America is a country heralded for the vast array of freedoms it provides. These can be attributed to our civil rights and civil liberties. Providing the necessary framework needed to uphold american values. These two ideas are the framework that create the freedoms enjoyed in american society.
Civil liberties and civil rights may are used almost synonymously, but they are actually two different fundamental concepts that both play necessary role in establishing american freedoms. Civil rights are the basic rights that guarantee fairness and equality to all citizens nondependent on arbitrary factors such as race, religion, sex, ethnicity, etc… These rights have been developed over america’s lifetime primarily by the judicial and legislative branches. Who have created and interpreted legislation that has secured this ideal of equality and fairness. Civil liberties are the actions that are guaranteed to us by the constitution’s bill of rights. These provide protection from government actions in order to prevent an oppressive regime from taking hold. These too
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Primarily this expansion has come in the form of supreme court rulings; that have shaped the limits of america’s civil liberties. One of the most important developments in this aspect is incorporation; which has expanded many civil liberties by allowing them to govern state actions as well as federal actions. Two landmark cases that have served to further define the liberties we are entitled are Gideon v. Wainwright and Mapp v. Ohio. Gideon v. Wainwright was a floridian case that determined that states have an obligation to provide appropriate legal representation. This Interpretation of the law had incorporated the 5th amendment. The Mapp v. Ohio trial also incorporated one of the bill of rights amendments. In this case it was the 4th. Creating a standard for search warrants that is still in place