1)Describe how you understand the “Establishment Clause” and the related “Lemon Test”.

=The establishment clause is found in the first amendment of the U.S constitution which basically says government can not make laws respecting an establishment of religion. The lemon test is a test used to determine if a law violates the establishment clause for example, the law must have a non religious purpose, it does not inhibit religion and so on, basically the lemon test makes sure the establishment clause is not violated

2) Is burning the US flag protected by the First Amendment? Explain by referring to the relevant court case discussed in the reading.

= Yes it is protected by the first amendment which guarantees freedom of speech, this was established by Gregory Lee Johnson case who burned an american flag as a form of protest. He was arrested back then because it was considered an offense but the supreme court ruled in his favor, they said that flag burning is a form of “symbolic speech” so it is protected by the first amendment

3) What does it mean when someone says “I’m taking the Fifth

= It means that a person can refuse to answer questions because their words can be used as evidence of a crime against them, it is just one way to protect oneself legally

Describe the primary differences in the role of citizens in government, among the federal, confederation, and unitary systems.

= In the federal system citizens are governed by multiple levels of government as the national which is the federal, state and local where citizens can participate in those categories like in elections of representatives of each level. The confederation one is when the states for example come together to form a central government so it looses power and become weak since to make decision it needs consent from the members state so citizens engage with their respective state government as the central authority (the state itself) has limited interaction with the citizens so in this way is different from the federal government that has multiple levels of government. In the unitary system all governmental powers are centered in a central authority that means citizens interact with this central authority because it has the decision making power, it is more like an only branch of power able to do anything

Briefly explain how you understand the system of division of power.

=I understand it as a balance needed to avoid excess of power from any branch of power and is needed so people like the president for example can not pass laws with no regulations or else that could harm a nation that follows a constitution

How does the federal government shape the actions of state and local governments? Write your answer based on doing a bit of research on how the federal government has influenced the actions of NY state and local governments, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

= Federal government can be considered as a support in this case, during the pandemic the federal government had a role of provider it gave funding and resources as financial assistance to the state for public health initiatives, also issued guidelines and recommendations on mask mandates, social distancing and vaccination control and the federal government also facilitated coordination among states. As to NY participated in the Eastern States Multi state council it was a interstate compact formed to coordinate the rollback of economic restrictions and share best practices during the pandemic

What concept that we have already discussed does “faction” remind you of?

1)= Faction reminds me the social classes that make up our society sinces A faction is a group of individuals who share a common interest, often in opposition to the interests of other groups like the working class for example

According to Federalist #10 (written by James Madison), what is the source of wealth (private property)? What factor explains why some people get to possess wealth by owning private property, and others don’t (thus remaining poor)? This is a key question, because it shows how the authors of the Constitution thought about the difference between different classes of Americans! HINT: focus on the passage that begins: “The diversity in the faculties (WHAT DOES FACULTIES mean or refer to?) of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not les….”

2)= In this context falculties refers to innate abilities, talents or something that makes the person stand out so the authors of the constitution thought that inequality was inevitable in society because this encourages ambition and production and according to James he says that people’s skills and capabilities naturally lead to economic inequality, getting back to the idea that those who are skilled are successful so basically it says that wealth is a result of natural differences among people

Do you agree with this explanation of wealth and poverty?

3)= I agree a little with this because i think the way society works forces everyone who does not come from a wealthy family to remain “poor” unless they become somebody skilled and capable and find a way to achieve financial success which is possible and it has happened before

What is the core mission (“first object”) of the US government? Does this surprise you, does it sound different from what our society today seems to suggest the core mission of the government is? Explain.

4)= It seems that the core mission of the government is to protect private property. I am not surprised since this was the main idea and reason why the Constitution was created and why the upper class supported it. The founders aimed to defend the economic interests of those who owned wealth and property

Given the discussion in questions 1-4, are you surprised that Federalist #10 is not in favor of democracy, and supports a Republican (representative) form of government? Why would d the author dislike a (pure) democratic form of government? Hint: think about how this question connects with the social classes…

5)= I am not surprised that it is not in favor of democracy because it supports a small group owning wealth the elite, in a republican government, this elite can protect and continue to uphold this system. If the lower classes were given full democratic control, they might pass laws that redistribute wealth or implement policies that negatively affect the interests of the wealthy. In other words, the republican system limits the power of the poor majority

which social class wrote the Constitution, and which class was excluded and not allowed to participate in this process?

1) The arguments presented in Readings 6.1 and 6.2 the Constitution was written by the wealthy elite landowners, merchants, and creditors who had a huge interest in protecting their economic power these people were from the upper class, owning property, businesses and so on and debtors were excluded from the process and were not given a voice, people in the working class, small farmers and those not rich had no opportunity to choose the government the wanted

Would say that the social class structure of early United States society, was the same as ours today, or different? Explain.

2) It is pretty much the same those with financial power have still advantage on the working class for example, the difference is that today the middle and low class are given voice and vote but still the rich ones have priority

Why were the people who wrote the Constitution so afraid of democracy?

