This lesson is from 21 October 2018. This contains about the First History Summary that me and dad did earlier.

Lesson

Lesson of Sunday, October 21, 2018

Fourth Week, Day Thirteen

First History Summary

History

Early Human History

The Fertile Crescent

In early human history, human beings did no farming. They are now called hunter-gatherers. They migrated from place to place following where their food sources went. Then humans learned farming, planting crops and then harvesting them for food. This requires fertile soils and water for irrigation. They settled in what is called the Fertile Crescent. The Fertile Crescent is a land that stretches from the east Mediterranean west to the Persian Gulf. This area is now called the cradle of civilization because it is where humans first settled and formed governments.

Hunter Gatherers and Social Orders

After the hunter gatherers learned to farm and settled in the fertile crescent, agriculture was invented with people growing their own food. They organized themselves into communities they needed a steady supply of food and self-defense so the first government was formed. The earliest form of government was a monarchy. Monarchies are based on kings and queens ruling the population. Each monarch would gain power by inheriting the thrown from a mother or father. A monarch would be ruler for life. They made the laws for the people, organized armies for self-defense, and ensured a steady food supply for their subjects. Their power was absolute, meaning that they couldn’t be challenged.

New social orders were formed, based on education and power. The upper class, which was the aristocracy was based on land ownership and power passed down from one generation to the next. Farmers, artisans, craftspeople, and slaves made up the lower class.

As time passed, the monarchies became more complex. In ancient Mesopotamia a theocracy formed, meaning government based on religion. Kings believed their power was bestowed upon them. The pharaohs soon found governing by themselves too complicated so they built a bureaucracy to help rule. This happened in ancient China. When writing developed more people became educated and demanded a say in the governing process. In ancient Greece, around 700 BC, tyrants seized power, Tyrants were members of the lower class who seized power. They paid people to be in their armies. This led to government called oligarchies, government by small number of people.

The rule of the tyrants ended the monarchies and allowed more people to participate in the government. The Greek government also developed democracies, government by elected representatives, and that would become a model for later governments, most notably Rome that became a republic (government by elected individuals).

The Fertile Crescent and Greek History

After humans settled in the fertile crescent between the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf, they set up governments. The first ones were of kings and queens. After that period the slaves were tired of being second class citizens so they revolted and overthrew the monarchies and formed democracies. An example of these democracies was from Athens, Greece. Athenian democracy, around 600 B.C. At the time, the city was in turmoil over an economic crisis. The lower class found themselves in debt and were forced into slavery because they couldn’t pay. To try to head of the crisis. Solon canceled all the debt and freed the slaves and took some of the land from the rich and gave it to the poor. In spite of these efforts, a tyrant named Peisistratus seized Athens in 560 B.C.

Peisistratus made reforms, increasing trade for the merchants and giving more land to the poor. This wasn’t enough and the people rebelled in 510 B.C. and appointed a reformer named Cleisthenes as their ruler.

Cleisthenes created a ruling council of 500 to oversee the government made up of male members of society. This was the first time a ruling majority had the power to negotiate treaties, make laws, and declare war. Democracy was born.

Then Pericles led the democracy and all male citizens had a voice in the democracy. Poor citizens and rich alike could run for public office. To guard against the ambitions of any one-man ostracism was adopted to get rid of the overly ambitious.

Under democracy, Athens became a power to be reckoned with in Greece. They built an empire and constructed the Parthenon, one of the greatest temples in the ancient world. They led the world in the fields of mathematics, astronomy, biology, and philosophy.

In spite of the progress a lot of citizens were left out of the democratic process including non-citizen males, females, and slaves.

Ultimately, Athens collapsed due to the conflict with their rival Sparta. The wars between Athens and Sparta in the war known as the Peloponnisian wars.

Roman History

At the same time that Athens was becoming democratic, people named the Romans began their own government. People that became the Romans first settled in modern day Italy in 1500 B.C. and established the city of Rome. Rome was divided into two classes-the patricians and the plebeians. Patricians were rich, landowning elites who ruled. Plebeians were merchants, farmers, poor landowners, artisans, and craftspeople. They were the majority. All male citizens paid taxes, served in the military and voted. Only patricians could hold public office.

