Download Primary Sources Worksheet DIRECTIONS: Analyze your assigned

The Blessings of Liberty?
Primary Sources Worksheet
DIRECTIONS: Analyze your assigned primary source using the written document analysis
worksheet. Each student will use this analysis to complete the appropriate section below. The
additional sections will be completed later in the lesson.
Description of Primary Source
How was it used to get around the 14th
Amendment, 15th Amendment, or Bill of
Rights?
Poll Tax Receipt
Literacy Test
Voting Eligibility Affidavit
State of Florida Constitution Excerpts
Jim Crow Laws
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The Blessings of Liberty?
Preamble to the Constitution
We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice,
insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and
secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this
Constitution for the United States of America.
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The Blessings of Liberty?
Amendments to the Constitution
Bill of Rights
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free
exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people
peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Amendment II
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to
keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Amendment III
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner,
nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against
unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon
probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be
searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a
presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or
in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be
subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in
any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property,
without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just
compensation.
Amendment VI
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an
impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which
district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause
of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process
for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
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The Blessings of Liberty?
Amendment VII
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of
trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any
court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
Amendment VIII
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual
punishments inflicted.
Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage
others retained by the people.
Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the
states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
14th Amendment to the Constitution (1868)
Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are
citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce
any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor
shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor
deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
15th Amendment (1870)
Article XV.
Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the
United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
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The Blessings of Liberty?
Florida Constitution of 1865
Article IV:
Section 4. No person shall be a Representative unless he be a white man, a citizen of the United
States, and shall have been an inhabitant of the State two years next preceding his election, and
the last year thereof a resident of the County for which he shall be chosen, and shall have
attained the age of twenty-one years.
Section 5. The Senators shall be chosen by the qualified electors for the term of two years, at the
same time, in the same manner, and at the same places where they vote for members of the
House of Representatives; and no man shall be a Senator unless he be a white man, a citizen of
the United States, and shall have been an inhabitant of this State two years next preceding his
election, and the last year thereof a resident of the District or County for which he shall be
chosen, and shall have attained the age of twenty-five years.
Section 1. Every free white male person of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, and who
shall be, at the time of offering to vote, a citizen of the United States, and who shall have resided
and had his habitation, domicil, home, and place of permanent abode in Florida, for one year
next preceding the election at which he shall offer to vote, and who shall, at such time, and for
six months immediately preceding said time, have had his habitation, domicil, and place of
permanent abode in the county in which he may offer to vote, shall be deemed a qualified elector
at all elections under the Constitution…”
Section 3. The Jurors of this State shall be white men, possessed of such qualifications as may be
prescribed by law.
Source: "Florida Constitution of 1865." http://www.law.fsu.edu/crc/conhist/1865con.html
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The Blessings of Liberty?
Jim Crow Laws
“All railroads carrying passengers in the state (other than street railroads) shall provide equal but
separate accommodations for the white and colored races, by providing two or more passenger
cars for each passenger train, or by dividing the cars by a partition, so as to secure separate
accommodations.”
—Tennessee, 1891
“Marriages are void when one party is a white person and the other is possessed of one-eighth or
more negro, Japanese, or Chinese blood.”
—Nebraska, 1911
“Separate free schools shall be established for the education of children of African descent; and
it shall be unlawful for any colored child to attend any white school, or any white child to attend
a colored school.”
—Missouri, 1929
“It shall be unlawful for a negro and white person to play together or in company with each other
in any game of cards or dice, dominoes or checkers.”
—Birmingham, Alabama, 1930
Source: "Jim Crow Laws - Separate Is Not Equal." Jim Crow Laws - Separate Is Not Equal.
http://americanhistory.si.edu/brown/history/1-segregated/jim-crow.html.
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