3) They believed it would lead to instability and threaten their economic interests, they saw too much public participation as a danger, particularly from the lower classes (working class), who might push for wealth redistribution, debt relief, or policies unfavorable to property owners, so basically they put their interests first and they did not want the lower class to has much participation or influence

The statistic on wealth inequality in the US that most impressive me is that just a small percentage of high class people has most of the commodities and wealth and the biggest percentage is the working and middle class and they have almost nothing compared to them, how is it possible that happened? why just a small group of people compared to the rest is so rich? i think that is the way capitalism work, it is just an effect of that system inequality is something that must happen in order to capitalism exist and work

Some implications of living in a society like that is that there is going to be always people in need and people super rich, the working class earning a wage less than the profit earned by their labor, we can see this dynamic in today’s jobs like in restaurants, the daily earnings are high but their payment is low compared to the labor they need to do and the risks they face, many times happen to be some form of labor exploitation when the owners want them to work faster or more without any kind of compensation.

I understand M-C-M as the way of capitalism to increase the profit every time money flows in society.

M= stands for money which is the initial investment, used to make purchases such as raw materials, labor and what is needed for production

C= Stands for commodities these are transformed into goods and services that hold value

M= Stands for money but this time (more money) after the profit gotten from the commodities, there must be a profit to meet this one

this way companies and employees keep growing their wealth as inflation keeps going up, but sometimes inflation is rising faster than the growth of money it self

 means of production and labor.

=Means of productions refers to resources and tools needed to make a product (wood, plastic, iron..) and that is when labor is needed to work with those resources and tools in this case people do labor i their daily life

 what is value?  What give “value” to value, what makes something valuable? 

= Value is what something is worth depending on any category like effort, time, innovation…. something is valuable when getting to that point takes valuable resources and work

How are labor and value related?

=Labor and resources are related because both need each other to exist, and both need any sort of purpose when getting resources to make them valuable through effort

How do you understand the difference between labor and labor power? 

= Labor power is capacity of working and labor is when somebody works also Labor comes with labor power but what is being bought, if you do labor for a wage, is your ability to do labor, not the amount of labor “Capitalism owns it” just like the means and the extra value produced by workers

Surplus Value: what is it?

=When it comes to the Marxist theory is says that the value from the labor is higher than what they are getting awarded for it when can see it in the way capitalism works and treat the working class it is important to understand how the working class is relies on “labor exploitation” when comprehending surplus value especially in today’s days

1.The distinction between employees and owners is that the employees usually uses their education to be part of the middle class while owners uses their earns to invest a long term and live from it, employees lives from their salary always seeking a rise
2.I understand from what Adam Smith said that labor is the mean where the the price can be established, people need to keep interested of what they need and want so it keeps the economy’s flow
3. I think that class is just a description of what your income relies on, but i think this might be also an ‘identity’ since the person might feel less or more rich than others and can assume his identity as his social value
4. I think that means that class depends on your income that depends on your sources, so class structures would be the things that make it possible, like income, role, education and so on and it is a form of dependency because the more you get education or income the more you class will change

1. Do you notice any similarities in the way social class is discussed in readings 4.1 and 4.2? Do you notice any differences in the way these two readings DIFFERENTIATE between social classes?
= One of their similarity is that both aim to define social class based on household income and what role people are identifies as (lower, working, middle, upper…) but also both differentiate that the reading 4.1 is more specific and gives facts like education make working-class identification drops significantly and people usually define themselves based on the social class they are surrounded by for example someone might be upper class but if there are people with more money so they identify as middle-upper class.
2) Pick the station closest to where you live. Using the concepts from Reading 4.1, what social class tends to live in your neighborhood? Are you surprised (or not) by the answer? Do you feel it is an accurate representation of the people living in your neighborhood?
=Based on my research the social class from my closest station (R train) are working and middle class mostly, which surprises me because the daily life is expensive for everyone specially in this city (considering the increasing cost of living).
3)Based on Reading 4.2, do you notice a general pattern about social classes in NYC?
=(Since reading 4.2 is not working at this moment this answer is based on research)
The general pattern is where the upper and lower class are distributed, these are areas that the living cost varies and is affordable for them for example living in Manhattan is way more expensive than Queens and somebody from the upper class will be likely in Manhattan more than Queens and it is the same the other way around

What is a Repressive State Apparatus? Why does Althusser call it “repressive”? Can we explain his choice of words here. Give an example.

=Repressive state apparatus i when an individual is being indoctrinated with fear by the system to act and think is a specific way, Althusser calls it because in this way the person faces a ‘punishment’ for not following what they are told, the most important thing here is to make the person not to reveal for example at schools they teach critical thinking but critical thinking nevers extends to the apparatus itself

2. Let’s do the same for the Ideological State Apparatuses. What are they, how do they seem to work?

=This one uses other methods to achieve the same objective but by ideological strategies where they are exposed to the same ideas constantly and making them think that is the idea the must follow too, we can see it in churches, schools, restaurants… they seem to work as ‘socially accepted’ so everybody is force to act the same way or else there will be any kind of consequence, also social pressure is there to ensure that kind of behave.

3. Important: this question will appear on our exam: How are the Repressive and Ideological State Apparatuses different from each other? What is the difference between the two?

=The repressive state is based on fear and the ideological one based on social ideas, the repressive one has to do more with physical restriction of freedom and the ideological one is more a restriction of free thinking

This image is an example of ideological state, news are a good example of how we are constantly exposed to them, many times not knowing if they are true or not, the way they are easily manipulable makes it a source of misinformation which can lead to indoctrination if they wanted.