Coordinates	43°35′07″N39°43′13″N
Conventional long name	United States of America
Common name	the United States
Image coat	US-GreatSeal-Obverse.svg
Length	1776–present
Symbol type	Great Seal
National motto	In God We Trust(official)(traditional)(Latin: Out of Many, One)
Map width	220px
National anthem	"The Star-Spangled Banner"
Official languages	None at federal level
Languages type	National language
Languages	English (''de facto'')
Capital	Washington, D.C.
Largest city	New York City
Government type	Federal presidential constitutional republic
Leader title1	President
Leader name1	Barack Obama (D)
Leader title2	Vice President
Leader name2	Joe Biden (D)
Leader title3
Leader name3	John Boehner (R)
Leader title4	Chief Justice
Leader name4	John Roberts
Legislature	Congress
Upper house	Senate
Lower house	House of Representatives
Sovereignty type	Independence
Established event1	Declared
Established date1	July 4, 1776
Established event2	Recognized
Established date2	September 3, 1783
Established event3	Current constitution
Established date3	June 21, 1788
Area footnote
Area sq mi	3794101
Area km2	9826675
Area rank	3rd/4th
Area magnitude	1 E12
Percent water	6.76
Population estimate	}}

|population_estimate_year = 2011 |population_estimate_rank = 3rd |population_density_km2 = 33.7 |population_density_sq_mi = 87.4 |GDP_PPP_year = 2010 |GDP_PPP = $14.780 trillion |GDP_PPP_rank = 1st |GDP_PPP_per_capita = $47,123 |GDP_PPP_per_capita_rank = 6th |GDP_nominal = $14.780 trillion |GDP_nominal_rank = 1st |GDP_nominal_year = 2010 |GDP_nominal_per_capita = $47,132 |GDP_nominal_per_capita_rank = 9th |HDI_year = 2010 |HDI = 0.902 |HDI_rank = 4th |HDI_category = very high |EF_year = 2007 |EF = 8.0 gha |EF_rank = 6th |Gini = 45.0 |Gini_rank = 39th |Gini_year = 2007 |currency = United States dollar ($) |currency_code = USD |country_code = USA |utc_offset = −5 to −10 |utc_offset_DST = −4 to −10 |cctld = .us .gov .mil .edu |calling_code = +1 |date_format = m/d/yy (AD) |drives_on = right |demonym = American |footnotes = a. English is the official language of at least 28 states—some sources give a higher figure, based on differing definitions of "official". English and Hawaiian are both official languages in the state of Hawaii.

b. English is the ''de facto'' language of American government and the sole language spoken at home by 80% of Americans age five and older. Spanish is the second most commonly spoken language.

c. Whether the United States or the People's Republic of China is larger is disputed. The figure given is from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency's ''World Factbook''. Other sources give smaller figures. All authoritative calculations of the country's size include only the 50 states and the District of Columbia, not the territories.

d. The population estimate includes people whose usual residence is in the fifty states and the District of Columbia, including noncitizens. It does not include either those living in the territories, amounting to more than 4 million U.S. citizens (most in Puerto Rico), or U.S. citizens living outside the United States. }}

The United States of America (also called the United States, the States, the U.S., the USA, and America) is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is mostly in central North America, where its forty-eight contiguous states and Washington, D.C., the capital district, lie between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, bordered by Canada to the north and Mexico to the south. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the continent, with Canada to the east and Russia to the west across the Bering Strait. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific. The country also possesses several territories in the Pacific and Caribbean.

At 3.79 million square miles (9.83 million km²) and with over 312 million people, the United States is the third or fourth largest country by total area, and the third largest by both land area and population. It is one of the world's most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of large-scale immigration from many countries. The U.S. economy is the world's largest national economy, with an estimated 2010 GDP of $14.780 trillion (23% of nominal global GDP and 20% of global GDP at purchasing-power parity).

Indigenous peoples have inhabited what is now the mainland United States for between 12,000 and 40,000 years since the Paleo-Indians crossed the Bearing land bridge from Asia to North America. This Native American population was greatly reduced by disease and warfare after European contact. The United States was founded by thirteen British colonies located along the Atlantic seaboard. On July 4, 1776, they issued the Declaration of Independence, which proclaimed their right to self-determination and their establishment of a cooperative union. The rebellious states defeated the British Empire in the American Revolution, the first successful colonial war of independence. The current United States Constitution was adopted on September 17, 1787; its ratification the following year made the states part of a single republic with a strong central government. The Bill of Rights, comprising ten constitutional amendments guaranteeing many fundamental civil rights and freedoms, was ratified in 1791.

Through the 19th century, the United States displaced native tribes, acquired the Louisiana territory from France, Florida from Spain, part of the Oregon Country from the United Kingdom, Alta California and New Mexico from Mexico, Alaska from Russia, and annexed the Republic of Texas and the Republic of Hawaii. Disputes between the agrarian South and industrial North over the expansion of the institution of slavery and states' rights provoked the Civil War of the 1860s. The North's victory prevented a permanent split of the country and led to the end of legal slavery in the United States. By the 1870s, its national economy was the world's largest. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the country's status as a military power. It emerged from World War II as the first country with nuclear weapons and a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union left the United States as the sole superpower. The country accounts for 41% of global military spending, and it is a leading economic, political, and cultural force in the world.

Etymology

In 1507, German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a world map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere "America" after Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci. The former British colonies first used the country's modern name in the 1776 Declaration of Independence, the "unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America". On November 15, 1777, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, which states, "The Stile of this Confederacy shall be 'The United States of America.'" The Franco-American treaties of 1778 used "United States of North America", but from July 11, 1778, "United States of America" was used on the country's bills of exchange, and it has been the official name ever since.

The short form "United States" is also standard. Other common forms include the "U.S.", the "USA", and "America". Colloquial names include the "U.S. of A." and, internationally, the "States". "Columbia", a once popular name for the United States, derives from Christopher Columbus; it appears in the name "District of Columbia".

The standard way to refer to a citizen of the United States is as an "American". Although "United States" is the official appositional term, "American" and "U.S." are more commonly used to refer to the country adjectivally ("American values", "U.S. forces"). "American" is rarely used in English to refer to people not connected to the United States.

The phrase "United States" was originally treated as plural—e.g., "the United States are"—including in the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1865. It became common to treat it as singular—e.g., "the United States is"—after the end of the Civil War. The singular form is now standard; the plural form is retained in the idiom "these United States".

Geography and environment

The land area of the contiguous United States is approximately . Alaska, separated from the contiguous United States by Canada, is the largest state at . Hawaii, occupying an archipelago in the central Pacific, southwest of North America, has just over . The United States is the world's third or fourth largest nation by total area (land and water), ranking behind Russia and Canada and just above or below China. The ranking varies depending on how two territories disputed by China and India are counted and how the total size of the United States is measured: calculations range from to to . Including only land area, the United States is third in size behind Russia and China, just ahead of Canada.

The coastal plain of the Atlantic seaboard gives way further inland to deciduous forests and the rolling hills of the Piedmont. The Appalachian Mountains divide the eastern seaboard from the Great Lakes and the grasslands of the Midwest. The Mississippi–Missouri River, the world's fourth longest river system, runs mainly north–south through the heart of the country. The flat, fertile prairie of the Great Plains stretches to the west, interrupted by a highland region in the southeast. The Rocky Mountains, at the western edge of the Great Plains, extend north to south across the country, reaching altitudes higher than 14,000 feet (4,300 m) in Colorado. Farther west are the rocky Great Basin and deserts such as the Mojave. The Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges run close to the Pacific coast. At 20,320 feet (6,194 m), Alaska's Mount McKinley is the tallest peak in the country and in North America. Active volcanoes are common throughout Alaska's Alexander and Aleutian Islands, and Hawaii consists of volcanic islands. The supervolcano underlying Yellowstone National Park in the Rockies is the continent's largest volcanic feature. The United States, with its large size and geographic variety, includes most climate types. To the east of the 100th meridian, the climate ranges from humid continental in the north to humid subtropical in the south. The southern tip of Florida is tropical, as is Hawaii. The Great Plains west of the 100th meridian are semi-arid. Much of the Western mountains are alpine. The climate is arid in the Great Basin, desert in the Southwest, Mediterranean in coastal California, and oceanic in coastal Oregon and Washington and southern Alaska. Most of Alaska is subarctic or polar. Extreme weather is not uncommon—the states bordering the Gulf of Mexico are prone to hurricanes, and most of the world's tornadoes occur within the country, mainly in the Midwest's Tornado Alley.

The U.S. ecology is considered "megadiverse": about 17,000 species of vascular plants occur in the contiguous United States and Alaska, and over 1,800 species of flowering plants are found in Hawaii, few of which occur on the mainland. The United States is home to more than 400 mammal, 750 bird, and 500 reptile and amphibian species. About 91,000 insect species have been described. The Endangered Species Act of 1973 protects threatened and endangered species and their habitats, which are monitored by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service. There are fifty-eight national parks and hundreds of other federally managed parks, forests, and wilderness areas. Altogether, the government owns 28.8% of the country's land area. Most of this is protected, though some is leased for oil and gas drilling, mining, logging, or cattle ranching; 2.4% is used for military purposes.

Political divisions

The United States is a federal union of fifty states. The original thirteen states were the successors of the thirteen colonies that rebelled against British rule. Early in the country's history, three new states were organized on territory separated from the claims of the existing states: Kentucky from Virginia; Tennessee from North Carolina; and Maine from Massachusetts. Most of the other states have been carved from territories obtained through war or purchase by the U.S. government. One set of exceptions comprises Vermont, Texas, and Hawaii: each was an independent republic before joining the union. During the American Civil War, West Virginia broke away from Virginia. The most recent state—Hawaii—achieved statehood on August 21, 1959. The states do not have the right to secede from the union.

The states compose the vast bulk of the U.S. land mass; the two other areas considered integral parts of the country are the District of Columbia, the federal district where the capital, Washington, is located; and Palmyra Atoll, an uninhabited but incorporated territory in the Pacific Ocean. The United States also possesses five major overseas territories: Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands in the Caribbean; and American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands in the Pacific. Those born in the major territories (except for American Samoa) possess U.S. citizenship. American citizens residing in the territories have many of the same rights and responsibilities as citizens residing in the states; however, they are generally exempt from federal income tax, may not vote for president, and have only nonvoting representation in the U.S. Congress.

History

Native American and European settlement

The indigenous peoples of the U.S. mainland, including Alaska Natives, are believed to have migrated from Asia, beginning between 12,000 and 40,000 years ago. Some, such as the pre-Columbian Mississippian culture, developed advanced agriculture, grand architecture, and state-level societies. After Europeans began settling the Americas, many millions of indigenous Americans died from epidemics of imported diseases such as smallpox.

In 1492, Genoese explorer Christopher Columbus, under contract to the Spanish crown, reached several Caribbean islands, making first contact with the indigenous people. On April 2, 1513, Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León landed on what he called "La Florida"—the first documented European arrival on what would become the U.S. mainland. Spanish settlements in the region were followed by ones in the present-day southwestern United States that drew thousands through Mexico. French fur traders established outposts of New France around the Great Lakes; France eventually claimed much of the North American interior, down to the Gulf of Mexico. The first successful English settlements were the Virginia Colony in Jamestown in 1607 and the Pilgrims' Plymouth Colony in 1620. The 1628 chartering of the Massachusetts Bay Colony resulted in a wave of migration; by 1634, New England had been settled by some 10,000 Puritans. Between the late 1610s and the American Revolution, about 50,000 convicts were shipped to Britain's American colonies. Beginning in 1614, the Dutch settled along the lower Hudson River, including New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island.

In 1674, the Dutch ceded their American territory to England; the province of New Netherland was renamed New York. Many new immigrants, especially to the South, were indentured servants—some two-thirds of all Virginia immigrants between 1630 and 1680. By the turn of the 18th century, African slaves were becoming the primary source of bonded labor. With the 1729 division of the Carolinas and the 1732 colonization of Georgia, the thirteen British colonies that would become the United States of America were established. All had local governments with elections open to most free men, with a growing devotion to the ancient rights of Englishmen and a sense of self-government stimulating support for republicanism. All legalized the African slave trade. With high birth rates, low death rates, and steady immigration, the colonial population grew rapidly. The Christian revivalist movement of the 1730s and 1740s known as the Great Awakening fueled interest in both religion and religious liberty. In the French and Indian War, British forces seized Canada from the French, but the francophone population remained politically isolated from the southern colonies. Excluding the Native Americans (popularly known as "American Indians"), who were being displaced, those thirteen colonies had a population of 2.6 million in 1770, about one-third that of Britain; nearly one in five Americans were black slaves. Though subject to British taxation, the American colonials had no representation in the Parliament of Great Britain.

Independence and expansion

Tensions between American colonials and the British during the revolutionary period of the 1760s and early 1770s led to the American Revolutionary War, fought from 1775 to 1781. On June 14, 1775, the Continental Congress, convening in Philadelphia, established a Continental Army under the command of George Washington. Proclaiming that "all men are created equal" and endowed with "certain unalienable Rights", the Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, drafted largely by Thomas Jefferson, on July 4, 1776. That date is now celebrated annually as America's Independence Day. In 1777, the Articles of Confederation established a weak confederal government that operated until 1789.

After the British defeat by American forces assisted by the French and Spanish, Great Britain recognized the independence of the United States and the states' sovereignty over American territory west to the Mississippi River. Those wishing to establish a strong national government with powers of taxation organized a constitutional convention in 1787. The United States Constitution was ratified in 1788, and the new republic's first Senate, House of Representatives, and president—George Washington—took office in 1789. The Bill of Rights, forbidding federal restriction of personal freedoms and guaranteeing a range of legal protections, was adopted in 1791.

Attitudes toward slavery were shifting; a clause in the Constitution protected the transatlantic slave trade only until 1808. The Northern states abolished slavery between 1780 and 1804, leaving the slave states of the South as defenders of the "peculiar institution". The Second Great Awakening, beginning about 1800, made evangelicalism a force behind various social reform movements, including abolitionism.

Americans' eagerness to expand westward prompted a long series of Indian Wars. The Louisiana Purchase of French-claimed territory under President Thomas Jefferson in 1803 almost doubled the nation's size. The War of 1812, declared against Britain over various grievances and fought to a draw, strengthened U.S. nationalism. A series of U.S. military incursions into Florida led Spain to cede it and other Gulf Coast territory in 1819. The Trail of Tears in the 1830s exemplified the Indian removal policy that stripped the native peoples of their land. The United States annexed the Republic of Texas in 1845, amid a period when the concept of Manifest Destiny was becoming popular. The 1846 Oregon Treaty with Britain led to U.S. control of the present-day American Northwest. The U.S. victory in the Mexican-American War resulted in the 1848 cession of California and much of the present-day American Southwest. The California Gold Rush of 1848–49 further spurred western migration. New railways made relocation easier for settlers and increased conflicts with Native Americans. Over a half-century, up to 40 million American bison, or buffalo, were slaughtered for skins and meat and to ease the railways' spread. The loss of the buffalo, a primary resource for the plains Indians, was an existential blow to many native cultures.

Civil War and industrialization

Tensions between slave and free states mounted with arguments over the relationship between the state and federal governments, as well as violent conflicts over the spread of slavery into new states. Abraham Lincoln, candidate of the largely antislavery Republican Party, was elected president in 1860. Before he took office, seven slave states declared their secession—which the federal government maintained was illegal—and formed the Confederate States of America. With the Confederate attack upon Fort Sumter, the Civil War began and four more slave states joined the Confederacy. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 declared slaves in the Confederacy to be free. Following the Union victory in 1865, three amendments to the U.S. Constitution ensured freedom for the nearly four million African Americans who had been slaves, made them citizens, and gave them voting rights. The war and its resolution led to a substantial increase in federal power. The war remains the deadliest conflict in American history, resulting in the deaths of 620,000 soldiers.

After the war, the assassination of Lincoln radicalized Republican Reconstruction policies aimed at reintegrating and rebuilding the Southern states while ensuring the rights of the newly freed slaves. The resolution of the disputed 1876 presidential election by the Compromise of 1877 ended Reconstruction; Jim Crow laws soon disenfranchised many African Americans. In the North, urbanization and an unprecedented influx of immigrants from Southern Southern and Eastern Europe hastened the country's industrialization. The wave of immigration, lasting until 1929, provided labor and transformed American culture. National infrastructure development spurred economic growth. The 1867 Alaska Purchase from Russia completed the country's mainland expansion. The Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890 was the last major armed conflict of the Indian Wars. In 1893, the indigenous monarchy of the Pacific Kingdom of Hawaii was overthrown in a coup led by American residents; the United States annexed the archipelago in 1898. Victory in the Spanish–American War the same year demonstrated that the United States was a world power and led to the annexation of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines. The Philippines gained independence a half-century later; Puerto Rico and Guam remain U.S. territories.

World War I, Great Depression, and World War II

At the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the United States remained neutral. Most Americans sympathized with the British and French, although many opposed intervention. In 1917, the United States joined the Allies, and the American Expeditionary Forces helped to turn the tide against the Central Powers. After the war, the Senate did not ratify the Treaty of Versailles, which established the League of Nations. The country pursued a policy of unilateralism, verging on isolationism. In 1920, the women's rights movement won passage of a constitutional amendment granting women's suffrage. The prosperity of the Roaring Twenties ended with the Wall Street Crash of 1929 that triggered the Great Depression. After his election as president in 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt responded with the New Deal, a range of policies increasing government intervention in the economy, including the establishment of the Social Security system. The Dust Bowl of the mid-1930s impoverished many farming communities and spurred a new wave of western migration. The United States, effectively neutral during World War II's early stages after Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland in September 1939, began supplying materiel to the Allies in March 1941 through the Lend-Lease program. On December 7, 1941, the Empire of Japan launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, prompting the United States to join the Allies against the Axis powers as well as the internment of Japanese Americans by the thousands. Participation in the war spurred capital investment and industrial capacity. Among the major combatants, the United States was the only nation to become richer—indeed, far richer—instead of poorer because of the war. Allied conferences at Bretton Woods and Yalta outlined a new system of international organizations that placed the United States and Soviet Union at the center of world affairs. As victory was won in Europe, a 1945 international conference held in San Francisco produced the United Nations Charter, which became active after the war. The United States, having developed the first nuclear weapons, used them on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August. Japan surrendered on September 2, ending the war.

Cold War and protest politics

The United States and Soviet Union jockeyed for power after World War II during the Cold War, dominating the military affairs of Europe through NATO and the Warsaw Pact, respectively. While they engaged in proxy wars and developed powerful nuclear arsenals, the two countries avoided direct military conflict. Resisting leftist land and income redistribution projects around the world, the United States often supported authoritarian governments. American troops fought Communist Chinese forces in the Korean War of 1950–53. The House Un-American Activities Committee pursued a series of investigations into suspected leftist subversion, while Senator Joseph McCarthy became the figurehead of anticommunist sentiment.

The 1961 Soviet launch of the first manned spaceflight prompted President John F. Kennedy's call for the United States to be first to land "a man on the moon", achieved in 1969. Kennedy also faced a tense nuclear showdown with Soviet forces in Cuba. Meanwhile, the United States experienced sustained economic expansion. A growing civil rights movement, symbolized and led by African Americans such as Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Jr., and James Bevel, used nonviolence to confront segregation and discrimination. Following Kennedy's assassination in 1963, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 were passed under President Lyndon B. Johnson. He also signed into law the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Johnson and his successor, Richard Nixon, expanded a proxy war in Southeast Asia into the unsuccessful Vietnam War. A widespread countercultural movement grew, fueled by opposition to the war, black nationalism, and the sexual revolution. Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, and others led a new wave of feminism that sought political, social, and economic equality for women.

As a result of the Watergate scandal, in 1974 Nixon became the first U.S. president to resign, to avoid being impeached on charges including obstruction of justice and abuse of power. The Jimmy Carter administration of the late 1970s was marked by stagflation and the Iran hostage crisis. The election of Ronald Reagan as president in 1980 heralded a rightward shift in American politics, reflected in major changes in taxation and spending priorities. His second term in office brought both the Iran-Contra scandal and significant diplomatic progress with the Soviet Union. The subsequent Soviet collapse ended the Cold War.

Contemporary era

Under President George H. W. Bush, the United States took a lead role in the UN–sanctioned Gulf War. The longest economic expansion in modern U.S. history—from March 1991 to March 2001—encompassed the Bill Clinton administration and the dot-com bubble. A civil lawsuit and sex scandal led to Clinton's impeachment in 1998, but he remained in office. The 2000 presidential election, one of the closest in American history, was resolved by a U.S. Supreme Court decision—George W. Bush, son of George H. W. Bush, became president.

On September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda terrorists struck the World Trade Center in New York City and The Pentagon near Washington, D.C., killing nearly three thousand people. In response, the Bush administration launched the global War on Terror, invading Afghanistan and removing the Taliban government and al-Qaeda training camps. Taliban insurgents continue to fight a guerrilla war. In 2002, the Bush administration began to press for regime change in Iraq on controversial grounds. Forces of a so-called Coalition of the Willing invaded Iraq in 2003, ousting Saddam Hussein. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina caused severe destruction along much of the Gulf Coast, devastating New Orleans. In 2008, amid a global economic recession, the first African American president, Barack Obama, was elected. In 2010, major health care and financial system reforms were enacted.

Government, elections, and politics

The United States is the world's oldest surviving federation. It is a constitutional republic and representative democracy, "in which majority rule is tempered by minority rights protected by law". The government is regulated by a system of checks and balances defined by the U.S. Constitution, which serves as the country's supreme legal document. In the American federalist system, citizens are usually subject to three levels of government, federal, state, and local; the local government's duties are commonly split between county and municipal governments. In almost all cases, executive and legislative officials are elected by a plurality vote of citizens by district. There is no proportional representation at the federal level, and it is very rare at lower levels.

The federal government is composed of three branches:

Legislative: The bicameral Congress, made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives, makes federal law, declares war, approves treaties, has the power of the purse, and has the power of impeachment, by which it can remove sitting members of the government.

Executive: The president is the commander-in-chief of the military, can veto legislative bills before they become law, and appoints the members of the Cabinet (subject to Senate approval) and other officers, who administer and enforce federal laws and policies.

Judicial: The Supreme Court and lower federal courts, whose judges are appointed by the president with Senate approval, interpret laws and overturn those they find unconstitutional.

The House of Representatives has 435 voting members, each representing a congressional district for a two-year term. House seats are apportioned among the states by population every tenth year. As of the 2000 census, seven states have the minimum of one representative, while California, the most populous state, has fifty-three. The Senate has 100 members with each state having two senators, elected at-large to six-year terms; one third of Senate seats are up for election every other year. The president serves a four-year term and may be elected to the office no more than twice. The president is not elected by direct vote, but by an indirect electoral college system in which the determining votes are apportioned to the states and the District of Columbia. The Supreme Court, led by the Chief Justice of the United States, has nine members, who serve for life.

The state governments are structured in roughly similar fashion; Nebraska uniquely has a unicameral legislature. The governor (chief executive) of each state is directly elected. Some state judges and cabinet officers are appointed by the governors of the respective states, while others are elected by popular vote.

The original text of the Constitution establishes the structure and responsibilities of the federal government and its relationship with the individual states. Article One protects the right to the "great writ" of habeas corpus, and Article Three guarantees the right to a jury trial in all criminal cases. Amendments to the Constitution require the approval of three-fourths of the states. The Constitution has been amended twenty-seven times; the first ten amendments, which make up the Bill of Rights, and the Fourteenth Amendment form the central basis of Americans' individual rights. All laws and governmental procedures are subject to judicial review and any law ruled in violation of the Constitution is voided. The principle of judicial review, not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution, was declared by the Supreme Court in ''Marbury v. Madison'' (1803).

Parties and ideology

The United States has operated under a two-party system for most of its history. For elective offices at most levels, state-administered primary elections choose the major party nominees for subsequent general elections. Since the general election of 1856, the major parties have been the Democratic Party, founded in 1824, and the Republican Party, founded in 1854. Since the Civil War, only one third-party presidential candidate—former president Theodore Roosevelt, running as a Progressive in 1912—has won as much as 20% of the popular vote.

Within American political culture, the Republican Party is considered center-right or "conservative" and the Democratic Party is considered center-left or "liberal". The states of the Northeast and West Coast and some of the Great Lakes states, known as "blue states", are relatively liberal. The "red states" of the South and parts of the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains are relatively conservative.

The winner of the 2008 presidential election, Democrat Barack Obama, is the 44th U.S. president. The 2010 midterm elections saw the Republican Party take control of the House and make gains in the Senate, where the Democrats retain the majority. In the 112th United States Congress, the Senate comprises 51 Democrats, two independents who caucus with the Democrats, and 47 Republicans; the House comprises 240 Republicans and 192 Democrats—three seats are vacant. There are 29 Republican and 20 Democratic state governors, as well as one independent.

