PHILADELPHIA — A sizable portion of the American public seems to show little interest in the fabric of the country’s government and history, a new survey finds.
Researchers at the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) surveyed over 1,000 American adults, finding a shocking lack of knowledge as it pertains to U.S. politics among the general populace.
Fifty-three percent of respondents believed the falsehood that illegal immigrants aren’t granted any constitutional rights, while 37 percent couldn’t even name a single right endowed by the First Amendment.
Thankfully, 48 percent of those surveyed were able to identify freedom of speech as being a right enshrined by the First Amendment, although far fewer could identify other rights accorded.
These include freedom of religion (15 percent), freedom of the press (14 percent), right of peaceful assembly (10 percent), and right to petition the government (three percent).
“Protecting the rights guaranteed by the Constitution presupposes that we know what they are. The fact that many don’t is worrisome,” says Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center (APPC) of the University of Pennsylvania, in a press release. “These results emphasize the need for high-quality civics education in the schools and for press reporting that underscores the existence of constitutional protections.”
Meanwhile, only 26 percent of Americans could name all three branches of the federal government — that would be the executive, legislative, and judicial, for those playing at home.
While conservatives were more likely to be able to name all three branches than liberals or moderates, the overall proportion of the public that can name all three has fallen by 12 percent since 2011.
Perhaps most embarrassing: a full third of respondents couldn’t name a single federal branch of government, a figure that hasn’t shifted over the past half-decade.
As for the rights of illegal immigrants, a majority of conservatives (67 percent) believed that illegal aliens were not provided any legal recourse, compared to slight minorities of moderates (48 percent) and liberals (46 percent).
In reality, illegal immigrants residing in the U.S. are usually afforded a number of rights, including protection under the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.
On another note, it’s somewhat surprising that a significant minority of respondents believed that one could be denied rights on the basis of their religion (e.g., if they were Muslim or atheist).
The poll’s findings have a sampling error of about 3.7 percentage points.
And we let them all vote…bahahhahah
Links:
http://opiniontoday.com/2017/09/12/americans-are-poorly-informed-about-basic-constitutional-provisions/
https://cdn.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Appendix_Civics_survey_2017.pdf
Republicans and Democrats should see this lack of knowledge as an existential threat to the country and the rights we hold dear. They should demand better civics classes in schools. I dont expect Trump people to get on board because they exploit these institutional weaknesses for their own advancement and are often exploited by it themselves.
I don’t blame the people as much as the public school system. It’s all part of a master plan: dumb them down, make them dependent on the government teet, then knowing nothing about the Constitution, will agree that it should be replaced, and the leftist deconstructionists will get to finish what they’ve been working for since President Wilson.
That is exactly the plan. Trump was just a minor setback. Another generation of indoctrination and it will be all over. And they know it.
the master plan is to make the history of the US and the constitution moot, that way you can strip the sovereignty away. Part and parcel to accelerating this is open borders.
Do you really think some illiterate breeder from Honduras gives a rats azz about the federalist papers ?
Put another way: It’s the moron machine called public education.
YEP you are totally correct
You know, I grew up poor and my parents said “Don’t wait for school to teach you what you need to know. Educate yourself. There are free public libraries everywhere and lots of used books are cheap”. There is NO excuse for being stupid. NONE! We were poor but we had plenty of used books and old books that were written before leftwing totalitarians started trying to rewrite our history. I still have those books today and NO ONE is every going to take them from me!
Kudos to you! I educated myself as well. Unfortunately, there are those in the education-bureaucrat complex who will make excuses ad infinitum for lazy kids.
You can be assure that the 75% know all about the ins and outs of our welfare system and can probably name every entitlement program nationwide.
I remember back in 2009 when there was a survey to see if people knew who was who in Washington. Everyone got the first question, “Who is the president?”, but not everyone could answer, “Who is the vice president?” Less than half the people could answer, “Who is the Speaker of the House?” However, almost everyone could answer the question, “Who is Angelina Jolie’s boyfriend?”
I did the survey with the two women in my life, and they correctly answered the first three questions. When asked the fourth, my wife asked, “Who is Angelina Jolie?” and my mother asked, Who cares?”
I love them!
“Fifty-three percent of respondents believed the falsehood that illegal immigrants aren’t granted any constitutional rights,”. ????. Non-citizens are not afforded constitutional rights, Mr. Steingold.
