Contents:
This treatment, which includes a list of cases, index, and bibliography, makes this guide indispensable for students, scholars, and practitioners of the Colorado constitution. Previously published by Greenwood, this title has been brought back in to circulation by Oxford University Press with new verve.
Re-printed with standardization of content organization in order to facilitate research across the series.
This title, as with all titles in the series, is set to join the dynamic revision cycle of The Oxford Commentaries on the State Constitutions of the United States. The Oxford Commentaries on the State Constitutions of the United States is an important new series that reflects a renewed international interest in constitutional history and provides expert insight into each of the 50 state constitutions. Each volume in this innovative series contains a historical overview of the state's constitutional development, a section-by-section analysis of its current constitution, and a comprehensive guide to further research.
Under the expert editorship of Professor G. Alan Tarr, Director of the Center on State Constitutional Studies at Rutgers University, this series provides essential reference tools for understanding state constitutional law.
Books in the series can be purchased individually or as part of a complete set, giving readers unmatched access to these important political documents. Toon meer Toon minder. The Twenty-third Amendment extends the right to vote in presidential elections to citizens residing in the District of Columbia by granting the District electors in the Electoral College, as if it were a state.
When first established as the nation's capital in , the District of Columbia's five thousand residents had neither a local government, nor the right to vote in federal elections. By the population of the District had grown to over , people. The Twenty-fourth Amendment prohibits a poll tax for voting. Although passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments helped remove many of the discriminatory laws left over from slavery, they did not eliminate all forms of discrimination.
Along with literacy tests and durational residency requirements, poll taxes were used to keep low-income primarily African American citizens from participating in elections. The Supreme Court has since struck down these discriminatory measures, opening democratic participation to all. The Twenty-sixth Amendment prohibits the government from denying the right of United States citizens, eighteen years of age or older, to vote on account of age.
The drive to lower the voting age was driven in large part by the broader student activism movement protesting the Vietnam War. It gained strength following the Supreme Court's decision in Oregon v. It stipulates that each elector must cast a distinct vote for President and Vice President, instead of two votes for President. It also suggests that the President and Vice President should not be from the same state. Article II, Section 1, Clause 3 is superseded by this amendment, which also extends the eligibility requirements to become President to the Vice President.
The Seventeenth Amendment modifies the way senators are elected. It stipulates that senators are to be elected by direct popular vote. The amendment supersedes Article 1, Section 2 , Clauses 1 and 2, under which the two senators from each state were elected by the state legislature. It also allows state legislatures to permit their governors to make temporary appointments until a special election can be held. The Twentieth Amendment changes the date on which a new President, Vice President and Congress take office, thus shortening the time between Election Day and the beginning of Presidential, Vice Presidential and Congressional terms.
This meant that, when a new Congress was elected in November, it did not come into office until the following March, with a " lame duck " Congress convening in the interim. By moving the beginning of the president's new term from March 4 to January 20 and in the case of Congress, to January 3 , proponents hoped to put an end to lame duck sessions, while allowing for a speedier transition for the new administration and legislators. The Twenty-second Amendment limits an elected president to two terms in office, a total of eight years.
However, under some circumstances it is possible for an individual to serve more than eight years. Although nothing in the original frame of government limited how many presidential terms one could serve, the nation's first president, George Washington, declined to run for a third term, suggesting that two terms of four years were enough for any president. This precedent remained an unwritten rule of the presidency until broken by Franklin D. Roosevelt , who was elected to a third term as president and in to a fourth. The Twenty-fifth Amendment clarifies what happens upon the death, removal, or resignation of the President or Vice President and how the Presidency is temporarily filled if the President becomes disabled and cannot fulfill the responsibilities of the office.
A concrete plan of succession has been needed on multiple occasions since The Twenty-seventh Amendment prevents members of Congress from granting themselves pay raises during the current session. Rather, any raises that are adopted must take effect during the next session of Congress. Its proponents believed that Federal legislators would be more likely to be cautious about increasing congressional pay if they have no personal stake in the vote. Article One, section 6, Clause 1 has been affected by this amendment, which remained pending for over two centuries as it contained no time limit for ratification.
Executive department Article V. Under the expert editorship of Professor G. Accusations must be corroborated by at least two witnesses. Francis Lightfoot Lee Carter Braxton. Swayne, Justice Supreme Court, U. To the south, the British were said to be openly funding Creek Indian raids on white settlers in Georgia and adjacent territory.
Collectively, members of the House and Senate typically propose around amendments during each two-year term of Congress. Six amendments approved by Congress and proposed to the states for consideration have not been ratified by the required number of states to become part of the Constitution. Four of these are technically still pending, as Congress did not set a time limit see also Coleman v. Miller for their ratification.