Foreign relations and military

The United States exercises global economic, political, and military influence. It is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and New York City hosts the United Nations Headquarters. It is a member of the G8, G20, and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Almost all countries have embassies in Washington, D.C., and many have consulates around the country. Likewise, nearly all nations host American diplomatic missions. However, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Bhutan, Libya, and the Republic of China (Taiwan) do not have formal diplomatic relations with the United States.

The United States has a "special relationship" with the United Kingdom and strong ties with Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Israel, and several European countries. It works closely with fellow NATO members on military and security issues and with its neighbors through the Organization of American States and free trade agreements such as the trilateral North American Free Trade Agreement with Canada and Mexico. In 2008, the United States spent a net $25.4 billion on official development assistance, the most in the world. As a share of America's large gross national income (GNI), however, the U.S. contribution of 0.18% ranked last among twenty-two donor states. By contrast, private overseas giving by Americans is relatively generous.

The president holds the title of commander-in-chief of the nation's armed forces and appoints its leaders, the secretary of defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The United States Department of Defense administers the armed forces, including the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force. The Coast Guard is run by the Department of Homeland Security in peacetime and the Department of the Navy in time of war. In 2008, the armed forces had 1.4 million personnel on active duty. The Reserves and National Guard brought the total number of troops to 2.3 million. The Department of Defense also employed about 700,000 civilians, not including contractors.

Military service is voluntary, though conscription may occur in wartime through the Selective Service System. American forces can be rapidly deployed by the Air Force's large fleet of transport aircraft, the Navy's eleven active aircraft carriers, and Marine Expeditionary Units at sea with the Navy's Atlantic and Pacific fleets. The military operates 865 bases and facilities abroad, and maintains deployments greater than 100 active duty personnel in 25 foreign countries. The extent of this global military presence has prompted some scholars to describe the United States as maintaining an "empire of bases".

Total U.S. military spending in 2008, more than $600 billion, was over 41% of global military spending and greater than the next fourteen largest national military expenditures combined. The per capita spending of $1,967 was about nine times the world average; at 4% of GDP, the rate was the second-highest among the top fifteen military spenders, after Saudi Arabia. The proposed base Department of Defense budget for 2012, $553 billion, is a 4.2% increase over 2011; an additional $118 billion is proposed for the military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan. As of September 2010, the United States is scheduled to have 96,000 troops deployed to Afghanistan, and 50,000 to Iraq. As of July 25, 2011, the United States had suffered 4,474 military fatalities during the Iraq War, and 1,680 during the War in Afghanistan.

Economy

The United States has a capitalist mixed economy, which is fueled by abundant natural resources, a well-developed infrastructure, and high productivity. According to the International Monetary Fund, the U.S. GDP of $15 trillion constitutes 23% of the gross world product at market exchange rates and over 20% of the gross world product at purchasing power parity (PPP). Though larger than any other nation's, its national GDP is about 5% smaller than the GDP of the European Union at PPP in 2008. The country ranks ninth in the world in nominal GDP per capita and sixth in GDP per capita at PPP. The U.S. dollar is the world's primary reserve currency.

The United States is the largest importer of goods and third largest exporter, though exports per capita are relatively low. In 2008, the total U.S. trade deficit was $696 billion. Canada, China, Mexico, Japan, and Germany are its top trading partners. In 2007, vehicles constituted both the leading import and leading export commodity. China is the largest foreign holder of U.S. public debt.

In 2009, the private sector was estimated to constitute 55.3% of the economy, with federal government activity accounting for 24.1% and state and local government activity (including federal transfers) the remaining 20.6%. While its economy has reached a postindustrial level of development and its service sector constitutes 67.8% of GDP, the United States remains an industrial power. The leading business field by gross business receipts is wholesale and retail trade; by net income it is manufacturing. Chemical products are the leading manufacturing field. The United States is the third largest producer of oil in the world, as well as its largest importer. It is the world's number one producer of electrical and nuclear energy, as well as liquid natural gas, sulfur, phosphates, and salt. While agriculture accounts for just under 1% of GDP, the United States is the world's top producer of corn and soybeans. Coca-Cola and McDonald's are the two most recognized brands in the world.

In August 2010, the American labor force comprised 154.1 million people. With 21.2 million people, government is the leading field of employment. The largest private employment sector is health care and social assistance, with 16.4 million people. About 12% of workers are unionized, compared to 30% in Western Europe. The World Bank ranks the United States first in the ease of hiring and firing workers. In 2009, the United States had the third highest labor productivity per person in the world, behind Luxembourg and Norway. It was fourth in productivity per hour, behind those two countries and the Netherlands. Compared to Europe, U.S. property and corporate income tax rates are generally higher, while labor and, particularly, consumption tax rates are lower.

Income and human development

According to the United States Census Bureau, the pretax median household income in 2007 was $49,777. The median ranged from $65,469 among Asian American households to $32,584 among African American households. Using purchasing power parity exchange rates, the overall median is similar to the most affluent cluster of developed nations. After declining sharply during the middle of the 20th century, poverty rates have plateaued since the early 1970s, with 11–15% of Americans below the poverty line every year, and 58.5% spending at least one year in poverty between the ages of 25 and 75. In 2009, 43.6 million Americans lived in poverty.

The U.S. welfare state is one of the least extensive in the developed world, reducing both relative poverty and absolute poverty by considerably less than the mean for rich nations, though combined private and public social expenditures per capita are relatively high. While the American welfare state effectively reduces poverty among the elderly, it provides relatively little assistance to the young. A 2007 UNICEF study of children's well-being in twenty-one industrialized nations ranked the United States next to last.

Between 1947 and 1979, real median income rose by over 80% for all classes, with the incomes of poor Americans rising faster than those of the rich. Since 1980, the United States has witnessed strong increases in productivity, low unemployment, and low inflation. However, income gains since 1980 have been slower than in previous decades, less widely shared, and accompanied by increased economic insecurity. Median household income has increased for all classes since 1980, largely owing to more dual-earner households, the closing of the gender gap, and longer work hours, but growth has been slower and strongly tilted toward the very top (see graph). Consequently, the share of income of the top 1%—21.8% of total reported income in 2005—has more than doubled since 1980, leaving the United States with the greatest income inequality among developed nations. The top 1% pays 27.6% of all federal taxes, while the top 10% pays 54.7%. Wealth, like income, is highly concentrated: The richest 10% of the adult population possesses 69.8% of the country's household wealth, the second-highest share among developed nations. The top 1% possesses 33.4% of net wealth. In 2010 the United Nations Development Programme ranked the United States 12th among 139 countries on its inequality-adjusted human development index (IHDI), eight places lower than in the standard HDI.

Infrastructure

Science and technology

The United States has been a leader in scientific research and technological innovation since the late 19th century. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell was awarded the first U.S. patent for the telephone. Thomas Edison's laboratory developed the phonograph, the first long-lasting light bulb, and the first viable movie camera. Nikola Tesla pioneered alternating current, the AC motor, and radio. In the early 20th century, the automobile companies of Ransom E. Olds and Henry Ford popularized the assembly line. The Wright brothers, in 1903, made the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight.

The rise of Nazism in the 1930s led many European scientists, including Albert Einstein and Enrico Fermi, to immigrate to the United States. During World War II, the Manhattan Project developed nuclear weapons, ushering in the Atomic Age. The Space Race produced rapid advances in rocketry, materials science, and computers. IBM, Apple Computer, and Microsoft refined and popularized the personal computer. The United States largely developed the ARPANET and its successor, the Internet. Today, 64% of research and development funding comes from the private sector. The United States leads the world in scientific research papers and impact factor. Americans possess high levels of technological consumer goods, and almost half of U.S. households have broadband Internet access. The country is the primary developer and grower of genetically modified food, representing half of the world's biotech crops.

Transportation

Personal transportation is dominated by automobiles, which operate on a network of 13 million roads, including the world's longest highway system. The world's second largest automobile market, the United States has the highest rate of per-capita vehicle ownership in the world, with 765 vehicles per 1,000 Americans. About 40% of personal vehicles are vans, SUVs, or light trucks. The average American adult (accounting for all drivers and nondrivers) spends 55 minutes driving every day, traveling .

Mass transit accounts for 9% of total U.S. work trips, ranking last in a survey of 17 countries. While transport of goods by rail is extensive, relatively few people use rail to travel. Light rail development has increased in recent years but, like high speed rail, is below European levels. Bicycle usage for work commutes is minimal.

The civil airline industry is entirely privately owned and has been largely deregulated since 1978, while most major airports are publicly owned. The four largest airlines in the world by passengers carried are American; Southwest Airlines is number one. Of the world's thirty busiest passenger airports, sixteen are in the United States, including the busiest, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

Energy

The United States energy market is 29,000 terawatt hours per year. Energy consumption per capita is 7.8 tons of oil equivalent per year, the 10th highest rate in the world. In 2005, 40% of this energy came from petroleum, 23% from coal, and 22% from natural gas. The remainder was supplied by nuclear power and renewable energy sources. The United States is the world's largest consumer of petroleum. For decades, nuclear power has played a limited role relative to many other developed countries, in part due to public perception in the wake of a 1979 accident. In 2007, several applications for new nuclear plants were filed. The United States has 27% of global coal reserves.

Education

American public education is operated by state and local governments, regulated by the United States Department of Education through restrictions on federal grants. Children are required in most states to attend school from the age of six or seven (generally, kindergarten or first grade) until they turn eighteen (generally bringing them through twelfth grade, the end of high school); some states allow students to leave school at sixteen or seventeen. About 12% of children are enrolled in parochial or nonsectarian private schools. Just over 2% of children are homeschooled.

The United States has many competitive private and public institutions of higher education. According to prominent international rankings, 13 or 15 American colleges and universities are ranked among the top 20 in the world. There are also local community colleges with generally more open admission policies, shorter academic programs, and lower tuition. Of Americans twenty-five and older, 84.6% graduated from high school, 52.6% attended some college, 27.2% earned a bachelor's degree, and 9.6% earned graduate degrees. The basic literacy rate is approximately 99%. The United Nations assigns the United States an Education Index of 0.97, tying it for 12th in the world.

Health

The United States life expectancy of 78.3 years at birth is ranked 36th among 194 United Nations member states; while above the world average, it falls short of the overall figure in Western Europe. Increasing obesity in the United States and health improvements elsewhere have contributed to lowering the country's rank in life expectancy from 1987 to 2007, from 11th to 42nd in the world. The infant mortality rate of 6.37 per thousand places the United States 42nd out of 221 countries, above average but behind all of Western Europe. Approximately one-third of the adult population is obese and an additional third is overweight; the obesity rate, the highest in the industrialized world, has more than doubled in the last quarter-century. Obesity-related type 2 diabetes is considered epidemic by health care professionals.

The U.S. health care system far outspends any other nation's, measured in both per capita spending and percentage of GDP. The World Health Organization ranked the U.S. health care system in 2000 as first in responsiveness, but 37th in overall performance.

Health care coverage in the United States is a combination of public and private efforts, and is not universal as in all other developed countries. In 2004, private insurance paid for 36% of personal health expenditures, private out-of-pocket payments covered 15%, and federal, state, and local governments paid for 44%. In 2005, 46.6 million Americans, 15.9% of the population, were uninsured, 5.4 million more than in 2001. The main cause of this rise is the drop in the number of Americans with employer-sponsored health insurance. The subject of uninsured and underinsured Americans is a major political issue. A 2009 study estimated that lack of insurance is associated with nearly 45,000 deaths a year. In 2006, Massachusetts became the first state to mandate universal health insurance. Federal legislation passed in early 2010 will create a near-universal health insurance system around the country by 2014.

Crime and law enforcement

Law enforcement in the United States is primarily the responsibility of local police and sheriff's departments, with state police providing broader services. Federal agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the U.S. Marshals Service have specialized duties. At the federal level and in almost every state, jurisprudence operates on a common law system. State courts conduct most criminal trials; federal courts handle certain designated crimes as well as certain appeals from the state systems. Federal law prohibits a variety of drugs, although states sometimes pass laws in conflict with federal regulations. The smoking age is generally 18 and the drinking age is generally 21.

Among developed nations, the United States has above-average levels of violent crime and particularly high levels of gun violence and homicide. There were 5.0 murders per 100,000 persons in 2009, 10.4% fewer than in 2000. Gun ownership rights are the subject of contentious political debate.

The United States has the highest documented incarceration rate and total prison population in the world. At the start of 2008, more than 2.3 million people were incarcerated, more than one in every 100 adults. The current rate is about seven times the 1980 figure, and over three times the figure in Poland, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) country with the next highest rate. African American males are jailed at about six times the rate of white males and three times the rate of Hispanic males. The country's high rate of incarceration is largely due to sentencing and drug policies.

Though it has been abolished in most Western nations, capital punishment is sanctioned in the United States for certain federal and military crimes, and in thirty-four states. Since 1976, when the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty after a four-year moratorium, there have been more than 1,000 executions. In 2010, the country had the fifth highest number of executions in the world, following China, Iran, North Korea, and Yemen. In 2007, New Jersey became the first state to legislatively abolish the death penalty since the 1976 Supreme Court decision, followed by New Mexico in 2009 and Illinois in 2011.

Demographics

{|class="infobox" style="font-size: 90%; border: 1px solid #999; float: right; margin-left: 1em; width: 240px;" |- style="background:#f5f5f5;" ! colspan="2" | Race/Ethnicity (2010) |- | White || style="text-align: center;" |72.4% |- | Black/African American || style="text-align: center;" |12.6% |- | Asian || style="text-align: center;" |4.8% |- | American Indian and Alaska Native || style="text-align: center;" |0.9% |- | Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander || style="text-align: center;" |0.2% |- | Other || style="text-align: center;" |6.2% |- | Two or more races || style="text-align: center;" | 2.9% |- | Hispanic/Latino (''of any race'') || style="text-align: center;" |16.3% |}

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates the country's population now to be }}, including an estimated 11.2 million illegal immigrants. The U.S. population almost quadrupled during the 20th century, from about 76 million in 1900. The third most populous nation in the world, after China and India, the United States is the only industrialized nation in which large population increases are projected. Even with a birth rate of 13.82 per 1,000, 30% below the world average, its population growth rate is positive at 1%, significantly higher than those of many developed nations. In fiscal year 2010, over 1 million immigrants (most of whom entered through family reunification) were granted legal residence. Mexico has been the leading source of new residents for over two decades; since 1998, China, India, and the Philippines have been in the top four sending countries every year.

The United States has a very diverse population—thirty-one ancestry groups have more than one million members. White Americans are the largest racial group; German Americans, Irish Americans, and English Americans constitute three of the country's four largest ancestry groups. African Americans are the nation's largest racial minority and third largest ancestry group. Asian Americans are the country's second largest racial minority; the two largest Asian American ethnic groups are Chinese Americans and Filipino Americans. In 2010, the U.S. population included an estimated 5.2 million people with some American Indian or Alaska Native ancestry (2.9 million exclusively of such ancestry) and 1.2 million with some native Hawaiian or Pacific island ancestry (0.5 million exclusively). The census counted more than 19 million people of "Some Other Race" who were "unable to identify with any" of its five official race categories in 2010.

The population growth of Hispanic and Latino Americans (the terms are officially interchangeable) is a major demographic trend. The 50.5 million Americans of Hispanic descent are identified as sharing a distinct "ethnicity" by the Census Bureau; 64% of Hispanic Americans are of Mexican descent. Between 2000 and 2010, the country's Hispanic population increased 43% while the non-Hispanic population rose just 4.9%. Much of this growth is from immigration; as of 2007, 12.6% of the U.S. population was foreign-born, with 54% of that figure born in Latin America. Fertility is also a factor; the average Hispanic woman gives birth to 3.0 children in her lifetime, compared to 2.2 for non-Hispanic black women and 1.8 for non-Hispanic white women (below the replacement rate of 2.1). Minorities (as defined by the Census Bureau, all those beside non-Hispanic, non-multiracial whites) constitute 34% of the population, and are projected to constitute the majority by 2042.

About 82% of Americans live in urban areas (including suburbs); about half of those reside in cities with populations over 50,000. In 2008, 273 incorporated places had populations over 100,000, nine cities had more than 1 million residents, and four global cities had over 2 million (New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston). There are fifty-two metropolitan areas with populations greater than 1 million. Of the fifty fastest-growing metro areas, forty-seven are in the West or South. The metro areas of Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, and Phoenix all grew by more than a million people between 2000 and 2008.

Language

{|class="infobox" style="font-size: 90%; border: 1px solid #999; float: right; margin-left: 1em; width: 200px;" |- style="background:#f5f5f5;" !colspan="2"|Languages (2007) |- |English (''only'')||style="text-align: center;"|225.5 million |- |Spanish, incl. Creole||style="text-align: center;"|34.5 million |- |Chinese||style="text-align: center;"|2.5 million |- |French, incl. Creole||style="text-align: center;"|2.0 million |- |Tagalog||style="text-align: center;"|1.5 million |- |Vietnamese||style="text-align: center;"|1.2 million |- |German||style="text-align: center;"|1.1 million |- |Korean||style="text-align: center;"|1.1 million |}

English is the de facto national language. Although there is no official language at the federal level, some laws—such as U.S. naturalization requirements—standardize English. In 2007, about 226 million, or 80% of the population aged five years and older, spoke only English at home. Spanish, spoken by 12% of the population at home, is the second most common language and the most widely taught second language. Some Americans advocate making English the country's official language, as it is in at least twenty-eight states. Both Hawaiian and English are official languages in Hawaii by state law.

While neither has an official language, New Mexico has laws providing for the use of both English and Spanish, as Louisiana does for English and French. Other states, such as California, mandate the publication of Spanish versions of certain government documents including court forms. Many jurisdictions with large numbers of non-English speakers produce government materials, especially voting information, in the most commonly spoken languages in those jurisdictions. Several insular territories grant official recognition to their native languages, along with English: Samoan and Chamorro are recognized by American Samoa and Guam, respectively; Carolinian and Chamorro are recognized by the Northern Mariana Islands; Spanish is an official language of Puerto Rico.

Religion

The United States is officially a secular nation; the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees the free exercise of religion and forbids the establishment of any religious governance. In a 2002 study, 59% of Americans said that religion played a "very important role in their lives", a far higher figure than that of any other wealthy nation. According to a 2007 survey, 78.4% of adults identified themselves as Christian, down from 86.4% in 1990. Protestant denominations accounted for 51.3%, while Roman Catholicism, at 23.9%, was the largest individual denomination. The study categorizes white evangelicals, 26.3% of the population, as the country's largest religious cohort; another study estimates evangelicals of all races at 30–35%. The total reporting non-Christian religions in 2007 was 4.7%, up from 3.3% in 1990. The leading non-Christian faiths were Judaism (1.7%), Buddhism (0.7%), Islam (0.6%), Hinduism (0.4%), and Unitarian Universalism (0.3%). The survey also reported that 16.1% of Americans described themselves as agnostic, atheist, or simply having no religion, up from 8.2% in 1990.

Family structure

In 2007, 58% of Americans age 18 and over were married, 6% were widowed, 10% were divorced, and 25% had never been married. Women now mostly work outside the home and receive a majority of bachelor's degrees.

Same-sex marriage is a contentious issue. Some states permit civil unions or domestic partnerships in lieu of marriage. Since 2003, several states have legalized gay marriage as the result of judicial or legislative action. Meanwhile, the federal government and a majority of states define marriage as between a man and a woman and/or explicitly prohibit same-sex marriage. Public opinion on the issue has shifted from general opposition in the 1990s to a statistical deadlock as of 2011.

The U.S. teenage pregnancy rate, 79.8 per 1,000 women, is the highest among OECD nations. Abortion policy was left to the states until the Supreme Court legalized the practice in 1972. The issue remains highly controversial, with public opinion closely divided for many years. Many states ban public funding of the procedure and restrict late-term abortions, require parental notification for minors, and mandate a waiting period. While the abortion rate is falling, the abortion ratio of 241 per 1,000 live births and abortion rate of 15 per 1,000 women aged 15–44 remain higher than those of most Western nations.

Culture

The United States is a multicultural nation, home to a wide variety of ethnic groups, traditions, and values. Aside from the now small Native American and Native Hawaiian populations, nearly all Americans or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries. The culture held in common by most Americans—mainstream American culture—is a Western culture largely derived from the traditions of European immigrants with influences from many other sources, such as traditions brought by slaves from Africa. More recent immigration from Asia and especially Latin America has added to a cultural mix that has been described as both a homogenizing melting pot, and a heterogeneous salad bowl in which immigrants and their descendants retain distinctive cultural characteristics.

American culture is considered the most individualistic in the world. Though the American Dream, or the perception that Americans enjoy high social mobility, plays a key role in attracting immigrants, other developed nations offer greater social mobility. While the mainstream culture holds that the United States is a classless society, scholars identify significant differences between the country's social classes, affecting socialization, language, and values. The American middle and professional class has initiated many contemporary social trends such as modern feminism, environmentalism, and multiculturalism. Americans' self-images, social viewpoints, and cultural expectations are associated with their occupations to an unusually close degree. While Americans tend greatly to value socioeconomic achievement, being ordinary or average is generally seen as a positive attribute.

Popular media

The world's first commercial motion picture exhibition was given in New York City in 1894, using Thomas Edison's Kinetoscope. The next year saw the first commercial screening of a projected film, also in New York, and the United States was in the forefront of sound film's development in the following decades. Since the early 20th century, the U.S. film industry has largely been based in and around Hollywood, California. Director D. W. Griffith was central to the development of film grammar and Orson Welles's ''Citizen Kane'' (1941) is frequently cited as the greatest film of all time. American screen actors like John Wayne and Marilyn Monroe have become iconic figures, while producer/entrepreneur Walt Disney was a leader in both animated film and movie merchandising. The major film studios of Hollywood have produced the most commercially successful movies in history, such as ''Star Wars'' (1977) and ''Titanic'' (1997), and the products of Hollywood today dominate the global film industry.

Americans are the heaviest television viewers in the world, and the average viewing time continues to rise, reaching five hours a day in 2006. The four major broadcast networks are all commercial entities. Americans listen to radio programming, also largely commercialized, on average just over two-and-a-half hours a day. Aside from web portals and search engines, the most popular websites are Facebook, YouTube, Wikipedia, Blogger, eBay, and Craigslist.

The rhythmic and lyrical styles of African-American music have deeply influenced American music at large, distinguishing it from European traditions. Elements from folk idioms such as the blues and what is now known as old-time music were adopted and transformed into popular genres with global audiences. Jazz was developed by innovators such as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington early in the 20th century. Country music developed in the 1920s, and rhythm and blues in the 1940s. Elvis Presley and Chuck Berry were among the mid-1950s pioneers of rock and roll. In the 1960s, Bob Dylan emerged from the folk revival to become one of America's most celebrated songwriters and James Brown led the development of funk. More recent American creations include hip hop and house music. American pop stars such as Presley, Michael Jackson, and Madonna have become global celebrities.

Literature, philosophy, and the arts

In the 18th and early 19th centuries, American art and literature took most of its cues from Europe. Writers such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, and Henry David Thoreau established a distinctive American literary voice by the middle of the 19th century. Mark Twain and poet Walt Whitman were major figures in the century's second half; Emily Dickinson, virtually unknown during her lifetime, is now recognized as an essential American poet. A work seen as capturing fundamental aspects of the national experience and character—such as Herman Melville's ''Moby-Dick'' (1851), Twain's ''The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn'' (1885), and F. Scott Fitzgerald's ''The Great Gatsby'' (1925)—may be dubbed the "Great American Novel".

Eleven U.S. citizens have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, most recently Toni Morrison in 1993. William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway are often named among the most influential writers of the 20th century. Popular literary genres such as the Western and hardboiled crime fiction developed in the United States. The Beat Generation writers opened up new literary approaches, as have postmodernist authors such as John Barth, Thomas Pynchon, and Don DeLillo.

The transcendentalists, led by Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson, established the first major American philosophical movement. After the Civil War, Charles Sanders Peirce and then William James and John Dewey were leaders in the development of pragmatism. In the 20th century, the work of W. V. Quine and Richard Rorty, built upon by Noam Chomsky, brought analytic philosophy to the fore of U.S. academics. John Rawls and Robert Nozick led a revival of political philosophy.

