Standard 4.4: Fundamental Principles and Values of American Political and Civic Life
Define and provide examples of fundamental principles and values of American political and civic life. (Massachusetts Curriculum Framework for History and Social Studies) [8.T4.4]
FOCUS QUESTION: What are the fundamental principles and values of American political and civic life?
Political and civic life in the United States rests on a set of fundamental principles and values including equality, rule of law, limited government, and representative government.
What do those principles and values actually mean? The modules for this standard explore that question by examining each in more detail, reviewing the importance of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, and outlining the boundaries of student rights at school.
4.4.1 INVESTIGATE: Fundamental Principles and Values of American Life
Equality, rule of law, limited government, and representative government are examples of fundamental principles and values in American political and civic life.
Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): "Equality" spelled out with Scrabble tiles on a rainbow flag background | Image by Wokandapix on Pixabay
Equality
The word "equality" did not appear in the Constitution of 1787 or the Bill of Rights of 1789. While the Constitution guaranteed rule of law to all citizens and provided security of liberty under the law, the existence of slavery and inequalities in the status of women contradicted the idea of equal rights.
It was not until after the Civil War that equality was deliberately addressed in the Constitution through a series of amendments:
The 13th Amendment (1865) banned slavery.
The 14th Amendment (1868) guaranteed equal rights of citizenship to all Americans, with the special intention of protecting the rights of former slaves.
The 15th Amendment (1870) provided voting rights for all (male) citizens.
Learn more about the efforts toward equality for marginalized groups:
The African American Struggle For Equality provides background on the history of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments.
The website Equal Rights Amendment discusses efforts to expand the concept of equality to women.
Black Lives Matter is an organization dedicated to overcoming violence and oppression of African Americans.
Human Rights Watch works to ensure the equal rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals.
The Rule of Law
The concept of the rule of law is taken from Alexander Hamilton's Federalist 33 where he wrote: "If individuals enter into a state of society, the laws of that society must be the supreme regulator of their conduct."
According to the United States Courts, "the Rule of law is a principle under which all persons, institutions, and entities are accountable to laws that are:
John Adams, the Boston Massacre, and the Right to an Attorney at Trial
The right to a trial when accused of a crime is one of the foundations of the rule of law in United States society. Guaranteed to all by the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution, it means that defendants have:
the right to speedy trial,
the right to a lawyer to defend them,
the right to an impartial jury, and
the right to confront their accusers and to know the charges being brought against them (National Constitution Center).
Before the Constitution and its Sixth Amendment was passed, the right to trial and the right to have a lawyer for those charged with a crime faced a stern test in the aftermath of the events of March 5, 1770 on King Street in Boston, Massachusetts when British soldiers fired their guns into a crowd of protestors, killing 5 people in what has become known as the Boston Massacre. One of those who lost his life was a Black man, Crispus Attucks, who is regarded as the first person killed in the American Revolution. What actually happened that night and why is still debated by historians and the event has parallels to modern-day responses by police officers to Black and Brown Lives Matter protestors.
In colonial Boston, immediately afterwards, popular emotions were high and people wanted instant punishment for the soldiers and the commander. John Adams, a 34 year-old Boston attorney and later the second President of the United States, agreed to defend the soldiers despite possible threats to himself and his family. Adams believed every person deserved a trial in court and a lawyer to defend them, no matter how clear and obvious someone's guilt may seem.
Going against the immense pressure of popular opinion, John Adams took a courageous action, one that helped establish the concepts of what would be the Sixth Amendment in American law.
Adams's efforts resulted in acquittal of the British commander, Captain Thomas Preston and six of the soldiers; two others were convicted of the lesser crime of manslaughter. Of his legal work, Adams later said, "It was, however, one of the most gallant, generous, manly and disinterested Actions of my whole Life, and one of the best Pieces of Service I ever rendered my Country."
Still, it took till the 1963 landmark Supreme Court case Gideon v. Wainwright to ensure that the state must provide an attorney to any defendant who cannot afford to hire their own lawyer, thereby guaranteeing the right to counsel to anyone accused of a crime.
Write and draw a history of the event and its aftermath
Write or draw a picture book or graphic history which explains the right to a trial and to a lawyer to defend you to a younger audience.
Limited government
In the United States political system, the national government is given limited but not supreme or total powers. After the struggle of the American Revolution to be free from rule by a king, people in the colonies were very wary of a tyrannical ruler or an overbearing government. In the Constitution, limited government relates to free markets and classical liberalism, drawing on Adam Smith's philosophy of the "invisible hand" and self-regulating economies.
The Ninth and Tenth amendments of the Bill of Rights further express the concept of limited government. Those amendments state that the rights of people do not have to be expressly written in the Constitution and that delegated powers of the Federal government are only to be performed if expressly mentioned in the Constitution. The Constitution also limits government intervention in other key areas of political life, including thought, expression, and association.
Representative democracy
Representative democracy is the principle that people elect individuals to represent them in the government. This is a fundamental element of the governmental system of the United States. Voters elect representatives to a ruling body (the Congress) who acts on behalf of the people's best interests. Learn more from this video: Representative Democracy.
Media Literacy Connections: Online Messaging by Special Interest Groups
Advocacy organizations (also known as special interest groups) are groups that support a political issue or cause (What is an Advocacy Group?). These organizations engage in fundraising, conducting public awareness and information campaigns, lobbying legislators, and contributing to political campaigns. They make extensive use of social media.