The other two are no longer pending, as both had a time limit attached and in both cases the time period set for their ratification expired. The way the Constitution is understood is influenced by court decisions, especially those of the Supreme Court.
These decisions are referred to as precedents. Judicial review is the power of the Court to examine federal legislation, federal executive, and all state branches of government, to decide their constitutionality , and to strike them down if found unconstitutional. Judicial review includes the power of the Court to explain the meaning of the Constitution as it applies to particular cases. Over the years, Court decisions on issues ranging from governmental regulation of radio and television to the rights of the accused in criminal cases have changed the way many constitutional clauses are interpreted, without amendment to the actual text of the Constitution.
Legislation passed to implement the Constitution, or to adapt those implementations to changing conditions, broadens and, in subtle ways, changes the meanings given to the words of the Constitution. Up to a point, the rules and regulations of the many federal executive agencies have a similar effect. If an action of Congress or the agencies is challenged, however, it is the court system that ultimately decides whether these actions are permissible under the Constitution.
The Supreme Court has indicated that once the Constitution has been extended to an area by Congress or the Courts , its coverage is irrevocable. To hold that the political branches may switch the Constitution on or off at will would lead to a regime in which they, not this Court, say "what the law is". Courts established by the Constitution can regulate government under the Constitution, the supreme law of the land.
First, they have jurisdiction over actions by an officer of government and state law. Second, federal courts may rule on whether coordinate branches of national government conform to the Constitution. Until the twentieth century, the Supreme Court of the United States may have been the only high tribunal in the world to use a court for constitutional interpretation of fundamental law, others generally depending on their national legislature. The basic theory of American Judicial review is summarized by constitutional legal scholars and historians as follows: It can change only by extraordinary legislative process of national proposal, then state ratification.
The powers of all departments are limited to enumerated grants found in the Constitution. Courts are expected a to enforce provisions of the Constitution as the supreme law of the land, and b to refuse to enforce anything in conflict with it. As to judicial review and the Congress, the first proposals by Madison Va and Wilson Pa called for a supreme court veto over national legislation.
In this it resembled the system in New York, where the Constitution of called for a " Council of Revision " by the Governor and Justices of the state supreme court. The Council would review and in a way, veto any passed legislation violating the spirit of the Constitution before it went into effect. The nationalist's proposal in Convention was defeated three times, and replaced by a presidential veto with Congressional over-ride.
The justification for judicial review is to be explicitly found in the open ratifications held in the states and reported in their newspapers. The preservation of the people's authority over legislatures rests "particularly with judges". The Supreme Court was initially made up of jurists who had been intimately connected with the framing of the Constitution and the establishment of its government as law. His service on the Court would extend 34 years over some of the most important rulings to help establish the nation the Constitution had begun.
When John Marshall followed Oliver Ellsworth as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in , the federal judiciary had been established by the Judiciary Act , but there were few cases, and less prestige. But the Court's life, jurisdiction over state legislation was limited. The Marshall Court's landmark Barron v. Baltimore held that the Bill of Rights restricted only the federal government, and not the states. In the landmark Marbury v.
Madison case, the Supreme Court asserted its authority of judicial review over Acts of Congress. Its findings were that Marbury and the others had a right to their commissions as judges in the District of Columbia. Marshall, writing the opinion for the majority, announced his discovered conflict between Section 13 of the Judiciary Act of and Article III.
The Constitution enumerates powers of the judiciary to extend to cases arising "under the Constitution". Further, justices take a Constitutional oath to uphold it as "Supreme law of the land". Something of a crisis arose when, in and , the Supreme Court handed down twelve decisions voiding Acts of Congress relating to the New Deal. Roosevelt then responded with his abortive " court packing plan ". Other proposals have suggested a Court super-majority to overturn Congressional legislation, or a Constitutional Amendment to require that the Justices retire at a specified age by law.
To date, the Supreme Court's power of judicial review has persisted. The power of judicial review could not have been preserved long in a democracy unless it had been "wielded with a reasonable measure of judicial restraint , and with some attention, as Mr. Dooley said, to the election returns. The Court controls almost all of its business by choosing what cases to consider, writs of certiorari.
In this way, it can avoid opinions on embarrassing or difficult cases. The Supreme Court limits itself by defining for itself what is a "justiciable question. Third, the Court requires a "personal interest", not one generally held, and a legally protected right must be immediately threatened by government action. Cases are not taken up if the litigant has no standing to sue. Simply having the money to sue and being injured by government action are not enough. These three procedural ways of dismissing cases have led critics to charge that the Supreme Court delays decisions by unduly insisting on technicalities in their "standards of litigability".
They say cases are left unconsidered which are in the public interest, with genuine controversy, and resulting from good faith action. The Supreme Court balances several pressures to maintain its roles in national government. It seeks to be a co-equal branch of government, but its decrees must be enforceable. The Court seeks to minimize situations where it asserts itself superior to either President or Congress, but federal officers must be held accountable.
