Convention.

    New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Delaware were the only states represented in Annapolis. Massachusetts, Rhode Island, North Carolina and New Hampshire had appointed delegates, but they did not arrive in time for the meeting. Connecticut, South Carolina, Georgia and Maryland didn’t even take any action to send delegates.

    The delegates present at the Annapolis Convention didn’t think there were enough states represented to make any serious agreements, so instead, they created a report, known as the Annapolis Convention report, calling on Congress to hold a meeting the following May in Philadelphia to consider amending the Articles of Confederation. They expressed not only their desire that policies concerning trade between the states be revised, but they hoped the entire Articles would be reviewed so other areas of concern, that were familiar to all, would be addressed. You can read the Annapolis Convention report here.

    The Congress of the Confederation received the report from the delegates at the Annapolis Convention and agreed with their findings. A new convention was scheduled to begin on May 14, 1787 that would examine the problems in the Articles of Confederation and propose amendments that would make it function better.

    The Constitutional Convention

    Even though the stated purpose of the Convention that met in Philadelphia in May, 1787 was to amend the Articles of Confederation, some of the delegates had much more radical plans. Their wish was to completely throw out the Articles and rewrite a brand new constitution.

    James Madison of Virginia was one of the leading proponents of writing a new constitution. When he arrived in Philadelphia, he presented a carefully researched and designed plan for a new constitution.

    James Madison - 2

    Due to the unpredictable nature of travel in those days, all of the delegates were not in Philadelphia on the first day of the convention. It took several weeks for everyone to arrive. Madison, however, was among the first.

    The Virginia and Pennsylvania delegations arrived before most of the others and Madison took advantage of this by promoting his plan to them. The Virginia delegation formally presented the plan to the others already present. The delegations from Virginia and Pennsylvania all supported Madison’s plan, which became known as the Virginia plan, and formed a strong coalition in the Convention to promote its acceptance by the others.

    Eventually the entire Congress voted to accept Madison’s plan for a new constitution. Then they began an extensive examination of each part, making revision after revision after revision, until the document was satisfactory in the eyes of as many delegates as possible.

    The Content of the New Constitution

    Most Americans are familiar with the basics of the Constitution. You are encouraged to read the entire United States Constitution at the back of this book. It doesn't take too long to read. If you want to have any understanding at all of how American government is supposed to function, you must begin with reading the Constitution!

    A basic overview includes the following:

    The Legislative Branch

    Article 1 establishes and defines the powers of the Legislative branch of the government – otherwise known as the Congress of the United States. It creates the House of Representatives, which is made up of 435 members divided up proportionally according to the size of each state, giving larger states an advantage. Representatives serve two year terms.

    Article 1 also creates the Senate. Each state has two senators who serve six year terms. Since each state has the same number of senators, small states have as much power in the Senate as large states. This prevents the largest states from running over the smaller states.

    Other parts of Article 1 state that Congress must meet once a year; members can be fined if they do not show up; members cannot be detained while traveling back and forth to Congress; all spending bills must originate in the House; bills must pass both houses of Congress in the exact same form in order to become law, which the President can veto; Congress can lay and collect taxes; Congress must establish an army, navy, post offices and lower federal courts; Congress has the sole power to declare war and to print money.

    In order to alleviate some of the squabbling between the states that existed under the Articles of Confederation, the new Constitution also allowed Congress to regulate all interstate trade and foreign trade, strictly forbidding any regulations that favored one state over another.

    The Constitution forbade the states from laying taxes on imports and exports from other states, printing money, entering into treaties with other states or foreign powers and keeping standing armies or navies.

    The Executive Branch

    Article 2 of the Constitution establishes the Executive Branch of government. The offices of the President and Vice President are created and given four year terms. The Electoral College is created. The President is given control of the army, navy and state militias (today’s National Guard).

    The President is given the power to make treaties with foreign powers and appoint ambassadors, judges and other officers of the government with consent of the Senate. He is also given the responsibilities of receiving foreign ambassadors and executing the laws passed by Congress.

    The Judicial Branch

    Article 3 establishes the Supreme Court, the highest court in the nation. It allows judges to serve as long as they are on good behavior, which usually means for life. It also defines which cases the Supreme Court has jurisdiction over, including cases between states or citizens of one state against another state. It also guarantees the right of trial by jury and defines treason as giving aid and comfort to foreign enemies.

    Articles Four through Seven

    The remaining articles of the Constitution, Articles 4-7, mandate that all states must recognize the laws of other states, meaning for example, that if a couple is married in Missouri, Massachusetts must also recognize the marriage, or if someone is convicted of a crime in Florida, he is also considered to be guilty by Texas.

    Other measures in the last four articles guarantee that all citizens be treated equally, no matter which state they are in and that if a person who commits a crime in one state flees to another state, he must be returned to the state where he committed the crime to face charges.

