FREE ESSAY ON CIVIL RIGHTS

CIVIL RIGHTS

The Constitution Protects the Civil Rights of Americans but again the Constitution does
protect the civil rights of Americans. Even though some laws are passed that violate the
civil rights of people in the United States, the Supreme Court corrects these errors. The
cases reviewed here ask if it is okay to compose and mandate prayer in schools, whether
the death penalty is Constitutional, and how much privacy is given to the American
people. In the following Supreme Court cases, the reader will find that the decisions
made are Constitutional and ensure that the civil rights of Americans are protected. The
First Amendment to the Constitution forbids the government form supporting religion. In
the Supreme Court case, Engle v.. Vitale, a New York school system composed a prayer and
forced children to pray in the mornings at school. This action by the school system
clearly violates the no establishment clause of the First Amendment, which states,
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion... The Supreme Court
ruled six to one that it was unconstitutional for schools to compose and mandate prayer.
The Engle decision was a good decision. Since the government now had no say in how school
children prayed, the rights of minority religious groups were protected. This decision
ensures that students in schools across the country will not have to go against their
religion to please the government. Because this decision ensures the people's right to
worship in the way that they choose, American society as a whole benefits from this
decision. The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution prohibits cruel and unusual
punishment. In the case, Gregg v. Georgia, the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty
was not unconstitutional as long as it was not arbitrarily applied. This case was
accurately read because the writers of the Bill of Rights did not believe that the death
penalty constituted cruel and unusual punishment. They believed that cruel and unusual
punishment was punishment that inflicted excessive pain on the convicted. Since the death
penalty is humane, it does not constitute cruel and unusual punishment and is therefore
acceptable to use as a form of punishment. The Gregg decision was a good decision. The
death penalty is a fair and just punishment for those that have committed capital
offenses. Although some might argue that it is a revenge-based punishment, it is only
doing to the convicted what he did to his victim, although in a way much less painful.
Because the death penalty is humane, causing almost no pain to the person being executed,
it is a fair and allowable punishment for those that deserve it. The Ninth Amendment to
the Constitution allows citizens more rights that those listed in the Constitution. It
can be inferred that the writers of the Bill of Rights meant for privacy to be included
in this amendment. In Connecticut, there was a law that forbid the use and distribution
of information about contraceptives. This law was overruled by the Supreme Court in the
case, Griswold v. Connecticut, when it ruled that the law violated Constitutionally
protected privacy. The government only has the right to censor information if it
endangers national security or if it is considered obscene. Since the use and
distribution of information about contraceptives does not fall under any of these
categories, it is not Constitutionally correct for the government to violate people's
privacy in the way that it did in the Connecticut law. The Griswold decision was a good
decision. Because people deserve and are Constitutionally given privacy, it seems
illogical that a state would make a law like the one that was made in Connecticut. This
type of action can be interpreted as a state not respecting a person's right to privacy,
which is not only unconstitutional, but wrong. Because the Supreme Court abolished the
Connecticut law forbidding the use and distribution of information about contraceptives,
the people of the United States can rest assured that their right to privacy is being
protected. In the preceding Supreme Court cases, the Justices that heard the cases upheld
the meanings of the Amendments contained in the Bill of Rights. The decisions all agreed
with what the writers of the Bill of Rights thought when they were writing the Bill of
Rights. Due to these decisions, the meanings of the rights given to Americans have grown
clearer than they were before, and will continue to do so as long as they are being
interpreted by the Supreme Court, and other courts in the American justice