The Supreme Court assumes power to declare acts of Congress as unconstitutional but it self-limits its passing on constitutional questions. Justice Brandeis summarized four general guidelines that the Supreme Court uses to avoid constitutional decisions relating to Congress: If it does, a rule of constitutional law is formulated only as the precise facts in the case require.
The Court will choose statutes or general law for the basis of its decision if it can without constitutional grounds. If it does, the Court will choose a constitutional construction of an Act of Congress, even if its constitutionality is seriously in doubt. Likewise with the Executive Department, Edwin Corwin observed that the Court does sometimes rebuff presidential pretensions, but it more often tries to rationalize them.
Against Congress, an Act is merely "disallowed". In the executive case, exercising judicial review produces "some change in the external world" beyond the ordinary judicial sphere. Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes addressed the Court's limitation when political process allowed future policy change, but a judicial ruling would "attribute finality".
Political questions lack "satisfactory criteria for a judicial determination". John Marshall recognized that the president holds "important political powers" which as Executive privilege allows great discretion. This doctrine was applied in Court rulings on President Grant 's duty to enforce the law during Reconstruction. It extends to the sphere of foreign affairs. Justice Robert Jackson explained, Foreign affairs are inherently political, "wholly confided by our Constitution to the political departments of the government Critics of the Court object in two principal ways to self-restraint in judicial review, deferring as it does as a matter of doctrine to Acts of Congress and Presidential actions.
Supreme Courts under the leadership of subsequent Chief Justices have also used judicial review to interpret the Constitution among individuals, states and federal branches. Chase was a Lincoln appointee, serving as Chief Justice from to His career encompassed service as a U. Senator and Governor of Ohio. He coined the slogan, "Free soil, free Labor, free men. Taney of Dred Scott case fame. The "Chase Court" is famous for Texas v. White , which asserted a permanent Union of indestructible states. Fenno upheld the Civil War tax on state banknotes.
Griswold found parts of the Legal Tender Acts unconstitutional, though it was reversed under a late Supreme Court majority. Chase [p] Union, Reconstruction. William Howard Taft [q] commerce, incorporation. Earl Warren [r] due process, civil rights. William Rehnquist [s] federalism, privacy. A Progressive Republican from Ohio, he was a one-term President. Taft successfully sought the expansion of Court jurisdiction over non- states such as District of Columbia and Territories of Alaska and Hawaii.
New York , the Court established the doctrine of " incorporation which applied the Bill of Rights to the states. Important cases included the Board of Trade of City of Chicago v. Olsen that upheld Congressional regulation of commerce. United States allowed exclusion of evidence obtained without a warrant based on application of the 14th Amendment proscription against unreasonable searches.
Illinois ruled the equitable power of the United States can impose positive action on a state to prevent its inaction from damaging another state. Earl Warren was an Eisenhower nominee, Chief Justice from to Warren's Republican career in the law reached from County Prosecutor, California state attorney general, and three consecutive terms as Governor.
His programs stressed progressive efficiency, expanding state education, re-integrating returning veterans, infrastructure and highway construction. In , the Warren Court overturned a landmark Fuller Court ruling on the Fourteenth Amendment interpreting racial segregation as permissible in government and commerce providing "separate but equal" services.
Warren built a coalition of Justices after that developed the idea of natural rights as guaranteed in the Constitution. Board of Education banned segregation in public schools. Carr and Reynolds v.
Sims established Court ordered "one-man-one-vote". Bill of Rights Amendments were incorporated into the states. Due process was expanded in Gideon v. Wainwright and Miranda v. First Amendment rights were addressed in Griswold v. Connecticut concerning privacy, and Engel v. Vitale relative to free speech. William Rehnquist was a Reagan appointment to Chief Justice, serving from to While he would concur with overthrowing a state supreme court's decision, as in Bush v. Gore , he built a coalition of Justices after that developed the idea of federalism as provided for in the Tenth Amendment.
Nevertheless, the Rehnquist Court was noted in the contemporary "culture wars" for overturning state laws relating to privacy prohibiting late-term abortions in Stenberg v. Carhart , prohibiting sodomy in Lawrence v. Texas , or ruling so as to protect free speech in Texas v. Johnson or affirmative action in Grutter v. There is a viewpoint that some Americans have come to see the documents of the Constitution, along with the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights , as being a cornerstone of a type of civil religion.
This is suggested by the prominent display of the Constitution, along with the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights, in massive, bronze-framed, bulletproof, moisture-controlled glass containers vacuum-sealed in a rotunda by day and in multi-ton bomb-proof vaults by night at the National Archives Building.
