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| A set of principles, either written or unwritten, that makes up the fundamental law of the state |
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| Rights of all human beings that are ordained by God, discoverable in nature and history, and essential to human progress |
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| Individual who refused to attend the Constitutional Convention because he "smelled a rat" |
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| Declaration of Independence |
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| A document written in 1776 declaring the colonists' intention to throw off British rule |
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| Articles of Confederation |
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| The government charter of the states from 1776 until the Constitution of 1787 |
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| A constitutional principle separating the personnel of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government |
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| A constitutional principle reserving separate powers to the national and state levels of government |
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| A principal architect of the Constitution who felt that a government powerful enough to encourage virtue in its citizens was too powerful |
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| First ten amendments to the Constitution |
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| Those powers that are given to the national government exclusively |
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| A historian who argued that the Founders were largely motivated by the economic advantage of their class in writing the Constitution |
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| Constitutional Convention |
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| A meeting of delegates in Philadelphia in 1787 charged with drawing up amendments to the Articles of Confederation |
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| Powers that are given exclusively to the states |
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| Pennsylvania Constitution |
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| A governing document considered to be highly democratic yet with a tendency toward tyranny as the result of concentrating all powers in one set of hands |
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| Massachusetts Constitution |
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| A state constitution with clear separation of powers but considered to have produced too weak a government |
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| An armed attempt by Revolutionary War veterans to avoid losing their property by preventing the courts in western Massachusetts from meeting |
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| Those powers that are shared by both the national and state governments |
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| A British philosopher whose ideas on civil government greatly influenced the Founders |
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| A series of political tracts that explained many of the ideas of the Founders |
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| A constitutional proposal that would have given each state one vote in a new congress |
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| Author of the Declaration of Independence |
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| A constitutional proposal that made membership in one house of Congress proportional to each state's population and membership in the other equal for all states |
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| A group with a distinct political interest |
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| Constitutional Convention |
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| A meeting of delegates in 1787 to revise the Articles of Confederation |
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| The power of the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government to block some acts by the other two branches |
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| A form of democracy in which leaders and representatives are selected by means of popular competitive elections |
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| An alliance between different interest groups or parties to achieve some political goal |
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| Rights thought to be based on nature and providence rather than on the preferences of people |
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| amendment (constitutional) |
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| Change in, or addition to, a constitution |
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| A group of people sharing a common interest who seek to influence public policy for their collective benefit |
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| The power of the courts to declare acts of the legislature and of the executive unconstitutional and therefor null and void |
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| The first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution |
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| A series of eighty-five essays published in New York newspapers to convince New Yorkers to adopt the newly proposed Constitution |
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| Supporters of a stronger central government who advocated ratification of the Constitution and then founded a political party |
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| The power of an executive to veto some provisions in an appropriations bill while approving others |
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| Those who opposed giving as much power to the national government as the Constitution did, favoring instead stronger states' rights |
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| A law that would declare a person guilty of a crime without a trial |
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| A law that would declare an act criminal after the act was committed |
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| Madisonian view of human nature |
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| A philosophy holding that accommodating individual self-interest provided a more practical solution to the problem of government than aiming to cultivate virtue |
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| An agreement among sovereign states that delegates certain powers to a national government |
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| A court order requiring police officials to produce an individual held in custody and show sufficient cause for that person's detention |
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