Grandfather clause

Federalism plays a large role into the lives of everyday Americans. One key policy issue which has long been pulled between the federal and state powers is the issue of voting rights. This is currently a very hot subject has the laws behind who can vote are continuing to be shaped within federal and state courts through new voter identification laws. The purpose of this paper will be to first present how the current voting laws have been developed through federalism. In the context of historical…

The Constitution: Suppression of the 2nd Amendment “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not infringed.” This is the 2nd amendment, and it is under attack. Many people believe that guns are evil and need to banned from the general public. They look at countries such as Australia, Japan, and France to get there reasoning for strict gun control. Advocates for this type of thinking conclude that if America…

Visual media is an influential source of information that helps us to understand others and ourselves in society. It aims to define all of the acceptable norms of society. It also gives us an idea of what the “others” are considered to be and who are predominant. Therefore, it specifies those with different statuses in society. Most importantly, it gives an idea of why different statuses exist in society. However, these stereotypes have been used to justify the position of racial groups on the…

In March of 2014, I watched my grandfather, who had stage four non-small cell lung cancer, lay in a hospital bed for a duration of fourteen days. During those fourteen days he was hooked up to a variety of machines, including a feeding tube and a ventilator. He was very much drugged up on morphine and was essentially a vegetable lying in the bed. Now, my grandfather was a noble man; he had his dignity and was a stubborn person who showed no weakness…

The Purpose of Reconstruction was to simply rebuild the South and restore the union. Reconstruction simply means to rebuild something that has been destroyed. After the American Civil War, the South was left with a ton of issues that need to be resolved. Cities and plantations were destroyed. Rich aristocratic whites are no longer rich. Union President Abraham Lincoln’s ratification of the thirteenth amendment will completely devastate the South’s economy and as a result, four million African…

During the 1950s and 60’s American was in the great society and in a thriving economic time. The Unites states economy was powerful and the tax revenue was so abundant and employment was very high because the federal government had money due to WWII and United States being the country that was not destroyed. Although in the 1950s and 60’s it was a great time for economy and a period of consense where most people agreedon on the American values like indivgualizm, repect of property and equal…

Reconstruction in America (1865-1871) What were the limits of Reconstruction in the United States from 1865 – 1871? Reconstruction was the period in American history following the Civil War until 1877. The country was in the process of repairing the damages and bringing in the former slave population into the constituency. A series of laws and amendments were passed in attempt to accomplish this lofty goal. The three pieces in particular are the Reconstruction amendments, the Reconstruction…

Mass Incarceration: Mass incarceration is a criminal sanction carried out by the justice system that results in nearly invisible punishment including the diminution of rights and privileges of citizenship and legal residency in the United States (Mauer & Chesney-Lind, 2002). Mass incarceration provides one of the largest and most influential examples of institutionalized racism in the contemporary U.S. because of the way that african americans are systematically singled out to be searched,…

Disenfranchisement is defined as White southern Democrats devising a variety of techniques in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century’s to prevent Black people from voting. Those techniques included literacy tests, poll taxes, and the grandfather clause as well as intimidation and violence. The definition of disenfranchisement is located in Chapter 14 on page 295. Disenfranchisement in America today correlates where voting is one of the most fundamental rights for every American citizen,…

With the various Supreme Court cases, protests, legislations, policies/programs, and martyrs, it is reasonable for an individual to assume that African Americans and other minority groups have advanced economically, socially, and politically. Throughout the fight for liberty, there have been gains and also setbacks that negate those gains. Many factors like The March on Washington and Dr. King’s “I Have A Dream” speech gave hope to many of a possible society where life, liberty and the pursuit…