The idea of displaying the documents struck one academic critic looking from the point of view of the or America as "idolatrous, and also curiously at odds with the values of the Revolution". But he saw imperfections and imagined that there could potentially be others, believing as he did that "institutions must advance also". Some commentators depict the multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian United States as held together by a political orthodoxy, in contrast with a nation state of people having more "natural" ties.
The United States Constitution has been a notable model for governance around the world. Its international influence is found in similarities of phrasing and borrowed passages in other constitutions, as well as in the principles of the rule of law , separation of powers and recognition of individual rights. The American experience of fundamental law with amendments and judicial review has motivated constitutionalists at times when they were considering the possibilities for their nation's future. The Constitution did not originally define who was eligible to vote , allowing each state to determine who was eligible.
In the early history of the U. Earlier written constitutions of independent states exist but were not adopted by bodies elected by the people, such as the Swedish Constitution of , adopted by the king, the Constitution of San Marino of which is the oldest surviving constitution in the world, or the Constitution of Pylyp Orlyk , the first establishing separation of powers. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. United States Constitution Page one of the original copy of the Constitution.
Drafting and ratification timeline Convention Signing Federalism Republicanism. Constitution of the United States Law Taxation. Presidential elections Midterm elections Off-year elections. History of the United States Constitution. Constitutional Convention United States.
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The number was periodically increased, reaching ten in , allowing Lincoln additional appointments. After the Civil War, vacancies reduced the number to seven. Congress finally fixed the number at nine. It also has roots in Natural Law expressions in the Declaration of Independence. The Supreme Court first ruled an act of Congress unconstitutional in Marbury v.
Madison , the second was Dred Scott. This avoids the perpetuation of civil war into the generations by Parliamentary majorities as in the Wars of the Roses. Bidwell , U. United States, U. Bush — That where the Constitution has been once formally extended by Congress to territories, neither Congress nor the territorial legislature can enact laws inconsistent therewith.
The Constitution grants Congress and the President the power to acquire, dispose of, and govern territory, not the power to decide when and where its terms apply. Of course, the President also takes an oath to support the Constitution. Georgia , finding Georgia could not impose its laws in Cherokee Territory. Jackson replied, "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it! Jackson would not politically interpose the U.
Army between Georgia and the Cherokee people as Eisenhower would do between Arkansas and the integrating students. Tennessee Valley Authority , Chase, Chief Justice, U. Nathan Clifford, Maine; Stephen J. Field, Justice Supreme Court, U. Swayne, Justice Supreme Court, U. Tom Clark; Robert H. One of the reforms, "sine quibus non", to use the words of Rizal and Mabini, always insisted upon by the Filipinos, was Philippine representation in the Spanish Cortez , the promulgation in the Islands of the Spanish Constitution, and the complete assimilation equal to that of any in the Spanish provinces on the continent.
Sun Yat-sen , for example, was much influenced by American democracy, especially the U. The Constitution of the United States of America: Retrieved September 10, Annenberg Classroom — Glossary. Retrieved September 21, The Ashbrook Center at Ashland University. Hero of the Sons of Liberty". Journal of the American Revolution. Retrieved May 20, Archived from the original on September 16, Retrieved August 27, Retrieved June 8, The Creation of the American Republic, — University of North Carolina Press. National Archives and Records Administration.
Retrieved April 16, Retrieved March 31, The Constitutional Convention of Retrieved October 21, Soldier-Statesmen of the Constitution. Retrieved August 31, Summary "The Texas State Constitution provides an outstanding constitutional and historical account of the state's governing charter. In addition to an overview of Texas' constitutional history, this volume provides an in-depth, section-by-section analysis of the entire constitution, detailing the many significant changes that have been made since its initial drafting.
This treatment, along with a table of cases, index, and bibliography provides an unsurpassed reference guide for students, scholars, and practitioners of Texas' constitution. The Oxford Commentaries on the State Constitutions of the United States is an important new series that reflects a renewed international interest in constitutional history and provides expert insight into each of the 50 state constitutions.
Each volume in this innovative series contains a historical overview of the state's constitutional development, a section-by-section analysis of its current constitution, and a comprehensive guide to further research. Under the expert editorship of Professor G. Alan Tarr, Director of the Center on State Constitutional Studies at Rutgers University, this series provides essential reference tools for understanding state constitutional law. Books in the series can be purchased individually or as part of a complete set, giving readers unmatched access to these important political documents"-- Contents Machine generated contents note: Legislative Department Article IV.
Executive Department Article V. Judicial Department Article VI. Legislative department Article IV. Executive department Article V. Taxation And revenue Article XI. Municipal corporations Article XII. Mode of amending the constitution Of this state. Notes Description based upon print version of record. ProQuest Ebook Central Rental. Includes bibliographical references pages and index.