I need an "In depth explanation of the first amendment"?

Question

I need to know a very in depth explanation from a legal standpoint of the 1st amendment, For my persuasive speech. You will be cited.

Answer 1

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Are you in law school? If you are do your own research!

It is pretty straight forward.

If you are concerned about the religion part of the amendment, it was more to protect the government from religion than religion from government! I think the English had had it with state sponsored religion long enough. It was the church with the most power in England until Elizabeth I

Answer 2

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. -Amendment I, US Constitution

Contrary to what many people will tell you, this amendment means exactly what is says. If the drafters of the Constitution didn't mean this, they would have written something else. If one learns a little about the history of the US and it's people, this becomes very clear. It's also helps to understand the context in which the amendments were written, not just in terms of the times (i.e. the attitudes of the people at that time) but also with the rest of the Constitution.

"Congress.." means those two legislative houses in Washington called the House of Representatives and the Senate. It doesn't refer to anyone else. It doesn't even refer to individual state legislative bodies; only Congress.
At the time this was written, people had a lot more pride in their state then they do today. People viewed their state with a sense of patriotism. They wanted their state to be as autonomous as possible; they wanted their own state to have control of it's own goings-on (for lack of thinking of a better word right now). The states were "united" largely for defense purposes.
This is important to understand because the first amendment only refers to the federal legislative body ("Congress"). When you consider this fact with the Tenth Amendment in mind ("The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States respectively or to the people.")...presumably a state legislature could establish a state religion for it's own state under the original intent of the Constitution. I think most, if not all states, however have the same "bill of rights" incorporated into their own state constitutions.

"..shall make no law" means they (Congess) is not allowed to pass a law with regard to the following;

"respecting an establishment of religion..." means they shouldn't establish a national religion by law.
Many immigrants to America came fleeing religious persecution. England, for example, established the Anglican Church, as the official religion of England. People that weren't Anglican were often mistreated by the government.
There were several denominations in the early United States (I believe some of them were the Methodists, Calvanists, and Baptists) and people feared a denomination other than their own would become the official national religion and lead to religious persecution of other "religions" (the term "religion" was used as we would use "denomination" today, but I believe they were also referring to non Christian religions as well)

Sorry, I have to go now...I'll try to finish up later if I remember to. There's a lot of interestin stuff to say here. Thanks for the question.

Answer 3

It says Congress will not establish a 'state' religion and it can't interfere with your practicing your religion. It says we are free to speak our minds and there's nothing Congress can do about it. It doesn't mean we can yell 'fire' in a crowded room but even this so called 'hate' speech is protected. It says we have the 'freedom of the press' but does anyone honestly believe that the founding fathers wouldn't have included the other ways we communicate today as well. If this is not true then those that are mute and speak only with their hands are not protected for they do not "speak'. We have the right to gather together in a peaceful crowd be it for the purposes of entertainment or protest. And lastly it says we have the right to petition the government, to demand explanation for the way they are conducting business in our name if we do not agree with such goings on. This amendment tells the government in no uncertain terms that it is 'We the People' that has power over government and not the other way around.

I believe many of us have forgotten this and we have allowed the government to get the upper hand. We can remain good little 'sheeple' or we can exercise 'our rights' as a free people and take back the power we have allowed to slip from our grasp.

Answer 4

The First Amendment guarantees freedom of expression. This includes freedom of press, speech, and religion. Not all is protected, however. Libel and slander are not protected. During WWI, the Supreme Court ruled that speech could be censored when it posed a direct threat to the safety of America. However, during Vietnam, the Supreme Court allowed the Pentagon Papers, a collection of reports on the reasons for entering Vietnam, be published in newspapers. Under the First Amendment, all people have the right to practice any religion. Some scholars have interpreted it to mean that the government should have no affiliation with religion whatsoever. However, I, along with many other scholars, believe that it means that the government cannot establish and promote any one national religion. While people have the right to believe whatever they want, they do not necessarily have the right to practice it. When secular law conflicts with religious practices, secular law nearly always wins. Examples of practices that are not allowed include human sacrifice and snake handling. Obviously, these present grave dangers to the safety of the community. Anyway, I hope this helps you.

Answer 5

This is not my work but it may help you with what you seek.

To believe that the Constitution requires a total separation of church and state is to believe a lie. Nowhere in the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, or any other founding documents of this nation will one find the phrase so often used today, “separation of church and state.”

