411 Pages · 4.14 mb ·
Law
- U.S. Constitution For Dummies® (Page 1) - About the Author (Page 5) - Dedication (Page 7) - Acknowledgments (Page 7) - Contents at a Glance (Page 9) - Table of Contents (Page 11) - Foreword (Page 21) - Introduction (Page 23) - Part I Exploring Constitutional Basics (Page 29) - Chapter 1: Constitutional Law: The Framework for Governance (Page 31) - Defining “Constitution” (Page 31) - Knowing When and Why the Constitution Was Created (Page 32) - Summarizing the Main Principles of the Constitution (Page 33) - Identifying Some Areas of Controversy (Page 36) - Chapter 2: Framing the U.S. Constitution: Big Thinkers, Big Thoughts (Page 39) - Building on Magna Carta (Page 40) - Respecting the Rule of Law (Or the Rule of Lawyers?) (Page 41) - Analyzing the Concepts Underlying the Declaration of Independence (Page 43) - Establishing a Republic (Page 48) - Chapter 3: Debating the Constitution (Page 53) - Listing Some Sources of Confusion (Page 53) - Discarding Out-Of-Date Ideas? (Page 55) - Untangling Ambiguities (Page 56) - Giving Some Important Principles the Silent Treatment (Page 57) - Interpreting the Constitution (Page 59) - Chapter 4: Introducing . . . the Constitution! The Preamble and the Seven Articles (Page 65) - Presenting the Preamble: “We the People . . .” (Page 65) - Article I: Setting up the Congress (Page 66) - Article II: Hailing the Chief (Page 68) - Article III: Understating Judicial Power (Page 71) - Article IV: Getting Along with the Neighbors — and Uncle Sam (Page 72) - Article V: Changing versus Amending the Constitution (Page 73) - Article VI: Fudging Federalism (Page 74) - Article VII: Ratifying the Constitution (Page 74) - Chapter 5: Amending versus Interpreting the Constitution: Taking Time for Change (Page 75) - Noting the Four Paths to an Amendment (Page 76) - Explaining What Happens in Practice (Page 77) - Listing the Amendments (Page 78) - Rating the Ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment (Page 79) - Reviving a Forgotten Amendment (Page 80) - Calling Time on an ERA (Page 81) - Reviewing Other Unratified Proposed Amendments (Page 81) - Debating the Need for Judge-Made Law (Page 82) - Reading a Right to Privacy into the Constitution (Page 83) - Part II: We the People: How the United States Is Governed (Page 87) - Chapter 6: Scrutinizing Sovereignty: Who Rules America? (Page 89) - Introducing “We the People” (Page 90) - Hailing the Chief (Page 94) - Congress: Flexing Its Lawmaking Muscle (Page 95) - The High Court: Saying What the Law Is (Page 96) - Giving the States Their Due (Page 98) - Uncovering Conspiracies (Page 99) - Chapter 7: Federalism: Forming One out of Many (Page 101) - Tracing the Origins of U. S. Federalism (Page 101) - Banking on McCulloch v. Maryland (Page 104) - Navigating the Commerce Clause with John Marshall (Page 107) - Riding the Federalism Rollercoaster (Page 107) - Ignoring the Elephant in the Room: The Question of State Sovereignty (Page 110) - Chapter 8: Separation of Powers: To Each His Own (Page 113) - No Moonlighting for the President (Page 114) - Keeping the Branches Apart (Page 115) - Checking and Balancing (Page 119) - Chapter 9: Doing Business: The Commerce Clause (Page 123) - How the Commerce Clause Was Born (Page 123) - Interpreting the Commerce Clause (Page 124) - Hunting Down the Dormant Commerce Clause (Page 125) - Tracing the Changing Meaning of the Commerce Clause (Page 128) - Part III (Page 135) - Chapter 10: Looking at the Role of Commander in Chief (Page 137) - Being “Eligible to the Office of President” (Page 137) - Picking a President (Page 139) - Canning the President (Page 145) - Signing, Vetoing, and Pocketing Legislation (Page 145) - Appointing Key Positions (Page 146) - Hailing the Chief: The President’s Administration (Page 147) - Battling Executive Privilege (Page 153) - Making War versus Declaring War (Page 156) - Chapter 11: Giving Everyone a Voice: The House of Representatives and Senate (Page 161) - Making the Laws That Govern the Land (Page 162) - Visiting the People’s House (Page 163) - Getting to Know the Senate (Page 171) - Passing Legislation (Page 175) - Chapter 12: “During Good Behaviour”: The Judicial System (Page 179) - Examining the Courts’ Function (Page 179) - Appointments and Elections: Becoming a Judge (Page 181) - Understanding Judicial Independence without Accountability (Page 184) - Making the Judiciary Paramount: Judicial Review (Page 187) - Casting the Swing Vote (Page 194) - Labeling Supreme Court Justices (Page 197) - Chapter 13: You’re Fired! Investigating the Impeachment Process (Page 201) - There’s Nothing Peachy about Impeachment (Page 201) - “High Crimes and Misdemeanors”: What Impeachment Is and Isn’t (Page 202) - Tracking the Impeachment Process (Page 204) - Understanding the Implications of Impeachment (Page 206) - Impeachment in Action: Johnson, the Judges, and Clinton (Page 208) - Removing State Officials from Office (Page 213) - Part IV (Page 215) - Chapter 14: