Manalo, Paelo
POLS155 M/W (9:30-10:45)
September 20, 2014
RA #2 Nationalizing Civil Liberties (Selective Incorporation) The concept of selective incorporation has played a huge role over the debate of the powers of a state or local government against the federal government. According to Tom Streissguth, "... it refers to how the rights outlined in the Constitution apply to the states -- and the requirement that state laws and constitutions must observe these rights" in his article "The Definition of Selective Incorporation" (Streissguth). After the Civil War, the idea of selective incorporation came with the passing of the Fourteenth Amendment. The legislature laid down significant new rights for the citizens of the United States; these rights included due process and equal protection. This amendment also touched upon and strengthened the first ten amendments to the Constitution known as the Bill of Rights.
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Arizona (1966) is an example of a Supreme Court case dealing with selective incorporation. According to United State Courts' article, Miranda v. Arizona (1966), "Ernesto Miranda, a Mexican immigrant living in Phoenix, Arizona, was identified in a police lineup by a woman who accused him of kidnapping and raping her... The case went to trial in an Arizona state court and the prosecutor used the confession as evidence against Miranda, who was convicted and sentenced to 20 to 30 years in prison" (uscourts.gov). Little did the public know that when Miranda was detained, he was interrogated for two long hours. The police interrogated him until he confessed to the crimes. When the interrogation was happening, the police never spoke to him about his fifth and sixth amendment. He was not protected against self-incrimination nor was he given the chance to speak to an attorney until the state court
This doctrine of selective incorporation enforced the inclusion of the right to a speedy trial within the Fourteenth Amendment, just as it did with the other rights included in the Bill of Rights. The Fourteenth Amendment itself ensures the enforcement of this basic right and makes it applicable to the states (Tokarev, 2012). That being said, no state can deny this right to any individual because it is a basic right guaranteed by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, as well as written within the Sixth
The originally Bill of Rights protected the rights of citizens from infringement by the federal government, but made no mention of the states. The Fourteen Amendment, adopted shortly after the Civil War, protected citizenship and individual rights from infringement by state governments. Under the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause, the United States Supreme Court began to apply the most important rights guaranteed in the Bill of Rights against the states. This process began in the early 1900s and is known as the doctrine of selective incorporation. Duncan versus Louisiana was the landmark case in which the court incorporated the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial against the states.
First, the Constitution guards us from tyranny by dividing powers between the central and state governments otherwise known as federalism. The Constitution expressly granted broad powers to the federal government, but not to the states. For instance, the Constitution includes the Necessary and Proper Clause, which allows Congress to make any law they deem appropriate to fulfill its duties. Instead of showing how much power that states have, the Constitution stressed what the states couldn 't do. The addition of the Bill of Rights, including the Tenth Amendment, helped to correct some of this imbalance. The Tenth Amendment reserved to the states or the people all powers either not specifically delegated to the national government or specifically denied to the states. This meant that the central and state
The Tenth Amendment protects Americans from intrusive federal government action, The federal government only has powers listed in the constitution. Sometimes the federal government may try to do whatever they want, but do not consider the state powers. Federal government must follow the constitution thoroughly because they are only specifically reserved to that.
Miranda V. Arizona has been a case that impacted our police officers and offenders and is still in place today. In 1996 Phoenix Arizona Ernesto Miranda a 18 year old school drop out with a 8th grade reading level was convicted of kidnaping and rapping a 18 year old girl.. He was a troubled teen growing up convicted of small offenses but this offense made the headlights. The women who was raped went home and told her family, one day her brother sees a car that matches the description and part of the license plate Ernesto Miranda’s car matching the description and was asked to come down to the police station for questioning. Ernesto Miranda lines up with other men on a line and the women says “that looks like him but I would have to hear his voice to fully identify him”, As the integration went on he was told that a women had positively accused him, which was false. Not only did the police lie to him but after that the investigation was on for two hours, he then signed a written confession. He was found guilty and He later states that he had no right to counsel and was never read his rights this case was taken to the Arizona supreme court. The court supported the ruling so Miranda and his lawyer now took it to the united states supreme court , the constitutional issue was the 5th amendment establish the people’s rights to not have witness against them self and the 6th amendment which guarantees criminal defendants the right to an attorney was also violated. In the Supreme
In 1791, the tenth Amendment expressed, "The forces not appointed to the United States by the Constitution, nor precluded by it to the States, are saved to the States separately, or to the individuals." Public instruction was not said as one of those elected powers, thus truly has been assigned to the nearby and state governments. In 1868, the fourteenth Amendment ensured rights to all American Citizens by expressing, "all persons conceived or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the locale thereof, are natives in the United States and of the state wherein they live. No state should make or uphold any law which might abbreviate the benefits or immunities of nationals of the United States; nor might any state deny any individual of life, freedom or property, without due procedure of law; nor deny to any individual inside of its locale the equivalent security of the
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States is perhaps the most sweeping and has likely impacted the general jurisprudence of the Supreme Court the most of any other amendment. This is because, where all other right-protecting amendments protect something specific, the fourteenth amendment was designed to ensure that states guaranteed due process rights, applied the law equally, and protected the “privileges [and] immunities of citizens of the United States.”