In the visual arts, the Hudson River School was a mid-19th-century movement in the tradition of European naturalism. The realist paintings of Thomas Eakins are now widely celebrated. The 1913 Armory Show in New York City, an exhibition of European modernist art, shocked the public and transformed the U.S. art scene. Georgia O'Keeffe, Marsden Hartley, and others experimented with new styles, displaying a highly individualistic sensibility. Major artistic movements such as the abstract expressionism of Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning and the pop art of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein developed largely in the United States. The tide of modernism and then postmodernism has brought fame to American architects such as Frank Lloyd Wright, Philip Johnson, and Frank Gehry. One of the first major promoters of American theater was impresario P. T. Barnum, who began operating a lower Manhattan entertainment complex in 1841. The team of Harrigan and Hart produced a series of popular musical comedies in New York starting in the late 1870s. In the 20th century, the modern musical form emerged on Broadway; the songs of musical theater composers such as Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, and Stephen Sondheim have become pop standards. Playwright Eugene O'Neill won the Nobel literature prize in 1936; other acclaimed U.S. dramatists include multiple Pulitzer Prize winners Tennessee Williams, Edward Albee, and August Wilson.

Though little known at the time, Charles Ives's work of the 1910s established him as the first major U.S. composer in the classical tradition, while experimentalists such as Henry Cowell and John Cage created a distinctive American approach to classical composition. Aaron Copland and George Gershwin developed a new synthesis of popular and classical music. Choreographers Isadora Duncan and Martha Graham helped create modern dance, while George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins were leaders in 20th century ballet. Americans have long been important in the modern artistic medium of photography, with major photographers including Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, and Ansel Adams. The newspaper comic strip and the comic book are both U.S. innovations. Superman, the quintessential comic book superhero, has become an American icon.

Food

Mainstream American cuisine is similar to that in other Western countries. Wheat is the primary cereal grain. Traditional American cuisine uses indigenous ingredients, such as turkey, venison, potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, squash, and maple syrup, which were consumed by Native Americans and early European settlers. Slow-cooked pork and beef barbecue, crab cakes, potato chips, and chocolate chip cookies are distinctively American foods. Soul food, developed by African slaves, is popular around the South and among many African Americans elsewhere. Syncretic cuisines such as Louisiana creole, Cajun, and Tex-Mex are regionally important.

Characteristic dishes such as apple pie, fried chicken, pizza, hamburgers, and hot dogs derive from the recipes of various immigrants. French fries, Mexican dishes such as burritos and tacos, and pasta dishes freely adapted from Italian sources are widely consumed. Americans generally prefer coffee to tea. Marketing by U.S. industries is largely responsible for making orange juice and milk ubiquitous breakfast beverages.

The American fast food industry, the world's largest, pioneered the drive-through format in the 1930s. Fast food consumption has sparked health concerns. During the 1980s and 1990s, Americans' caloric intake rose 24%; frequent dining at fast food outlets is associated with what public health officials call the American "obesity epidemic". Highly sweetened soft drinks are widely popular, and sugared beverages account for 9% of American caloric intake.

Sports

Baseball has been regarded as the national sport since the late 19th century, while American football is now by several measures the most popular spectator sport. Basketball and ice hockey are the country's next two leading professional team sports. College football and basketball attract large audiences. Boxing and horse racing were once the most watched individual sports, but they have been eclipsed by golf and auto racing, particularly NASCAR. Soccer is played widely at the youth and amateur levels. Tennis and many outdoor sports are popular as well.

While most major U.S. sports have evolved out of European practices, basketball, volleyball, skateboarding, snowboarding, and cheerleading are American inventions. Lacrosse and surfing arose from Native American and Native Hawaiian activities that predate Western contact. Eight Olympic Games have taken place in the United States. The United States has won 2,301 medals at the Summer Olympic Games, more than any other country, and 253 in the Winter Olympic Games, the second most.

Measurement systems

The country retains United States customary units, constituted largely by British imperial units such as miles, yards, and degrees Fahrenheit. Distinct units include the U.S. gallon and U.S. pint volume measurements. The United States is one of only three countries that have not adopted the International System of Units. However, metric units are increasingly used in science, medicine, and many industrial fields.

See also

International rankings of the United States

List of Americans

List of places in the United States

List of U.S. state portals

References

External links

;Government

Official U.S. Government Web Portal Gateway to government sites

House Official site of the United States House of Representatives

Senate Official site of the United States Senate

White House Official site of the President of the United States

[ Supreme Court] Official site of the Supreme Court of the United States ;Overviews and Data

InfoUSA Portal to U.S. Information Agency resources

Library of Congress Official site of the U.S. Library of Congress

Demographic Highlights Statistics from the Population Reference Bureau

The 50 States of the U.S.A. Collected informational links for each state

United States travel guide from Wikitravel

United States ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' entry

U.S. Census Housing and Economic Statistics Wide-ranging data from the U.S. Census Bureau

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Official government site

State Fact Sheets Population, employment, income, and farm data from the U.S. Economic Research Service

State Energy Profiles Economic, environmental, and energy data for each state from the U.S. Energy Information Administration

;History

Historical Documents Collected by the National Center for Public Policy Research

U.S. National Mottos: History and Constitutionality Analysis by the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance

USA Collected links to historical data

;Maps

National Atlas of the United States Official maps from the U.S. Department of the Interior

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Coordinates	43°35′07″N39°43′13″N
Document name	United States Constitution
Image width	220px
Date created	September 17, 1787
Date ratified	June 21, 1788
Location of document	National Archives, Washington, D.C.
Writer	Delegates of the Philadelphia Convention
Signers	39 of the 55 Philadelphia Convention delegates
Purpose	National constitution to replace the Articles of Confederation }}

The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.

The first three Articles of the Constitution establish the three branches of the national government: a legislature, the bicameral Congress; an executive branch led by the President; and a judicial branch headed by the Supreme Court. They also specify the powers and duties of each branch. All unenumerated powers are reserved to the respective states and the people, thereby establishing the federal system of government.

The Constitution was adopted on September 17, 1787, by the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and ratified by conventions in each U.S. state in the name of "The People". It has been amended twenty-seven times; the first ten amendments are known as the Bill of Rights.

The United States Constitution is the second oldest written constitution still in use by any nation in the world after the 1600 Statutes of San Marino . It holds a central place in United States law and political culture. The handwritten original document penned by Jacob Shallus is on display at the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington, D.C.

History

The First Constitution

The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union were the first constitution of the United States of America. The problem with the United States government under the Articles of Confederation was, in the words of George Washington, “no money”.

Congress could print money, but by 1786, the money was useless. Congress could borrow money, but could not pay it back. Under the Articles, Congress requisitioned money from the states. But no state paid all of their requisition; Georgia paid nothing. A few states paid the U.S. an amount equal to interest on the national debt owed to their citizens, but no more. Nothing was paid toward the interest on debt owed to foreign governments. By 1786 the United States was about to default on its contractual obligations when the principal came due.

Most of the U.S. troops in the 625-man U.S. Army were deployed facing British forts on American soil. The troops had not been paid; some were deserting and the remainder threatened mutiny. Spain closed New Orleans to American commerce. The U.S. protested, to no effect. The Barbary Pirates began seizing American commercial ships. The U.S. had no funds to pay the pirates' extortion demands. States such as New York and South Carolina violated the peace treaty with Britain by prosecuting Loyalists for wartime activity. The U.S. had no more credit if another military crisis had required action. In Massachusetts during Shays' Rebellion, Congress had no money; General Benjamin Lincoln had to raise funds among Boston merchants to pay for a volunteer army.

Congress was paralyzed. It could do nothing significant without nine states, and some legislative business required all thirteen. By April 1786 there had been only three days out of five months with nine states present. When nine states did show up, and there was only one member of a state on the floor, then that state’s vote did not count. If a delegation were evenly divided, the division was duly noted in the Journal, but there was no vote from that state towards a nine-count. States, in violation of the Articles, laid embargoes, negotiated unilaterally abroad, provided for armies and made war. The Articles Congress had “virtually ceased trying to govern.”

The vision of a “respectable nation” among nations seemed to be fading in the eyes of such men as Virginia’s George Washington and James Madison, New York’s Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, Pennsylvania’s Benjamin Franklin and George Clymer and Massachusetts’ Henry Knox and Rufus King. The dream of a republic, a nation without hereditary rulers, with power derived from the people in frequent elections, was in doubt.

Calling and convening

In September 1786, commissioners from five states met in the Annapolis Convention to discuss adjustments to the Articles of Confederation that would improve commerce. They invited state representatives to convene in Philadelphia to discuss improvements to the federal government. After debate, the Congress of the Confederation endorsed a plan to revise the Articles of Confederation on February 21, 1787. The plan called on each state legislature to send delegates to a convention “’for the sole and express purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation’ in ways that, when approved by Congress and the states, would ‘render the federal constitution adequate to the exigencies of government and the preservation of the Union.’”

Twelve states, Rhode Island being the only exception, accepted this invitation and sent delegates to convene in May 1787. While the resolution calling the Convention specified that its purpose was to propose amendments to the Articles, through discussion and debate it became clear by mid-June that the Convention would propose a Constitution with a fundamentally new design. The Constitutional Convention voted to keep the debates secret so that the delegates could speak freely. Of those participating, ten members would also number in the 33 chosen by their state legislatures for the Articles Congress that September.

Current knowledge of the drafting and construction of the United States Constitution comes primarily from the diaries left by James Madison, who kept a complete record of the proceedings at the Constitutional Convention.

Work of the Constitutional Convention

396px|right|thumb|The Philadelphia Convention George Washington will be President of the Convention, then President of the USThe Virginia Plan was the unofficial agenda for the Convention, and was drafted chiefly by James Madison, considered to be "The Father of the Constitution" for his major contributions. It was weighted toward the interests of the larger states, including the following: A bicameral legislature of a House proportioned to population and variable state representation in a Senate

An executive chosen by the legislature

A judiciary, with life-terms of service and vague powers

The national legislature would be able to veto state laws

An alternative proposal, William Paterson's New Jersey Plan, contained proposals geared toward smaller states:

A unicameral national legislature with each state legislature sending an equal number to represent it

An executive branch appointed by the legislature

A judicial branch appointed by the executive.

Roger Sherman of Connecticut brokered The Great Compromise whereby the House would represent the people and a Senate would represent the states.

Slavery

The contentious issue of slavery was too controversial to be resolved during the Convention. Section 9 of Article I allowed the continued "importation" of such persons, Section 2 of Article IV prohibited the provision of assistance to escaping persons and required their return if successful and Section 2 of Article I defined other persons as "three-fifths" of a person for calculations of each state's official population for representation and federal taxation. Article V prohibited any amendments or legislation changing the provision regarding slave importation until 1808, thereby giving the States then existing 20 years to resolve this issue.

Just as in the Convention debates, where George Mason refused to sign the Constitution, in the ratification conventions of Massachusetts and Virginia, the anti-slavery delegates began as anti-ratification votes. But those opposed to slavery were persuaded that the evils of a broken Union would bring worse consequences than allowing the fate of slavery to be determined gradually over time. Virginia’s Federalist George Nicholas dismissed fears on both sides. Objections to the Constitution were inconsistent, “At the same moment it is opposed for being promotive and destructive of slavery!” But the contradiction was never resolved peaceably, and the failure to do so contributed to the Civil War.

New power allocations

The Constitutional Convention created a new, unprecedented form of government by reallocating powers of government. Every previous national authority had been either a centralized government, or a “confederation of sovereign constituent states.” The American power sharing was unique at the time. The sources and changes of power were up to the states. The foundations of government and extent of power came from both national and state sources. But the new government would have a national operation.

To meet their goals of cementing the Union and securing citizen rights, Framers allocated power among executive, senate, house and judiciary of the central government. But each and every state government in their variety continued exercising powers in their own sphere. The Convention did not start with national powers from scratch, it began with the powers already vested in the Articles Congress with control of the military, international relations and commerce. The Constitution added ten more. Five were minor relative to power sharing, including business and manufacturing protections. One important new power authorized Congress to protect states from the “domestic violence” of riot and civil disorder, but it was conditioned by a state request.

Taxation substantially increased the power of Congress relative to the states. It was limited by restrictions, forbidding taxes on exports, per capita taxes, requiring import duties to be uniform and that taxes be applied to paying U.S. debt. But the states were stripped of their ability to levy taxes on imports, which was at the time, “by far the most bountiful source of tax revenues”. And Congress had no further restrictions relating to political economy. It could institute protective tariffs, for instance. Congress overshadowed state power regulating interstate commerce; the United States would be the “largest area of free trade in the world.” The Constitution increased Congressional power to organize, arm and discipline the state militias, to use them to enforce the laws of Congress, suppress rebellions within the states and repel invasions. But the Second Amendment would ensure that Congressional power could not be used to disarm state militias. The most undefined grant of power was the power to “make laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution” the Constitution’s enumerated powers.

Besides expanding Congressional power, the Constitution limited states and central government. Six limits on the national government addressed property rights such as slavery and taxes. Six protected liberty such as prohibiting ex post facto laws and no religious tests for national offices in any state, even if they had them for state offices. Five were principles of a republic, as in legislative appropriation. These restrictions lacked systematic organization, but all constitutional prohibitions were practices that the British Parliament had “legitimately taken in the absence of a specific denial of the authority.” The regulation of state power presented a “qualitatively different” undertaking. In the state constitutions, the people did not enumerate powers. They gave their representatives every right and authority not explicitly reserved to themselves. The Constitution extended the limits that the states had previously imposed upon themselves under the Articles of Confederation, forbidding taxes on imports and disallowing treaties among themselves, for example.

In light of recent repeated state abuses, the Constitution prohibited state ex post facto laws and bills of attainder to protect United States citizen property rights. Congressional power of the purse was protected by forbidding taxes or restraint on interstate commerce and foreign trade. States could make no law “impairing the obligation of contracts.” To check future state abuses the framers searched for a way to review and veto state laws harming the national welfare or citizen rights. They rejected proposals for Congressional veto of state laws and gave the Supreme Court appellate case jurisdiction over state law because the Constitution is the supreme law of the land. The United States had such a geographical extent that it could only be safely governed using a combination of republics. As of ratification, sovereignty was no longer to be theoretically indivisible. With a wide variety of specific powers among different branches of national governments and thirteen republican state governments, now "each of the ''portions'' of powers delegated to the one or to the other … is … sovereign ''with regard to its proper objects''". There were some powers that remained beyond the reach of both national powers and state powers, so the logical seat of American “sovereignty” belonged directly with the people-voters of each state.

Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759) characterized two kinds of leaders in times of “civil discontent and civil disorder”. One is infected with a "spirit of system", a plan that will relieve current unrest. The plan is held out as an elixir to prevent social ills from ever happening again. He does not need to consider existing interests or widespread prejudices. He has the mojo to arrange each individual and each group as pieces on a chess board. The second kind of leader acts with moderation, respecting established powers, considering individuals, accommodating the habits and society found in the state. Both kinds were found in the Convention, but the moderates won the votes. The Constitution reflects the pluralism which is the genius of the American people.

Ratification and inauguration of the new government

On September 17, 1787, the Constitution was completed, followed by a speech given by Benjamin Franklin. Franklin urged unanimity, although the Convention had decided that only nine states were needed to ratify. The Convention submitted the Constitution to the Congress of the Confederation.

Massachusetts’s Rufus King assessed the Convention as a creature of the states, independent of the Articles Congress, submitting its proposal to Congress only to satisfy forms. Though amendments were debated, they were all defeated. On September 28, 1787, the Articles Congress resolved “unanimously” to transmit the Constitution to state legislatures for submitting to a ratification convention according to the Constitutional procedure. Several states enlarged the numbers qualified just for electing ratification delegates. In doing so, they went beyond the Constitution's provision for the most voters for the state legislature to make a new social contract among, more nearly than ever before, "We, the people".

Following Massachusetts's lead, the Federalist minorities in both Virginia and New York were able to obtain ratification in convention by linking ratification to recommended amendments. A minority of the Constitution’s critics continued to oppose the Constitution. Maryland’s Luther Martin argued that the federal convention had exceeded its authority; he still called for amending the Articles. Article 13 of the Articles of Confederation stated that the union created under the Articles was "perpetual" and that any alteration must be "agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every State".

However, the unanimous requirement under the Articles made all attempts at reform impossible. Martin’s allies such as New York’s John Lansing, Jr., dropped moves to obstruct the Convention's process. They began to take exception to the Constitution “as it was”, seeking amendments. Several conventions saw supporters for "amendments before" shift to a position of "amendments after" for the sake of staying in the Union. New York Anti’s “circular letter” was sent to each state legislature proposing a second constitutional convention for "amendments before". It failed in the state legislatures. Ultimately only North Carolina and Rhode Island would wait for amendments from Congress before ratifying.

Article VII of the proposed constitution stipulated that only nine of the thirteen states would have to ratify for the new government to go into effect for the participating states. After a year had passed in state-by-state ratification battles, on September 13, 1788, the Articles Congress certified that the new Constitution had been ratified. The new government would be inaugurated with eleven of the thirteen. The Articles Congress directed the new government to begin in New York City on the first Wednesday in March, and on March 4, 1789, the government duly began operations.

George Washington had earlier been reluctant to go the Convention for fear the states “with their darling sovereignties” could not be overcome. But he was elected the Constitution's President unanimously, including the vote of Virginia’s presidential elector, the Anti-federalist Patrick Henry. The new Congress was a triumph for the Federalists. The Senate of eleven states would be 20 Federalists to two Virginia (Henry) Anti-federalists. The House would seat 48 Federalists to 11 Antis from only four states: Massachusetts, New York, Virginia and South Carolina.

Antis' fears of personal oppression by Congress were allayed by Amendments passed under the floor leadership of James Madison in the first session of the first Congress. These first ten Amendments became known as the Bill of Rights. Objections to a potentially remote federal judiciary were reconciled with 13 federal courts (11 states, Maine and Kentucky), and three Federal riding circuits out of the Supreme Court: Eastern, Middle and South. Suspicion of a powerful federal executive was answered by Washington’s cabinet appointments of once-Anti-Federalists Edmund Jennings Randolph as Attorney General and Thomas Jefferson as Secretary of State.

What Constitutional historian Pauline Maier calls a national “dialogue between power and liberty” had begun anew.

Historical influences

Several ideas in the Constitution were new, and a large number were drawn from the literature of republicanism in the United States, the experiences of the 13 states, and the British experience with mixed government. The most important influence from the European continent was from Montesquieu, who emphasized the need to have balanced forces pushing against each other to prevent tyranny. (This in itself reflects the influence of Polybius's 2nd century BC treatise on the checks and balances of the constitution of the Roman Republic.) British political philosopher John Locke was a major influence, and the due process clause of the Constitution was partly based on common law stretching back to Magna Carta (1215).

Native American Influence

The Iroquois nations' political confederacy and democratic government have been credited as influences on the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

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Prominent figures such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin were more involved with leaders of the Iroquois Confederacy, based in New York. John Rutledge of South Carolina in particular is said to have read lengthy tracts of Iroquoian law to the other framers, beginning with the words, "We, the people, to form a union, to establish peace, equity, and order..."

Historians debate how much the colonists borrowed from existing Native American governmental models. But several founding fathers had contact with Native American leaders and had learned about their styles of government. The Iroquois Confederation could not be overlooked. They were “the most powerful Indian group on the continent.” Their government did not always work perfectly, unanimously, but they were once secure within their territory, and had been “nearly invincible” to outsiders over the lifetime of the Convention delegates.

Even in the 1750s, Franklin had seen that no single English colony could effectively deal with Amerindian tribes or the French. “If the Iroquois could form a powerful union … some kind of union ought not to be beyond the capacity of a dozen English colonies.” The delegates meeting at Albany seeing the dangers before them, acted together, going over the heads of the colonial legislatures and going directly to the Parliament. In this they exceeded their authority, “like those who met at Philadelphia in 1787 would.”

During the Articles period, individual states had been making separate agreements with foreign nations apart from Congress. The Confederacy of the Iroquois was both a model and a cautionary tale. The Iroquois Confederacy’s Grand Council had no coercive control over the constituent members. This decentralization of authority and power had frequently plagued the Six Nations since the coming of the Europeans. The Iroquois would suffer from “too much democracy.” The new United States faced a diplomatic and military world inhabited by the same Europeans.

The Constitution would be an experiment of improvement in self-governance based on Iroquois and Greek, Roman and Enlightenment influences. In October 1988, the U.S. Congress passed Concurrent Resolution 331 to recognize the influence of the Iroquois Constitution upon the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Influences on the Bill of Rights

The United States Bill of Rights consists of the ten amendments added to the Constitution in 1791, as supporters of the Constitution had promised critics during the debates of 1788. The English Bill of Rights (1689) was an inspiration for the American Bill of Rights. Both require jury trials, contain a right to keep and bear arms, prohibit excessive bail and forbid "cruel and unusual punishments." Many liberties protected by state constitutions and the Virginia Declaration of Rights were incorporated into the Bill of Rights.

Articles of the Constitution

The Constitution consists of a preamble, seven original articles, twenty-seven amendments, and a paragraph certifying its enactment by the constitutional convention.

Preamble: Statement of purpose

Article One: Legislative Power

Article One describes the Congress, the legislative branch of the federal government. The United States Congress is a bicameral body consisting of two co-equal houses: the House of Representatives and the Senate.

The article establishes the manner of election and the qualifications of members of each body. Representatives must be at least 25 years old, be a citizen of the United States for seven years, and live in the state they represent. Senators must be at least 30 years old, be a citizen for nine years, and live in the state they represent.

Article I, Section 1, reads, "All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives." This provision gives Congress more than simply the responsibility to establish the rules governing its proceedings and for the punishment of its members; it places the power of the government primarily in Congress.

Article I Section 8 enumerates the legislative powers. The powers listed and all other powers are made the exclusive responsibility of the legislative branch:

The Congress shall have power... To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.

Article I Section 9 provides a list of eight specific limits on congressional power and Article I Section 10 limits the rights of the states.

The United States Supreme Court has interpreted the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause in Article One to allow Congress to enact legislation that is neither expressly listed in the enumerated power nor expressly denied in the limitations on Congress. In ''McCulloch v. Maryland'' (1819), the United States Supreme Court fell back on the strict construction of the necessary and proper clause to read that Congress had "[t]he foregoing powers and all other powers..."

Article Two: Executive power

Section analysis

Section 1 creates the presidency. The section states that the executive power is vested in a President. The presidential term is four years and the Vice President serves the identical term. This section originally set the method of electing the President and Vice President, but this method has been superseded by the Twelfth Amendment.

Qualifications. The President must be a natural born citizen of the United States, at least 35 years old and a resident of the United States for at least 14 years. An obsolete part of this clause provides that instead of being a natural born citizen, a person may be a citizen at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. The reason for this clause was to extend eligibility to Citizens of the United States at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, regardless of their place of birth, who were born under the allegiance of a foreign sovereign before the founding of the United States. Without this clause, no one would have been eligible to be president until thirty-five years after the founding of the United States.

Succession. Section 1 specifies that the Vice President succeeds to the presidency if the President is removed, unable to discharge the powers and duties of office, dies while in office, or resigns. The original text ("the same shall devolve") left it unclear whether this succession was intended to be on an acting basis (merely taking on the powers of the office) or permanent (assuming the Presidency itself). After the death of William Henry Harrison, John Tyler set the precedent that the succession was permanent; this practice was followed when later presidents died in office. Today the 25th Amendment states that the Vice President becomes President upon the death or disability of the President.

Pay. The President receives "Compensation" for being the president, and this compensation may not be increased or decreased during the president's term in office. The president may not receive other compensation from either the United States or any of the individual states.

Oath of office. The final clause creates the presidential oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution.

Section 2 grants substantive powers to the president:

The president is the Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces, and of the state militias when these are called into federal service.

The president may require opinions of the principal officers of the federal government.

The president may grant reprieves and pardons, except in cases of impeachment (i.e., the president cannot pardon himself or herself to escape impeachment by Congress).

Section 2 grants and limits the president's appointment powers:

The president may make treaties, with the advice and consent of the Senate, provided two-thirds of the senators who are present agree.

With the advice and consent of the Senate, the President may appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States whose appointments are not otherwise described in the Constitution.

Congress may give the power to appoint lower officers to the President alone, to the courts, or to the heads of departments.

The president may make any of these appointments during a congressional recess. Such a "recess appointment" expires at the end of the next session of Congress.

Section 3 opens by describing the president's relations with Congress:

The president reports on the state of the union.

The president may convene either house, or both houses, of Congress.

When the two houses of Congress cannot agree on the time of adjournment, the president may adjourn them to some future date.

Section 3 adds:

The president receives ambassadors.

The president sees that the laws are faithfully executed.

The president commissions all the offices of the federal government.

Section 4 provides for removal of the president and other federal officers. The president is removed on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.

