POL 100 – D.B 14.1

1. I think the connection between “whiteness” and racism is that white people and black people are obviously not equal. Everyone knows that white people have more privilege than black, and this leads to what Gilmore was pointing out, Gilmore is arguing that to protect the idea of equality, white people need to treat black people like they should be treated. So, in order for racial capitalism to stop, white people should treat black people like they have rights like them. 

2. Gilmore points out that criminals are really being formed by the criminal justice and prison systems. Gilmore states “the category of ‘criminal person’ can be perpetuated.” I believe that the prison system creates new criminals by being biased and choosing based on the “crimes” people do such as drugs for example which is a minor crime in my opinion. Also, the criminal system is creating new criminals based on racial bias and how people live. In order for criminals to be bailed out of jail, they must pay a large amount of money which requires tax. The tax step will then be one of the prison system creation to create new criminals where they will have to pay in order to be bailed out of jail. 

3. In the last part of Prof. In Gilmore’s video, I understand that the liberation struggle is mentioned and explained when Prof. Gilmore stated that “we have to be attentive to the many different kinds of factors institutions, places, and processes through which people come to consciousness through fermenting liberation struggle.” By what I believe Prof. Gilmore was arguing about, I’m assuming that she is specifying that when there is a different kinds of places in the world, especially in Africa, people come to consciousness through picking freedom struggle. 

In the Wal-Mart case, the Supreme Court decided that the 1.5 million females are not capable to be approved as a right class of plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit for work bias against Wal-Mart. It justified its decision because of commonality. The commonality is defined to be the common people, for example, the type of class the common people come from, socio-economic class. Therefore, in 2011, the Supreme Court judged Walmart’s turn when they said that the plaintiffs did not have enough in common to comprise and to form a whole class.  

1. The court system is better suited to protect the individual than are the elected branches of government such as the Congress and the president, or the mayor of NYC and the NYC City Assembly. The court system defends individual rights and freedoms by going against the laws that disobey the constitution. The judicial branch for example has done the most to protect the individual’s rights—this branch defines and preserves fairness, equality, and liberty. The U.S. Supreme court is not formally connected with the public the way elected leaders are. Thus, the court system is better suited to protect the individual because of how it protects individuals’ rights and defends individual freedoms. 

2. Our current president Joe Biden is a Republican which makes him anti-democratic. However, I believe that the Supreme court is somewhat anti-democratic because the current president is a Republican, and what controls the supreme court is the president of the U.S. Therefore, the senate approves the unconditioned positions with a suggestion. Thus, I agree that the Supreme Court is an anti-democratic part of our government for the reason that the president is a Republican, and the power comes back to him. The reason for this way of choosing judges in federal courts is that they are selected by the president and are approved by the Senate.

1. The establishment clause stops the states from having an empowered religion, in other words, the establishment clause gives all religions a chance to succeed and to thrive. The government can not say that there has to be one religion that everyone (the citizens) should follow. The lemon test is essentially determining whether a rule or other government action that might encourage a certain religious practice should be permitted to stand.

2. According to Texas v. Johnson, burning the flag was a form of symbolic speech protected by the First Amendment and found the law, as applied to flag desecration, to be unconstitutional. This demonstrates that burning the US flag is protected by the first amendment. 
3. When someone says “I’m taking the fifth”, it means that they have the right not to give proof in court or to law enforcement officers that might include an admission of blame or responsibility for a crime. The most well-known provision of the Fifth Amendment is its defense against self-incrimination, or the right to remain silent.

1. According to P. Williams, the war on terror is a new type of war because it is facing new kinds of enemies who have access to new weapons of mass destruction. The war on terror has been as one against “terror” against unruly if deadly emotionalism rather than as a war against specific bodies, specific land, and specific resources. (P. Williams). This is the difference that the war on terror has from traditional wars. 

2. To start off, the fourth amendment protects people from unreasonable searches and outbreaks by the government, but if it is guaranteed that the person had done a crime, then the government is allowed to search. The Roving Wiretaps violated the fourth amendment which declares the government can not run a search without getting a contract and demonstrating possible reasons to think that the person has committed a crime. Citizens say that the language of the act could lead to privacy violations for anyone who comes into casual contact with a suspect. 

3. Sneek and peek is referred to as a police officer physically going into a private owner’s place and running a search and observing what they see. If it was a drug dealer or other criminal’s place, then, in this case, it would be a great act because the police are after the criminals in this case. However, if there are police officers who enter places to observe and search for minor crimes then it would obviously violate the fourth amendment.

1. The primary difference in the role of citizens in governments, among the federal, confederation, and unitary systems is that in a federal system, the constitution gives powers between states and the federal government however in a unitary system, authorities are lodged in the national government. Regardless of how the systems are built, in the confederation system, the citizens are the ones who have the most authority that is because the confederation system is created explicitly by its section governments.