In these activities, you will explore how civil rights and social justice advocacy organizations use social media and online messaging to promote equality in society and then you will design your own!
Does American political and civic life exemplify the fundamental principles and values of equality, rule of law, limited government, and representative government?
Conduct research and then create a video that educates others.
Create a social media post about representative democracy
Using Tik Tok, Instagram, Snapchat, or some other digital tool, create a social media post that answers the following questions:
What personal qualities, education, and background should an elected representative have?
How would that representative best stay in touch with you and other constituents?
What problems do you want that representative to focus on solving?
What type of person do you want representing you in government at the local, state, and national level?
Online Resources for Fundamental Principles of American Political Life
Fundamentals of Representative Democracy, Lesson Plans for High School Civics, Government, and U.S. History Classes
4.4.2 UNCOVER: The Importance of the 14th Amendment
John Bingham, a now mostly forgotten Congressman from Ohio, wrote these famous words of 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."
Figure \(\PageIndex{3}\): 14th Amendment Sign at the Brown v. Board of Education Historical Site by Shutterbugsage
The 14th Amendment was one of three post-Civil War Amendments to the Constitution.
The 13th Amendment abolished slavery.
The 14th Amendment gave equality under the law and for citizenship to anyone born in the United States; however, explicit rights for women were not guaranteed.
The 15th Amendment gave all citizens the right to vote regardless of race, color, or previous position of servitude; however, voting rights for women were not guaranteed.
Historian Eric Foner (2019) characterized the three post-Civil War amendments as "sleeping giants . . . that continued to inspire those who looked to the Constitution to support their efforts to create a more just social order" (p. xxviii).
Since its passage, the 14th Amendment has continued to transform law and society in the United States. As New York Times opinion writer Magliocca (2013) noted:
This sentence would be the legal basis for the Supreme Court’s subsequent decisions desegregating the public schools, securing equality for women, and creating the right to sexual privacy. Bingham also said that his text would also extend all of the protections of the Bill of Rights to the actions of state governments, which is largely, though not completely, the law today (para. 15).
Passed on July 9, 1868 and based on the Civil Rights Bill of 1866, the 14th Amendment had five sections:
State and federal citizenship for everyone, no matter of race, who were born or naturalized in the United States.
States are not permitted to limit "privileges and immunities" of citizens.
No citizen is denied life, liberty, or property without "due process of law."
No citizen can be denied "equal protection of the laws."
4.4.3 ENGAGE: What Are Students' Rights at School?
Students "do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate" declared the Supreme Court in the 1969 Tinker v. Des Moines case (the details of the case are in Topic 5, Standard 6 of this book).
Schools can restrict students' rights to free speech when what students are saying can cause a "substantial disruption" to school activities or impinges on the rights of others. Schools can also restrict student speech that is lewd, that is happening at school-sponsored events, or that promotes illegal drug use (Johnson, 2021).
Additionally, students do not have a right to wear racially or religiously threatening images (such as swastikas or Confederate battle flags) in school, nor can they post racist or degrading comments about classmates on their outside-of-school social media accounts (National Education Association, 2018). Student actions can be restricted by school officials when those officials believe there is a significant threat to orderly educational practices or other people's legal rights.
The rights of students are subject to shifting legal interpretations and intensified political debates over the ongoing issues of speech, privacy, social media, dress codes, discipline procedures, disability rights, gender expression, bathroom access, health, pregnancy, and more. Legal scholar Catherine J. Ross (2015) contends that courts have retreated from the broad protections that granted student speech in the 1940s through the 1960s.
Students attending private schools (that is, schools not funded by local, state, or federal government) do not automatically have the same rights as their peers in public schools. Constitutional protections do not necessarily apply. Instead, student rights are determined by the legal contract that families sign to send children to those schools (Student Rights in Private Schools). Private schools therefore have broad discretion about the rules and behaviors they want to enforce; students must follow them, or they can be punished or expelled for violating the contract signed by their families to allow them attend.
You can learn more about student legal rights involving speech and social media, including the landmark 2021 Mahanoy Area School District vs. B.L. Supreme Court decision (the so-called school cheerleader free speech case) in Topic 5.6 of this book.
Suggested Learning Activities
Analyze data and conduct research
Conduct a class poll: What do students in your class or school believe are their rights in school?
Write an proposed new amendment to the U.S. Constitution, in plain English, that spells out the rights of the government in regards to modern media (for example, social media, TV news, the Internet, etc.)
Explain if your amendment will expand or lessen the power of the government regulation in regards to media and publishing rights.
Legal Guidance on Students Rights: Discrimination and Harassment Based on Race, Religion, National Origin, and Immigration Status, National Education Association (March 2018)
Standard 4.4 Conclusion
American political and civic life rests on a series of fundamental principles and broadly shared values. INVESTIGATE explored the meanings of four of those principles and values: equality, rule of law, limited government, and representative government. UNCOVER discussed how the 14th Amendment to the Constitution has over time extended America's fundamental principles and values to African Americans and other marginalized individuals and groups. ENGAGE asked what the protections and limits of students' rights at school are.
![The quote "[No State shall] deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of its laws" from the 14th Amendment to the Constitution is printed on a sheet of glass at the Brown v. Board of Education historical site.](https://socialsci.libretexts.org/@api/deki/files/87935/4.4.2_14th_Amendment_Sign.png?revision=1)
