Analysis of the Constitution
The U.S. Constitution enshrines both institutional powers and the Bill of Rights. As far as institutional powers in the constitution are concerned, I personally like the Congressional power contained in the Fourteenth Amendment (Amendment XIV) adopted on July 9, 1868 as a reaction to slave matters emanating from the American Civil War. This amendment addresses Americans’ right to citizenship and equal safeguard of the law. Just like the Bill of Rights, this amendment takes care of the wellbeing of the ordinary American by limiting the actions of the states and local officers, and the powers of those acting on behalf of such officers.
Personal rights are contained in the bill of rights. In total, there are ten amendments in the Bill of Rights, whose aim is to protect the individual American. Of all the ten, Amendment Six stands out for me as the most fundamental. It states, “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favour, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense” ( Bodenhamer, 68)
There is nothing as dehumanising as being convicted to a jail term for a crime you did not commit. Also, when justice is delayed, an individual who may be totally innocent is exposed to a lot of psychological torture awaiting trial. The right to obtain witnesses to prove your innocence and an additional right to have counsel to represent and defend you in a court of law before an impartial jury are rights that come very close to defining the worth of human life. Justice delayed is justice denied; and justice denied is pure injustice.
The amendment that I feel is not the best for the American people and should be removed from the Bill of Rights is Amendment Two that guarantees Americans the right to possess guns for personal security. These weapons have been used wrongly to commit crime and sometimes carelessly handled by some people. It is not uncommon for us to hear a student or other shooting fellow students after taking their parent’s gun to school. Some children even shoot their own parents or siblings. The country keeps losing some very productive people to this careless handling of guns.
The presidential veto is the institutional power that should have been removed a long time ago, at least according to me. Considering the long process a bill has to go through before reaching the president’s desk, it is not in order for the president to unilaterally refuse to sign the bill into law. We have seen bills that meant a lot of good for the American people dying a sudden death at the president’s desk, never mind that the bills will have been debated and passed by both The Congress and The Senate.
The Bill of Rights requires an additional amendment that would further guarantee protection of individual American people. My proposal would be an amendment that gives the Supreme Court the powers to repeal a law. In the event that a third or more of the Supreme Court vote against a law, then the law becomes null.
One of the institutional powers conspicuously missing in the constitution and which I feel should be introduced is the power to pass into law any legislation that is recognized as law in more than two thirds of the American States. This amendment would be apt in holding together our nation as United States of America which shares values and principals. When more than a third of Americans believe in a certain value, yet the other third remains opposed to such a value, it portrays an image of a divided America.
Work Cited
Bodenhamer, David J, and James W. Ely. The Bill of Rights in Modern America
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008. Print.
Joseph, Gilbert M., and Emily S. Rosenberg. Foreign in a Domestic Sense: Puerto Rico,
American Expansion, and the Constitution. Eds. Christina Duffy Burnett, and Burke Marshall. Duke University Press, 2001.