As much as I hate it, they actual are afforded rights. Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, and there’s been some court cases that upheld that. Forgive me if I don’t know them from memory.
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.”
While there may be lawyers and judges that act contrary to the Constitution, that does not make their action(s) law. The Constitution should not be subjective. The fact remains that those here illegally are not born or naturalized.
Immigration lawyers disagree (and some judges)… but they are lawyers..
Even illegal aliens are covered under the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 8th amendments.
The three branches of Government are Taxation, Gimme, and Up Yours.
This article is hate language directed against Inner Cities, illegals, Dreamers, Snowflakes. the diverse, social promotion, Equal Opportunity, Special Needs LGBT+, NFL players, Progressives, substance abusers, the professionally poor…and Chicago’s burgeoning graveyard vote. Government is historic White Protestant patriarchal oppression of Peoples’ of Color and Peoples of Need.
You can probably blame that on the public schools who do little teaching of the Constitution or American history. Sad stuff.
What teaching is done on American History is totally warped beyond reality.
THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM WILL NOT TEACH AMERICAN VALUES.This country is a joke!
And I’m sure they ALL voted for Hillary!
Thanks to our public educational system for creating zombies.
a good reporter would have told us the political party affiliation of these morons….hint, rhymes with democrat. When i was a kid, you had to correctly answer a basic question at the polling places to be allowed to vote, and you had to pay property taxes to vote in bond elections for public schools. the democrat-infested courts threw out these two safeguards against being governed by the dumbest half of america, and look where we are now
are you 150 years old and living in the south…..?
no to both. those two important safeguards were eliminated by the courts in the 1960’s
Right, because they were overtly racist voting procedures specifically used to target blacks from going to the polls. Wow, man…. you are right up Trump’s alley. I suspect you were in Charlottesville — that is, if you are still able to walk.
now pepe, let’s not go around spraying people with your skunk perfume. i grew up in lilly white arizona and remember when these laws were tossed out by judges in arizona, and it had nothing to do with race. it had to do with a lack of common sense on the part of judges who came of age in democrat-infested colleges and law schools. i vividly remember my parents and friends being concerned about what this would do to the election process, allowing the dumb and those who don’t have to pay the interest on school bonds to vote. i suspect that you are an obola voter who believes that anyone who disagrees with you is a racist. when people play that race thing with me, i ask them if they are still cheating on their wife, which is the same kind of question that assumes you are guilty. are you still cheating on your wife?
And lets not going around pretending a skunk isnt a skunk. Lily white Arizona was covered by the Voting Rights act at one point to protect voters that were being systematically discriminated against because of racism — that is a fact. If you think that is okay and you do not want to call it racism that your right, but I dont know why you wouldnt just stand up and take responsibility for that. It shows that you are lying to yourself or everyone else because it is easy to understand what you mean. I notice that you cant bring yourself to say “President Obama” — hmmmm….. I also notice that your parents and the other lily whites were worried about the “dumb” voting. Could they have been conflating the “dumb” with the non-whites in the area? If you are honest and brave, I suspect you will say yes, but I also suspect you are neither honest nor brave. No more smoke screens please…. you are embarrassing yourself.
still cheating on your wife?
When you are slapped with a Voting Rights infraction by Congress or the Courts it is because you have shown systematic RRRRaaaaacccccism. Not me saying that — it is how the Act works. Sorry that you are uneducated about this. Well, I guess you are consistent with the theme of the article that people do not know very much about their government. But let us be 100% clear and honest with one another — you and I know very well that Arizona can be terribly racist dont we. Come clean — you think you are better than other races dont you…? And your parents did too didnt they? This is the last communication I will have with you because I really cant stand to see you embarrass yourself like this — I have compassion for strangers, even dumb ones.
No reason to freak out on this fool. He’s obviously in the minority. And he’s a !@#%&^ skunk.
Raaaaaaaaaaacism. Again. You cry raaaaaaacism when someone says the night is dark. Sick to death of blaming your own failures on raaaaaaaaacism.