Article Three: Judicial power

Article Three describes the court system (the judicial branch), including the Supreme Court. The article requires that there be one court called the Supreme Court; Congress, at its discretion, can create lower courts, whose judgments and orders are reviewable by the Supreme Court. Article Three also creates the right to trial by jury in all criminal cases, defines the crime of treason, and charges Congress with providing for a punishment for it. This Article also sets the kinds of cases that may be heard by the federal judiciary, which cases the Supreme Court may hear first (called original jurisdiction), and that all other cases heard by the Supreme Court are by appeal under such regulations as the Congress shall make.

Article Four: States' powers and limits

Article Four outlines the relation between the states and the relation between the federal government. In addition, it provides for such matters as admitting new states as well as border changes between the states. For instance, it requires states to give "full faith and credit" to the public acts, records, and court proceedings of the other states. Congress is permitted to regulate the manner in which proof of such acts, records, or proceedings may be admitted. The "privileges and immunities" clause prohibits state governments from discriminating against citizens of other states in favor of resident citizens (e.g., having tougher penalties for residents of Ohio convicted of crimes within Michigan). It also establishes extradition between the states, as well as laying down a legal basis for freedom of movement and travel amongst the states. Today, this provision is sometimes taken for granted, especially by citizens who live near state borders; but in the days of the Articles of Confederation, crossing state lines was often a much more arduous and costly process. Article Four also provides for the creation and admission of new states. The Territorial Clause gives Congress the power to make rules for disposing of federal property and governing non-state territories of the United States. Finally, the fourth section of Article Four requires the United States to guarantee to each state a republican form of government, and to protect the states from invasion and violence.

Article Five: Amendments

An amendment may be ratified in three ways:

The new amendment may be approved by two-thirds of both houses of Congress, then sent to the states for approval.

Two-thirds of the state legislatures may apply to Congress for a constitutional convention to consider amendments, which are then sent to the states for approval.

Congress may require ratification by special convention. The convention method has been used only once, to approve the 21st Amendment (repealing prohibition, 1933).

Regardless of the method of proposing an amendment, final ratification requires approval by three-fourths of the states.

Today Article Five places only one limit on the amending power: no amendment may deprive a state of equal representation in the Senate without that state's consent. The original Article V included other limits on the amending power regarding slavery and taxation; however, these limits expired in 1808.

Article Six: Federal power

Article Six establishes the Constitution, and the laws and treaties of the United States made according to it, to be the supreme law of the land, and that "the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, any thing in the laws or constitutions of any state notwithstanding." It also validates national debt created under the Articles of Confederation and requires that all federal and state legislators, officers, and judges take oaths or affirmations to support the Constitution. This means that the states' constitutions and laws should not conflict with the laws of the federal constitution and that in case of a conflict, state judges are legally bound to honor the federal laws and constitution over those of any state.

Article Six also states "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."

Article Seven: Ratification

Article Seven sets forth the requirements for ratification of the Constitution. The Constitution would not take effect until at least nine states had ratified the Constitution in state conventions specially convened for that purpose, and it would only apply to those states that ratified it. (''See above Drafting and ratification requirements.'')

Judicial review

The way the Constitution is understood is influenced by court decisions, especially those of the Supreme Court. These decisions are referred to as precedents. In the 1803 case ''Marbury v. Madison'', the Supreme Court established the doctrine of judicial review. Judicial review is the power of the Court to examine federal legislation, executive agency rules and state laws, to decide their constitutionality, and to strike them down if found unconstitutional. Judicial review includes the power of the Court to explain the meaning of the Constitution as it applies to particular cases. Over the years, Court decisions on issues ranging from governmental regulation of radio and television to the rights of the accused in criminal cases have changed the way many constitutional clauses are interpreted, without amendment to the actual text of the Constitution.

Legislation passed to implement the Constitution, or to adapt those implementations to changing conditions, broadens and, in subtle ways, changes the meanings given to the words of the Constitution. Up to a point, the rules and regulations of the many federal executive agencies have a similar effect. If an action of Congress or the agencies is challenged, however, it is the court system that ultimately decides whether these actions are permissible under the Constitution.

The Supreme Court has indicated that once the Constitution has been extended to an area (by Congress or the Courts), its coverage is irrevocable. To hold that the political branches may switch the Constitution on or off at will would lead to a regime in which they, not this Court, say “what the law is.”.

Amendments

Amending the Constitution is a two-part process: amendments must be proposed then ratified. Amendments can be proposed one of two ways. Amendments may be proposed by a two-thirds vote in each house of Congress, or alternatively, if two-thirds of the state legislatures demand one, Congress must call for a constitutional convention which would have the power to propose amendments.

To date, all amendments, whether ratified or not, have been proposed by a two-thirds vote in each house of Congress. Over 10,000 constitutional amendments have been introduced in Congress since 1789; during the last several decades, between 100 and 200 have been offered in a typical congressional year. Most of these ideas never leave Congressional committee, and far fewer get proposed by the Congress for ratification. As no convention has been called, it is unclear how one would work in practice.

The framers of the Constitution were aware that changes would be necessary if the Constitution was to endure as the nation grew. However, they were also conscious that such change should not be easy, lest it permit ill-conceived and hastily passed amendments. On the other hand, they also wanted to ensure that a rigid requirement of unanimity would not block action desired by the vast majority of the population. Their solution was a two-step process for proposing and ratifying new amendments.

Regardless of how the amendment is proposed, it must also be ratified by three-fourths of states. Congress determines whether the state legislatures or special state conventions ratify the amendment. The 21st Amendment is the only one that employed state conventions for ratification.

There are currently only a few proposals for amendments which have entered mainstream political debate. These include the Federal Marriage Amendment, the Balanced Budget Amendment, and the Flag Desecration Amendment. All three proposals are supported primarily by conservatives, but failed during periods of Republican control of Congress to achieve the supermajorities necessary for submission to the states. As such, none of these are likely to be proposed under the current Congress, which includes a Senate controlled by the more liberal Democratic Party.

Unlike amendments to most constitutions, amendments to the United States Constitution are appended to the body of the text without altering or removing what already exists. (However, in cases where newer text clearly contradicts older text, the newer text is given precedence. For instance, the Twenty-first Amendment repealed the Eighteenth Amendment.) Technically, nothing prevents a future amendment from actually changing the older text, rather than simply appending text to the end.

Successful amendments

The Constitution has twenty-seven amendments. The first ten, collectively known as the Bill of Rights, were ratified simultaneously by 1791. The following seventeen were ratified separately over the next two centuries.

The Bill of Rights (Amendments 1 to 10)

It is commonly understood that originally the Bill of Rights was not intended to apply to the states; however, there is no such limit in the text itself, except where an amendment refers specifically to the federal government. One example is the First Amendment, which says only that "Congress shall make no law...", and under which some states in the early years of the nation officially established a religion. A rule of inapplicability to the states remained until 1868, when the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, which stated, in part, that:

The Supreme Court has interpreted this clause to extend most, but not all, parts of the Bill of Rights to the states, a process known as incorporation of the Bill of Rights. The balance of state and federal power under the incorporation doctrine is still an open question and continues to be fought separately for each right in the federal courts.

The amendments that became the Bill of Rights were the last ten of the twelve amendments proposed in 1789. The second of the twelve proposed amendments, regarding the compensation of members of Congress, remained unratified until 1992, when the legislatures of enough states finally approved it; as a result, after pending for two centuries, it became the Twenty-seventh Amendment.

The first of the twelve, which is still technically pending before the state legislatures for ratification, pertains to the apportionment of the United States House of Representatives after each decennial census. The most recent state whose lawmakers are known to have ratified this proposal is Kentucky in 1792, during that commonwealth's first month of statehood.

First Amendment: addresses the rights of freedom of religion (prohibiting Congress from establishing a religion and protecting the right to free exercise of religion), freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of petition.

Second Amendment: guarantees the right of individuals to possess weapons. The most recent Supreme Court decision interpreting the Second Amendment is ''McDonald v. Chicago''.

Third Amendment: prohibits the government from using private homes as quarters for soldiers during peacetime without the consent of the owners. The only existing case law directly regarding this amendment is a lower court decision in the case of ''Engblom v. Carey''. However, it is also cited in the landmark case, ''Griswold v. Connecticut'', in support of the Supreme Court's holding that the constitution protects the right to personal privacy.

Fourth Amendment: guards against searches, arrests, and seizures of property without a specific warrant or a "probable cause" to believe a crime has been committed. Some rights to privacy have been inferred from this amendment and others by the Supreme Court.

Fifth Amendment: forbids trial for a major crime except after indictment by a grand jury; prohibits double jeopardy (repeated trials), except in certain very limited circumstances; forbids punishment without due process of law; and provides that an accused person may not be compelled to testify against himself (this is also known as "Taking the Fifth" or "Pleading the Fifth"). This is regarded as the "rights of the accused" amendment, otherwise known as the Miranda rights after the Supreme Court case. It also prohibits government from taking private property for public use without "just compensation", the basis of eminent domain in the United States.

Sixth Amendment: guarantees a speedy public trial for criminal offenses. It requires trial by a jury, guarantees the right to legal counsel for the accused, and guarantees that the accused may require witnesses to attend the trial and testify in the presence of the accused. It also guarantees the accused a right to know the charges against him. The Sixth Amendment has several court cases associated with it, including ''Powell v. Alabama'', ''United States v. Wong Kim Ark'', ''Gideon v. Wainwright'', and ''Crawford v. Washington''. In 1966, the Supreme Court ruled that the fifth amendment prohibition on forced self-incrimination and the sixth amendment clause on right to counsel were to be made known to all persons placed under arrest, and these clauses have become known as the Miranda rights.

Seventh Amendment: assures trial by jury in civil cases.

Eighth Amendment: forbids excessive bail or fines, and cruel and unusual punishment.

Ninth Amendment: declares that the listing of individual rights in the Constitution and Bill of Rights is not meant to be comprehensive; and that the other rights not specifically mentioned are retained by the people.

Tenth Amendment: reserves to the states respectively, or to the people, any powers the Constitution did not delegate to the United States, nor prohibit the states from exercising.

Subsequent amendments (11 to 27)

Amendments to the Constitution after the Bill of Rights cover many subjects. The majority of the seventeen later amendments stem from continued efforts to expand individual civil or political liberties, while a few are concerned with modifying the basic governmental structure drafted in Philadelphia in 1787. Although the United States Constitution has been amended 27 times, only 26 of the amendments are currently in effect because the twenty-first amendment supersedes the eighteenth.

Eleventh Amendment (1795): Clarifies judicial power over foreign nationals, and limits ability of citizens to sue states in federal courts and under federal law. (Full text)

Twelfth Amendment (1804): Changes the method of presidential elections so that members of the Electoral College cast separate ballots for president and vice president. (Full text)

Thirteenth Amendment (1865): Abolishes slavery and authorizes Congress to enforce abolition. (Full text)

Fourteenth Amendment (1868): Defines a set of guarantees for United States citizenship; prohibits ''states'' from abridging citizens' privileges or immunities and rights to due process and the equal protection of the law; repeals the Three-fifths compromise; prohibits repudiation of the federal debt caused by the Civil War. (Full text)

Fifteenth Amendment (1870): Prohibits the federal government and the states from using a citizen's race, color, or previous status as a slave as a qualification for voting. (Full text)

Sixteenth Amendment (1913): Authorizes unapportioned federal taxes on income. (Full text)

Seventeenth Amendment (1913): Converts state election of senators to popular election. (Full text)

Eighteenth Amendment (1919): Prohibited the manufacturing, importing, and exporting of alcoholic beverages (see Prohibition in the United States). ''Repealed by the Twenty-First Amendment''. (Full text)

Nineteenth Amendment (1920): Prohibits the federal government and the states from forbidding any citizen to vote due to their sex. (Full text)

Twentieth Amendment (1933): Changes details of congressional and presidential terms and of presidential succession. (Full text)

Twenty-first Amendment (1933): Repeals Eighteenth Amendment. Permits states to prohibit the importation of alcoholic beverages. (Full text)

Twenty-second Amendment (1951): Limits president to two terms. (Full text)

Twenty-third Amendment (1961): Grants presidential electors to the District of Columbia. (Full text)

Twenty-fourth Amendment (1964): Prohibits the federal government and the states from requiring the payment of a tax as a qualification for voting for federal officials. (Full text)

Twenty-fifth Amendment (1967): Changes details of presidential succession, provides for temporary removal of president, and provides for replacement of the vice president. (Full text)

Twenty-sixth Amendment (1971): Prohibits the federal government and the states from forbidding any citizen of age 18 or greater to vote on account of their age. (Full text)

Twenty-seventh Amendment (1992): Limits congressional pay raises. (Full text)

Unratified amendments

Of the thirty-three amendments that have been proposed by Congress, six have failed ratification by the required three-quarters of the state legislatures, and four of those six are still pending before state lawmakers (see ''Coleman v. Miller''). Starting with the proposal of the 18th Amendment in 1917, each proposed amendment has included a deadline for passage in the text of the amendment, except the 19th Amendment (women's voting), the 23rd Amendment (DC electoral votes), the 24th Amendment (poll taxes), the 25th Amendment (Presidential succession), the 26th Amendment (voting age), the Child Labor Amendment (proposed in 1924 and still unratified), and the Equal Rights Amendment (proposed in 1972 and still unratified). The following are the unratified proposals:

The Congressional Apportionment Amendment, proposed by the 1st Congress on September 25, 1789, defined a formula for how many members there would be in the United States House of Representatives after each decennial census. Ratified by eleven states, the last being Kentucky in June 1792 during Kentucky's initial month of statehood, this amendment contains no expiration date for ratification. In principle it may yet be ratified, though as written, it became irrelevant when the population of the United States reached ten million.

The "Titles of Nobility Amendment" (TONA), proposed by the 11th Congress on May 1, 1810, would have ended the citizenship of any American accepting "any Title of Nobility or Honour" from any foreign power. Some maintain that the amendment was ratified by the legislatures of enough states, and that a conspiracy has suppressed it, but this has been thoroughly debunked. Known to have been ratified by lawmakers in twelve states, the last in 1812, this amendment contains no expiration date for ratification and could still be ratified.

The Corwin Amendment, proposed by the 36th Congress on March 2, 1861, would have forbidden any attempt to subsequently amend the Constitution to empower the federal government to "abolish or interfere" with the "domestic institutions" of the states (a delicate way of referring to slavery). It was ratified by only Ohio and Maryland lawmakers before the outbreak of the Civil War. Illinois lawmakers—sitting as a state constitutional convention at the time—likewise approved it, but that action is of questionable validity. The proposed amendment contains no expiration date for ratification and may yet be ratified. However, adoption of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments after the Civil War likely means that the amendment would be ineffective if adopted.

A child labor amendment proposed by the 68th Congress on June 2, 1924. It provides, "The Congress shall have power to limit, regulate, and prohibit the labor of persons under eighteen years of age." This amendment is highly unlikely to be ratified, since subsequent federal child labor laws have uniformly been upheld as a valid exercise of Congress's powers under the Commerce Clause.

There are two amendments that were approved by Congress but were not ratified by enough states prior to the ratification deadline set by Congress:

The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which reads in pertinent part "Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex." Proposed by the 92nd Congress on March 22, 1972, it was ratified by the legislatures of 35 states, and expired on either March 22, 1979 or on June 30, 1982, following a controversial three-year extension of the ratification deadline passed by the 95th Congress in 1978. Of the 35 states ratifying it, four later rescinded their ratifications before the extended ratification period which began on March 23, 1979 and a fifth, while not going so far as to rescind its earlier ratification, adopted a resolution stipulating that its approval would not extend beyond March 22, 1979. There continues to be disagreement over whether such reversals are valid; no court has ruled on the question, including the Supreme Court. A precedent against the validity of rescission was first established during the ratification process of the 14th Amendment when Ohio and New Jersey rescinded their earlier approvals, but yet were counted as ratifying states when the 14th Amendment was ultimately proclaimed part of the Constitution in 1868.

The District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment was proposed by the 95th Congress on August 22, 1978. Had this amendment been ratified, it would have granted to Washington, D.C. two Senators and at least one member of the House of Representatives as though the District of Columbia were a state. Ratified by the legislatures of only 16 states (out of the required 38), the proposed amendment expired on August 22, 1985.

Criticism of the Constitution

Several academics have criticized the Constitution. University of Virginia professor Larry Sabato wants an amendment to organize primaries to prevent a "frontloaded calendar" long before the election. Such an amendment would prevent a "race by states to the front of the primary pack", which subverts the national interest, in Sabato's view. Sabato details more objections in his book ''A More Perfect Constitution''. In an interview in Policy Today, Sabato is critical of the "incoherent organization of primaries and caucuses," and faults the Constitution for enabling presidents to continue unpopular wars, for requiring presidents to be "natural born citizens", for lifetime tenure for Supreme Court judges which "produces senior judges representing the views of past generations better than views of the current day." He also writes that "If the 26 least populated states voted as a bloc, they would control the U.S. Senate with a total of just under 17% of the country’s population." Richard Labunski appeals to the same Article V to apply popular pressure outside of established partisan and corporate channels. Like minded citizens could connecting by internet, organize congressional district meetings, gather in a state convention, and send delegates to a “pre-convention” in D.C. It would forward subject areas for Constitutional amendment to the States. The participating states would then trigger a Second Constitutional Convention. In his book "The Second Constitutional Convention", Labunski outlines ten subject areas that should be considered for constitutional amendments.

University of Texas law professor Sanford Levinson wonders whether it makes sense to give "Wyoming the same number of votes as California, which has roughly seventy times the population". Levinson thinks this imbalance causes a "steady redistribution of resources from large states to small states." Levinson is critical of the Electoral College because the Electoral College allows the possibility of electing presidents who do not win the majority of votes. Three times in American history, presidents have been elected by the Electoral College despite failing to win the popular vote: 1876 (Rutherford B. Hayes), 1888 (Benjamin Harrison) and 2000 (George W. Bush). The current Constitution does not give the people a quick way to remove incompetent or ill presidents, in his view. Others have criticized the politically driven redistricting process popularly known as gerrymandering.

Yale professor Robert A. Dahl sees a problem with an American tendency towards worship of the Constitution itself. He sees aspects of American governance which are "unusual and potentially undemocratic: the federal system, the bicameral legislature, judicial review, presidentialism, and the electoral college system." Levinson and Labunski and others have called for a Second Constitutional Convention, although professors like Dahl believe there is no real hope this would ever happen.

Worldwide influence and translations

The world historian William Hardy McNeill taking a long view, sees the U.S. as “one of a family of peoples and nations” making a history relative to European civilization. The United States Constitution is an expression of diverging from their colonial rule. Its effect is reflected in the ideals of a democratic republican constitution as limiting the rulers of a state apart and above sitting law-givers. The concepts of governance are not only found among similarities in phrasing and entire passages. They are in the rule of law and recognition of individual rights. The American experience has motivated foreign constitutionalists to reconsider possibilities.

Generally the influence of the Constitution is documented in trans-national history of ideas, foreign translations, and exchanges between Americans and their counterparts from the beginning with smuggled translations into Spanish America until today with conferences among national legislators. Innovations include constitutional conventions, written constitutions, ratification and amendment procedures. There are common provisions for presidential executives, federalism and judicial review. George Athan Billias, studying the Constitution and related documents, describes six waves of influence: first, 1776-1800 northwestern Europe and connections. Second, from 1811-1848 it was referenced by Latin American, Caribbean, and European nationalists. After the Spanish American War, nationalist movements borrowed from it in Asia and Latin America. After World War I, its influence spread with anti-colonial movements in Africa Mid-east and Asia. After World War II, 1945-1974, independence movements consulted it. Most recently, 1974-1989 once nondemocratic regimes, including European ones, transitioned towards constitutional democracies.

This influence is beyond theory or ideology; rather, it addresses people living together under a common governance in a modern nation-state. The variety of state constitutions, the Articles of Confederation, Convention debates, Federalist Papers, ratification debates and the Bill of Rights all show a way to a constitutional federalism which reconciles national power, social diversity and personal liberty across different places, populations and cultures. Democratizing countries have often chosen British or French models. American constitutionalism has waxed and waned in influence. Confucian and Islamic cultures do not readily adopt some of its premises. Nevertheless, “the influence of American constitutionalism abroad was profound in the past and remains a remarkable contribution to humankind’s search for freedom under a system of laws.”

Translations

The Constitution has been translated into many languages, many of which can be found online. Sources include governmental agencies and universities, private foundations and associations.

The Federal Judicial Center has links to other materials about the United States government and judicial system. The site has materials in 16 languages besides English, such as Dari, Indonesian, Malay, Serb, and Turkish. In addition to translations, The Federal Judicial Center has links to other materials about the United States government and judicial system. Its statutory mission includes compiling histories and research resources and conferences. Its goal is to improve administration of justice in the U.S. and foreign countries. The Center works with judges and court officials of other nations, and other judicial education organizations.

The Columbia Law Review sponsors the International Constitutional Law Project. It has over 100 constitutions and provides English translations of and other textual material related to constitutional documents. It cross-references those documents for quick comparison of constitutional provisions internationally, internally within each document, and with fact oriented background information. The Historical Society of Philadelphia lists translations of the United States Constitution into various foreign languages. One example is Armenian.

University of Chicago Library features constitutional resources on the influence of the U.S. Constitution abroad. It holds texts of Constitutions, non-U.S. Constitutions, case reports, books, journals, articles and current commentary. At the University of Richmond’s Constitution Finder, there are international constitutions, historical constitutions, and state constitutions. For China, there is the 1982, 1947, and Hong Kong Constitutions, and other documents. For the United States, there is the Constitution of 1787 with amendments and five unpassed amendments, the Articles of Confederation, and the Confederate Constitution and 84 state constitutions past and present.

Professor James Chen has annotated the Spanish translation prepared by the U.S. State Department. His notes focus on the problems and nuances of this translation. Nguyen Canh Binh has translated the Constitution into Vietnamese. The Bill of Rights has been translated into Hawaiian. Elizabeth Claire has rewritten the Constitution into simplified English. Some of the many translations of The Constitution into other languages are listed below.

Arabic Catalan Chinese Dutch

Finnish

French

Georgian

German

Hebrew Hungarian Italian Japanese

Korean Portuguese Russian Slovak

Spanish

Swedish

Thai

Ukrainian

Constitution as civic religion

Political scientists, sociologists, and legal scholars study the Constitution and how it is used in American society. Historians are concerned with putting themselves back into a time and place, in context. It would be anachronistic for them to look at the documents of the “Charters of Freedom” and see America’s “civic religion” because of “how much Americans have transformed very secular and temporal documents into sacred scriptures”. The National Archives serves as a temple to preserve and display the great documents consecrating the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. These texts are enshrined in massive, bronze-framed, bulletproof, moisture-controlled glass containers vacuum sealed from all harmful oxygen, in a cathedral-like Rotunda by day, in multi-ton bomb-proof vaults by night.

The whole business of erecting a shrine for the worship of the Declaration of Independence strikes some academic critics looking from point of view of the 1776 or 1789 America as “idolatrous, and also curiously at odds with the values of the Revolution.” It was suspicious of religious iconographic practices. At the beginning, in 1776, it was not meant to be that at all. On the 1782 Great Seal of the United States, the date of the Declaration of Independence and the words under it signify the beginning of the “new American Era” on earth. Though the inscription, Novus ordo seclorum, does not translate from the Latin as “secular”, it also does not refer to a new order of heaven. It is a reference to generations of society in the western hemisphere.

But even from the vantage point of a new nation only ten to twenty years after the drafting of the Constitution, the Framers themselves differed in their assessments of its significance. Washington in his Farewell Address pled that "the Constitution be sacredly maintained."' He echoed Madison in “The Federalist No. 49” that citizen "veneration" of the Constitution might generate the stability needed to maintain even the "wisest and freest governments” amidst conflicting loyalties. There is also a rich tradition of dissent from Constitution worship. By 1816, Jefferson could write that "[s]ome men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be touched." But he saw imperfections and imagined that potentially, there could be others, believing as he did that "institutions must advance also”.

It makes a nation

American identity has an ideological connection to these “Charters of Freedom”. Samuel P. Huntington discusses common connections for most peoples in nation-states, a national identity as product of common ethnicity, ancestors and experience, common language, culture and religion. The United States has a fate different from “most peoples.” American identity is “willed affirmation” of what Huntington refers to as the ‘American creed.’ The creed is made up of individual rights, majority rule, and a constitutional order of limited government power. American independence from Britain was not based on cultural difference, but on the adoption of principles found in the Declaration. Whittle Johnson in the Yale Review sees a sort of “covenanting community” of freedom under law, “transcending the ‘natural’ bonds of race, religion and class, itself takes on transcendent importance”.

