Question

identify and describe a core myth that you personally relate to as an american. separation of church and state, the right to bear arms, that all men are created equal, and the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are just a few examples. note: you may apply the myth specifically to health care, if you wish, but you are not required to do so.

Answer 1

The “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” clause comes from the Declaration of Independence not the constitution.

The Declaration of Independence is a legal argument that sets out the justification for separating from King and Country. It is not law.

The constitution is the contract between the government and the citizens. It is law.

The right to bear arms is not actually granted by the constitution. Instead the constitution assumes that speech, religion, bearing of arms, property, and general freedom are rights that are granted by an authority greater than governments (god or gods, nature, humanity, take your pick); the constitution forbids the government from infringing on those greater rights.

The founders were followers of that philosophy set out by John Locke. His idea was that those rights belonged to the people. They could yield some of them to form a government, but the people still retained authority over that government. If the government did not work, the people could scrap it and start over, peacefully or through force of arms. Thus the right to bear arms had to pre-exist and survive the formation of a government.

Locke’s philosophy was called liberalism, because it started from liberty for all people