Roman politics consisted of a Senate who ruled and held their office for life. In the third century, the Senate began to rule the republic. Peoples assemblies served below the Senate, most importantly the centeriate assembly, which elected officials and passed laws. The plebeians had their own assembly, called the council of plebs to serve as a check on the powers of the patrician class.

The chief political officers in Rome were the consuls and the praetors. Two consuls, elected annually, ran the government and commanded Roman armies, making sure that one man could not gain too much power. The praetors oversaw all civil laws, laws governing Roman citizens and eventually judged cases involving non-citizens.

Central to the Roman republic was a deep mistrust of total rule by any one man and so a series of checks and balances were established. Each assembly and each office had the power of veto over another, and they effectively blocked any decision deemed dangerous or unpopular. The most powerful veto was given to the tribune of the plebs, a powerful office designed to protect the plebeians from the Senate. Class struggle and mistrust dominated the Roman Republic.

The most enduring legacy of the Roman Republic was its system of law. They established that each Roman citizen had some basic rights. Many Roman standards of justice endure today, including presumption of innocence and the right of a fair trial.

Ultimately the Roman empire collapsed because of the ambitions of a few people. Julius Caesar was able to use his popularity to make himself dictator in 47 B.C. Caesar declared himself dictator for life. He gave land and money to the plebeians in order to keep them happy which weakened the power of the Senate. A group of the Senators reacted by having him assassinated in 44 B.C. A decade of civil war resulted. Julius Caesars grandnephew, Octavian, became the first emperor of Rome, and the Republic would never return again.

At the same time that Athens was becoming democratic, the Romans started the system of laws that governments later would copy. Then Octavio became the first Emperor of Rome. The Roman Empire collapsed in 378 C. E. (Common Era), and absolute monarchies dominated governments in much of the world.

The Magna Carta and English History

It was not until 1215, when king John of England signed the Magna Carta (Great Charter), that governments again began to include the voice of the people. After a series of dictators, the English aristocracy began to demand more of a say in the government. Central to their demands were basic civil liberties, or personal freedoms that cannot be taken away. Members of the English class argued that they were entitled to certain rights. The Magna Carta gave written recognition of basic civil liberties and was a first step to limiting monarchies. Then English noblemen establish Parliament a representative body that would consist of two houses, a House of Lords, and a house of Commons. Parliament became central to the government acting as a check on the king’s power.

In 1628, Parliament passed the Petition of Rights, widening the rights of the common people. At first King Charles seemed to accept the petition, but soon began to ignore it. In 1642 England descended into civil war under the leadership of Oliver Cromwell, and Parliamentary forces won that war. Charles I was executed in 1649 and England was declared a republic named the Commonwealth, a nation for and by the people and founded in the law.

The Commonwealth did not last long and Oliver Cromwell declared himself dictator. After his death in 1660, the monarchy was completely restored. The power of the king was weakened however and the Parliament gave to the people the right to bear arms and raise armies. The power of the Parliament slowly expanded after that further weakening the power of the king. John Locke wrote a treatise Two Treaties on Government, Locke argued that citizens were born with natural rights, including the right of life, liberty, and property and if the government failed to protect those rights it was the right of the people to abolish it. Many of Locke’s ideas can be found in the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

Lesson from September 27, 2018

Greek, Roman and English History

American democracy has its foundations in ancient Greece, where democracy or rule by the people was developed 2500 years ago. The majority elected leaders and those eligible voted on the policies of the government. Laws could be proposed by anyone and trials were held in public. The idea of direct rule through popular election was then later adopted by ancient Rome, which set up a representative democracy in which eligible citizens were allowed to elect officials to act on their behalf. A senate devised laws and magistrates passed sentences at trial.

Although these early attempts at democracy failed, they became a model for future experiments in majority rule. One such place where democratic ideas took root was medieval England.

