Federalists and Anti-Federalists
This required document expresses the concern that certain clauses in the Constitution will allow the federal government to take too much power.
What is Brutus 1?
When you are accused of a crime, the fifth amendment protects you from having to do this.
What is testify against yourself?
(Also acceptable: be put on trial without a grand jury indictment, be tried for the same crime twice, be punished without due process.)
This word describes a government system that divides power between levels (for example, federal and state).
What is federalism?
While some powers are reserved to certain levels of government (state OR federal), this type of power is shared between levels of government.
What are concurrent powers?
In the transition from the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution, this level of government gained strength.
What is federal (or national, central, etc.)?
In Federalist 10, Madison argues that only a large republic with many competing points of view can mitigate the potentially harmful effects of these potentially dangerous groups of like-minded people.
What are factions?
The second amendment protects the right to bear arms and justifies that right by saying that a "well-regulated" one of these is "necessary to the security of a free state."
What is a militia?
In order to balance power between states with large populations and states with small populations, the Constitution created Congress, which can be described using this phrase that means a lawmaking body with two chambers.
What is a bicameral legislature?
According to this clause in the Constitution, if there is a conflict between state and federal laws in an area of shared or federal jurisdiction, the federal law will win out.
What is the supremacy clause?
As predicted by the anti-federalists, this clause of the constitution did expand the powers of Congress over time.
What is the elastic clause or the necessary and proper clause?
In Federalist 78, Hamilton argued that this branch of government was at the lowest risk of becoming too powerful, because it controlled neither the economy nor the military.
What is the judicial branch?
The eighth amendment protects against excessive bail and fines, as well as this.
What is cruel and unusual punishment?
A point in the policymaking process where ordinary citizens can influence government is known as this.
What is an access point?
This 1819 Supreme Court case prevented a state from taxing a branch of a federal bank.
What is McCulloch v. Maryland?
As the courts have ruled on limitations to federal powers, some powers have been returned to the states in this process.
What is devolution?
In Federalist 51, Madison borrowed this concept from Enlightenment philosopher Montesquieu, arguing that it was necessary to keep any branch from becoming too powerful.
What is the separation of powers? (Also acceptable: checks and balances.)
The first amendment provides freedom of religion both by protecting the free exercise of anyone's religion as well as by preventing this.
What is a state religion/laws that require people to take religious actions?
In United States v. Lopez, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress had exceeded its authority by using this constitutional clause to claim the right to pass a national law banning guns in school zones.
What is the interstate commerce clause?
This amendment states that any powers not specifically given to the federal government are reserved to the states or the people.
What is the 10th Amendment?
When President Washington led US troops to put down the Whiskey Rebellion, he was demonstrating the ways in which the Constitution had strengthened the federal government since this Massachusetts uprising that exposed weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation.
What is Shays' Rebellion?
In Federalist 70, Hamilton argued that this structure for a particular branch of government would increase accountability.
What is the unitary executive?
The sixth amendment provides many rights for people accused of crimes; they include the right to a speedy and public trial, the right to know who is testifying against them, the right to get help making their own witnesses appear in court, and this right that is now more famously known as part of the "Miranda" rights.
What is the right to counsel/right to an attorney?
According to Article V of the Constitution, the Constitution can be amended if two-thirds of both houses of Congress propose an amendment or the legislatures of two-thirds of the states request a convention, and this fraction of state legislatures or state conventions vote to ratify the amendment.
What is three-fourths?
State governments tend to prefer this type of grant over more restrictive categorical grants.
What are block grants?
When the 17th amendment provided for the direct election of senators, rather than the appointment of senators by state legislatures, it shifted democracy away from the elitist model and toward this model that features participation by all.
What is participatory democracy?