Part B

Full Faith and Credit(Article 4)

In article four under "Full Faith and Credit" the constitution states that congress has full responsibility for following each state's own legal actions. Each individual state can have there own individual laws that the citizens must follow. The laws from each state must be respected by the congress. The congress must leave the laws of the state to itself, giving each state it's own freedom to do as it pleases with the laws. A good example of this is the gay marriage law. A big issue in all the states is whether to allow or ban same sex marriages. Today in American, the majority of the states have banned gay marriage, many of these decisions are made by the citizens of the state. For example, California used to be a state that allowed same sex marriage but up until recently California has just had a referendum (which means the people of the state vote for whether they want the law to be adopted or not, the popular vote wins) making gay marriage banned from the state of California. Although this brings up the idea of whether this part of the constitution can be contradicted. In a way people find ways to tweak and work certain laws. An example of this is the gay couples that travel to the very few states that allow gay marriage such as Massachusetts to get married, once married they move back to the state that they take actual residence in whether the state banned gay marriage or not. I think that is the part of the constitution that ables same sex couples to be able to get married in a different state and yet live in a state that has banned gay marriage. These laws i guess are not always adopted by the people of United States, finding ways to work around them.

Highest Law of the Land/Oath of Office
The "Highest Law of the Land" is the constitution itself. The clause stating that no other government can enforce any law that will go against the constitution. After the "Supremacy of Laws" the constitution then mentions about religious beliefs, this is under "Oath of Office". It states that no persons should be excluded based on their religious beliefs or background, in my personal opinion I think of this in two different ways. First, I think of this as a good way to keep the government less judgemental towards a certain religious belief. Making it one less problem for the government to be worrying over. If they exclude a certain religious belief then they might as well start exclude people of different ethnic backgrounds as well. This makes a more "equal" and diverse government which brings up my second thought; maybe it was not just a way to make a more fair government but actually a way to win the "hearts" of the people of United States. It is a way to get the citizens of the Unite States to look upon the constitution and the government with a sense of trust and awe, trying to gain the trust of the people as well as their support. In a way it seems to me as a similar way companies try to buy their customers money. Although, not want to be such a devil's advocate, I do think that it is a pretty fair and "nice" idea to NOT exclude people of religious backgrounds thus proving my second idea of convincing people to trust the government because it sure convinced me for a second.

The 4th Amendment: Searches and Seizures
In the fourth amendment, it states that the government does not have the right to invade the privacy of the people by searching a person's home or personal belongings unless being able to provide a warrant for the searches. It also states that no person can be arrested unless they are able to provide a warrant for that as well. Although the constitution states this, there are many examples where people can find it to contradict the fourth amendment. These examples included airport searches, library searches, and random MTA searches. It definitely does contradict the amendment but it depends of a person's viewpoint towards the issue. Airports searches can be annoying and take forever to get through but it can be understood for the fact that they are searching not to invade people's privacy and annoy the people but to search for anything that can be a harm towards the people. They search for the safety of the people. Every since the incident of 9/11 airport searches have been on a much higher alert then before. There searches are to ensure there would not be another terrorist attack of any sort. Libraries on the other hand, i never really understood why they must search through people's book bags and purses. Is it because they think people might steal from the library or bomb it? What is the original purpose to searches in libraries? Personally I think the searches in the libraries very much contradict the 4th amendment without a warrant let a lone a good reason. It always depends on the viewpoint of which is more significant, the safety of the people or the safety of privacy and personal belongings.

6th & 7th Amendment: Criminal Proceedings/Civil Trials
Starting with the 6th amendment, it states that any person who is accused of a crime can have the right to defend their selves by requesting a public trial within the district. A person being accused also has the right to a lawyer to represent them in court. If a person is found guilty then they must be told of their fate or consequences for their accused crime. Following after is the 7th amendment which states that during a trial those who are involved have the right to be tried by the jury. The jury is known to have no biased views on any cased. The jury in the end decides the fate of the one who is being accused based on facts and questionings in court. This can show how the US may fear of unfairness and a bad government, it is feared that the government may use its power to unfairly convict a person of a crime whether they may be innocents or guilty. They try to keep it fair by ensuring a sense of being equal from both the accuser and the one being accused. They do this by allowing each to have a lawyer to defend their case. And by placing a jury that would not take sides and have a biased view, this ensures that a persons is not just convicted by favorites of the jury. This ensures they are not convicted the innocent person and instead the guilty person.

ThanksGiving and Black Friday

I'm not a person that usually celebrates thanksgiving as a family. I hop around to different events people host because of the food they have prepared. I think thanks giving a a big part of the American way of life, it is a holiday where family and friends gather around to celebrate and give thanks to all the opportunities and things they have been set in front of them. They usually give thanks to the food they have, the friends they have, and there family. Although people don't exactly realize that Thanksgiving was set on a day where the Indians were killed by the Pilgrims. Why is it that we celebrate thanks on a day where there was a genocide? I think thanksgiving was not originally set to give thanks for the pilgrims killing the Indians. When I asked my boyfriend why people still celebrate thanksgiving when it was a day where many Indians where massacred, he answered in a joking manner "we are celebrating because of that reason". I think thanksgiving is just an excuse for people to have a party, eat, and get fat. Not to mention the excuse to have a ridiculous amount of sales the day after the holiday. This year, i celebrating thanks giving with my boyfriend and his large Hispanic family. It was quite interesting to me how many people with different ethnic backgrounds still celebrate thanksgiving. Whether it is black, Asian, Hispanic, or white, all of them celebrate thanksgiving even if they are not even born United States Citizens. Which brings back my idea that people don't see it as "Thanks for killing the Indians" day but see it more as a "Excuse to have a party and thank everything" day. Not forgetting about black Friday which is the single most manipulative way companies can get people to spent money on a ridiculous amount of junk. Although it is sad how people are sucked into it so much, I myself must admit it works. On black Friday I didn't wake up early in the morning to go shopping like most people do. Around the evening I got bored so I took a walk with my friend around 86 Street to see what kind of "amazing" sale that stores were having. I stepped into a Victoria
Secret and saw that they were selling bras for 34 dollars rather then there super expensive prices of around 50 dollars. I noticed that they also put up an add saying that if u spent more then 60 dollars you get a free Victoria Secrete bag with a whole bunch of goodies inside. Since i was broke i was not able to buy anything but my friend bought 63 dollars worth of underwear (which I'm not sure why anyone would spent so much on underwear) which means she was able to get the free goody bag. This amused me because the free gift was basically a crappy bag with what looks like a whole bunch of left over sample gifts of lotions, perfumes, etc. It never yet amazes me how everyone can get so hyped up over "free" things or things that my be cheaper then its original price. It made it even more ironic when I heard on the next day that a worker from Walmart died from being trampled by the mop of customers hungry for sales. It made me think the people were like zombies to have trampled a 6 foot 5 man without even noticing. It makes it really sad how society can be sucked in by companies and luxury items.