The First Amendment: Freedom of Religion, Speech, and Assembly (Page 217) - Considering the Amendment’s Wording (Page 217) - Separating Church and State (Page 218) - Guaranteeing the Free Exercise of Religion (Page 221) - Guaranteeing Freedom of Expression (Page 223) - Protecting the Right to Assemble and Petition (Page 227) - Chapter 15: The Second Amendment: Bearing Arms (Page 229) - Debating Interpretation: Individual versus State Rights (Page 230) - Breaking Down the Amendment’s Clauses (Page 231) - Upholding Individual Rights: D.C. v. Heller (Page 235) - Considering the Future of the Debate (Page 237) - Chapter 16: The Third and Fourth Amendments: Protecting Citizens from Government Forces (Page 239) - Keeping the Feds Out of Your House (Page 239) - Keeping the Government Off Your Back (Page 242) - Chapter 17: Taking the Fifth — and a Bit of the Fourteenth (Page 253) - Invoking the “Great Right” Against Self-Incrimination (Page 254) - Peeking Behind the Closed Doors of the Grand Jury (Page 255) - Avoiding Double Jeopardy (Page 257) - Agonizing over Due Process (Page 259) - Opening Up the Incorporation Debate (Page 264) - Taking Private Property (Page 267) - Chapter 18: Dealing with Justice and Individual Rights: The Sixth through Eighth Amendments (Page 269) - Outlining Defendants’ Rights in Criminal Prosecutions: The Sixth Amendment (Page 270) - Guaranteeing Jury Trials in Civil Suits: The Seventh Amendment (Page 278) - Prohibiting “Cruel and Unusual Punishments”: The Eighth Amendment (Page 279) - Chapter 19: The Ninth and Tenth Amendments: Leaving Things Up to the People and States (Page 285) - Reading the Constitution: The Ninth Amendment (Page 286) - Considering the Tenth Amendment (Page 288) - Part V (Page 299) - Chapter 20: States’ Rights, Elections, and Slavery: The Eleventh through Thirteenth Amendments (Page 301) - The Eleventh Amendment: Asserting State Sovereign Immunity? (Page 302) - Cleaning Up the Framers’ Political Mess: The Twelfth Amendment (Page 304) - Removing the Blot of Slavery: The Thirteenth Amendment (Page 306) - Chapter 21: The Fourteenth Amendment: Ensuring Equal Protection (Page 313) - Defining Citizenship (Page 314) - Understanding States’ Obligations (Page 315) - Achieving “Equal Justice Under Law” — Or Not (Page 318) - Apportioning Representatives (Page 323) - Disqualifying Confederates from Office (Page 325) - Repudiating Confederate Debts (Page 326) - Empowering Congress (Page 326) - Chapter 22: Starts, Stops, and Clarifications: Amendments since 1870 (Page 327) - Removing Race Qualifications for Voting: The Fifteenth Amendment (Page 327) - Letting Uncle Sam Raid Your Piggy Bank: The Sixteenth Amendment (Page 329) - Electing the Senate: The Seventeenth Amendment (Page 330) - Outlawing Liquor: The Eighteenth Amendment (Page 331) - Giving Women the Vote: The Nineteenth Amendment (Page 332) - Moving Out of the Horse and Buggy Age: The Twentieth Amendment (Page 333) - Repealing Prohibition: The Twenty-First Amendment (Page 333) - Taking George Washington’s Lead: The Twenty-Second Amendment (Page 334) - Enfranchising the Nation’s Capital: The Twenty-Third Amendment (Page 336) - Banning Tax Barriers to Voting: The Twenty-Fourth Amendment (Page 337) - Succeeding to the Presidency: The Twenty-Fifth Amendment (Page 339) - Lowering the Voting Age: The Twenty-Sixth Amendment (Page 341) - Limiting Congressional Pay Raises: The Twenty-Seventh Amendment (Page 342) - Part VI (Page 343) - Chapter 23: Ten Landmark Constitutional Cases (Page 345) - Marbury v. Madison (1803) (Page 345) - Brown v. Board of Education (1954) (Page 346) - Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 and Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education (2007) (Page 347) - West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (1937) (Page 347) - United States v. Lopez (1995) (Page 348) - Kelo v. City of New London (2005) (Page 348) - United States v. Nixon (1974) (Page 349) - Nixon v. Fitzgerald (1982) (Page 349) - Clinton v. Jones (1997) (Page 349) - Boumediene v. Bush (2008) (Page 350) - Chapter 24: Ten Influential Supreme Court Justices (Page 351) - John Marshall (Page 352) - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (Page 353) - Louis Brandeis (Page 353) - Felix Frankfurter (Page 354) - Earl Warren (Page 354) - Thurgood Marshall (Page 355) - William Rehnquist (Page 356) - Sandra Day O’Connor (Page 357) - Antonin Scalia (Page 357) - John Roberts (Page 358) - Chapter 25: Two Sides of Five Constitutional Conundrums (Page 359) - Is the Constitution Outdated? (Page 359) - Should the Electoral College Be Abolished? (Page 360) - Does the U. S. Supreme Court Have Too Much Power? (Page 362) - Why Is There No Agreed-Upon Interpretation of the Constitution? (Page 364) - Does the President Have Too Much Power? (Page 365) - Appendix: Constitution of the United States of America (Page 367) - Preamble (Page 367) - Articles (Page 367) - Signatures (Page 378) - AMENDMENTS (Page 380) - Index (Page 391)