After the victory of William of Normandy at the battle of Hastings in 1066, the French speaking Normans gradually merged with the native Angeles and Saxons of England. William established himself as a monarch and expanded the system of taxation and royal courts begun by the Anglo-Saxon kings. The power of the king expanded further under the reign of Williams heirs, who could, without justification, banish, execute, or imprison their subjects.

The Magna Carta

Resentful of the growing power of the king, the English nobility rebelled under the reign of King John. At Runnymede in 1215, a group of English nobles forced John to accept and sign a document of rights called the Magna Carta, or Great Charter. Its ideas had a great influence on the development of constitutional government. One of the most important principles established by the Magna Carta was due process of law. The Magna Carta said that no freeman shall be seized or imprisoned except by lawful judgement of his equals or by law of the land. The Magna Carta made it clear that everyone, including the monarch, must follow the law.

The Magna Carta also defined the English nobles’ individual rights that the monarch could not take away. The document also guaranteed people accused of crimes to a trial by their peers.

US History

Civil Rights and Liberties

Ideas of civil rights and civil liberties were at the forefront when the American colonies declared their independence from Britain in 1776. The revolutionary war that followed demonstrated John Locke’s idea that a government that failed in its obligation to its people should be changed or abolished. The struggle for independence was long and bloody, but in the end the colonists won and created a new representative democracy, based on the foundations of Greek and Roman government and by the English ideas of natural rights.

Colonial leaders recognized that they could not foresee every problem that the new nation might face in the future, so they created a government that would be flexible enough to change peacefully. The US constitution served as a framework for a government open to ongoing interpretation and change, as opposed to a strict set of laws and regulations. This idea made the US government unlike any other on the face of the Earth.

Under the US constitution power was divided between the executive and the legislative branches of government. As in Athens, citizens had a right to voice their opinions and debate the issues, but a series of checks and balances would prevent one branch of government from overpowering the other. As in the Roman republic, citizens would have a right to vote for their representatives. As in England citizens were guaranteed basic civil rights, but these rights were extended to all citizens, not just the aristocracy.

The US government was founded on the idea of shared power between branches of government, between citizens and their elected representatives, and between states’ rights and federal rights. Citizens’ rights were protected but also citizens had certain duties to obey the law and pay taxes. Therefore, citizens could be informed on the issues and vote.

Over time, through protest and negotiation, the idea of who could become a citizen has changed. When the constitution was adopted, only landowning freemen over the age of 21 could become citizens. Over time, citizenship and voting rights were extended to non-landowning white men. Passed by Congress, and ratified by the states after the Civil War, the Fourteenth Amendment granted citizenship to former slaves, and the Fifteenth Amendment guaranteed voting rights and equal protection of the law to all male citizens regardless of race. In 1920 the Nineteenth Amendment granted voting rights to women. In 1971, the Twenty-Sixth Amendment lowered the voting age to eighteen.

In addition to voting rights, American history has seen several movements meant to extend full civil rights to all citizens. The struggles in the 1960’s was to ensure equal rights to African Americans, the 1970’s to women, and gays and lesbians today.

American Democracy and Greek History

Although these early attempts at democracy failed, they became a model for future experiments in majority rule. One such place where democratic ideas took root was medieval England.

English History and the Magna Carta

The Magna Carta also defined the English nobles’ individual rights that the monarch could not take away. The document also guaranteed people accused of crimes to a trial by their peers.

Later, in the 1200s, Parliament was established to give voice to the people in dealing with the state. In 1628, a conflict between the King Charles I and Parliament led to another document called The Petition of Right. The Petition of Right further limited the king’s power by requiring the king to get permission of the Parliament before setting new taxes. It also outlined rules under which individuals could be punished or when martial law could be declared.

Pilgrims and the Mayflower Compact

After European forces reached America in the 1400s, the powers of Europe began to colonize the territories that they claimed across North America. The English, competing against the French and Dutch, began to send ships to what is now New England, and they eventually dominated the eastern seaboard of what would become the United States. Although many of the ships sent went in search of trade and wealth, some were filled with groups of people seeking freedom from political and religious persecution. Among these groups was a sect of Puritans we know today as the Pilgrims.

