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1215
Magna Carta
Moved from rule of man to rule of law
Outlined individual rights which king could not violate
Included taxation and trial provisions -
1215
Limited Government
Magna Carta was issued in June 1215 and was the first document to put into writing the principle that the king and his government was not above the law. It sought to prevent the king from exploiting his power, and placed limits of royal authority by establishing law as a power in itself. -
Jamestown’s House of Burgesses
With its origin in the first meeting of the Virginia General Assembly at Jamestown in July 1619, the House of Burgesses was the first democratically-elected legislative body in the British American colonies. About 140 years later, when Washington was elected, the electorate was made up of male landholders. -
Mayflower Compact
The Mayflower Compact, originally titled Agreement Between the Settlers of New Plymouth, was the first governing document of Plymouth Colony. It was written by the male passengers of the Mayflower, consisting of separatist Puritans, adventurers, and tradesmen. -
Petition of Right
Required monarchs to obtain Parliamentary approval before new taxes
Government could not unlawfully imprison people or establish military rule during times of peace -
King Charles required to sign the Petition of Right
The petition sought recognition of four principles: no taxation without the consent of Parliament, no imprisonment without cause, no quartering of soldiers on subjects, and no martial law in peacetime. See also petition of right. The Petition of Right was drawn up by Charles's third Parliament in as many years. -
English Bill of Rights
Guaranteed free speech and protection from cruel and unusual punishment -
Articles of Confederation
First National Government
Delegates aimed to have a confederation in which colonies kept their “sovereignty, freedom, and independence.”
Ratification delayed by argument over who would control western lands
Small states refused to ratify until they granted the entire confederation control over the lands -
Northwest Ordinance
Established a plan for settling the Northwest Territory
Included disputed lands
Created system for admitting states to the Union
Banned slavery in the territory
Guided nation’s western expansion -
Dual Federalism
Dual federalism, also known as layer-cake federalism or divided sovereignty, is a political arrangement in which power is divided between the federal and state governments in clearly defined terms, with state governments exercising those powers accorded to them without interference from the federal government -
Federalist paper Gazette of the United States published
an early American newspaper, first issued semiweekly in New York on April 15, 1789, but moving the next year to Philadelphia when the nation’s capital moved there the next year -
Judiciary Act of 1789
The Judiciary Act of 1789 was a United States federal statute adopted on September 24, 1789, in the first session of the First United States Congress. It established the federal judiciary of the United States. -
1st Amendment
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution prevents the government from making laws which regulate an establishment of religion, or that would prohibit the free exercise of religion -
Second Amendment
The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution protects the right to keep and bear arms. It was ratified on December 15, 1791, along with nine other articles of the Bill of Rights -
Marbury v. Madison
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137, was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that established the principle of judicial review in the United States, meaning that American courts have the power to strike down laws and statutes that they find to violate the Constitution of the United States. -
McCulloch v. Maryland
McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316, was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that defined the scope of the U.S. Congress's legislative power and how it relates to the powers of American state legislatures. -
Gibbons v. Ogden
Right of a state legislature to award a monopoly to operate a steamship line between NY and NJ
Court said only Congress has the right to regulate commerce between states -
Seneca Falls Convention
The Seneca Falls Convention was the first women's rights convention. It advertised itself as "a convention to discuss the social, civil, and religious condition and rights of woman". Held in the Wesleyan Chapel of the town of Seneca Falls, New York, it spanned two days over July 19–20, 1848 -
Dred Scott v. Sanford
was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court in which the Court held that the United States Constitution was not meant to include American citizenship for people of African descent, regardless of whether they were enslaved or free, and so the rights and privileges that the Constitution confers upon American citizens could not apply to them. -
Morrill Act
The Morrill Land-Grant Acts are United States statutes that allowed for the creation of land-grant colleges in U.S. states using the proceeds from sales of federally-owned land, often obtained from indigenous tribes through treaty, cession, or seizure. -
The 14th Amendment
No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. -
jim crow laws
Jim Crow laws were state and local laws that enforced racial segregation in the Southern United States. -
Chinese Exclusion Act
The Chinese Exclusion Act was a United States federal law signed by President Chester A. Arthur on May 6, 1882, prohibiting all immigration of Chinese laborers. -
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537, was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that racial segregation laws did not violate the U.S. Constitution as long as the facilities for each race were equal in quality, a doctrine that came to be known as "separate but equal". -
16th amendment
The Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution allows Congress to levy an income tax without apportioning it among the states on the basis of population. -
17th amendmant
written and passed -
19th amendment
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. -
Native Americans granted citizenship
On June 2, 1924, Congress enacted the Indian Citizenship Act, which granted citizenship to all Native Americans born in the U.S. The right to vote, however, was governed by state law; until 1957, some states barred Native Americans from voting. -
The New Deal
The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939 -
United States v. Miller
United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174, was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States that involved a Second Amendment challenge to the National Firearms Act of 1934. The case is often cited in the ongoing American gun politics debate, as both sides claim that it supports their position. -
Minersville School District v. Gobitis
Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586, was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States involving the religious rights of public school students under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. -
United States v. Darby
United States v. Darby Lumber Co., 312 U.S. 100, was a case in which the United States Supreme Court upheld the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, holding that the U.S. Congress had the power under the Commerce Clause to regulate employment conditions. -
