Florida Civic Literacy Exam Resources Guide: Competency Four

Five Laws passed in September of 1850 that dealt with issues of slavery and territorial expansion as a result of land annexed from Mexico. They can be summarized as:
1) Fugitive Slave Act - which required that enslaved people be returned to the slave holder, even if the enslaved person had fled to a free state.
2) The suppression and abolishment of the slave trade in the District of Columbia. Slavery, however, continued to be allowed.
3) The admission of the State of California as a free state although slavery continued in the state.
4). A territorial government was established in Utah, Which encompassed the present day state of Utah, most of Nevada, and a large portion of Colorado. Slavery was legal in this territory.
5). Settlement of the northern and western borders of the State of Texas.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act repealed the Missouri Compromise, created two new territories, and allowed for popular sovereignty. It also produced a violent uprising known as “Bleeding Kansas,” as proslavery and antislavery activists flooded into the territories to sway the vote. Political turmoil followed, destroying the remnants of the old Whig coalition and leading to the creation of the new Republican Party. Stephen Douglas had touted his bill as a peaceful settlement of national issues, but what it produced was a prelude to civil war.

Passed on May 20, 1862, the Homestead Act accelerated the settlement of the western territory by granting adult heads of families 160 acres of surveyed public land for a minimal filing fee and five years of continuous residence on that land.

Approved on January 16, 1883, the Pendleton Act established a merit-based system of selecting government officials and supervising their work.

Passed in preparation for an anticipated war with France, the Alien and Sedition Acts tightened restrictions on foreign-born Americans and limited speech critical of the government.

This bill mandated that "all persons born in the United States," with the exception of American Indians, were "hereby declared to be citizens of the United States." The legislation granted all citizens the “full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property.”

Passed after the 9/11 attacks, this act expanded law enforcement survelliance abilities, improved interagency communication, and increased penalities for terrorism crimes.

From approximately 1929 through the late 1930s, the U.S. experienced a period of economic depression and recovery. In response, President Franklin D. Roosevelt announced a series of social programs and funding to help improve the lives of Americans. This included the Work Projects Administration (WPA) and the Farm Security Administration (FSA).

President Lyndon Johnson announced his Great Society program during his State of the Union address in 1964. He outlined a series of domestic programs that he promised would eliminate poverty and inequality in the United States. By the end of Johnson’s term, Congress had implemented 226 of 252 his legislative requests.

This law passed in March 2010 was designed to make affordable health insurance available to more people.

The enactment of the Clean Air Act of 1970 (1970 CAA) resulted in a major shift in the federal government's role in air pollution control. This legislation authorized the development of comprehensive federal and state regulations to limit emissions from both stationary (industrial) sources and mobile sources.

On August 7, 1964, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing President Johnson to take any measures he believed were necessary to retaliate and to promote the maintenance of international peace and security in southeast Asia. This resolution became the legal basis for the Johnson and Nixon Administrations prosecution of the Vietnam War.

Established the principle of judicial review, in other words, the power to declare a law written by the legislative branch as unconstitutional.

Established that while states retain the power of taxation, the Constitution and the laws made according to the Constitution are supreme and cannot be controlled by the states.

Established portions of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 as unconstitional, ruling that the plaintiff, Mr. Scott, was property and not a person.

Established that racial segregation in accomodations on a train did not violate the 14th Amendment to the constitution.

Established that the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment does not protect speech deemed as a "clear and present danger" to which Congress has the power to prevent.

Established that the exlusion order of Americans of Japanese descent during WWII was lawful and did not show racial prejudice.

Established the principle that "seperate but equal" educational facilities for racial minorities is inherently unequal and thus violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Established that all evidence in a criminal case obtained by searches and seizures in violation of the Fourth Amendenment wil be rendered inadmissable in state court.

Established that state reapportionment claims are justiciable in federal court.

Established that the state cannot hold prayers in public schools, even if participation is not required and the prayer is not tied to a particular religion.

Established that the Sixth Amendment's guarantee of a right to assistance of counsel applies to criminal defendants in state court by way of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The Fifth Amendment requires that law enforcement officials advise suspects of their right to remain silent and to obtain an attorney during interrogations while in police custody.

Established that the students did not lose their First Amendment rights to freedom of speech when they stepped onto school property. In order to justify the suppression of speech, the school officials must be able to prove that the conduct in question would "materially and substantially interfere" with the operation of the school.

Established that the vague word "security" should not be used to "abrogate the fundamental law embodied in the First Amendment."

Established that individual's interests in the free exercise of religion under the First Amendment outweighed the State's interests in compelling school attendance beyond the eighth grade.