If we look at the unitary system, we will see that the citizens are mainly not active and leave everything up to their central government. 

2. The system of division of power was created so that there should not be one person who rules the country. The system of division of power protects the individual’s freedoms so that it can not abuse its power. The system was divided into three separate branches which are the executive, legislative, and judicial. Each branch has its own power. Also, it is considered to be a system of checks and balances where it ensured that no one branch would ever become too powerful because the other branches would always be able to check the power of the other two. (How is power divided in the United States government? 0:42-1:08)

3. The federal government shapes the actions of state and local governments by providing funds to operate federal programs such as affordable health insurance. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the federal government has influenced the actions of NY state and its local governments by providing funds and assisting those who had jobs to get back to their jobs.

1. Based on the arguments presented in Readings 6.1 and 6.2, the upper middle class who were the white framers were the ones who wrote the constitution. The lower class, the poor who were slaves, Native Americans (Indians), persons of African descent, women indentured servants, and White males lacking sufficient property, were excluded and not allowed to participate in this process. The difference between the two classes was the upper middle class (white framers) and the lower class, who had lower incomes and were less educated. However, the upper class consisted of people with high incomes and people who were educated and had professional jobs such as lawyers, doctors and etc. According to the 6.1 reading, it states “not only should the low-income majority be prevented from coalescing, but its upward thrust upon government also should be blunted with indirect forms of representation.” (pg. 11). This indicates how the lower class was prevented from being part of the process. As stated in reading 6.1, it says “in twelve of the thirteen states (Pennsylvania excepted), only property-owning White males could vote.” (pg 5). This demonstrates that the white males could vote who only had property owing. 

2. Over time, the social class structure had extremely changed. There are still upper classes and lower classes, but all people vote for the country. It is not like before when someone needed to have property ownership in order for a person to vote. However, I believe in order to participate in elections, the individual must be a U.S. citizen or else they won’t be able to vote or have a say. 

3. The people who wrote the constitution were so afraid of democracy because they were concerned about permitting one individual to have too much power or authority. This is why the people who wrote the constitution used a republic election to hear the people’s opinions.

1. When I hear the faction concept, I automatically think of James Madison and how he defines it as a number of citizens (political party) where the two parties the democratic and the republic are organizing to for example work government out or work to win elections. 

2. For example the source of wealth (private property) includes business owner interests, it was stated in the reading Federalist Paper #10 “the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests.” This factor explains why some people get to possess wealth by owning private property, and others don’t because of interests, unequal faculties, and from the influence of these on the sentiments and views of the respective proprietors. 

3. I do not agree with this explanation of wealth and poverty because of how the poor remain poor and how wealthy people keep increasing their wealth by possessing wealth by owning private property. 

4. “The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is no less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests.” When these faculties are protected, it is considered to be the first object. 

5. Given the discussion in questions 1-4, I’m not surprised that Federalist #10 is not in favor of democracy, and supports a Republican form of government because of the fact that if Federalist #10 was a democracy then the authority would be a major problem. The author disliked a purely democratic form of government because the author knows that the people will fight who will be at the top. Going back to faction, the citizens that Madison referred to will argue not just for their rights but for what will benefit them. This is why the citizens did not do the decision-making because he knows what will happen then.

1. If I would explain the means of production, I would explain it as to create or produce a product that will benefit the person who is producing. Productions are made, for example, the video that the narrator in the video created is considered a product because he created the video. Labor is the only that can increase the value of what an individual has. For example, if an individual buys a book and does nothing with it, its value will remain constant. But if individual labor to carve that wood into a chair, then the individual will increase its value.

2. Based on the ideas presented in video 5.1, value is the worth of a product. The speaker in the video talked about how when an individual buys a block of wood and does not do anything with it, its value will not change and will stay constant. Until the individual carves the wood to make a chair for example, then its value (worth) will increase because the individual took their time and effort into making the wooden chair. 

3. Labor and value are both related because when an individual spends a longer amount of time producing a product, then its value will increase. Hence, that is why artists sell their paintings for an expensive amount of money because they put all their effort and time into making the paintings. Labor is when humans work and value is the worth of the goods that the humans are creating. 

4. Labor is defined as when humans work to produce goods that they can sell. Labor power when applied increases the value of what the individual has. Labor power is found only in individuals, and when they work, they rent out their labor power for the day. So, labor and labor power are different because labor requires the amount of time the individual takes, unlike labor power, where the work is getting sold.

5. Surplus value is the excess of value that is produced by the labor of workers over the wages they are paid. To clarify, surplus value is the difference between the amount raised through a sale of a product and the amount the boss of the workplace will make the product cost. It is important that we know about the surplus value in our study of social classes so that we know that the workers and the boss are not getting an equal amount of money. The boss is mainly in the higher class and the worker is in the much lower class.