Ch 4 - Civil Liberties and Civil Rights

Question 1

affirmative action

Answer 1

government policies or programs that seek to address past injustices against specified groups by making special efforts to provide members of these groups with access to educational and employment opportunities

Question 2

Bill of Rights

Answer 2

the first ten amendments to the Constitution, which guarantee certain rights and liberties to the people

Question 3

bills of attainder

Answer 3

laws that decree a person guilty of a crime without a trial

Question 4

Brown v. Board of Education (1954)

Answer 4

the 1954 supreme Court decision that stuck down the “seperate but equal” doctrine as fundamentally unequal. This case eliminated state power to use race as a criterion of discrimination in law and provided the national government with the power to intervene by exercising stric tregulatory poliicies against discriminatory actions

Question 5

civil liberties

Answer 5

areas of personal freedom with which governments cannot interfere

Question 6

civil rights

Answer 6

legal or moral claims that citizens are entitled to make on govenrment

Question 7

“clear and present danger” test

Answer 7

test to determine whether speech is protected or unprotected based on its capacity to present a “clear and present danger” to society

Question 8

de facto

Answer 8

literally “by fact”; pracitcies that occur even when there is no legal enforcement, such as school segregation in much of the United States today

Question 9

de jure

Answer 9

literally “by law”; legally enforced practices, such as school segregation in the South before the 1960s

Question 10

double jeopardy

Answer 10

the fifth amendment right providing that a person cannot be tried twice for the same crim

Question 11

dual citizenship

Answer 11

the status of being governed by both the US federal government and the individual state’s government

Question 12

due process of law

Answer 12

the right of every citizen to be protected against arbitrary action by national or state government

Question 13

eminent domain

Answer 13

the right of government to take private property for public use

Question 14

equal protection clause

Answer 14

provision of the Fourteenth Amendment guaranteeing citizens “the equal protection of the laws” this clause has served for the basis for the civil rights of African Americans, womena nd other groups

Question 15

establishment clause

Answer 15

the first amendment clause that syas that “congress shall make no law respecticing an establishment of religion”. This means that a “wall of separation” exists between church and state

Question 16

exclusionary rule

Answer 16

the ability of courts to excluse evidence obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment

Question 17

ex post facto laws

Answer 17

laws that declare an action to be illegal after it has been committed

Question 18

Fifteenth Amendment

Answer 18

one of three civil war amendments; guaranteeing voting rights for African American men

Question 19

fighting words

Answer 19

speech that directly incites damaging conduct

Question 20

Fourteenth Amendment

Answer 20

one of three Civil War amendments; guaranteed equal protection and due process

Question 21

free exercise clause

Answer 21

the first amendment clause that protects a citizen’s right to believe and practice whatever religion he or she chooses

Question 22

grand jury

Answer 22

jury that determines whether sufficient evidence is available to justiy a trial; grand juries do not rule on the accused’s guilt or innocence

Question 23

habeas corpus

Answer 23

a court order demanding that an individual in custody be brought into court and shown the cause for detention

Question 24

incorporation

Answer 24

the process by which court decisions have required the states to follow parts of the Bill of Rights based on the use or application of the Fourteenth Amendment

Question 25

libel

Answer 25

a written statement, made in “reckless disregard of the truth,” which is considered damaging to a victim because it is “malicious, scandalous and defamatory”

Question 26

Miranda rule

Answer 26

the requirement, articulted by the supreme court in Miranda v. Arizona (1966) , that persons under arrest nmust be informed prior to police interrogation of their rights to remain silent and to have the benefit of legal counsel

Question 27

preferred freedoms

Answer 27

certain protections in the Bill of Rights, such as free speecha dn free press, that are considered even more important than other freedoms

Question 28

Prior restraint

Answer 28

an effor by a govenrmental agency to block the publication of material it deems libelous or harmful in some other way; censorship. In the United States, the courts forbid prior restraint except under the most extraordinary of circumstances

Question 29

right to privacy

Answer 29

the right to be left alone, which has been interpreted to entail free access to birth control and abortions

Question 30

“seperate but equal” rule

Answer 30

doctrine that public accomodations could be segregated by race but still be equal

Question 31

slander

Answer 31

an oral statement, made in “recklass disregard of the truth” which is considered damaging to the victim because it is “malicious, scandalous and defamatory”

Question 32

speech plus

Answer 32

speeh acoompanied by conduct or physcial acitvity sucha sit=ins, picketing and demonstrations; protections of this form of speech under the First Amendment is conditional and restictions imposed by state or local authorities are acceptable is properly balanced by considerations of public order

Question 33

strict scrutiny

Answer 33

test, used by the Supreme Court in racial discrimination cases and other cases involving civil liberties and civil rights, which places the burden of proof on the government rather than on the challengers to show that the law in question is constitutional

Question 34

Thirteenth Amendment

Answer 34

abolished slavery after the civil war.