Yet the United States was founded upon and became great because of Judeo-Christian values (our greatness is quickly fading away due to moral decay). Read the founding documents meshak, amongst other things we're the only country in history where our rights come from God, not man. Jesus would approve.
They should teach American history in the UK Al (but then that would be rubbing salt into the proverbial wound, wouldn't it?).
A Principle of The Traditional American Philosophy
3. Unalienable Rights - From God
". . . endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights . . ." (Declaration of Independence)
The Principle
1. The traditional American philosophy teaches that Man, The Individual, is endowed at birth with rights which are unalienable because given by his Creator.
The Only Moral Basis
2.
This governmental philosophy is uniquely American. The concept of Man's rights being unalienable is based solely upon the belief in their Divine origin. Lacking this belief, there is no moral basis for any claim that they are unalienable or for any claim to the great benefits flowing from this concept. God-given rights are sometimes called Natural Rights--those possessed by Man under the Laws of Nature, meaning under the laws of God's creation and therefore by gift of God. Man has no power to alienate--to dispose of, by surrender, barter or gift--his God-given rights, according to the American philosophy. This is the meaning of "unalienable."...
An Offender's Just Punishment
9. Whenever Man violates either the equal rights of others or the above-mentioned just laws, he thereby forfeits his immunity in this regard; by his misconduct, he destroys the moral and legal basis for his immunity and opens the door to just reprisal against himself, by government. This means that any person, as such offender, may justly be punished by the people's proper instrumentality--the government, including the courts--
under a sound system of equal justice under equal laws; that is, under Rule-by-Law (basically the people's fundamental law, the Constitution). Such punishment is justified morally because of the duty of all Individuals--in keeping with Individual Liberty-Responsibility--to cooperate, through their instrumentality, government, for the mutual protection of the unalienable rights of all Individuals. The offender is also justly answerable to the aggrieved Individual, acting properly through duly-established machinery of government, including courts, designed for the protection of the equal rights of all Individuals.
Read more:
http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/AmericanIdeal/yardstick/pr3.html
Due Process of Law: A fundamental, constitutional guarantee that all legal proceedings will be fair and that one will be given notice of the proceedings and an opportunity to be heard before the government acts to take away one's life, liberty, or property. Also, a constitutional guarantee that a law shall not be unreasonable, Arbitrary, or capricious.
The constitutional guarantee of due process of law, found in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, prohibits all levels of government from arbitrarily or unfairly depriving individuals of their basic constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property. The due process clause of the Fifth Amendment, ratified in 1791, asserts that no person shall "be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." This amendment restricts the powers of the federal government and applies only to actions by it. The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, declares,"[N]or shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law" (§ 1). This clause limits the powers of the states, rather than those of the federal government.
The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment has also been interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court in the twentieth century to incorporate protections of the Bill of Rights, so that those protections apply to the states as well as to the federal government. Thus, the Due Process Clause serves as the means whereby the Bill of Rights has become binding on state governments as well as on the federal government.
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Due+Process+of+Law
Pop quiz tomorrow.