Significantly, the phrase “separation of church and state” is not even mentioned in the Congressional Record from June 7 to September 25, 1789, the period that documents the months of discussions and debates of the 90 men who framed the First Amendment. Had separation been the intent of the First Amendment, it seems logical that the phrase would have been mentioned at least once.

Unfortunately, radical advocates have long been trying to re-write the Constitution by making the First Amendment say something it doesn’t.

In contrast, the Declaration of Independence contains four references to God: God as the Creator and the source of liberty (“all men are endowed by their Creator with unalienable rights”), God the law giver (“law of nature and of nature’s God”), God the ultimate judge (“the Supreme Judge of the World”), and God as the king above all earthly rulers, as the Sovereign (“Divine Providence”).

Answer 6

That one is loaded with several commands. Let's take a close look at the text of the Amendment breaking it down into its components:

Congress shall:

1. Make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;

2. [Make no law respecting] or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or

3. [Make no law respecting] the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and

4. [Make no law respecting the right of the people] to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

There are actually FOUR rights.

Take the four rights in their order.

1. No law respecting religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. This one's intuitive, but to understand it, you have to understand its history.

Before the War of Independence, England owned our country which consisted of 13 colonies. England has a state-religion, the Anglican Church. Therefore, England made laws that respected only 1 religion and in some cases, prohibited the exercise of certain other religions, or made the exercise of those religions difficult, like Catholics who were persecuted by the Anglican Church or Church of England as its known.

The colonists, however, fled to the New World to avoid religious persecution. Many of them were from different faiths, but share a unilateral belief on one God, but worshipped God under different religions. The Founding Fathers felt religion had to be kept sacred and that the government had no right to impose a religion on the people, or prohibit them from exercising their own religion.

The impact of this component is to prohibit virtually all government-backed laws that create the appearance of state-backed religions. The case law interpreting this part of the amendment is complex and voluminous, and sometimes confusing. Suffice it to say, the struggle continues.

2. Speech and Press. Again this one is intuitive. But history is a guide.

Prior to the War of Independence, England passed a number of laws that made it a crime to criticize the King or Parliament. These were called sedition laws. Those persons who said things that were politically or even religiously unpopular would be arrested and charged with sedition, treason, heresy, you name it.

Newspapers would be shut down too, if the authorities didn't like what they had to say. The English used the press for propoganda and supressed it to supress the truth.

This one's not so complex. Outside of commercial speech (advertising to some), and speech by minors, personal speech is pretty much a protected right. The only limits to such speech are false speech (like libel and slander) and dangerous speech (inciting a crowd to violence and say shouting "fire" in a crowded theater when there is no fire). There are some complex analyses by the Supreme Court, but this one's generally wide open. Speech has also been extended to "expression" in the form of art work, sculptures, and even a jacket that said "FXXX the draft" on the back.

3. Peaceable Assembly. History is a guide once again. Before the War of Independence, the assembly of persons for all but permitted or licensed purposes, was strictly forbidden. Redcoats had no problem disbursing groups by shooting them on sight.

This one is very good. It allows people to assemble to speak, to pray, to rally for political reasons, to conduct a parade or celebration, or to mourn to name a few. This component of the First Amendment pretty much means that no man shall tell you who your friends are, or who you can live with, or what clubs, fraternities, or other groups you can belong to. This one protects legitimate political parties, etc. Limitations: few except for groups that practice violence, advocate violent overthrow of the government, criminal associations (RICO) and criminal conspiracies to name a few.

4. Petition the government for redress of grievances. This is the last part of the 1st Amendment.

Historically the colonists petitioned their colonial governments and England repeatedly for relief from the oppression of additional taxation and other abuses by the King. Those petitions were never heard and often discarded. England had little regard for procedure or the rights of the colonists.

This amendment requires public officials to at the very least consider petitions by citizens. A petition is essentially a prayer, an entreaty, a motion to adopt some resolution.

Thus writing letters to your congressman or senator, your governor, the president or any public official expressing your dissatisfaction, or requesting official action, are all protected activities. Those officials cannot punish you for exercising this right and requesting that the government do something.

I don't think I can do more than this, without writing a book and I am going to run out of space.

Hope this answers your question.

Answer 7

I will not answer your question, but will give you a link to a fairly credible source called FindLaw.com. It has a very detailed description of the First Amendment, a little historical context, and some scholarly commentary about the amendment and its importance.

Answer 8

when you start reading amendments, it's the first one

Answer 9

Ok, I didnt make this up, I got it form another site!! But it was very helpful, for my paper.




http://www.csulb.edu/~jvancamp/freedom1.html