These political ideals which emphasize political orthodoxy make it possible for an ethnic diversity unequalled in Britain, France, Germany or Japan. And, lacking the ancestor who may have landed on Plymouth Rock or a distant cousin “purportedly” related to those of the Spirit of 1776, Anne Norton has explained that it is the only way immigrants can establish a commonality with those who had an ethnic history like those Founding Fathers. But that same commonality has become the criteria for belonging which is almost unique in its openness to strangers. The touchstone of becoming a naturalized citizen is demonstration of their attachment to the Charters of Freedom, followed by a public oath supporting the Constitution. Hans Kohn described the United States Constitution “unlike any other: it represents the lifeblood of the American nation, its supreme symbol and manifestation. It is so intimately welded with the national existence itself that the two have become inseparable.” Indeed, abolishing the Constitution in Huntington’s view would abolish the United States, it would “destroy the basis of community, eliminating the nation, [effecting] … a return to nature.”

As if to emphasize the lack of any alternative “faith” to the American nation that those traditional societies with divinely appointed rulers enjoying heavenly mandates for social cohesion, Thomas Grey in the Stanford Law Review pointed out in “The Constitution as scripture”, that Article VI, in the third clause, requires all political figures, both federal and state, “be bound by oath or affirmation to support this Constitution, but no religious test shall ever be required…” This was a major break not only with English past practice, but most states as well.

Article V., the escape clause

Whatever the oversights and evils the modern reader can see in the original Constitution, the Declaration of “all men are created equal” informed the Constitution in such a way that Frederick Douglass in 1860 could label the Constitution, if properly understood, as an antislavery document. He held that “the constitutionality of slavery can be made out only by disregarding the plain and common-sense reading to the Constitution itself. [T]he Constitution will afford slavery no protection when it shall cease to be administered by slaveholders,” a reference to the Supreme Court. Some scholars refer to the coming of a “second” Constitution with the Thirteenth Amendment, we are all free, the Fourteenth, we are all citizens, the Fifteenth, men vote, and the Nineteenth, women vote. So much so, that in 1972, the U.S. Representative from Texas, Barbara Jordan, could affirm, "My faith in the Constitution is whole, it is complete, it is total ...”

After discussion of the Article V. provision for change as a stimulus to serious political consensus building, Sanford Levinson performed a thought experiment in a William and Mary Law Review article, one which was suggested at the bicentennial celebration of the Constitution in Philadelphia. If one were to sign the Constitution today, whatever our reservations might be knowing what we do now, transported back in time to its original shortcomings, great and small, “signing the Constitution commits one not to closure but only to a process of becoming, and to taking responsibility for the political vision toward which I, joined I hope, with others, strive.

The shrine

The design of the National Archives Building was authorized by Congress as a part of a massive public building program in the center of Washington DC to beautify the central market area immediately west of the Capitol. (Eastern Market east of the Capitol is still extant.) When John Russell Pope was added to the Board of Architectural Consultants, his vision brought its location to the foot of Capitol Hill and transformed it into a monumental building. Beginning in 1952, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were displayed in the Rotunda of the National Archives Building. Visual inspections have been enhanced by electronic imaging. Changes in the cases led to removal from their cases July 2001, preservation treatment by conservators, and installment in new encasements for public display September, 2003.

The Archives were set up by Franklin Roosevelt in 1934. It keeps 1-3% of government documents to be kept forever. These are over 9 billion text records, 20 million photographs, 7 million maps, charts, and architectural drawings and over 365,000 reels of film. The monumental Archives Building was inadequate by the 1960s, so new facilities were built in College Park, MD. Work on electronic archives progresses.

Original pages misspellings

{| align=center |The original pages of the Constitution |- | |}

There is an apparent spelling error in the original document, in the so-called Export Clause of Article 1, Section 10 on page 2, where the possessive pronoun ''its'' appears to be spelled with an apostrophe, turning it into ''it's''. However, the letters ''t'' and ''s'' are connected, and the mark interpreted as an apostrophe is somewhat inconspicuous; different U.S. government sources have transcribed this phrase with and without the apostrophe.

The spelling ''Pensylvania'' is used in the list of signatories at the bottom of page 4 of the original document. Elsewhere, in Article 1, Section 2, the spelling that is usual today, ''Pennsylvania'', is used. However, in the late 18th century, the use of a single ''n'' to spell "Pennsylvania" was common usage — the Liberty Bell's inscription, for example, uses a single ''n''.

Constitutional commemorative postage

{|align=right | |} In 1937, the U.S. Post Office under the Presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt released a commemorative postage stamp celebrating the 150th anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution. The engraving on this issue is after an 1856 painting by Junius Brutus Stearns of Washington and shows delegates signing the Constitution at the 1787 Convention. George Washington is on dais with an open document in hand, James Madison sitting at table with pages taking his famous notes on the convention.

Amendments to the United States Constitution are treated as integral to the document. One commemoration of the 19th Amendment permitting women the right to vote was celebrated in a U.S. commemorative in 1950 and again in 1970 (pictured). The woman is voting in a curtained mechanical voting booth. She choses levers to punch or mark her votes on a paper roll. The Model T has a man driver with a banner "Votes for women" on the car, women riders and marchers as though in a parade.

The Second Polish Republic issued a commemorative stamp of the U.S. and Polish Constitutions in 1938 under the government of Prime Minister, Major General Składkowski It features George Washington in military regalia, holding an 48-star American Flag and a drawn sword. Thomas Paine holds a book on a rod, and Kosciuszko poses with a cross and saber. The next scene is of a line of infantry flying a polish flag. The right panel shows the Statue of Liberty imposed in front of the New York 1930s skyline.

In 1937, the Second Spanish Republic commemorated the 150th anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution under the government of Prime Minister Juan Negrín of the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE). The Statue of Liberty is the central focus, flanked by Spanish flags and United States Flags. The Spanish Republic Flag of red, yellow and purple, as civil ensign, lacks the coat of arms.

See also

General

Bill of Rights Institute

''Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States by Joseph Story'' (three volumes)

Congressional power of enforcement

Constitution Day (United States)

Federalist Papers

History of democracy

List of constitutions of the United States

List of national constitutions (world countries)

List of proposed amendments to the United States Constitution

List of sources of law in the United States

National Constitution Center

Pocket Constitution

Related documents

Magna Carta (1215)

Mayflower Compact (1620)

Fundamental Orders of Connecticut (1639)

Massachusetts Body of Liberties (1641)

English Bill of Rights (1689)

United States Declaration of Independence (1776)

Articles of Confederation (1777)

Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom (1779)

United States Bill of Rights (1791)

Notes

References

Primary sources

Bailyn, Bernard, ed. ''The Debate on the Constitution: Federalist and Antifederalist Speeches, Articles, and Letters During the Struggle for Ratification''. Part One: September 1787 to February 1788 (The Library of America, 1993) ISBN 0-940450-42-9

Bailyn, Bernard, ed. ''The Debate on the Constitution: Federalist and Antifederalist Speeches, Articles, and Letters During the Struggle for Ratification''. Part Two: January to August 1788 (The Library of America, 1993) ISBN 0-940450-64-X

Elliot, Jonathan, Debates in the Several State Conventions of the Adoption of the Federal Constitution 5 vols Vol. 1, Constitution, Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, Journal of Federal Convention, Vol. 2, State Conventions Massachusetts, Connecticut., New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Vol. 3, Virginia, Vol. 4, North. and South. Carolina, Resolutions, Tariffs, Banks, Debt, Vol. 5 Debates in Congress, Madison’s Notes, Misc. Letters

Ford, Paul Leicester, ed. on the Constitution of the United States, published during its Discussion by the People, 1787-1788'', edited with notes and a bibliography by Paul Leicester Ford (Brooklyn, N.Y., 1888). Pamphlets written between 1787-88 by Elbridge Gerry, Noah Webster, John Jay, Melancthon Smith, Pelatiah Werster, Tench Coxe, James Wilson, John Dickinson, Alexander Contee Hanson, Edmund Randolph, Richard Henry Lee, George Mason, and David Ramsay. The essay attributed to Gerry was in fact written by Mercy Otis Warren.

Garvey, John H. ed. ''Modern Constitutional Theory: A Reader'' 5th ed 2004; 820pp.

Kaminski, John P. ed Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, 1976- (Published volumes 1-10, 13-23, forthcoming volumes 11-12, 24-29. Most recent volume: The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, Vol. 23, Ratification by the States: New York, No. 5 ISBN 978-0-87020-439-5), Madison, The State Historical Society of Wisconsin, (http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/ratification) Edited by John P. Kaminski, Gaspare J. Saladino,Richard Leffler, Charles H. Schoenleber and Margaret A. Hogan.

Kurland, Philip B. and Lerner, Ralph, eds. ''The Founders' Constitution''. The work consists of “extracts from the leading works of political theory, history, law, and constitutional argument on which the Framers and their contemporaries drew and which they themselves produced.” (Liberty Fund ISBN 0-86597-279-6) The Online Edition is a joint venture of the University of Chicago Press and the Liberty Fund.

Maier, Pauline. ''Ratification: the people debate the Constitution, 1787-1788'' (2010) ISBN 978-684-86854-7, ebook ISBN 978-1-4516-0636-2

Mason, Alpheus Thomas and Donald Grier Stephenson, ed. ''American Constitutional Law: Introductory Essays and Selected Cases'' (14th Edition) (2004)

Tribe, Laurence H. ''American Constitutional Law'' (1999)

Yale Law School:

Reference books

Hall, Kermit, ed. ''The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States.'' Oxford U. Press, 1992. 1032 pp.

Levy, Leonard W. et al., ed. ''Encyclopedia of the American Constitution.'' 5 vol; 1992; 3000 pp.

Secondary sources

Casey, Gregory. "The Supreme Court and Myth: An Empirical Investigation," ''Law & Society Review,'' Vol. 8, No. 3 (Spring, 1974), pp. 385–420

Fritz, Christian G. ''American Sovereigns: The People and America's Constitutional Tradition Before the Civil War'' (Cambridge University Press, 2008) [ISBN 978-0-521-88188-3

Maier, Pauline. The People Debate the Constitution, 1787-1788" (2010) ISBN 978-0-684-86854-7, ISBN 978-1-4516-0636-2 ebook “MIT w/NYT,WP” “Harvard Mg”

Further reading

External links

National Archives

National Constitution Center

The National Archives Experience—Constitution of the United States

The National Archives Experience—High Resolution Downloads of the Charters of Freedom

National Constitution Center's "Interactive Constitution"

Official U.S. government sources

Constitution and related resources: Library of Congress

Analysis and Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States: Annotated constitution, with descriptions of important cases (official publication of U.S. Senate)

Non-governmental web sites

U.S. Constitution Online

Mobile friendly version of the Constitution

Audio reading of the Constitution in MP3 format provided by the University of Chicago Law School

Annotated Constitution by the Congressional Research Service of the U.S. Library of Congress (hyperlinked version published by Cornell University)

Category:1789 establishments in the United States Category:1789 in law Category:James Madison Category:Official documents of the United States United States Constitution Category:Article Feedback Pilot Category:1787 in the United States Category:1789 in the United States Category:Protections against legal system abuse

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The Second Amendment (Amendment II) to the United States Constitution is the part of the United States Bill of Rights that protects the right of the people to keep and bear arms. It was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights.

In 2008 and 2010, the Supreme Court issued two Second Amendment decisions. In ''District of Columbia v. Heller'' (2008), the Court ruled that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to possess a firearm, unconnected to service in a militia and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Additionally, the Court enumerated several longstanding prohibitions and restrictions on firearms possession that it found were consistent with the Second Amendment. In ''McDonald v. Chicago'' (2010), the Court ruled that the Second Amendment limits state and local governments to the same extent that it limits the federal government.

Text

There are several versions of the text of the Second Amendment, each with slight capitalization and punctuation differences, found in the official documents surrounding the adoption of the Bill of Rights. One version was passed by the Congress, while another is found in the copies distributed to the States and then ratified by them.

As passed by the Congress: As ratified by the States:

The original hand-written copy of the Bill of Rights, approved by the House and Senate, was prepared by scribe William Lambert and resides in the National Archives.

Pre-Constitution background

Influence of the English Bill of Rights of 1689

The right to have arms in English history is believed to have been regarded as a long-established natural right in English law, auxiliary to the natural and legally defensible rights to life. The English Bill of Rights emerged from a tempestuous period in English politics during which two issues were major sources of conflict: the authority of the King to govern without the consent of Parliament and the role of Catholics in a country that was becoming ever more Protestant. Ultimately, the Catholic James II was overthrown in the Glorious Revolution, and his successors, the Protestants William III and Mary II, accepted the conditions that were codified in the Bill. One of the issues the Bill resolved was the authority of the King to disarm its subjects, after James II had attempted to disarm many Protestants, and had argued with Parliament over his desire to maintain a standing (or permanent) army. The bill states that it is acting to restore "ancient rights" trampled upon by James II, though some have argued that the English Bill of Rights created a new right to have arms which developed out of a duty to have arms. In ''District of Columbia v. Heller'' (2008), the Supreme Court did not accept this view, remarking that the English right at the time of the passing of the English Bill of Rights was "clearly an individual right, having nothing whatsoever to do with service in the militia" and that it was a right not to be disarmed by the crown and was not the granting of a new right to have arms.

The text of the English Bill of Rights of 1689 includes language protecting the right of Protestants against disarmament by the Crown. This document states: "That the Subjects which are Protestants may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Conditions and as allowed by Law." It also contained text that aspired to bind future Parliaments, though under English Constitutional Law no Parliament can bind any later Parliament. Nevertheless, the English Bill of Rights remains an important constitutional document, more for enumerating the rights of Parliament over the monarchy than for its clause concerning a right to have arms.

The statement in the English Bill of Rights concerning the right to bear arms is often quoted only in the passage where it is written as above and not in its full context. In its full context it is clear that the bill was asserting the right of Protestant citizens not to be disarmed by the King without the consent of Parliament and was merely restoring rights to Protestants which the previous King briefly and unlawfully had removed. In its full context it reads:

Whereas the late King James the Second by the Assistance of diverse evill Councellors Judges and Ministers imployed by him did endeavour to subvert and extirpate the Protestant Religion and the Lawes and Liberties of this Kingdome ''(list of grievances including)'' ... by causing severall good Subjects being Protestants to be disarmed at the same time when Papists were both Armed and Imployed contrary to Law, ''(Recital regarding the change of monarch)'' ... thereupon the said Lords Spirituall and Temporall and Commons pursuant to their respective Letters and Elections being now assembled in a full and free Representative of this Nation takeing into their most serious Consideration the best meanes for attaining the Ends aforesaid Doe in the first place (as their Auncestors in like Case have usually done) for the Vindicating and Asserting their ancient Rights and Liberties, Declare ''(list of rights including)'' ... That the Subjects which are Protestants may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Conditions and as allowed by Law.

The historical link between the English Bill of Rights and the Second Amendment, which both codify an existing right and do not create a new one, has been acknowledged by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The English Bill of Rights includes the proviso that arms must be as "allowed by law." This has been the case before and after the passage of the Bill. While it did not override earlier restrictions on the ownership of guns for hunting, it was written to preserve the hunting rights of the landed aristocracy and is subject to the parliamentary right to implicitly or explicitly repeal earlier enactments. There is some difference of opinion as to how revolutionary the events of 1688-89 actually were, and several commentators make the point that the provisions of the English Bill of Rights did not represent new laws, but rather stated existing rights. Mark Thompson wrote that, apart from determining the succession, the English Bill of Rights did "little more than set forth certain points of existing laws and simply secured to Englishmen the rights of which they were already posessed [sic]." Before and after the English Bill of Rights, the government could always disarm any individual or class of individuals it considered dangerous to the peace of the realm. In 1765, William Blackstone wrote the ''Commentaries on the Laws of England'' describing the right to have arms in England during the 18th century as a natural right of the subject that was "also declared" in the English Bill of Rights.

Although there is little doubt that the writers of the Second Amendment were heavily influenced by the English Bill of Rights, it is a matter of interpretation as to whether they were intent on preserving the right to regulate arms to the states over the federal government (as the English Parliament had reserved for itself against the monarch) or whether it was intent on creating a new right akin to the right of others written into the Constitution (as the Supreme Court recently decided). Some in the U.S. have preferred the "rights" argument arguing that the English Bill of Rights had granted a right. The need to have arms for self-defence was not really in question. Peoples all around the world since time immemorial had armed themselves for the protection of themselves and others, and as organized nations began to appear these arrangements had been extended to the protection of the state. Without a regular army and police force (which in England was not established until 1829), it had been the duty of certain men to keep watch and ward at night and to confront and capture suspicious persons. Every subject had an obligation to protect the king's peace and assist in the suppression of riots.

Experience in America prior to the U.S. Constitution

In no particular order, early American settlers viewed the ''right to arms'' and/or ''the right to bear arms'' and/or ''state militias'' as important for one or more of these purposes:

deterring undemocratic government;

repelling invasion;

suppressing insurrection;

facilitating a natural right of self-defense;

participating in law enforcement;

enabling the people to organize a militia system.

Which of these considerations they thought were most important, which of these considerations they were most alarmed about, and the extent to which each of these considerations ultimately found expression in the Second Amendment is disputed. Some of these purposes were explicitly mentioned in early state constitutions; for example, the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776 asserted that, "the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state".

During the 1760s pre-revolutionary period, the established colonial militia was composed of colonists, which included a number who were loyal to British imperial rule. As defiance and opposition to the British rule developed, a distrust of these Loyalists in the militia became widespread among the colonists, known as Patriots, who favored independence from British rule. As a result, these Patriots established independent colonial legislatures to create their own militias which excluded the Loyalists and then sought out to stock up independent armories for their militias. In response to this arms build up, the British Parliament established an embargo on firearms, parts and ammunition on the American colonies.

British and Loyalist efforts to disarm the colonial Patriot militia armories in the early phases of the American Revolution resulted in the Patriot colonists protesting by citing the Declaration of Rights, Blackstone's summary of the Declaration of Rights, their own militia laws and common law rights to self-defense. While British policy in the early phases of the Revolution clearly aimed to prevent coordinated action by the Patriot militia, some have argued that there is no evidence that the British sought to restrict the traditional common law right of self-defense. Patrick J. Charles disputes these claims citing similar disarming by the patriots and challenging those scholars' interpretation of Blackstone.

The right of the colonists to arms and rebellion against oppression was asserted, for example, in a pre-revolutionary newspaper editorial in 1769 Boston objecting to the British army suppression of colonial opposition to the Townshend Acts:

The armed forces that won the American Revolution consisted of the standing Continental Army created by the Continental Congress, together with various state and regional militia units. In opposition, the British forces consisted of a mixture of the standing British Army, Loyalist Militia and Hessian mercenaries. Following the Revolution, the United States was governed by the Articles of Confederation. Federalists argued that this government had an unworkable division of power between Congress and the states caused military weakness, as the standing army was reduced to as few as 80 men. They considered it to be bad that there was no effective federal military crackdown to an armed tax rebellion in western Massachusetts known as Shays' Rebellion. Anti-federalists on the other hand took the side of limited government and sympathized with the rebels, many of whom were former Revolutionary War soldiers. Subsequently, the Philadelphia Convention proposed in 1787 to grant Congress exclusive power to raise and support a standing army and navy of unlimited size. Anti-federalists objected to the shift of power from the states to the federal government, but as adoption of the Constitution became more and more likely, they shifted their strategy to establishing a bill of rights that would put some limits on federal power.

Modern scholars Thomas B. McAffee and Michael J. Quinlan have stated that James Madison "did not invent the right to keep and bear arms when he drafted the Second Amendment; the right was pre-existing at both common law and in the early state constitutions." In contrast, historian Jack Rakove suggests that Madison's intention in framing the Second Amendment was to provide assurances to moderate Anti-Federalists that the militias would not be disarmed.

One aspect of the gun control debate is the conflict between gun control laws and the right to rebel against unjust governments. Blackstone in his Commentaries alluded to this right to rebel as the natural right of resistance and self preservation, to be used only as a last resort, exercisable when "the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression". Some believe that the framers of the Bill of Rights sought to balance not just political power, but also military power, between the people, the states and the nation, as Alexander Hamilton explained in 1788:

Some scholars have said that it is wrong to read a right of armed insurrection in the Second Amendment because clearly the founding fathers sought to place trust in the power of the ordered liberty of democratic government versus the anarchy of insurrectionists. Other scholars, such as Glenn Reynolds, contend that the framers did believe in an individual right to armed insurrection. The latter scholars cite examples, such as the Declaration of Independence (describing in 1776 "the Right of the People to...institute new Government") and the New Hampshire Constitution (stating in 1784 that "nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind").

There was an ongoing debate in the 1780s about "the people" fighting governmental tyranny (as described by Anti-Federalists); or the risk of mob rule of "the people" (as described by the Federalists) related to the ongoing revolution in France. A widespread fear, during the debates on the ratification of the Constitution, was the possibility of a military takeover of the states by the federal government, which could happen if the Congress passed laws prohibiting states from arming citizens, or prohibiting citizens from arming themselves. Though it has been argued that the states lost the power to arm their citizens when the power to arm the militia was transferred from the states to the federal government by Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution, the individual right to arm was retained and strengthened by the Militia Act of 1792 and the similar act of 1795.

Drafting and adoption of the Constitution

|award2= qtd. in Cottrol, p. 283. while Alexander Hamilton (right) wrote in Federalist No. 29 that "little more can be reasonably aimed at, with respect to the people at large, than to have them properly armed..."|footer_align=left|image1=Patrick henry.JPG|width1=128|image2=Alexander_Hamilton_portrait_by_John_Trumbull_1806.jpg|width2=125}} }} Struggling under the inefficiencies of the Articles of Confederation, delegates from Virginia and Maryland assembled at the Mount Vernon Conference in March 1785 to fashion a remedy. The following year, at a meeting in Annapolis, Maryland, 12 delegates from five states (New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia) met and drew up a list of problems with the current government model. At its conclusion, the delegates scheduled a follow-up meeting in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for May 1787 to present solutions to these problems, such as the absence of:

interstate arbitration processes to handle quarrels between states;

sufficiently trained and armed intrastate security forces to suppress insurrection;

a national militia to repel foreign invaders.

It quickly became apparent that the solution to all three of these problems required shifting control of the states' militias to the federal congress and giving that congress the power to raise a standing army. Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution codified these changes by allowing the Congress to do the following:

provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States;

raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;

provide and maintain a navy;

make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;

provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;

provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress.

Some representatives mistrusted proposals to enlarge federal powers because they were concerned about the inherent risks of centralizing power. Federalists, including James Madison, initially argued that a bill of rights was unnecessary, sufficiently confident that the federal government could never raise a standing army powerful enough to overcome a militia. Federalist Noah Webster argued that an armed populace would have no trouble resisting the potential threat to liberty of a standing army. Anti-federalists, however, advocated amending the Constitution with clearly defined and enumerated rights providing more explicit constraints on the new government. Many anti-federalists feared the new federal government might choose to disarm state militias. Federalists countered that in listing only certain rights, unlisted rights might lose protection. Nevertheless, upon realizing there was insufficient support to ratify the Constitution without a bill of rights, federalists conceded, promising that upon enactment they would support amending the Constitution with a bill of rights. Enough anti-Federalists were persuaded by this compromise to vote for the Constitution, allowing for ratification. The Constitution was declared ratified June 21, 1788, when nine of the original thirteen states had ratified it. The remaining four states later followed suit, although the last two states, North Carolina and Rhode Island, ratified only after Congress had passed the Bill of Rights and sent it to the states for ratification. James Madison drafted what ultimately became the United States Bill of Rights, which was proposed by the first Congress on June 8, 1789, and was adopted on December 15, 1791.

Ratification debates

There was substantial opposition to the new Constitution because it moved the power to arm the state militias from the states themselves to the federal government. This created a fear that the federal government by neglecting the upkeep of the militia could have overwhelming military force at its disposal, through its power to maintain a standing army and navy, in any confrontation with the states, encroaching on the powers the states had reserved for themselves and even engaging in a military takeover. Article VI of the Articles of Confederation states:

:No vessel of war shall be kept up in time of peace by any State, except such number only, as shall be deemed necessary by the united States in congress assembled, for the defense of such State, or its trade; nor shall any body of forces be kept up by any State in time of peace, except such number only, as in the judgement of the united States, in congress assembled, shall be deemed requisite to garrison the forts necessary for the defense of such State; but every State shall always keep up a well-regulated and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutered, and shall provide and constantly have ready for use, in public stores, a due number of field pieces and tents, and a proper quantity of arms, ammunition and camp equipage.

In contrast, Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution states:

:To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress

A foundation of American political thought during the Revolutionary period was the well justified concern about political corruption and governmental tyranny. Even the federalists, fending off their opponents who accused them of creating an oppressive regime, were careful to acknowledge the risks of tyranny. Against that backdrop, the framers saw the personal right to bear arms as a potential check against tyranny. Theodore Sedgwick of Massachusetts expressed this sentiment by declaring that it is "a chimerical idea to suppose that a country like this could ever be enslaved . . . Is it possible . . . that an army could be raised for the purpose of enslaving themselves or their brethren? or, if raised whether they could subdue a nation of freemen, who know how to prize liberty and who have arms in their hands?" Noah Webster similarly argued:

:Before a standing army can rule the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States.