Selective Incorporation is basically a concept of taking specific parts of the Bill of Right and apply them to the States and local government, on a case by case basis. And That was after the Civil War (1868), when the 14th amendment was past and it has in it two famous clauses which are the ‘due process clause” in which the states can’t be working by a different standard then the National Congress, and the equal protection clause which people have to be protected equally from the Congress and the States government.
The 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution were also sources of power for the national government when it came to its jurisdiction over the states. By passing laws against slavery and allowing "equal protection under the law," the national government gave itself the power to enforce those laws and therefore enhanced authority over the states. The 13th Amendment abolished slavery and in section 2 stated that "Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." By adding section 2 to the amendment, Congress was simply ensuring their supremacy over the state governments. Among other things, the 14th Amendment guarantees "equal protection under the law" to all citizens. Since all citizens are guaranteed protection, it is left up to the national government to make sure all citizens are receiving these rights. Even though many thought that the 14th Amendment meant that the Bill of Rights was
When the first ten amendments were added to the Constitution, they were planned to shield the public from the national government and not the states. States had their individual constitutions, and their laws only had to comply with their constitution. The founders of our country were very concerned about creating too powerful of a centralized government that might overstep on the given civil liberties of the public. As a protection of individual liberties, the Bill of Rights was formed. The Bill of Rights contains the first ten amendments of the Constitution and protect and preserve inalienable rights against abuse by the federal government.
1. The concept of selective incorporation according to We the People, was a “progression by which different securities in the Bill of Rights were incorporated into the Fourteenth Amendment. In 1937 the “courts were still unwilling to defend civil freedoms beyond the First Amendment. The first case that established selective incorporation was Palko v. Connecticut. The courts determined that “the provisions of the Bill of Rights should be selectively combined and useful as a constraint on the states by the Fourteenth Amendment “(Ginsberg et al. 117). Gideon v. Wainwright “established the right to counsel during criminal courts”. The Miranda v. Arizona likewise established the right to counsel and remain silent” The incorporation that gained a lot of nationwide attention is McDonald v. Chicago where the “right to bear arms was granted” (Ginsberg et al. 118). This incorporation has paved the way for several national cities to pass gun laws.
This case had to do with an Ernest Miranda who raped a Patty McGee*. After extracting a written confession from the rapist about the situation, Miranda’s lawyer argued that it was not valid since the Phoenix Police Department failed to read Miranda his rights, also in violation of the Sixth Amendment which is the right to counsel. Some factors that helped support Miranda’s arguments were that the suspect had requested and been denied an opportunity to consult with a lawyer; the suspect had not been effectively warned about his right to remain silent; and an incriminating statement must have been given by the suspect. The author of the Arizona court’s decision, former U.S. Senator and
In the book, selective incorporation is defined as the, “Process of applying some of the rights in the Bill of Rights to the states to the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment (Losco 65).” In other words, selective incorporation is a doctrine that protects the rights, privileges and immunities of the citizens in the United States from state laws. It was created because of the complex debate that comes in the heart of the Constitution itself. A major issue since the beginning of the government was the relationship between the individual states and the national government, and was a heated debate at the Philadelphia convention which produced the Constitution. Additionally, as we learned earlier in history classes
It was not until after the Civil War that the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments were enacted and began protecting individuals against the states. The Fourteenth Amendment has been the principal means by which this protection has been accomplished. It reads, in part, “No State shall...deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.” The Supreme Court had interpreted this guarantee of liberty to embrace the fundamental liberties in the Bill of Rights, meaning that the state governments must observe and protect them to the same extent as the federal government this is also known called incorporation. The amendments in the Bill of Rights are said to be incorporated against the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. There has been an ongoing debate on the Supreme Court about the extent of incorporation, and whether the entire Bill of Rights, or only some of it’s guarantees, should be incorporated against the states.
The 10th amendment gives each state the power where the federal government does not have it. This is important for maintaining a unified nation because if the majority votes on an act or bill then the majority will be happy. However, this amendment has a history of being taken advantage of to justify immoral issues such as segregation in the Southern states during the times of slavery. Following the ratification of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights was created to clarify the limitations the federal government had over the 50 states.