I hope this message finds you well. Students are to write a minimum 200-word reflection, provide a personal opinion not summary, on the topic of the chosen video. Then reflect/critique another student discussion submission(minimum 100-words).
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David GomezYesterdayMar 30 at 11:51am
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For the chapter 6 discussion, I watched, ” Alexander Hamilton: Founding Father and American Statesman”, a biography. What I found interesting about what I saw from the video was As imperfect and incomplete as the American Revolution was, there is no doubt that it sparked a desire for democracy and political equality that has affected our history and continues now. That impulse, however, clashes with the Constitution, which not only structures but also arguably constrains American democracy. After all, amending the Constitution is a near-impossible task. A two-thirds majority of Congress and a three-quarters majority of states, for example, would virtually certainly vote to demand a direct public election of the president and vice president. And Article 5’s final language, which states that no state will be deprived of equal suffrage in the Senate without its consent, is an intractable barrier to eliminating the distortions generated by equal state participation in that house. What also amazed me was it was also difficult, if not impossible, to envision significant reform in the unwritten aspects of the American political system. The Supreme Court’s judicial review power, which is not granted by the Constitution, is practically unassailable. The two-party system is similarly resistant to change because existing legislators would have to vote to drastically alter the environment in which they operate.