George Mason argued the importance of the militia and right to bear arms by reminding his compatriots of England's efforts "to disarm the people; that it was the best and most effectual way to enslave them . . . by totally disusing and neglecting the militia." He also clarified that under prevailing practice the militia included all people, rich and poor. "Who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers." Because all were members of the militia, all enjoyed the right to individually bear arms to serve therein.

The framers thought the personal right to bear arms to be a paramount right by which other rights could be protected. Therefore, writing after the ratification of the Constitution, but before the election of the first Congress, James Monroe included "the right to keep and bear arms" in a list of basic "human rights" which he proposed to be added to the Constitution.

Patrick Henry, also in the Virginia convention, eloquently argued for the dual rights to arms and resistance to oppression:

Thus, they agreed that an armed populace was the ultimate check on tyranny.

While both Monroe and Adams supported ratification of the Constitution, its most influential framer was James Madison. In Federalist No. 46, he confidently contrasted the federal government of the United States to the European kingdoms which he contemptuously described as "afraid to trust the people with arms." He assured his fellow citizens that they need never fear their government because of "the advantage of being armed...."

By January of 1788, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut ratified the Constitution without insisting upon amendments. Several specific amendments were proposed, but were not adopted at the time the Constitution was ratified. The Pennsylvania convention, for example, debated fifteen amendments, one of which concerned the right of the people to be armed, another with the militia. The Massachusetts convention also ratified the Constitution with an attached list of proposed amendments. In the end, the ratification convention was so evenly divided between those for and against the Constitution that the federalists agreed to amendments to assure ratification. Samuel Adams proposed that the Constitution:

:Be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms; or to raise standing armies, unless when necessary for the defence of the United States, or of some one or more of them; or to prevent the people from petitioning, in a peaceable and orderly manner, the federal legislature, for a redress of their grievances: or to subject the people to unreasonable searches and seizures.

Conflict and compromise in Congress produce the Bill of Rights

James Madison's initial proposal for a bill of rights was brought to the floor of the House of Representatives on June 8, 1789, during the first session of Congress. The initial proposed passage relating to arms was:

On July 21, Madison again raised the issue of his Bill and proposed a select committee be created to report on it. The House voted in favor of Madison's motion, and the Bill of Rights entered committee for review. The committee returned to the House a reworded version of the Second Amendment on July 28. On August 17, that version was read into the Journal:

The Second Amendment was debated and modified during sessions of the House on in late August of 1789. These debates revolved primarily around risk of "mal-administration of the government" using the "religiously scrupulous" clause to destroy the militia as Great Britain had attempted to destroy the militia at the commencement of the American Revolution. These concerns were addressed by modifying the final clause, and on August 24, the House sent the following version to the Senate:

The next day, August 25, the Senate received the Amendment from the House and entered it into the Senate Journal. When the Amendment was transcribed, the semicolon in the religious exemption portion was changed to a comma by the Senate scribe: By this time, the proposed right to keep and bear arms was in a separate amendment, instead of being in a single amendment together with other proposed rights such as the due process right. As a Representative explained, this change allowed each amendment to "be passed upon distinctly by the States." On September 4, the Senate voted to change the language of the Second Amendment by removing the definition of militia, and striking the conscientious objector clause:

The Senate returned to this amendment for a final time on September 9. A proposal to insert the words "for the common defence" next to the words "bear arms" was defeated. The Senate then slightly modified the language and voted to return the Bill of Rights to the House. The final version passed by the Senate was:

The House voted on September 21, 1789 to accept the changes made by the Senate, but the amendment as finally entered into the House journal contained the additional words "necessary to":

On December 15, 1791, the Bill of Rights (the first ten amendments to the Constitution) was adopted, having been ratified by three-fourths of the States.

Militia in the decades following ratification

During the first two decades following the ratification of the Second Amendment, public opposition to standing armies, among Anti-Federalists and Federalists alike, persisted and manifested itself locally as a general reluctance to create a professional armed police force, instead relying on county sheriffs, constables and night watchmen to enforce local ordinances. Though sometimes compensated, often these positions were unpaid—held as a matter of civic duty. In these early decades, law enforcement officers were rarely armed with firearms, using clubs as their sole defensive weapon. In serious emergencies, a ''posse comitatus'', militia company, or group of vigilantes assumed law enforcement duties; these individuals were more likely than the local sheriff to be armed with firearms.

On May 8, 1792, Congress passed "[a]n act more effectually to provide for the National Defence, by establishing an Uniform Militia throughout the United States" requiring:

The act also gave specific instructions to domestic weapon manufacturers "that from and after five years from the passing of this act, muskets for arming the militia as herein required, shall be of bores sufficient for balls of the eighteenth part of a pound." In practice, private acquisition and maintenance of rifles and muskets meeting specifications and readily available for militia duty proved problematic; estimates of compliance ranged from 10 to 65 percent. Compliance with the enrollment provisions was also poor. In addition to the exemptions granted by the law for custom-house officers and their clerks, post-officers and stage drivers employed in the care and conveyance of U.S. mail, ferrymen, export inspectors, pilots, merchant mariners and those deployed at sea in active service; state legislatures granted numerous exemptions under Section 2 of the Act, including exemptions for: clergy, conscientious objectors, teachers, students, and jurors. And though a number of able-bodied white men remained available for service, many simply did not show up for militia duty. Penalties for failure to appear were enforced sporadically and selectively. None are mentioned in the legislation.

The first test of the militia system occurred in July 1794, when a group of disaffected Pennsylvania farmers rebelled against federal tax collectors whom they viewed as illegitimate tools of tyrannical power. Attempts by the four adjoining states to raise a militia for nationalization to suppress the insurrection proved inadequate. When officials resorted to drafting men, they faced bitter resistance. Forthcoming soldiers consisted primarily of draftees or paid substitutes as well as poor enlistees lured by enlistment bonuses. The officers, however, were of a higher quality, responding out of a sense of civic duty and patriotism, and generally critical of the rank and file. Most of the 13,000 soldiers lacked the required weaponry; the war department provided nearly two-thirds of them with guns. In October, President George Washington and General Harry Lee marched on the 7,000 rebels who conceded without fighting. The episode provoked criticism of the citizen militia and inspired calls for a universal militia. Secretary of War Henry Knox and President John Adams had lobbied Congress to establish federal armories to stock imported weapons and encourage domestic production. Congress did subsequently pass "[a]n act for the erecting and repairing of Arsenals and Magazines" on April 2, 1794, two months prior to the insurrection. Nevertheless, the militia continued to deteriorate and twenty years later, the militia's poor condition contributed to several losses in the War of 1812, including the sacking of Washington, D.C. and the White House being burned down in 1814.

Scholarly commentary

Early commentary

The earliest published commentary on the Second Amendment by a major constitutional theorist was by St. George Tucker. He annotated a five-volume edition of Sir William Blackstone's ''Commentaries on the Laws of England'', a critical legal reference for early American attorneys published in 1803.

In footnotes 40 and 41 of the ''Commentaries'', Tucker stated that the right to bear arms under the Second Amendment was not subject to the restrictions that were part of English law: "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Amendments to C. U. S. Art. 4, and this without any qualification as to their condition or degree, as is the case in the British government" and "whoever examines the forest, and game laws in the British code, will readily perceive that the right of keeping arms is effectually taken away from the people of England." Blackstone himself also commented on English game laws, Vol. II, p. 412, "that the prevention of popular insurrections and resistance to government by disarming the bulk of the people, is a reason oftener meant than avowed by the makers of the forest and game laws." Blackstone discussed the right of self-defense in a separate section of his treatise on the common law of crimes. Tucker's annotations for that latter section did not mention the Second Amendment but cited the standard works of English jurists such as Hawkins.

Further, Tucker criticized the English Bill of Rights for limiting gun ownership to the very wealthy, leaving the populace effectively disarmed, and expressed the hope that Americans "never cease to regard the right of keeping and bearing arms as the surest pledge of their liberty."

Tucker's commentary was soon followed, in 1825, by that of William Rawle in his landmark text, ''A View of the Constitution of the United States of America''. Like Tucker, Rawle condemned England's "arbitrary code for the preservation of game," portraying that country as one that "boasts so much of its freedom," yet provides a right to "protestant subjects only" which it "cautiously describ[es] to be that of bearing arms for their defence" and reserves for "[a] very small proportion of the people[.]" In contrast, Rawle characterizes the second clause of the Second Amendment, which he calls the corollary clause, as a general prohibition against such capricious abuse of government power, declaring bluntly:

Rawle, long before the concept of incorporation was formally recognized by the courts, or Congress drafted the Fourteenth Amendment, contended that citizens could appeal to the Second Amendment should either the state or federal government attempt to disarm them. He did warn, however, that "this right [to bear arms] ought not...be abused to the disturbance of the public peace" and observed, paraphrasing Coke, that "[a]n assemblage of persons with arms, for unlawful purpose, is an indictable offence, and even the carrying of arms abroad by a single individual, attended with circumstances giving just reason to fear that he purposes to make an unlawful use of them, would be sufficient cause to require him to give surety of the peace."

The orthodox view of the meaning of the Second Amendment was articulated by Joseph Story in his influential ''Commentaries on the Constitution''. In his view the meaning of the Amendment was clear:

In this quote, Story describes a militia as the "natural defence of a free country," both against foreign foes, domestic revolts and usurpation by rulers. The book regards the militia as a "moral check" against both usurpation and the arbitrary use of power, while expressing distress at the growing indifference of the American people to maintaining such an organized militia, which could lead to the undermining of the protection of the Second Amendment.

Abolitionist Lysander Spooner, commenting on bills of rights, stated that the object of all bills of rights is to assert the rights of individuals against the government and that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms was in support of the right to resist government oppression, as the only security against the tyranny of government lies in forcible resistance to injustice, for injustice will certainly be executed, unless forcibly resisted. Spooner's theory provided the intellectual foundation for John Brown and other radical abolitionists who believed that arming slaves was not only morally justified, but entirely consistent with the Second Amendment. An express connection between this right and the Second Amendment was drawn by Lysander Spooner who commented that a "right of resistance" is protected by both the right to trial by jury and the Second Amendment.

In the Congress, the debate on the Fourteenth Amendment concentrated on what the Southern States were doing to harm the newly freed slaves. One particular concern was the disarming of former slaves.

Late 20th century commentary

In the latter half of the 20th century there was considerable debate over whether the 2nd Amendment protected an individual right or a collective right. The debate centered on whether the initial clause “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State” declared the Amendment’s only purpose, or if it merely announced a purpose to introduce the main or operative clause “the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”.

Three basic competing models were offered to interpret the Second Amendment:

:The first, known as the "states' rights" or "collective rights" model, was that the Second Amendment did not apply to individuals; rather, it recognized the right of a state to arm its militia.

:The second, known as the "sophisticated collective rights model", held that the Second Amendment recognized some limited individual right. However, this individual right could only be exercised by members of a functioning, organized state militia while actively participating in the organized militia’s activities.

:The third, known as the "standard model", was that the Second Amendment recognized the personal right of individuals to keep and bear arms.

Under both of the collective rights models, the opening phrase was considered essential as a pre-condition for the main clause. These interpretations held that this was a grammar structure that was common during that era, and that this grammar dictated that the Second Amendment protected a collective right to firearms to the extent necessary for militia duty.

Under the standard model, the opening phrase was believed to be prefatory or amplifying to the operative clause. The opening phrase was meant as a non-exclusive example—one of many reasons for the amendment This interpretation was consistent with the position that the Second Amendment protects a modified individual right.

The question of a collective rights versus an individual right was progressively resolved with the 2001 Fifth Circuit ruling in ''United States v. Emerson'', in the 2008 Supreme Court ruling in ''District of Columbia v. Heller'', and in the 2010 Supreme Court ruling in ''McDonald v. Chicago''. All of those rulings upheld the individual rights model when interpreting the Second Amendment. In ''Heller'', the Supreme Court upheld the Second Amendment as protecting an individual right. Although the Second Amendment is the only Constitutional amendment with a prefatory clause, such constructions were widely used elsewhere.

Meaning of "well regulated militia"

The term "regulated" means "disciplined" or "trained". In ''Heller'', the U.S. Supreme Court stated that "[t]he adjective 'well-regulated' implies nothing more than the imposition of proper discipline and training." Regarding a well regulated militia, Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist No. 29:

Regarding regulation and training of the militia, Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist No. 29:

Meaning of "the right of the People"

Justice Antonin Scalia in writing for the majority in ''District of Columbia v. Heller'':

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Justice John Paul Stevens countered in his dissenting opinion:

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Meaning of "keep and bear arms"

While a number of authors, lawyers and historians have advocated the view that the term "to bear arms" implies only the military use of arms, the courts have disregarded this viewpoint by pointing out that the term to bear arms also has a private component. In ''District of Columbia v. Heller'' the majority pointed out that:

In a dissenting opinion, joined by Justices David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Stephen Breyer, Justice John Paul Stevens said:

Supreme Court cases

For almost a century following the ratification of the Bill of Rights, the intended meaning and application of the Second Amendment drew less interest than it does in modern times. The vast majority of regulation was done by states, and the first case law on weapons regulation dealt with state interpretations of the Second Amendment. The notable exception to this general rule was ''Houston v. Moore'', , where the Supreme Court mentioned the Second Amendment in an aside, but Justice Story "misidentified" it as the "5th Amendment."

State and federal courts historically have used two models to interpret the Second Amendment: the now generally accepted individual rights model, and the "collective rights" model which holds that the right is dependent on militia membership. While having influenced a number of past court cases, the "collective rights" model has been discarded by the U.S. Supreme Court, in favor of the individual rights model.

The primary U.S. Supreme Court Second Amendment cases include ''Robertson v. Baldwin'', (1897); ''United States v. Miller'', (1939); ''District of Columbia v. Heller'', (2008); and ''McDonald v. Chicago'' (2010).

In ''Heller'' and ''McDonald'' the U.S. Supreme Court supported the individual rights model, under which the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms much as the First Amendment protects the right to free speech. Under this model the militia is composed of members who supply their own arms and ammunition. This is generally recognized as the method by which U.S. militias have historically been armed.

:The signification attributed to the term Militia appears from the debates in the Convention, the history and legislation of Colonies and States, and the writings of approved commentators. These show plainly enough that the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. 'A body of citizens enrolled for military discipline.' And further, that ordinarily when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.

Of the collective rights model that holds that the right to arms is based on militia membership, the U.S. Supreme Court, in ''Heller'', had this to say:

:A purposive qualifying phrase that contradicts the word or phrase it modifies is unknown this side of the looking glass (except, apparently, in some courses on Linguistics). If “bear arms” means, as we think, simply the carrying of arms, a modifier can limit the purpose of the carriage (“for the purpose of self-defense” or “to make war against the King”). But if “bear arms” means, as the petitioners and the dissent think, the carrying of arms only for military purposes, one simply cannot add “for the purpose of killing game.” The right “to carry arms in the militia for the purpose of killing game” is worthy of the mad hatter.

''United States v. Cruikshank''

In the Reconstruction era case of ''United States v. Cruikshank'', , the defendants were white men who had killed more than sixty black people in what was known as the Colfax massacre and had been charged with conspiring to prevent blacks from exercising their right to bear arms. The Court dismissed the charges, holding that the Bill of Rights restricted Congress but not private individuals. The Court concluded, "[f]or their protection in its enjoyment, the people must look to the States."

The Court stated that "[t]he Second Amendment...has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the national government...." Likewise, the Court held that there was no state action in this case, and therefore the Fourteenth Amendment was not applicable:

Thus, the Court held a federal anti-Ku-Klux-Klan statute to be unconstitutional as applied in that case.

Regarding the Second Amendment and the incorporation doctrine, the Supreme Court, in ''District of Columbia v. Heller'', said in 2008:

Regarding the assertion in ''Heller'' that ''Cruikshank'' said the First Amendment did not apply to the states, Professor David Rabban writes that the ''Cruikshank'' Court "never specified whether the First Amendment contains 'fundamental rights' protected by the Fourteenth Amendment against state action...."

''Presser v. Illinois''

In ''Presser v. Illinois'', , Herman Presser headed a German-American paramilitary shooting organization and was arrested for leading a parade group of 400 men, training and drilling with military weapons with the declared intention to fight, through the streets of Chicago as a violation of Illinois law that prohibited public drilling and parading in military style without a permit from the governor.

At his trial, Presser argued that the State of Illinois had violated his Second Amendment rights. The Supreme Court reaffirmed ''Cruikshank'' and held that the Second Amendment prevented neither the States nor Congress from barring private militias that parade with arms; such a right "cannot be claimed as a right independent of law." This decision upheld the States' authority to regulate the militia and that citizens had no right to create their own militias or to own weapons for semi-military purposes.

''Miller v. Texas''

In ''Miller v. Texas'', , Franklin Miller was convicted and sentenced to be executed for shooting a police officer to death with an unlicensed handgun in violation of Texas law. Miller sought to have his conviction overturned, claiming his Second Amendment rights were violated and that the Bill of Rights should be applied to state law. The Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment did not apply to state laws such as the Texas law: "As the proceedings were conducted under the ordinary forms of criminal prosecutions there certainly was no denial of due process of law."

''Robertson v. Baldwin''

In ''Robertson v. Baldwin'', , the Court stated that laws regulating concealed arms did not infringe upon the right to keep and bear arms and thus were not a violation of the Second Amendment:

''United States v. Miller''

In ''United States v. Miller'', , the Supreme Court rejected a Second Amendment challenge to the National Firearms Act prohibiting the interstate transportation of unregistered Title II weapons:

In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice McReynolds, the Supreme Court stated "the objection that the Act usurps police power reserved to the States is plainly untenable." As the Court explained:

Gun rights advocates cite ''Miller'' because they claim that the Court ruled that the Second Amendment protected the right to keep arms that are part of "ordinary military equipment." Gun control advocates cite ''Miller'' because they claim that the Court did not consider the question of whether the sawed-off shotgun in the case would be an applicable weapon for personal defense, instead looking solely at the weapon's suitability for the "common defense." Law professor Andrew McClurg states, "The only certainty about ''Miller'' is that it failed to give either side a clear-cut victory. Most modern scholars recognize this fact."

''District of Columbia v. Heller''

Judgment

According to the syllabus prepared by the U.S. Supreme Court Reporter of Decisions, in this decision the Supreme Court held:

(1) The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Pp. 2–53.

(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.

(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved. Pp. 22–28.

(c) The Court’s interpretation is confirmed by analogous arms-bearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately followed the Second Amendment. Pp. 28–30.

(d) The Second Amendment’s drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms. Pp. 30–32.

(e) Interpretation of the Second Amendment by scholars, courts and legislators, from immediately after its ratification through the late 19th century also supports the Court’s conclusion. Pp. 32–47.

(f) None of the Court’s precedents forecloses the Court’s interpretation. Neither ''United States v. Cruikshank'', 92 U. S. 542 , nor ''Presser v. Illinois'', 116 U. S. 252 , refutes the individual-rights interpretation. ''United States v. Miller'', 307 U. S. 174 , does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes. Pp. 47–54.

(2) Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms. ''Miller''’s holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those “in common use at the time” finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. Pp. 54–56.

(3) The handgun ban and the trigger-lock requirement (as applied to self-defense) violate the Second Amendment. The District’s total ban on handgun possession in the home amounts to a prohibition on an entire class of “arms” that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition—in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute—would fail constitutional muster. Similarly, the requirement that any lawful firearm in the home be disassembled or bound by a trigger lock makes it impossible for citizens to use arms for the core lawful purpose of self-defense and is hence unconstitutional. Because Heller conceded at oral argument that the D. C. licensing law is permissible if it is not enforced arbitrarily and capriciously, the Court assumes that a license will satisfy his prayer for relief and does not address the licensing requirement. Assuming he is not disqualified from exercising Second Amendment rights, the District must permit Heller to register his handgun and must issue him a license to carry it in the home. Pp. 56–64.

Other legal summaries of the court's findings in this case are similar.

Notes and analysis

This has been widely described as a landmark decision. To clarify that its ruling does not invalidate a broad range of existing firearm laws, the majority opinion, written by Justice Scalia, said:

The majority opinion held that the amendment's prefatory clause (referencing the "militia") serves to clarify the operative clause (referencing "the people"), but does not limit the scope of the operative clause, because "the 'militia' in colonial America consisted of a subset of 'the people'...."

Justice Stevens' dissenting opinion, which was joined by the three other dissenters, said:}}

This dissent called the majority opinion "strained and unpersuasive" and said that the right to possess a firearm exists only in relation to the militia and that the D.C. laws constitute permissible regulation. In the majority opinion, Justice Stevens' interpretation of the phrase "to keep and bear arms" was referred to as a "hybrid" definition that Stevens purportedly chose in order to avoid an "incoherent" and "[g]rotesque" idiomatic meeting.

Justice Breyer, in his own dissent and speaking only for himself, stated that the entire Court subscribes to the proposition that "the amendment protects an 'individual' right—i.e., one that is separately possessed, and may be separately enforced, by each person on whom it is conferred".

Regarding the term "well regulated", the majority opinion said: "The adjective 'well-regulated' implies nothing more than the imposition of proper discipline and training." The majority opinion quoted Spooner from ''The Unconstitutionality of Slavery'' as saying that the right to bear arms was necessary for those who wanted to take a stand against slavery. The majority opinion also stated that:

The dissenting justices were not persuaded by this argument.

Immediate reaction to ''Heller'' was varied, with many sources giving focus to the portions of the ruling that pertained to the fact that the ruling was the first in the history of the Supreme Court to read any individual right meaning as being protected by the Second Amendment. The majority opinion, authored by Justice Antonin Scalia, gives explanation of the majority legal reasoning behind this decision. The majority opinion made clear that the recent ruling did not foreclose the Court’s prior interpretations given in ''United States v. Cruikshank'', ''Presser v. Illinois'', and ''United States v. Miller'' though these earlier rulings were not to limit the right to keep and bear arms solely for militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia (i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes).

''Heller'' pertained to three District of Columbia ordinances involving restrictions on firearms amounting to a total ban. These three ordinances were a ban on handgun registration, a requirement that all firearms in a home be either disassembled or have a trigger lock, and licensing requirement that prohibits carrying an unlicensed firearm in the home, such as from one room to another.

Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition—in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute—would fail constitutional muster. Because Heller conceded at oral argument that the District's licensing law is permissible if it is not enforced arbitrarily and capriciously, the Court assumed that a license will satisfy his prayer for relief and did not address the licensing requirement. Assuming he is not disqualified from exercising Second Amendment rights, the District must permit Heller to register his handgun and must issue him a license to carry it in the home.

''McDonald v. Chicago''

On June 28, 2010, the Court incorporated the Second Amendment in ''McDonald v. Chicago''. This means that the Court ruled that the Second Amendment limits State and local governments to the same extent that it limits the federal government. It also remanded a case regarding a Chicago handgun prohibition. Four of the five Justices in the majority voted to do so by way of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, while the fifth Justice, Clarence Thomas, voted to do so through the amendment's Privileges or Immunities Clause.

Lower federal court decisions since ''Heller''

Since ''Heller'', the federal courts have ruled on many Second Amendment challenges to convictions and gun control laws. The following are post-''Heller'' cases, divided by Circuit, along with summary notes:

First Circuit

''United States v. Rene E.'', - On August 31, 2009, the First Circuit affirmed the conviction of a juvenile for the illegal possession of a handgun as a juvenile, under and , rejecting the defendant's argument that the federal law violated his Second Amendment rights under ''Heller''. The court cited "the existence of a longstanding tradition of prohibiting juveniles from both receiving and possessing handguns" and observed "the federal ban on juvenile possession of handguns is part of a longstanding practice of prohibiting certain classes of individuals from possessing firearms — those whose possession poses a particular danger to the public."

Second Circuit

''Maloney v. Cuomo'', - On January 28, 2009, the Second Circuit ruled that the Second Amendment does not apply to state and local governments. Also, New York was ruled to have a "rational basis" for banning possession of nunchaku. On June 29, 2010, under the name ''Maloney v. Rice'', the Supreme Court vacated this decision and remanded this case in light of ''McDonald v. Chicago''.

Fourth Circuit

''United States v. Hall'', - On August 4, 2008, the Fourth Circuit upheld as constitutional the prohibition of possession of a concealed weapon without a permit.

