AP Gov Unit 3 Vocab

Civil Liberties

Personal freedoms protected from arbitrary governmental interference or deprivations by constitutional guarantee.

Bill of Rights

Designed specifically to guarantee liberties and rights. These civil liberties include protections of citizens’ thoughts, beliefs, opinions, and their right to express them.

Establishment Clause

In the First Amendment to prevent the federal government from establishing a national religion. More recently, the clause has come to mean that governing institutions—federal, state, and local—cannot sanction, recognize, favor, or disregard any religion.

Free Exercise Clause

In the First Amendment to prevent governments from stopping religious practices. Today, these clauses collectively mean people can practice any religion they want, provided it doesn’t violate established law or harm others, and the state cannot endorse or advance one religion over another.

Clear and Present Danger Test

The balancing act between competing demands of free expression and a government needing to protect a free society. 

Prior Restraint

The right to stop spoken or printed expression in advance.

Libel

A charge referring to false statements in print about someone that defames—or damages that person’s reputation.

Ex Post Facto Laws

Making an act illegal after one has committed it. 

Bill of Attainder

Legislative acts that declare a person or group guilty of a crime and impose punishment without a trial. Is outlawed in the Constitution.

Writ of Habeas Corpus

A legal order that requires a person who is holding another person in custody to bring the detainee before a court, ensuring that the detention is lawful.

Due Process Clause

In the Fifth Amendment and establishes that no person shall be “deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

Selective Incorporation

The process of declaring only certain, or selected, provisions of the Bill of Rights applicable to the states rather than all of them at once, using the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause.

Miranda Rights

The legal rights that law enforcement must inform a suspect of before interrogation, ensuring that individuals are aware of their right to remain silent and to have legal counsel.

Civil Rights

Protections from discrimination based on such characteristics as race, color, national origin, religion, and sex.

Thirteenth Amendment

Outlawed slavery across the United States, trumping the Tenth Amendment’s reserved powers to the states.

Fourteenth Amendment

Guaranteed U.S. citizenship to anyone born or naturalized in the United States. The equal protection clause protected individuals’ rights when in other jurisdictions [states].

Equal Protection Clause

In the Fourteenth Amendment and prohibited state governments from denying persons within their jurisdiction equal protection of the laws.

Fifteenth Amendment

Prohibited states from denying the vote to anyone “on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”

Separate but Equal

A legal doctrine that originated from the Supreme Court decision in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), which upheld racial segregation laws as long as the separate facilities for the races were considered equal.

Affirmative Action

A set of policies or practices that seek to improve access to education and employment opportunities for historically underrepresented groups.

Civil Rights Act of 1964

Legislation that outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin in public places and employment.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Addressed discrimination in voting registration but lacked the necessary provisions to fully guarantee African Americans the vote.

Nineteenth Amendment

The amendment to the Constitution that prohibits denying citizens the right to vote based on sex, thereby granting women the right to vote.

Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972

Amended the 1964 Civil Rights Act and guaranteed that women have the same educational opportunities as men in programs receiving federal government funding.