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624, is a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court holding that the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment protects students from being forced to salute the American flag or say the Pledge of Allegiance in public school. -
Korematsu v. United States
Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214, was a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court to uphold the exclusion of Japanese Americans from the West Coast Military Area during World War II. -
Brown v. Board
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483, was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that U.S. state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the segregated schools are otherwise equal in quality. -
Overturned by Hernandez v. Texas
In 1954, in Hernandez v. Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the conviction of an agricultural labourer, Pete Hernandez, for murder should be overturned because Mexican Americans had been barred from participating in both the jury that indicted him and the jury that convicted him. -
Civil Rights Act of 1960
Empowered the federal government to actively engage in voter registration in places where voting discrimination had been found -
Equal Pay Act of 1963
The Equal Pay Act of 1963 is a United States labor law amending the Fair Labor Standards Act, aimed at abolishing wage disparity based on sex. It was signed into law on June 10, 1963, by John F. Kennedy as part of his New Frontier Program. -
Edwards v. South Carolina
Edwards v. South Carolina, 372 U.S. 229, was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court ruling that the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution forbade state government officials to force a crowd to disperse when they are otherwise legally marching in front of a state house. -
Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, and later sexual orientation and gender identity.7 -
miranda v. arizona
Court ruled that the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution restricts prosecutors from using a person's statements made in response to interrogation in police custody as evidence at their trial unless they can show that the person was informed of the right to consult with an attorney before and during questioning, and of the right against self-incrimination before police questioning, and that the defendant not only understood these rights, but voluntarily waived them. -
Loving V. Virginia
Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1, was a landmark civil rights decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that laws banning interracial marriage violate the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. -
Age Discrimination in Employment Act
The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 is a US labor law that forbids employment discrimination against anyone at least 40 years of age in the United States. In 1967, the bill was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson. -
Freedom of Information Act
The Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. § 552, is a federal freedom of information law that requires the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government upon request. -
Tinker v. Des Moines
Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503, was a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court that defined First Amendment rights of students in U.S. public schools. -
De Jure Segregation ended
De jure segregation mandated the separation of races by law, and was the form imposed by slave codes before the Civil War and by Black Codes and Jim Crow laws following the war. De jure segregation was outlawed by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. -
War Powers Resolution
The War Powers Resolution of 1973 (also known as the War Powers Act) "is a congressional resolution designed to limit the U.S. president's ability to initiate or escalate military actions abroad -
“Iron Triangle”
In United States politics, the "iron triangle" comprises the policy-making relationship among the congressional committees, the bureaucracy, and interest groups, as described in 1981 by Gordon Adams. -
New federalism
New Federalism is a political philosophy of devolution, or the transfer of certain powers from the United States federal government back to the states. As a policy theme, New Federalism typically involves the federal government providing block grants to the states to resolve a social issue. -
Harlow v. Fitzgerald
Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, was a case decided by the United States Supreme Court involving the doctrines of qualified immunity and absolute immunity. -
Tennessee v. Garner
A civil case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that, under the Fourth Amendment, when a law enforcement officer is pursuing a fleeing suspect, the officer may not use deadly force to prevent escape unless "the officer has probable cause to believe that the suspect poses a significant threat of death or serious physical injury to the officer or others." -
Graham v. Connor
was a United States Supreme Court case where the Court determined that an objective reasonableness standard should apply to a civilian's claim that law enforcement officials used excessive force in the course of making an arrest, investigatory stop, or other "seizure" of her or his person. -
Americans with Disabilities Act
Prohibits discrimination against individuals with disabilities in all areas of public life, including jobs, schools, transportation, and all public and private places that are open to the general public. -
"Contract With America"
The Contract with America was a legislative agenda advocated for by the Republican Party during the 1994 congressional election campaign. Written by Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey, and in part using text from former President Ronald Reagan's 1985 State of the Union Address, the Contract detailed the actions the Republicans promised to take if they became the majority party in the United States House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years. -
Homeland Security
The United States Department of Homeland Security is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. -
District of Columbia v. Heller
Heller, case in which the U.S. Supreme Court on June 26, 2008, held (5–4) that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to possess firearms independent of service in a state militia and to use firearms for traditionally lawful purposes, including self-defense within the home. -
D.C. v. Heller
a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court ruling that the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms, unconnected with service in a militia, for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home, and that the District of Columbia's handgun ban and requirement that lawfully owned rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock" violated this guarantee. -
McDonald v. Chicago
a landmark[1] decision of the Supreme Court of the United States that found that the right of an individual to "keep and bear arms", as protected under the Second Amendment, is incorporated by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and is thereby enforceable against the states. -
obergefell v. hodges
Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. 644, is a landmark civil rights case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. -
Trump v. Hawaii
a landmark United States Supreme Court case involving Presidential Proclamation 9645 signed by President Donald Trump, which restricted travel into the United States by people from several nations, or by refugees without valid travel documents.