Establish that inherent in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is a fundamental “right to privacy” that protects a pregnant woman’s choice whether to have an abortion. However, this right is balanced against the government’s interests in protecting women's health and protecting “the potentiality of human life.”

By unanimous decision the Court held that neither the doctrine of separation of powers, nor the generalized need for confidentiality of high-level communications, without more, can sustain an absolute, unqualified, presidential privilege.

There was no single majority opinion in this case. Four of the justices contended that any racial quota system supported by the government violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964. he remaining four justices held that the use of race as a criterion in admissions decisions in higher education was constitutionally permissible. The Court managed to minimize white opposition to the goal of equality (by finding for Bakke) while extending gains for racial minorities through affirmative action.

The Court held that the First Amendment did not require schools to affirmatively promote particulary types of student speech. Educators did not offend the First Amendment by exercising editorial control over the content of student speech so long as their actions were "reasonably related to legitimate pedagogical concerns."

The Court held that Johnson's burning of an American flag was protected expression under the First Amendment. The Court found that Johnson's actions fell into the category of expressive conduct and had a distinctively political nature. The fact that an audience takes offense to certain ideas or expression, the Court found, does not justify prohibitions of speech.

The Court held that although North Carolina's reapportionment plan was racially neutral on its face, the resulting district shape was bizarre enough to suggest that it constituted an effort to separate voters into different districts based on race.

Held that possession of a gun in a local school zone is not an economic activity that might, through repetition elsewhere, have a substantial effect on interstate commerce. The law is a criminal statute that has nothing to do with "commerce" or any sort of economic activity.

Noting that the Equal Protection clause guarantees individuals that their ballots cannot be devalued by "later arbitrary and disparate treatment," the per curiam opinion held 7-2 that the Florida Supreme Court's scheme for recounting ballots was unconstitutional. Even if the recount was fair in theory, it was unfair in practice. The record suggested that different standards were applied from ballot to ballot, precinct to precinct, and county to county.

The court held that a ban on registering handguns and the requirement to keep guns in the home disassembled or nonfunctional with a trigger lock mechanism violate the Second Amendment.

The Supreme Court reversed the Seventh Circuit, holding that the Fourteenth Amendment makes the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense applicable to the states.

The First Amendment protects the right to free speech, despite the speaker’s corporate identity.

Signed in 1898, this treaty concluded the Spanish-American war. In exchange for 20 million dollars, the United States gained control of the Philippines, Guam and Puerto Rico. Spain also relinquished its claim to Cuba.

The Louisiana Purchase encompassed 530,000,000 acres of territory in North America that the United States purchased from France in 1803 for $15 million.

In this treaty, Spain ceded East Florida to the United States and renounced all claim to West Florida. Spain received no compensation, but the United States agreed to assume liability for $5 million in damage done by American citizens who rebelled against Spain. Under the Onís-Adams Treaty of 1819 (also called the Transcontinental Treaty and ratified in 1821) the United States and Spain defined the western limits of the Louisiana Purchase and Spain surrendered its claims to the Pacific Northwest. In return, the United States recognized Spanish sovereignty over Texas.

The doctrine of habeas corpus is the right of any person under arrest to appear in person before the court, to ensure that they have not been falsely accused. in response to the Civil War, President Lincoln suspended habeas corpus in the volatile border state of Maryland. Many critics argued that President Lincoln had suberveted the Constitution, however President Lincoln defended his decision by arguing that acts that might be illegal in peacetime might be necessary “in cases of rebellion,” when the nation’s survival was at stake.

Issued by President Franklin Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, this order authorized the forced removal of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to "relocation centers" further inland – resulting in the incarceration of Japanese Americans.

On May 17, 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Brown vs. Topeka Board of Education that segregated schools are "inherently unequal." In September 1957, as a result of that ruling, nine African-American students enrolled at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. The ensuing struggle between segregationists and integrationists, the State of Arkansas and the federal government, President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus, has become known in modern American history as the "Little Rock Crisis.

On July 26, 1948, President Harry S. Truman signed this executive order banning segregation in the Armed Forces.

For the first time, Executive Order 11246 charged the Secretary of Labor, a Cabinet–level official with strong enforcement authority, with the responsibility of ensuring equal opportunity for minorities in federal contractors’ recruitment, hiring, training and other employment practices. Until that time, such efforts had been in the hands of various Presidential committees. Executive Order 11246 continued and reinforced the requirement that federal contractors not discriminate in employment and take affirmative action to ensure equal opportunity based on race, color, religion, and national origin.