''United States v. Chester'', (4th Cir. 2010) - On December 30, 2010, the Fourth Circuit vacated William Chester's conviction for possession of a firearm after having been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence, in violation of . The court found that the district court erred in perfunctorily relying on ''Heller's'' exception for "presumptively lawful" gun regulations made in accordance with "longstanding prohibitions".

Fifth Circuit

''United States v. Dorosan'', 350 Fed. Appx. 874 (5th Cir. 2009) - On June 30, 2008, the Fifth Circuit upheld , which bans weapons on postal property, sustaining restrictions on guns outside the home, specifically in private vehicles parked in employee parking lots of government facilities, despite Second Amendment claims that were dismissed. The employee's Second Amendment rights were not infringed since the employee could have instead parked across the street in a public parking lot, instead of on government property.

''United States v. Bledsoe'', 334 Fed. Appx. 771 (5th Cir. 2009) - The Fifth Circuit affirmed the decision of a U.S. District Court decision in Texas, upholding , which prohibits "straw purchases." A "straw purchase" occurs when someone eligible to purchase a firearm buys one for an ineligible person. Additionally, the court rejected the request for a strict scrutiny standard of review.

''United States v. Scroggins'', - On March 4, 2010, the Fifth Circuit affirmed the conviction of Ernie Scroggins for possession of a firearm as a convicted felon, in violation of . The court noted that it had, prior to ''Heller'', identified the Second Amendment as providing an individual right to bear arms, and had already, likewise, determined that restrictions on felon ownership of firearms did not violate this right. Moreover, it observed that ''Heller'' did not affect the longstanding prohibition of firearm possession by felons.

Sixth Circuit

''Hamblen v. United States'', 2009 FED App. 439P (6th Cir. 2009) - The Sixth Circuit affirmed a denial of the petitioner's motion to vacate convictions for possession of machine guns and possession of unregistered firearms, in violation of and , respectively. The court observed that ''Heller'' explicitly excluded from Second Amendment protection any weapons "not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes." The court rejected the petitioner's argument that the federal restrictions were nevertheless unconstitutional, stating that, "whatever the individual right to keep and bear arms might entail, it does not authorize an unlicensed individual to possess unregistered machine guns for personal use."

Seventh Circuit

''United States v. Skoien'', - Steven Skoien, a Wisconsin man, convicted of two misdemeanor domestic violence convictions appealed his conviction based on the argument that the prohibition violated the individual rights to bear arms, as described in ''Heller''. After initial favorable rulings in lower court based on a standard of intermediate scrutiny, on July 13, 2010, the Seventh Circuit, sitting ''en banc'', ruled 10-1 against Skoien and reinstated his conviction for a gun violation citing the strong relation between the law in question and the government objective. Skoien was convicted and sentenced to two years in prison for the gun violation and likely will be subject to a lifetime ban on gun ownership. Pro-gun editorials have sharply criticized this ruling as going too far with the enactment of a lifetime gun ban while editorials favoring gun regulations have praised the ruling as "a bucket of cold water thrown on the 'gun rights' celebration".

Eighth Circuit

''United States v. Perkins'', - On September 23, 2008, the Eighth Circuit upheld which prohibits the receiving or possession of an unregistered firearm.

Ninth Circuit

''United States v. Heredia-Mendoza'' (9th Cir. 2008) - On November 18, 2008, the Ninth Circuit upheld which mandates stricter sentencing for use of a firearm during crimes of violence or drug trafficking. The court rejected the defendant's claim of unconstitutionality because the law criminalized possession of gun for self defense in the home.

''Nordyke v. King'' - On July 29, 2009, the Ninth Circuit vacated an April 20 panel decision and reheard the case en banc on September 24, 2009. The April 20 decision had held that the Second Amendment applies to state and local governments, while also upholding an Alameda County, California ordinance that makes it a crime to bring a gun or ammunition on to, or possess either while on, county property. The ''en banc'' panel remanded the case to the three-judge panel. On May 2, 2011, that panel ruled that intermediate scrutiny was the correct standard by which to judge the ordinance's constitutionality and remanded the case to the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

Tenth Circuit

''United States v. Artez'', 290 Fed. Appx. 203 (10th Cir. 2008) - On August 29, 2008, the Tenth Circuit upheld the federal ban on possession of un-registered sawed-off shotguns.

Eleventh Circuit

''United States v. Boffil-Rivera'' (11th Cir. 2008) - On August 12, 2008, the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida ruled that prohibiting firearms possession by persons illegally or unlawfully in the United States, under , was constitutional. The court stated that ''"Heller casts no shadow on the statute on a facial challenge"''. The Eleventh Circuit later affirmed the jury's verdict.

See also

Gun politics in the United States

Notes and Citations

References

Books

Periodicals

Other publications

External links

National Archives Scanned Image of the Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment

Category:1791 in American politics Category:1791 in law 02 Category:Militia in the United States Category:United States federal firearms legislation

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Coordinates	43°35′07″N39°43′13″N
name	Bill Maher
birth name	William Maher, Jr.
birth date	January 20, 1956
birth place	New York, New York, U.S.
alma mater	Cornell University
medium	Stand-Up, Television, Film, Books
nationality	American
active	1979–present
genre	Satire, Political satire, News Satire, Observational comedy
subject	American politics, current events, American culture, pop culture, freedom of speech, environmentalism, religion, human sexuality, recreational drug use, libertarianism, American liberalism, American conservatism
influences	Steve Allen, George Carlin, Johnny Carson, David Frost, Robert Klein, Don Rickles, Gore Vidal, Lenny Bruce
notable work	Elliot on Charlie HooverHost of Politically Incorrect Host of Real Time with Bill Maher''Religulous''
website	BillMaher.com
footnotes	}}

William "Bill" Maher, Jr. (; born January 20, 1956) is an American stand-up comedian, television host, political commentator, author and actor. Before his current role as the host of HBO's ''Real Time with Bill Maher'', Maher hosted a similar late-night talk show called ''Politically Incorrect'' originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC.

Maher is known for his political satire and sociopolitical commentary, which targets a wide swath of topics including: religion, politics, bureaucracies of many kinds, political correctness, the mass media, greed among people and persons in positions of high political and social power, and the lack of intellectual curiosity of the electorate. He supports the legalization of marijuana and same-sex marriage, and serves on the board of PETA. He is also a critic of religion and is an advisory board member of Project Reason, a foundation to promote scientific knowledge and secular values within society. In 2005, Maher ranked at number 38 on Comedy Central's 100 greatest stand-up comedians of all time. Bill Maher received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star on September 14, 2010.

Early life and education

Maher was born in New York City, the son of Julie (née Berman), a nurse, and William Maher, Sr., a network news editor and radio announcer. He was raised in his Irish American father's Catholic religion, remaining unaware that his mother was Jewish until his early teenage years. Maher's family stopped attending church services when Maher was thirteen, due to his father's disagreement with the Catholic Church's position on birth control.

Maher was raised in River Vale, New Jersey, and graduated from Pascack Hills High School in Montvale in 1974. He received a B.A. in English and history from Cornell University in 1978.

Early career

Maher began his career as a stand-up comedian and actor. He was host of the New York City comedy club Catch a Rising Star in 1979. Thanks to Steve Allen, he began appearing on Johnny Carson's and David Letterman's shows in 1982. He made limited television appearances including a recurring role in ''Sara'' (1985), appeared in ''Max Headroom'' (1987), two separate appearances on ''Murder, She Wrote'' (1989, 1990), a recurring role in ''Charlie Hoover'' (1991) and other productions. He has also appeared in several films, usually in a comic role. His feature film debut was in ''D.C. Cab'' (1983), and he also appeared in ''Ratboy'' (1986) ''Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death'' (1988) and ''Pizza Man'' (1991), among others.

Television career

''Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher''

Maher assumed the host role ''Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher'', a late-night political talk show that ran on Comedy Central from 1993 to 1997 and on ABC from 1997 to 2002. The show regularly began with a topical monologue by Maher preceding the introduction of four guests, usually a diverse group of individuals from show business, popular culture, political pundits, political consultants, authors, and occasionally news figures. The group would discuss topical issues selected by Maher, who also participated in the discussions. Jerry Seinfeld, a regular guest on the show, stated that ''Politically Incorrect'' reminded him of talk shows from the 1950s and 60s "when guests interacted with each other as much as with the host."

''Politically Incorrect'' won an array of awards, including an Emmy Award for Outstanding Technical Direction, two CableACE awards for Best Talk Show Series, and a Genesis Award for Best Television Talk Show. Maher earned numerous award nominations for his producing, writing and hosting of ''Politically Incorrect'', including ten Emmy nominations, two TV Guide nominations, and two Writers Guild nominations. ABC decided against renewing Maher's contract for ''Politically Incorrect'' in 2002, after he made a controversial on-air remark shortly after the September 11 attacks. He agreed with his guest, conservative pundit Dinesh D'Souza, that the 9/11 terrorists did not act in a cowardly manner (in rebuttal to President Bush's statement calling 9/11 hijackers cowards). Maher said, "We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from two thousand miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly. You're right." Maher later clarified that his comment was not anti-military in any way whatsoever, referencing his well-documented longstanding support for the American military.

In the context of the attacks, some corporate advertisers found the comment too insensitive and controversial. Several companies, including FedEx and Sears Roebuck, pulled their advertisements from the show, costing the show more than it returned.

The show was cancelled on June 16, 2002, and the Sinclair Broadcast Group had dropped the show from its ABC-affiliated stations months prior. On June 22, 2002, just six days after the cancellation of ''Politically Incorrect'', Maher received the Los Angeles Press Club president's award (for "championing free speech"). Maher was on the board of judges one year for the PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award.

Maher's remarks after 9/11 were not the first time he had sparked controversy on ''Politically Incorrect''. In the same year, Maher was widely criticized for comparing dogs to retarded children. He apologized for his comments.

''Real Time with Bill Maher''

In 2003, Maher became the host, co-producer and co-writer of ''Real Time with Bill Maher'', a weekly hour-long political comedy talk show on the cable television network HBO. During an interview, Maher told Terry Gross (on NPR's ''Fresh Air'') that he much prefers having serious and well-informed guests on his program, as opposed to the random celebrities that fleshed out his roundtable discussions on ''Politically Incorrect''.

As with his previous show, ''Politically Incorrect'', Maher begins ''Real Time'' with a comic opening monologue based upon current events and other topical issues. He proceeds to a one-on-one interview with a guest, either in-studio or via satellite. Following the interview, Maher sits with three panelists, usually consisting of pundits, authors, activists and journalists, for a discussion of the week's events. In the segment "New Rules" at the end of each show, Maher delivers a humorous editorial on popular culture and American politics.

In late May 2005, Alabama Congressman Spencer Bachus sent a letter to Time Warner's board of directors requesting ''Real Time'' be cancelled after remarks Maher made after noting the military had missed its recruiting goals by 42 percent. Bachus said he felt the comments were demeaning to the military and treasonous. Maher stated his highest regard and support for the troops and asked why the congressman criticized him instead of doing something about the recruitment problem.

''Real Time'' has earned widespread praise. It has been nominated for more than ten Primetime Emmy Awards and six Writer's Guild awards. In 2007, Maher and his co-producers were awarded the Television Producer of the Year Award in Variety Television.

In early 2006, ''Real Time'' was released as an audio CD, along with another CD entitled ''Bill Maher's New Rules'' which features clips, segments and teasers from Real Time. Starting with Episode 67 (2-23-06), ''Real Time'' became available in the USA on iTunes as a free weekly audio podcast.

Maher holds the record for the most Emmy nominations without a win, having been nominated on 22 occasions and not winning once. Eleven of the nominations were for ''Politically Incorrect'', while nine were for ''Real Time.'' The other two were nominations for two of his HBO comedy specials: ''Bill Maher: I'm Swiss'' and ''Bill Maher: The Decider.''

HBO announced in July 2011 the show was renewed for a tenth season.

Christine O'Donnell

On September 17, 2010, Maher aired a clip of Delaware Republican Senatorial candidate Christine O'Donnell from the October 29, 1999 episode of his old show ''Politically Incorrect'' on his current show ''Real Time with Bill Maher'', where she discussed that she had "dabbled in witchcraft." This was one of the most notable of numerous controversial statements by O'Donnell that made her the most covered candidate in the 2010 mid-term election cycle.

Political commentator

Maher is a frequent commentator on various cable news networks, namely CNN, MSNBC, and HLN. Maher has regularly appeared on CNN's ''The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer'' and has also been a frequent guest on MSNBC's ''Hardball with Chris Matthews'', ''The Rachel Maddow Show'' and ''Countdown with Keith Olbermann''. Maher has also appeared as a guest on HLN's ''The Joy Behar Show''.

Maher hosted the January 13, 2006 edition of ''Larry King Live'', on which he was a frequent guest. Maher appeared as a special guest on the June 29, 2010 edition of the show, on which CNN anchor Larry King announced his retirement. Maher co-emceed the final show of ''Larry King Live'' on December 16, 2010 with Ryan Seacrest.

Since May 2005, he has been a contributing blogger at ''The Huffington Post''.

Views and beliefs

Politics

Maher eschews political labels, referring to himself as "practical". In the past, he has described himself as a libertarian and has also referred to himself "as a progressive, as a sane person".

Maher favors a partial privatization of Social Security, ending corporate welfare and federal funding of non-profits, and legalization of gambling, prostitution, and marijuana. Maher is a member of NORML's Advisory Board, an organization which supports regulated legalization of marijuana. He describes himself as an environmentalist, and he has spoken in favor of the Kyoto treaty on global warming on his show ''Real Time''. He often criticizes industry figures involved in environmental pollution.

Maher is a board member of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. He has expressed his distaste for the pharmaceutical and health care industries in general, on the grounds that they make their money out of curing people who are made sick by consuming unhealthy food that corporations urge upon the public. He maintains that mass consumption of high-fructose corn syrup is a contributor to the rise in frequency of obesity in the United States. :" If you believe you need to take all the pills the pharmaceutical industry says you do, then you're already on drugs!"

Before the 2004 U.S. presidential election, Maher became candid in his stated opposition to the re-election of George W. Bush and in his support for John Kerry.

Known for protesting against the demonization of the word "liberal", during the campaign Maher criticized Kerry for being ashamed of the word. On his show, the comedian has noted the paradox of people claiming they distrusted "elite" politicians while at the same time wanting elite doctors to treat them and elite lawyers to represent them in court. Maher supports the death penalty, the legality of abortion and euthanasia. Since the 9/11 attacks, he has endorsed the use of racial profiling at airports.

He was originally against the Iraq War, and has summarized his opinion by saying that the United States and the world have had to pay too high a price for the war. He is skeptical of Iraq surviving without civil war.

In the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Maher announced his support for Barack Obama. Although Maher welcomed Obama's electoral victory, he has subjected him to criticism once in office for not acting boldly on health care reform and other progressive issues.

Religion

Maher is highly critical of religion, and views it as not worth the bother. He has referred to himself as an apatheist, instead of an agnostic or atheist, on ''Scarborough Country'' on April 24, 2007, and again in July 2011. He has reiterated this stance in subsequent interviews, rejecting both the certitude of the existence, as well as the certitude of nonexistence of deities, concluding, "I'm saying that doubt is the only appropriate response for human beings." He is an advisory board member of author Sam Harris's The Reason Project, a foundation that promotes scientific knowledge and secular values within society.

Maher and director Larry Charles teamed up to make the feature film ''Religulous'' (2008), described by trade publication ''Variety'' as a documentary "that spoofs religious extremism across the world." It was released on October 3, 2008.

While Maher is critical towards Christianity, he is an outspoken critic of religion as a whole, including Islam. On October 29, 2010, during a Real Time segment, Maher commented on a news story saying that the name Mohammed had become the most popular baby name in the United Kingdom. He asked, "Am I a racist to feel alarmed by that? Because I am. And it’s not because of the race, it’s because of the religion. I don’t have to apologize, do I, for not wanting the Western world to be taken over by Islam in 300 years? Sharia law is being institutionalized in England? Well, then I am right, I should be alarmed." He later defended his comments on CNN, saying, "And when I say Westerner, I mean someone who believes in the values that Western people believe in that a lot of the Muslim world does not. Like separation of church and state. Like equality of the sexes. Like respect for minorities, free elections, free speech, freedom to gather. These things are not just different from cultures that don’t have them. … It’s better. … I would like to keep those values here."

Maher received the Richard Dawkins Award for 2009 from Atheist Alliance International "for his efforts to further the values science and reason in the world."

Maher was ranked first by MormonVoices, a group associated with Foundation for Apologetic Information & Research, on its Top Ten Anti-Mormon Statements of 2011 list for saying "By any standard, Mormonism is more ridiculous than any other religion".

Health care

Maher has stated that the AMA is a powerful lobbying group and one of the primary reasons why the United States had failed to enact health care reform.

On August 24, 2009, Maher was a guest on ''The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien'' and on the topic of getting universal health care legislation passed, Maher stated that Obama should forget about trying to get 60 votes for it, "he only needs 51." "Forget getting the sixty votes or sixty percent — sixty percent of people don't believe in evolution in this country — he just needs to drag them to it, like I said, they're stupid; get health care done, with or without them."

Maher has expressed the view that most illness is generally the result of poor diet and lack of exercise, and that medicine is often not the best way of addressing illness. In an episode of his show about the 2008 presidential candidates' health plans, Maher stated that poor nutrition is a primary cause of illness, and that "the answer isn't another pill."

In a discussion with Michael Moore about the film ''Sicko'', Maher asks, "The human body is pretty amazing; it doesn't get sick, usually, for no reason. I mean, there's some genetic stuff that can get to you, but, basically, people are sick in this country because they're poisoned. The environment is a poisoning factor, but also, we gotta say, they poison themselves. They eat shit. People eat shit, and that's, to my way of thinking, about 90 percent of why people are sick, is because they eat shit. Would you agree?"

On October 9, 2009, on his HBO show, Maher debated the effectiveness of flu vaccinations with Bill Frist and stated, "Why would you let them be the ones to stick a disease into your arm? I would never get a swine flu vaccine or any vaccine. I don’t trust the government, especially with my health." Maher also expressed skepticism about the seriousness of the swine flu and whether completely healthy people could die from it. His comments have generated criticism, and his remarks have been called unscientific and even harmful.

Maher responded to the criticism, noting, "What I've read about what they think I'm saying is not what I've said. I'm not a germ theory denier. I believe vaccinations can work. Polio is a good example. Do I think in certain situations that inoculating Third World children against malaria or diphtheria, or whatever, is right? Of course. In a situation like that, the benefits outweigh costs. But to me living in Los Angeles? To get a flu shot? No." (see Vaccine controversy)

Criticism of 9/11 conspiracy theories

Maher has been a critic of 9/11 conspiracy theories. On October 19, 2007, Maher confronted several 9/11 truthers and had them ejected from his show audience after they interrupted the live show numerous times by calling out from the audience. The incident drew significant media attention and praise from Fox News talk show host and frequent critic John Gibson.

Personal life

Maher has never married. In 2003, he began dating former Playboy Cyber Girl Coco Johnsen. In November 2004, at the end of their 17-month relationship, she sued him for USD $9 million for "pain and suffering" for alleged "insulting, humiliating and degrading racial comments." Her suit stated that Maher promised to marry her and father her children, support her financially, and purchase a Beverly Hills home. Her suit also alleged that she quit her job as a flight attendant and occasional model to be with him. Maher's lawyers in their response filed on November 23, 2004, in Los Angeles Superior Court said Maher is a "confirmed bachelor, and a very public one at that" who "never promised to marry [Johnsen] or to have children with her."

Maher's filing stated that "When the dating ended, [Johnson] (sic) launched a campaign to embarrass, humiliate, and extort ridiculous sums of money from Bill Maher." Johnsen accused another former boyfriend of rape and kidnapping in 1997, and the charges were later dismissed for lack of evidence. Her lawsuit against Maher was dismissed on May 2, 2005.

Maher enjoys his bachelor status and states that he does not want to get married. On his website, he is quoted as saying, "I'm the last of my guy friends to have never gotten married, and their wives — they don't want them playing with me. I'm like the escaped slave — I bring news of freedom."

In 2005, he began dating Karrine Steffans, best-selling author and former hip hop model. When commentators suggested there was a pattern to his dating because both his girlfriend and former girlfriend were black, Maher said, "People say I'm into black women. Robert De Niro is into black women. I'm just into women who are real, and they happen to be black."

Credits

Bibliography

''True Story : A Novel'', 1994 (ISBN 0-7432-4251-3)

''Does Anybody Have a Problem With That? Politically Incorrect's Greatest Hits'', 1996 (ISBN 0-679-45627-9)

''Does Anybody Have a Problem with That? The Best of Politically Incorrect'', 1997 (ISBN 0-345-41281-8)

''When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden: What the Government Should Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism'', 2003 (ISBN 1-893224-90-2)

''Keep the Statue of Liberty Closed: The New Rules'', 2004 (ISBN 1-932407-47-2)

''New Rules: Polite Musings from a Timid Observer'', 2005 (ISBN 1-59486-295-8)

''The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass'', 2011 (ISBN 0-39915-841-3)

Filmography

Film
! Year	! Title	! Role
1983	''D.C. Cab''	Bob
	''Rags to Riches''	Freddie
''Club Med''	Rick
''Ratboy''	Party Guest
1987	''House II: The Second Story''	John
1988		Maxwell Taylor
1989	''Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death''	Jim
1991	''Pizza Man''	Elmo Bunn
1996	''Don't Quit Your Day Job!''	Comic's Table
1997	''Bimbo Movie Bash''	Unknown
1998	''EDtv''	Himself
2001	''Tomcats (film)''	Carlos
2005		Himself
		Himself
''Religulous''	Himself
2009	''New Rules: Best of''	Himself
2010	''Sex, Drugs & Religion (2010)''	Himself
HBO Specials
! Year	! Title	! Role
1989	''One Night Stand''	Himself
1992	''One Night Stand''	Himself
1995	''Stuff that Struck Me Funny''	Himself
1997	''The Golden Goose Special''	Himself
2000		Himself
2003	''Victory Begins at Home''	Himself
2005	''I'm Swiss''	Himself
2007		Himself
2010		Himself
Television
! Year	! Title	! Role
1985		Marty Lang
		Unknown
	Haskel
1989–90	''Murder, She Wrote''	(2 episodes)
1990	''The Midnight Hour''	Host
1991	''Charlie Hoover''	Elliot
1992	''Say What?''	Host
	''Married... with Children''	Adam Gold
''Roseanne''	Photographer
1997	''Dharma & Greg''	Himself
1993–2002	''Politically Incorrect''	Host
2002	''Just for Laughs''	Himself
2003–present	''Real Time with Bill Maher''	Host
2008	''True Blood''	Himself
2010		Himself
2010	''Family Guy''	Himself

References

External links

in 2004

HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" site

2006 Maher Interview with ''The A.V. Club''

2009 Maher Interview with writers at the ''Religulous'' DVD release

Category:1956 births Category:Writers from New York Category:Actors from New Jersey Category:Writers from New Jersey Category:American people of Jewish descent Category:American agnostics Category:American cannabis activists Category:American film actors Category:American libertarians Category:American satirists Category:American stand-up comedians Category:American television actors Category:American television talk show hosts Category:Cornell University alumni Category:American comedians of Irish descent Category:American writers of Irish descent Category:Living people Category:People from Beverly Hills, California Category:People from River Vale, New Jersey Category:Religious skeptics Category:Former Roman Catholics Category:Actors from New York City Category:Drug policy reform activists Category:Animal rights advocates

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Coordinates	43°35′07″N39°43′13″N
name	Ted Nugent
background	solo_singer
born	December 13, 1948Redford, Michigan, U.S.
alias	The Nuge, Motor City Madman, Uncle Ted
genre	Rock, hard rock, heavy metal
occupation	Musician, songwriter, entrepreneur, hunter, activist, actor
instrument	Guitar, vocals, bass
associated acts	The Amboy Dukes, Damn Yankees, Damnocracy
years active	1958–present
website	TedNugent.com
notable instruments	Gibson Byrdland }}

Theodore Anthony "Ted" Nugent (; born December 13, 1948) is an American guitarist, musician, singer, author, reserve police officer and activist. From Detroit, Michigan, he originally gained fame as the lead guitarist of The Amboy Dukes, before embarking on a lengthy solo career. He is also noted for his conservative political views and his ardent defense of hunting and gun ownership rights.

Early life

Nugent was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Marion Dorothy (née Johnson) and Warren Henry Nugent. He moved to Palatine, Illinois as a teenager, and has two brothers: John and Jeffrey. Raised Catholic, Nugent has mentioned his ties with the Christian faith many times during interviews, and has stated that he regularly attends church. He attended St. Viator High School in Arlington Heights, Illinois.

