The United States Constitution: Ward Against Tyranny

The creation of the constitution took place in Philadelphia of the year 1787. The point at issue was that the existing government that was under the Articles Of Confederation was very ineffective. Hence, the fifty-five men representing the thirteen states came together to redo our constitution to create a strong government without allowing one person or group of people to have too much power. The Constitution guarded against tyranny in four ways, those being federalism, separation of powers, checks and balances, and small states versus large states. First off, the Constitution guards against tyranny through federalism. Federalism is the act of splitting power to two ruling governments such as, the central and state governments. The divided power allows both governments to carry out decree independently. Document A states that the central government can regulate trade, conduct foreign relations and declare war. On the other hand, the state government creates local governments, they pass state regulated laws, and apoint taxes. Since each has different influences, it prevents tyranny through making certain none of the two carries the overall power over the entire nation, meaning they have to work together to benefit the nation.

The following guard against tyranny was the separation of powers which means that the government is separated into separate branches comprising of the Senate and House of Representatives. Each branches directive had a different objective, rules, and methods of conducting their work, which contributes to the overall running of the country. Document B shows the way that the constitution uses the separation of powers to guard against tyranny is when it has the people in the government that make the largest decisions only able to serve for a term of a few years. The separation of powers protects against tyranny because it makes sure that one branch of government can't be more powerful and have more say than another so that there can't be any tyranny.

Continuing on, tyranny is deterred by establishing checks and balances. The different branches of government can disagree with something that another branch is doing in order to keep everything in the government fair. One way that the constitution shows this is when it is put that the other branches can get rid of something that another branch is doing because it may be unconstitutional as Document C states. For example, the executive branch can veto a congressional legislation, however the legislative branch can override the presidential veto. Checks and balances protects against tyranny because it make sure that one group in the government can do anything that would be unconstitutional.

Lastly, the prevention of tyranny also happens through the representation of all states in the country. Whether the state is small or large, each have two senators that are chosen to serve for a term of six years. Tyranny can not happen as no state has more power than one another regardless of size or stature The Constitution guarded against tyranny in several ways such as federalism, separation of powers, checks and balances, and balance of large and small states. The Constitution split power between the central and federal governments, separated power among the branches of government, used checks and balances for the branches and finally promoted for equal representation of all states. It is safe to say that the constitution has and for the time being has guarded against tyranny.