    The rules for admitting new states to the Union are defined and the government is guaranteed to be a republican government, meaning the states and federal government derive their powers from the people. It also guarantees that the federal government will protect the people from invasions and domestic insurrection.

    Article 5 defines how the Constitution can be amended. The process is that two-thirds of each House of Congress must propose Amendments to the Constitution, which are then forwarded to the States. If three-fourths of the States vote to approve the Amendment, it becomes law.

    The final section of the Constitution guarantees that all debts incurred by the government under the previous Articles of Confederation will be assumed by the new government; makes the Constitution and any laws or treaties passed by the Congress the supreme Law of the Land and requires all executive officers and judges to take an oath of allegiance to support the Constitution.

    Finally, the last Article of the Constitution, Article 7, brings us to the topic of this book, which is… the Bill of Rights.

    Article 7 requires that each state must hold a ratification convention to approve the establishment of the Constitution as the new governing document of the United States. It requires that nine of the thirteen states must approve it to go into effect. To ratify something means to formally approve, express assent to or make legally valid. So if the states were to ratify the Constitution, they would be formally approving it, expressing assent to it and making it legally valid.

    Scene at the Signing of the Constitution

    by Howard Chandler Christy - 3

    After the Philadelphia Convention drew up the Constitution, it sent the document to the Congress of the Confederation which met in New York. This Congress then forwarded a copy to each of the thirteen states with instructions to hold a ratification convention to vote on whether or not to approve the new Constitution.

    And this is where the problem began that resulted in the creation of the Bill of Rights…

    Chapter 2

    The Need for a Bill of Rights

    What is the purpose of the Bill of Rights? Why was it important to the Founding Fathers? What function does it serve? What is a bill of rights?

    Once the new Constitution was sent to the states for ratification in the fall of 1787, a spirited debate began across the country about the desired size and scope of the federal government. Keep in mind that the people of the United States had just thrown out a tyrannical government only a few years before. They were extremely leery of any central government at all and wanted to be certain not to create another tyrannical power in its place.

    Once copies of the proposed Constitution were published and citizens had a chance to look at it, opinions came fast and furious from all sides. As was mentioned earlier, the people more or less coalesced into two camps – the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists.

    Their basic disagreement centered around the following questions:

    *How much power should be given to the federal government?

    *How much power should be retained by the states? And…

    *How much power should be retained by individuals?

    In order to have a central government, some power would have to be given up by the states and by individuals in order for that government to function. The states were accustomed to governing themselves though and many citizens were concerned that if they created a powerful new government, it might try to take away their basic human rights as the previous British government had done.

    Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists

    The word Federal refers to a central government of separate states that have formed a confederation, or a union. Thus the Federal Government of the United States refers to the government of the United States in Washington DC., which is a central government given certain powers by the fifty individual states.

    The states are the origin of the federal government and not the other way around. The states are sovereign entities that gave the federal government certain powers. The states created the central government to perform certain functions for them. Keeping this in mind will help you as we proceed.

    Federalists wanted to create a stronger government because of the failures under the Articles of Confederation. Anti-Federalists believed that a strong central government might become so strong that it would steal away the rights of the states and of individuals. Remember, a government is made up of people, and if evil or ambitious people were to get into office, these people could use their power to harm others, take advantage of people or use them for their own personal gain. So the Anti-Federalists wished to prevent evil people in government from taking advantage of the rest of society.

    Federalists didn’t want to create a government so powerful that it stole away the people's rights either, but they did want it to be sufficiently strong to be able to hold itself together and promote the general welfare of the people.

    The Anti-Federalists certainly wanted a central government, but they wanted more power to be locally controlled because it was easier for the citizens to monitor. They were concerned that a faraway central government would not care about the local needs of the people and would be more difficult to control if it began to grow too powerful.

    As the various states began to look at the new Constitution, the climate in several states became sufficiently polarized that passage of the Constitution became uncertain. Many, many people had questions about whether or not this new government would be too powerful at the expense of the states and individual rights.

    Anti-Federalists voiced concerns about such things as freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to petition the government, the right to trial by jury, the right to bear arms and many other basic human rights. They had seen government abuses of these things throughout English and colonial history and were wary that this new government might do the same. The new Constitution did not address any of these things and it made many people nervous.

    One passage of the Constitution in particular made them nervous. Section 8 of Article 1 states that Congress shall have power:

    To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

    This seemed to give Congress carte blanche to do anything it wanted, beyond the duties that were clearly spelled out.

    Many Anti-Federalists were sufficiently alarmed that they vowed they would never support the Constitution as written. Others, however, said they could be persuaded to accept the Constitution if, and only if, it had a document attached to it, known as a bill of rights, that would specifically lay out the rights of the people and of the states that were to be protected from interference by the federal government.