Career

Nugent has released more than 34 albums, and has sold a career total of 30 million records. He was known throughout his early career in the 1970s for using Fender amps, a large part of his signature sound, and for playing the hollow-body Gibson Byrdland guitar. Gibson Guitar Corporation has since developed a model named for him. Performing professionally since 1958, Nugent has been touring annually since 1967, averaging more than 300 shows per year (1967–73), 200 per year (1974–80), 150 (1981–89), 127 concerts in 1990, 162 concerts in 1991, 150 concerts in 1993, 180 in 1994, 166 in 1995, 81 in 1996, Summer Blitz '97, '98, Rock Never Stops '99, 133 concerts with KISS 2K. Nugent's 2005 plans involved a tour with country music singer-songwriter Toby Keith, whom Nugent met in Iraq while they were both performing in USO-sponsored shows for the coalition troops. Nugent toured with local Detroit musician Alex Winston during the summers of 2007 and 2008.

On July 4, 2008, at the DTE Energy Music Theater in Clarkston, Michigan, Ted Nugent played his 6,000th concert. Derek St. Holmes (original singer for the Ted Nugent band), Johnny Bee Badanjek (drummer for Mitch Ryder and The Detroit Wheels), and Ted's guitar teacher from 1958 Joe Podorsek all jammed on stage with Ted for various tunes.

Amboy Dukes

His first edition of The Amboy Dukes played at The Cellar, a teen dance club outside of Chicago in Arlington Heights, Illinois, starting in late 1965, while Nugent was a student at St. Viator High School. The Cellar's "house band" at the time had been the Shadows of Knight, although the Amboy Dukes eventually became a staple until the club's closing.

The Amboy Dukes' second single was "Journey to the Center of the Mind", which featured lyrics written by the Dukes' second guitarist Steve Farmer. Nugent, an ardent anti-drug campaigner, has always claimed that he had no idea that this song was about drug use. ''The Amboy Dukes'' (1967), ''Journey to the Center of the Mind'' (1968) and ''Migration'' (1969) — all recorded on the Mainstream label — sold moderately well. On April 4, 1968, Nugent along with a group of musicians paid tribute to Martin Luther King by having a folk, rock and blues jam session. Joni Mitchell played first, followed by Buddy Guy and Jimi Hendrix. Other musicians who participated were BB King and Al Kooper.

After settling down on a ranch in Michigan in 1973, Nugent signed a record deal with Frank Zappa's DiscReet Records label and recorded ''Call of the Wild''. The following year, ''Tooth Fang & Claw'' (which contained the song "Great White Buffalo") established a fan base for Nugent and the other Amboy Dukes. Personnel changes nearly wrecked the band, which became known as Ted Nugent & the Amboy Dukes. Nugent reunited with the other members of the Amboy Dukes at the 2009 Detroit Music Awards, which took place April 17, 2009. The psychedelic band received a distinguished achievement honor at the event. The Dukes also played together at the ceremony, marking their first public performance in more than 30 years.

Solo career

Nugent dropped the Amboy Dukes band name for good in 1975, and signed to Epic Records. Derek St. Holmes (guitar, vocals), Rob Grange (bass) and Clifford Davies (drums) were the primary additional band members for his classic 1970s multi-platinum albums: ''Ted Nugent'' (1975), ''Free-for-All'' (1976) and ''Cat Scratch Fever'' (1977). These albums produced the popular radio anthems "Hey Baby", "Stranglehold", "Dog Eat Dog", and "Cat Scratch Fever". It was during these three years that Nugent truly emerged as a guitar hero to thousands of young hard rock fans, many of whom were unaware of his lengthy apprenticeship with the Amboy Dukes. This band lineup toured extensively, also releasing the multi-platinum live album ''Double Live Gonzo!'', until its breakup in 1978 when St. Holmes and Grange departed. St. Holmes was replaced by Charlie Huhn and Grange by Dave Kiswiney. Davies finally left around 1982 after staying on to record ''Weekend Warriors'' (1978), ''State of Shock'' (1979), ''Scream Dream'' (1980) and ''Intensities in 10 Cities'' (1981).

On July 8, 1979, Ted was on the rock radio program ''King Biscuit Flower Hour''. This was the original broadcast of Ted's performance of ''Live at Hammersmith '79'' which had been recorded during the second set of a sold-out night at London's Hammersmith Odeon in 1979. An album of this program was released in 1997.

During this era, Nugent was notable for his frequent declarations that he did not drink alcoholic beverages or smoke tobacco or marijuana. In an interview for VH1's ''Behind The Music'', Nugent said this was due to his father having sternly reprimanded him when he came home smelling of alcohol after a night of drinking. This was an unusual stance for a major rock performer of the 1970s, and Nugent has been cited as an important early influence on the straight edge movement, which disavows drinking and recreational drug use.

Influences

Nugent has been praised for his playing style, and is cited as an influence by many other hard rock and heavy metal musicians. Nugent has cited his own musical influences as Vanilla Fudge, Jeff Beck, Chuck Berry, The Kinks, Jimmy Page, The Rolling Stones, The Who, The Yardbirds, Bo Diddley, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Steppenwolf, Mitch Ryder & the Detroit Wheels, The Animals, Little Richard, MC5, Frank Zappa, and Muddy Waters.

Damn Yankees

During the period of 1982-89, Nugent released a series of moderately successful solo albums. In 1989, he formed the supergroup Damn Yankees, with Jack Blades (bass/vocals, formerly of Night Ranger), Tommy Shaw (guitar/vocals, formerly of Styx) and Michael Cartellone (drums/vocals). ''Damn Yankees'' (1990) was a hit, selling 5 million albums, thanks in no small part to the smash hit power ballad "High Enough". The video for this song featured Nugent in a priest's collar, and later in a zebra-striped cape during the guitar solo. It also saw the first appearance of his famous 'WhackMaster' hat.

Back to solo

Returning to a solo career, Nugent released ''Spirit of the Wild'' in 1995, his best-reviewed album in quite some time. This album also marked the return of Derek St. Holmes to Nugent's studio band. A series of archival releases also came out in the 1990s, keeping Nugent's name in the national consciousness. He also began hosting a radio show in Detroit on WWBR-FM ("102.7 The Bear, Detroit's Rock Animal") and took ownership in several hunting-related businesses. He created TV shows for several networks; ''Wanted: Ted or Alive'' on Versus, ''Ted Nugent Spirit of the Wild'' on PBS and The Outdoor Channel, as well as ''Surviving Nugent'' and ''Supergroup-Damnocracy'' on VH1. In 2006, Nugent was inducted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.

Ted Nugent appears on David Crowder Band's 2007 release, ''Remedy'', playing guitar on the song "We Won't Be Quiet". He announced his "Trample the Weak, Hurdle the Dead" tour on April 21, 2010.

On March 14, 2011, Nugent released a new song, "I Still Believe", as a free download via his website to subscribers to his news letter. Nugent says of the song: "America is a target-rich environment for an independent man addicted to logic, truth and The American Way. 'I Still Believe' throttles the animal spirit of rugged individualism in pure MotorCity ultra high-energy rhythm and blues and rock and roll." In April 2011 Nugent announced that former frontman Derek St. Holmes would be joining his band for Nugent's I Still Believe Tour.

Media appearances

Reality programming

Nugent starred in his own outdoors television show named after his popular song "Spirit of the Wild". The song was the theme music to the TV series in which Nugent took viewers on a variety of wild game hunts using his bow. In the series he teaches and advises hunters and "hands-on" conservationists around the world on the different aspects of hunting and politics, and informs the public on the importance of getting children away from the TV and video games and getting them out beyond the pavement in order to better their lives.

In 2003, he was host of the VH1 reality television program ''Surviving Nugent'' in which city dwellers such as model Tila Tequila moved to Nugent's Michigan ranch in order to survive such "backwoods" activities as building an outhouse and skinning a boar. The success of the two-hour show spawned a four-part miniseries in 2004 entitled ''Surviving Nugent: The Ted Commandments''. This time it was filmed on Nugent's ranch in China Spring, Texas. During filming, Nugent injured himself with a chainsaw, requiring 44 stitches and a leg brace.

In 2003, Nugent also guested on the VH1 program ''Forever Wild'', hosted by Sebastian Bach (former lead vocalist for the band Skid Row). They shot some firearms and walked around Nugent's cabin in the woods. Two years later he hosted a reality-type show, ''Wanted: Ted or Alive'' on OLN (now the sports channel 'Versus') where contestants competed for money as well as for opportunities to go hunting with "Uncle Ted." The contestants had to kill and clean their own food to survive.

In 2006, he appeared on VH1's reality show ''SuperGroup'', with Scott Ian (Anthrax, guitar), Evan Seinfeld (Biohazard, bass), Sebastian Bach (ex-Skid Row, vocals) and Jason Bonham (Bonham, UFO, Foreigner, drums). The name of the supergroup was originally FIST but later was changed to Damnocracy. Bach had lobbied for the name Savage Animal. Captured on film by VH1 was a rare Nugent duet with guitarist Joe Bonamassa at the Sand Dollar Blues Room for a 45-minute blues jam. He starred in another reality show for CMT in August 2009. The show, entitled ''Runnin' Wild ... From Ted Nugent'', featured Nugent instructing competitors in the art of survival; the competitors had to use those skills in challenges in which they were hunted down by Nugent.

In 2008, Ted Nugent was on the episode ''Southwest Road Trip Special'' of ''Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations'', where he spoke against obesity and public health care.

Also in 2009, he played guitar at The Alamo for a Tax Day Tea Party hosted by Glenn Beck and Fox News. Most notable in his set was a version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" in which he used alternate picking and whammy bar effects. The clip and sound bite of this is played extensively on Fox News as well as on ''The Glenn Beck Program''.

Acting

In 1986, he guest starred in an episode of the hit television show ''Miami Vice'' entitled "Definitely Miami". Nugent played a villain. His song "Angry Young Man" was featured in the episode. His song "Little Miss Dangerous" was also featured on a ''Miami Vice'' episode of the same name, although he did not appear in the episode.

In 2001, Nugent appeared as himself in a third season episode of ''That '70s Show'' entitled "Backstage Pass." Donna Pinciotti (Laura Prepon), who works for radio station WFPP, obtains tickets to the upcoming Ted Nugent concert for the entire gang. Following the concert, her boss Max (Howard Hesseman) gives Donna a backstage pass to meet Nugent, where he volunteers to sit for an interview. Meanwhile, Steven Hyde (Danny Masterson) and Fez (Wilmer Valderama) try to sell unauthorized concert t-shirts accidentally spelled ''Tad Nugent''.

Also in 2001, Nugent appeared as himself in the second episode of the short-lived university campus FOX comedy series, "Undeclared". In the episode "Full Bluntal Nugety", Nugent is a guest at the university, there to speak on his favorite topics, mainly hunting and gun control. This is where new student Steven Karp (Jay Baruchel) takes his love interest Lizzie (Carla Gallo) on their first date. Karp tries to heckle Nugent during his speech in an attempt to impress Lizzie, with disastrous results. FOX didn't like the idea of Nugent and his political views appearing on this show, so the episode was re-shot and re-edited as "Oh, So You Have a Boyfriend?" which aired without any Ted Nugent content whatsoever. The complete "Full Bluntal Nugety (Director's Cut)" episode is available in its entirety, in the "Undeclared" DVD box set (released by SHOUT! Factory), including some extra Ted Nugent scenes that had been deleted.

He made a guest appearance on the cult television series ''Aqua Teen Hunger Force,'' in the episode "Gee Whiz," on Adult Swim. Locals believe to have seen the face of Jesus in a billboard, and they mention how it looks like Ted Nugent. Throughout the episode they think it's Jesus' face, but at the end they discover it was in fact Nugent's. He proceeds to shoot a flaming explosive arrow at Carl (mistaking him for a "varmint").

In 2007, Nugent appeared in the music video for Nickelback's "Rockstar", and in 2008 he played a key role in the Toby Keith movie ''Beer For My Horses'' as the quiet deputy named Skunk.

In 2007, Nugent debated ''The Simpsons'' producer Sam Simon on the ''Howard Stern Show'' about the ethics of hunting animals. Coincidentally, he would later lend his voice to an over-the-phone appearance in the season 19 episode of ''The Simpsons'', "I Don't Wanna Know Why the Caged Bird Sings", where, in a humorous jab at his political stance, inmate Dwight picks up his call for voting no to the fictional Proposition 87, which bans crossbows in public schools. As part of his pre-recorded message, Nugent asks "If we outlaw crossbows in our public schools, who's going to protect our children from charging elk?".

Other media appearances

Attracting attention for his outspoken statements on issues ranging from guns to biodiversity, Nugent has been a regular guest on such programs as ''Larry King Live'', ''The Howard Stern Show'', and ''Politically Incorrect''.

In 1991. he guest-starred on the PBS science show ''Newton's Apple'' in a short comedic feature called ''Science of the Rich and Famous'' in which he demonstrates and explains the phenomenon of electric guitar feedback. On March 13, 2007, Nugent was interviewed on ABC's ''Jimmy Kimmel Live'' and performed the songs "Cat Scratch Fever" and "Rawdogs and Warhogs".

Also in 2008, Nugent appeared on the Memphis-based ''The Political Cesspool'', a radio talk show known for its "pro-white" views.

On April 15, 2009, Nugent appeared onstage with his guitar in San Antonio as part of Glenn Beck's coverage of the Tax Day Tea Party protests on the Fox News Channel. He hosted the show with Glenn Beck, and played music for the protestors at the Alamo. He made an appearance in ''Guitar Hero: World Tour'' As part of the solo guitar career, the player engages in a guitar duel with Nugent, after which the song "Stranglehold" is unlocked and Dirty Nuge becomes available as a playable character.

Nugent was interviewed on the ''The Alex Jones Show'' July 30, 2008 about his new book "Ted, White, and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto" (2008). On July 9, 2010 Ted was again interviewed by Alex Jones and he criticized the latest policies issued by the Obama Administration and the Supreme Court concerning gun policy. He claimed that rejecting the idea of the right to self-defense being expressed in the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution, which Nugent called "gun control" policies, are most likely to destroy the American society. Nugent also claimed similar policies were the cause of the downfall of every society in human history.

Nugent appeared on penn and teller's BS episode on P.E.T.A

Personal life

He has had two wives and has eight children, including three out of wedlock in two liaisons almost 30 years apart. In the late 1960s, prior to his first marriage, Nugent fathered a boy, Ted (Mann) and a girl, whom he gave up for adoption in infancy. This did not become public knowledge until 2010. The siblings were adopted separately and had no contact with one another. The son learned the identity of his birth father in 2010 through the daughter's quest to make contact with him and their birth parents. According to a news report, Nugent over the years had discussed the existence of these children with his other children.

In 2005 Nugent was involved in a legal battle for not paying enough child support for a child he had out of wedlock in 1995. It was finally resolved when Nugent was ordered to pay $3,500 in child support.

He was married to his first wife, Sandra Jezowski, from 1970 to 1979. They had three children, son Theodore Tobias "Toby" Nugent, and daughters Sasha and Starr Nugent. Sandra died in a car crash in 1982. His second marriage was to Shemane Deziel, whom he met while a guest on Detroit's WLLZ-FM, where she was a member of the news staff. They married on January 21, 1989. Together they have two children, son Rocco Winchester Nugent, and daughter Chantal Nugent.

In 1978, Nugent began a relationship with seventeen-year-old Hawaii native Pele Massa. Due to the age difference they could not marry so Nugent joined Massa's parents in signing documents to make himself her legal guardian, an arrangement that ''Spin'' magazine ranked in October 2000 as #63 on their list of the "100 Sleaziest Moments in Rock".

In the late 1990s, Nugent began writing for various magazines. He has written for more than 20 publications and is the author of ''New York Times'' Best Seller ''God, Guns and Rock 'n' Roll'' (July 2000), ''Kill It and Grill It'' (2002) (co-authored with his wife, Shemane), ''BloodTrails II: The Truth About Bowhunting'' (2004), and "Ted, White, and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto" (2008).

In 1996 Nugent joined the WWBR-FM air staff. The Ted Nugent Morning Show on 102.7 FM in Detroit was a success. He and co-host Steve Black (now host of the syndicated radio show Chop Shop and Chop Shop Classic) often shocked Detroit with their opinions and Nugent's unique method of delivering his ideas.

Nugent is a fan of the Detroit Pistons. He wore a Pistons shirt in the Damn Yankees music video for "Come Again". He is also a fan of the Dallas Cowboys and attends many games with his children and grandchildren.

Hearing loss

Nugent also suffers from hearing loss. A November 2005 ''Rolling Stone'' article noted Nugent, among others, has publicly acknowledged hearing problems. "The ear's not too good, especially with background noise", he said in a 2007 interview. "[But] that's a small price to pay. Believe me the journey was worth it."

Activism

Drugs and alcohol stances

Since the early 1990s Nugent has become both popular and criticized for his conservative beliefs and his anti-drug and anti-alcohol stances. He is a national spokesman for the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program, advocating the "natural highs" to be found in an outdoor lifestyle.

Concealed carry weapon (CCW) law

Nugent is a strong advocate of the right to bear arms. When interviewed by Texas Monthly editor Evan Smith in season 5 of TexasMonthlyTalks he said, "I would rather that [a victim of violent crime] in Massachusetts last month who was taking her daughter to soccer when they were carjacked by a recidivist maggot, who had been in the prison system all his life but was let out again because we feel sorry for him, maybe he had a bad childhood. Instead of her being hijacked and murdered, I'd rather she just shot the bastard dead... But in Massachusetts, somebody decided she can't do that. So she's dead. I would rather she was alive and the carjacker was dead... I'm weird."

Nugent currently serves on the Board of Directors of the National Rifle Association (NRA).

Conflicts with animal rights groups

Nugent once said in an interview, “I'm stymied to come up with anything funnier than people who think animals have rights. Just stick an arrow through their lungs.” In 2000, Bhaskar Sinha was jailed briefly following an incident outside a department store in San Francisco in which he threatened and physically assaulted Nugent, who in turn took Sinha into custody until San Francisco Police arrived and arrested the protester. However, protesters claim that Nugent started the altercation by spitting in one of the protester's faces when he was offered an anti-fur flyer, although police on the scene did not witness such an action.

Nugent has reported receiving death threats against him and his family from animal rights activists. On the ''Penn & Teller's Bullshit!'' episode about People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Nugent claimed, "We've got reports and files with law enforcement across America where left-wing animal rights extremists are on record threatening to kill my children on the way to school because we eat pheasant." In 2006 he stated in an interview that "anyone who thinks hunting is terrible can kiss my ass."

In a 1992 radio interview, Nugent referred to Heidi Prescott of the Fund for Animals as a "worthless whore" and a "shallow slut," asking "who needs to club a seal, when you can club Heidi?" He was ordered by a court to pay Prescott $75,000.

Nugent owns a hunting ranch near Jackson, Michigan, called Sunrize Acres. Anti-hunters claim this fenced facility offers "canned" hunts. Nugent has said, "I understand the criticism from those who say canned hunting violates the ethic of fair chase," though he still operates the facility, and refers to it as "high fence hunting". Nugent was recently interviewed by ''Field & Stream'' magazine regarding "canned" hunts. At Sunrize Acres he personally guides customers on a hunt for trophy bull bison ($5,000), Russian boar, or white-tailed deer ($1,000 each).

In September 2009, Nugent embarked on a hunt near Somerset, El Dorado County, California. He was accompanied by a guide and a cameraman, filming for his Outdoor Channel show "Spirit of the Wild." The video taken appeared in an episode of the show first broadcast on February 9, 2010. California Fish and Game wardens who watched the broadcast noticed that it showed Nugent killing a very young buck which had been attracted by commercial bait. Both the killing of such a young deer and the use of bait are crimes under California state law. On August 13, 2010, he pled no contest in Yuba County to two misdemeanors: illegally baiting a deer, and failing to have a deer tag signed by a government official after a kill. He was fined USD $1,750 by the court.

The band Goldfinger released a song called "FTN", which is critical of Ted Nugent.

Politics

In 2007 and 2008, during a period of years when he publicly speculated about running for governor of Michigan, Nugent singled out prominent Democratic politicians for violent or vulgar rhetoric or gestures. At a concert on August 21, 2007, Nugent made controversial comments about Democratic Party presidential aspirants Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and California's senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein. He complained, "Obama's a piece of shit, and I told him to suck on my machine gun." Referring to Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm (in office 2003-11), during performances he would frequently interject "Jennifer Granholm, kiss my ass" into his songs, and shoot an arrow at her likeness. In a 2007 interview, in discussing running for governor of Michigan, he stated that Granholm "is not doing an ugly job, but as the perfect woman, she is scrotumless".

Although Nugent has never run for government office, in the decade of the 2000s he publicly speculated about doing so on several occasions. In May 2005, he announced he was "getting real close to deciding to run" for governor of Michigan in 2006, while in 2007, he talked about running for that office in 2010. During the latter period, he stated, "Michigan was once a great state. Michigan was a state that rewarded the entrepreneur and the most productive, work-ethic families of the state. Now the pimps and the whores and the welfare brats are basically the state's babies." In July 2008, Nugent declared "I was serious when I threatened to run for office in the past if I cannot find a candidate who respects the U.S. Constitution and our sacred Bill of Rights." When asked by ''Imagineer'' magazine in a 2010 interview about what he would do if elected to political office, he responded: "Slash the living hell out of the waste and corruption and the outrageous army of do-nothing bureaucrats. I would fire every government worker whose job I would deem to be redundant and wasteful. No able-bodied human being would ever get a handout again."

Nugent is a veteran supporter of Republican Party politicians. On July 17, 2008, during the presidential election season, shortly before the Republican presidential nominating convention, however, he stated that front-runner John McCain was "catering to a growing segment of soulless Americans who care less what they can do for their country, but whine louder and louder about what their country must do for them. That is both un-American and pathetic". As a longtime resident of Texas, he was a weekly contributor to the newspaper, the ''Waco Tribune-Herald'' until 2009. He has been a special deputy sheriff in Lake County, Michigan since 1982 and he also has been a reserve deputy constable in McLennan County, Texas.

According to an interview in ''The Independent'' he "considers homosexuality morally wrong" and is an outspoken supporter of the United States military. As a reward for entertaining US troops in Iraq in 2004, he visited Saddam Hussein's war room. "It was a glorious moment. It looked like something out of ''Star Wars''. I saw his gold toilet. I shat in his bidet." Nugent also said: "Our failure has been not to Nagasaki them."

Nugent was initially scheduled to speak at Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally on August 28, 2010, but subsequently cancelled due to a scheduling conflict.

Military

In 2006, an interviewer from the British newspaper ''The Independent'' questioned Nugent about a 1977 interview in ''High Times'' magazine in which Nugent allegedly detailed elaborate steps taken to avoid the Vietnam draft. In the interview Nugent explains that, contrary to the story in ''High Times'', he was awarded a 2-S (student) deferment because he was enrolled as a student at Oakland Community College.

Tours

Summer Blitz Tour 1997

1998 Tour

Rock Never Stops Tour 1999

Remember The Alamo Tour 2005

Unleash The Beast Tour 2006

Unleash The Nuge Beast Killer Rock Tour 2007

Rolling Thunder Tour 2008

Trample The Weak, Hurdle The Dead Tour 2010

I Still Believe Tour 2011

Discography

Published books

Nugent, Ted. ''Blood Trails: The Truth About Bowhunting'' Ted Nugent (1991) ISBN B0006ORP2G (146 pages)

Nugent, Ted. ''God, Guns & Rock and Roll''. Regnery Publishing, Inc. (August 21, 2000) ISBN 0-89526-173-1 (316 pages)

Nugent, Ted. ''Blood Trails II: The Truth About Bowhunting''. Woods N' Water Inc. (November 12, 2004) ISBN 0-9722804-7-2 (256 pages)

Nugent, Ted and Nugent, Shemane. ''Kill It & Grill It: A Guide to Preparing and Cooking Wild Game and Fish''. Regnery Publishing, Inc. (June 25, 2005) ISBN 0-89526-164-2 (250 pages)

Nugent, Ted. ''Ted, White, and Blue: The Nugent Manifesto ''. Regnery Publishing Inc. (November 12, 2008) ISBN 978-1-59698-555-1 (256 pages)

Articles

References

External links

Official Ted Nugent Website

Damnocracy

Category:1948 births Category:American anti-communists Category:American rock guitarists Category:American heavy metal guitarists Category:American hunters Category:Damn Yankees members Category:Epic Records artists Category:Lead guitarists Category:Living people Category:Musicians from Detroit, Michigan Category:Musicians from Michigan Category:National Rifle Association members Category:Participants in American reality television series Category:People associated with firearms Category:People from Detroit, Michigan Category:People from Palatine, Illinois Category:People from Waco, Texas Category:The Amboy Dukes members

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