The Pilgrims were separatist from the Church of England who believed that the church needed reform and restoration from corruption. Facing increased persecution for their beliefs, a group of Pilgrims left England in 1620 aboard a ship called the Mayflower.

After crossing the Atlantic Ocean, the Pilgrims eventually settled near what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts. Upon arrival with limited contact with royal or colonial authorities, the Pilgrims drew up the Mayflower Compact, a plan for self-government. Essentially, the Pilgrims while avowing their loyalty to the King of England, also empowered themselves to create laws and regulations through majority rule. The Mayflower Compact drew heavily on English democratic tradition that was born out of the Magna Carta, and it represented the first attempt at majority rule in the New World.

Revolutionary War and the Declaration of Independence

Throughout the 1600s and 1700s the British colonies continued to grow. As territories and trade expanded, tensions between the colonies and the British government began to rise. Central to the issue was the lack of representation of the colonists in Parliament along with increased taxation on colonial exports and increasingly strict laws by the king. Drawing on the precedent of majority rule, many colonists believed that they had a right to have a say in how the colonies were governed. By 1775, these tensions had escalated into armed conflict. Colonial militia and British troops fought at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, marking the first time the colonist had taken up arms against British rule. The fighting at Lexington and Concord marked the beginning of the Revolutionary War.

Colonial leaders met in Philadelphia in 1776 to discuss the problems, and after prolonged debate and vote, that the only viable course of action was separation from the British Empire. Thomas Jefferson, a representative of a wealthy Virginia colony as well as a renowned scholar and political philosopher, was tasked with the job of writing the document that officially called for independence from the British Crown.

Influenced heavily by Enlightenment thinkers such as John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Baron de Montesquieu, Jefferson believed that men had certain unalienable, natural rights, and among these were the right to life, liberty, and property. Jefferson also believed that there existed a social contract between a government and its people based on upholding these rights. When a government failed in its duty and denied its citizens justice and liberty, it was the right of the people to abolish the government and establish a new one in its place.

On July 4th, 1776, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence. The main purpose of the declaration of Independence as a whole was to announce that the colonies had separated from Britain. The nation it established was the United States of America.

Articles of Confederation and the Constitution

Once the colonies declared their independence from Britain, the Second Continental Congress faced a larger problem. They had to devise a new national government. The United States first attempt at self-rule came in the form of the Articles of Confederation, adopted by Congress in 1777 and ratified by the states in 1781. After fighting for independence from British rule, the colonies did not want a powerful government that might become tyrannical. As a result, the articles loosely unified the colonies as states under Congress, which had only a few limited powers. Congress could negotiate with other countries, raise armies, and declare war, but it had no power to regulate trade or impose taxes. In addition, there were no separate branches of government, and each state had one vote in Congress, regardless of population.

After several political and economic problems threatened to undo the young republic, the political leaders of the United States met again to discuss the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation. It was agreed that a strong national government was essential to the nation’s success.

In 1787, 55 delegates representing the 13 states met in Independence Hall in Philadelphia to discuss the formation of a new government. First, they agreed that the government should be divided into the executive, legislative, and judicial branches to ensure that no one part of the government could grow too powerful. Third, they divided the Congress into two houses, a House of Representatives in which the states would be represented on the basis of population, and a Senate in which each state would receive two votes regardless of size. Finally, the delegates created a representative system known as federalism, in which the powers would be divided between the national government and the state governments.

In September, the Constitution was voted on by Congress and submitted to the states for ratification. Once all states concerns were satisfied, including the addition of the Bill of Rights, the Constitution was formally ratified by all thirteen states on May 29, 1790. The US government as we know it was born.

