LAW 456 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: United States Constitution, Equal Protection Clause
Under the terms of proposed constitution, the new government was to become operative if a certain
number of states unified:
9
The first Congress assembled under the new Constitution did so in
1791
The United States Constitution, as originally adopted:
was divided into seven major portions/articles
Article I of the United States Constitution:
grants CONGRESS power to regulate interstate & foreign commerce
Article II of the United States Constitution:
establishes powers of the PRESIDENT
The first three articles of the Constitution are commonly referred to as the:
separation of powers articles
Suppose the supreme court recently handed down decision declaring that the death penalty violates the
Eighth Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment and, therefor, may no longer be
imposed. The members of Congress are outraged by this decision and want to change it. Under our
Constitution, a Supreme Court decision interpreting the Constitution:
can be nullified by a constitutional amendment proposed by 2/3 vote in both houses of Congress and
ratified by 3/4 of the state legislatures.
The Constitution directly established the Supreme Court and granted Congress the power to establish
judicial tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court. Under the federal judiciary system established by
Congress:
federal criminal trials are held in federal district courts.
The commerce clause, as interpreted by the Supreme Court:
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