    What is a Bill of Rights?

    In response to abuses by the British and colonial governments over the years, the colonies had begun to create Bills of Rights. A Bill of Rights is a document that describes certain individual rights that are retained by the people with which the government has no right to interfere.

    The practice began with the English Bill of Rights of 1689. This Bill was passed by Parliament in 1689 and it defined certain limits on the sovereign, as well as the rights of Parliament and of the citizens, such as the rights to petition the government, bear arms and hold regular elections. All of these things and more had been forbidden by earlier monarchs who had absolute power.

    If the monarch didn’t like the way the government was voting, he would simply dissolve it! He would forbid his political enemies from owning guns or imprison people on false charges without the chance to have a fair trial. A Bill of Rights simply defined the limits on the powers of the sovereign. If the sovereign didn’t follow them or like them, he wasn’t fit to rule and could be thrown out.

    Many colonial governments and later, state governments, had passed Bills of Rights before and during the time of the American Revolution. So it wasn't a new idea when Anti-Federalists called for one.

    Federalists such as Alexander Hamilton and James Madison had some concern about adding a Bill of Rights to the Constitution though. They believed there was a hidden danger if a Bill of Rights were to be included. They believed that if certain rights were listed in the Constitution as being protected, it might imply that other rights that were not mentioned were not protected.

    In other words, there are an innumerable list of human rights, too many to be defined in a single document. The Founders could not possibly have listed them all. If they were to list only a few, say ten or twenty or fifty or however many, it might imply that any other rights not listed were not protected.

    Instead, the Federalists argued that the writers of the Constitution intended that the federal government was only to be given power over the short list of things that were specifically laid out and defined in the Constitution. If a power or right was not listed as given to the federal government, it was automatically kept by the states. This made the addition of a Bill of Rights unnecessary.

    Speaking hypothetically, if there are 1,000 human rights and the government is given control over 30 of them, it is not necessary to forbid the government from violating a list of the other 970 rights. The government has only 30 distinct areas in which it can govern. Everything else is off limits. So the Constitution lists what the government can do, not what it cannot do. The list of what it cannot do would go on forever. This was the argument of Hamilton, Madison and the other Federalists.

    This argument did not sway the Anti-Federalists however. Even though the Constitution granted only certain powers to the federal government, they still wanted a Bill of Rights added to it. They wanted their rights specifically spelled out, in no uncertain terms, with limits on what the government could and could not do regarding individual and state rights. Many threatened to reject the Constitution unless a Bill of Rights was added.

    The Massachusetts Compromise

    The Anti-Federalist sentiment was large enough in many states that passage of the Constitution was in jeopardy. Sentiment in Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut was relatively positive and these states all ratified the Constitution by early 1788. The other states were much more divided and unsure.

    Massachusetts was one of the most populous states and its vote was considered to be pivotal in the question of whether the Constitution would be accepted on a nationwide basis. The Anti-Federalists though, had a slight upper hand when it came to predicting which way the vote would go.

    To remedy the problem, the Federalists came up with a compromise solution that they hoped would persuade a few Anti-Federalists to change their votes. It became known as the Massachusetts Compromise.

    The Massachusetts Compromise recognized the desire of the Anti-Federalists to include a Bill of Rights with the Constitution that defined certain rights retained by the people that were off limits to the federal government. It proposed that if the Anti-Federalists would vote yes to accept the Constitution now, the First Congress of the new government would receive proposals from the states for items to be included in a Bill of Rights and would vote on which ones to include.

    James Madison and other Federalists believed this was unnecessary and were not pleased with adding a Bill of Rights to a document which had very narrowly defined powers given to the federal government, but they agreed to add one in order to assuage the fears of the Anti-Federalist camp and see the Constitution formally ratified and declared the law of the land.

    As they hoped, the Massachusetts Compromise did its job. Several Anti-Federalist votes in Massachusetts switched to yes votes and Massachusetts voted to accept the new Constitution, albeit with a narrow vote of 187 for and 168 against.

    This started a chain reaction of positive ratifications in the remaining states. Over the next several months, Maryland, South Carolina and New Hampshire voted yes. With New Hampshire’s vote on June 21, 1788, the Constitutional requirement of nine states voting in the affirmative was met and this caused the document to take effect. Virginia and New York voted yes in June and July.

    Seven of the states, when they voted to ratify the Constitution, also created a list of amendments to be sent to the First Congress. In all, 148 amendments were proposed, some that could be listed as protected rights in a Bill of Rights and some that would be alterations to the existing text of the Constitution.

    Massachusetts sent nine suggested amendments, including a guarantee of trial by jury, a denial of any officer of the United States to accept any title or office from foreign powers and a declaration that all rights not specifically given to the government in the

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