U.S. Government

Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Branches

Under the Constitution, the national government was divided into the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. The legislative branch, made up of the House of Representatives, and the Senate, is responsible for passing laws. The executive branch is headed by the President of the United States and is responsible for carrying out the laws. The judicial branch includes all courts up to and including the Supreme Court, the final authority in the federal court system. Most of the Supreme Court’s cases come from appeals of lower court decisions. Since the writing of the Constitution the power of the Supreme Court has gradually expanded, most notably in 1803 when Chief Justice John Marshal struck down an act of Congress in the case of Marbury vs. Madison, thus establishing the principle of judicial review. Since then, the Supreme Court has greatly shaped American democracy through numerous landmark decisions.

Supreme Court Cases

Plessy v. Ferguson

In 1892, an African American named Homer Plessy took a seat in a white only section of an East Louisiana Railway train in violation of an 1890 segregation law. After refusing to move from the seat, Plessy was arrested and convicted at trial. Plessy appealed his case first to the Louisiana Supreme Court and then to the US Supreme Court. In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in the doctrine of so-called “separate but equal” facilities for people of different races. The ruling in Plessy v. Ferguson established the legal basis for segregation in the South.

Brown v. Board of Education

In 1952 the questions of segregation and basic natural rights again came before the Supreme Court. In the case that would become known as Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) challenged the “separate but equal” principle first established in Plessy v. Ferguson as it pertained to public schools.

In 1954 the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favor of the NAACP and the plaintiffs in the case, thus overturning Plessy v. Ferguson and effectively making segregation in public schools illegal in the United States. Brown v. Board of Education also marked the first in a series of landmark decisions passed down by Chief Justice Earl Warren.

The Warren Court

In 1953 President Dwight D. Eisenhower appointed the governor of California, Earl Warren, to be the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. With a reputation as a fair but tough law and order politician, Warren became an activist on the bench, greatly expanding the power of the Supreme Court.

Under Warren the Supreme Court handed down several landmark rulings. In 1954, the court ruled in Brown v. the Board of Education, which effectively ended segregation in public schools. The Brown decision was not just a powerful moral statement, it also demonstrated the power of the Court to affirm individual rights.

The area in which the Warren Court was most active was in the area of criminal law. In 1961 the court ruled in the case of Mapp v. Ohio that evidence seized illegally could not be used as evidence at trial. In 1963, in Gideon v. Wainwright, the court ruled that criminal defendants were entitled to publicly funded counsel. In 1966, in the famous Miranda v. Arizona case, the Court ruled that police had to explain legal rights clearly to people in custody. Collectively, these cases and others remade the United States’ legal framework and made Earl Warren a major figure in the shaping of the way citizens interacted with their government.

Roe v. Wade

In addition to major shifts in civil and criminal rights, the 1960s and 1970s saw profound changes in the right to privacy too. As women began to take more of an active role in society and demand equal treatment in the workplace, the issues of contraception and later reproduction came before the Supreme Court.

In 1965 the Supreme Court heard the case of Griswald v. Connecticut, in which the justices struck down a Connecticut state law banning contraceptive drugs. Although the Bill of Rights does not expressly mention a right to privacy, the justices ruled that the right to privacy exists in the spirit throughout the Constitution, including the self-incrimination clause of the Fifth Amendment.

The notion the constitutionality protected privacy was put to its greatest test eight years later in 1973 when the supreme Court decided the landmark case Roe v. Wade. Prior to 1973 abortion was regulated by the state and was largely illegal across the country. A shift began in the 1960s when several states began to relax their rules about abortion, especially in the case of rape or incest. With Roe v. Wade, the court ruled that the states could not regulate abortion during the first three months of pregnancy, as this period was deemed protected under the right to privacy. It was only during the second three months that abortion could be regulated, and the final three months that it could be banned. The decision gave rise to a right-to-life movement whose members consider abortion to be morally wrong. The impassioned debate between pro-choice and pro-life factions eventually led to alterations to abortion rules, but the struggle to define the limits of privacy continues until this day.

Credits

This lesson was originally made with LibreOffice Writer by John M. Harpster.
Formatted with Notepad++ for space removal.
This was made and published to PDF with LibreOffice Writer and Microsoft Word by John T. Harpster.

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