When a state is slapped with a Voting Rights infraction by Congress or the Courts it is because the state has shown systematic RRRRaaaaacccccism at the voting booth. Not me saying that — it is how the Act works. Sorry that you are uneducated about this. Well, I guess you are consistent with the theme of the article that people do not know very much about their government. But let us be 100% clear and honest with one another — you and I know very well that Arizona can be terribly racist dont we? I have no idea why you are so afraid to admit that you feel superior to other races and feel like you should be able to vote and they should not.
Stop projecting. Who said I was superior? YOU. Who said I think some people shouldn’t be able to vote? YOU. Your fantasy life ignores reality. Stop making excuses for why people don’t get proper ID, register, participate in the process. You’re good at whining and complaining, though.
Why not explain just how showing a simple ID to vote is racist, Pew. That should be pathetically easy for a constitutional scholar, such as yourself. Most states have actually long required their citizens to possess a state issued ID, as well as to have it on their person when in public. Hell, didn’t the democratic convention require that anyone entering show ID? Most states have made it pathetically easy for even the laziest person to aquire one–and, if it’s for voting purposes, they are FREE!!!! Why is it not racist to require an ID to buy beer? Anyone with an IQ above 70 (which definitely excludes anyone who has voted democrat in any federal election during, at least, the last decade) knows that the corrupt democrats just want to make it easier to win elections by fraudulent voting. There can simply be no other reason. Anyway, I’m really looking forward to finally learning the “truth” about this (what should’ve been a just plain, old common sense) non issue lol.
I always have to show a photo ID to vote, Ilya, and I have no problem with it. The Constitution provides that each state gets to choose the way that they vote. The research on this is clear and it directly refutes your point — there is very little voter fraud in the country and, what little that may exist, does not impact elections. There has been tons of research on this. I am very driven by facts and data. If I saw research that says voter fraud is a problem in affecting the outcome of elections, then I would be on your side in a heartbeat, but right now, there is no evidence that points to a problem. I guess if you are referring to the Voting Rights Act, the Act said that any state with a history of voter suppression based on race had to run checks before proceeding with any plan to alter their election structures — just to make sure that they are still not carrying out racist policies. But a couple of years ago, certain parts of the Voting Rights Act was altered by the Supreme Court so maybe what you are looking for is coming.
In schools they teach that 3 branches r equal but they’re not – Congress most powerful by design closest to the peeps. Makes one wonder why Congress then purposely messes up over and over…could it be to make peeps beg for a COS…which is what the elites want both sides?
They did not ask party affiliation.
https://cdn.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Appendix_Civics_survey_2017.pdf
that’s my point. why not, afraid to expose the correlation?
I agree, there should be qualifications for voting. The only one still enforced (to my knowledge) is age.
I’m sure democrats have no problem with minors voting.
They don’t care who votes or how many times as long as it’s for Democrat socialists. If Republicans complain, it’s voter suppression. I mean, how hard is it to get a photo ID? If you can get to the polling place, you certainly can get to the DMV for a free ID.
There is nothing that disqualifies a person from voting democrat. illegal alien, felony conviction, rigor mortis, are all acceptable conditions.
I would ALSO like to see: ANY candidate for office (certainly federal if not state and local too) MUST take and PASS the same test immigrants take to become citizens. Their scores made public. IF they don’t pass, they can’t run for office.
Don’t bet on it
I’d rather see an age breakdown. I’m assuming the vast majority of folks who got it wrong are millennials, regardless of party.
This study proves exactly why we still need the electoral college:) We also need mandatory voter ID laws in place at the federal level!
and less teaching that america is the bad guy…
Until William “The Bomber” Ayers is longer teaching education to our new teachers we will continue to have problems.
He’s just the tip of the iceberg.
I will freely admit that there are sometimes local issues that appear on the ballot that I have either no knowledge to make an informed decision, or that I just don’t care either way (for a variety of reasons.) My policy is to leave that portion of my ballot blank.
Oh yeah, there are bound to be things like that. And I commend you for leaving those blank. I certainly don’t expect everyone to know the ins and outs of every issue – that wouldn’t be reasonable. But they sure as heck ought to know basic civics and at least have a grasp of current affairs that’s solid enough to make informed decisions on major candidates. That’s all I’m trying to say.
That’s crazy! Why is it such a brain drain or chore to know WTH you’re voting for? All sample ballots have every candidate who is up for election as well as varous “Propositions” the people can vote on that WILL affect them in their local area and neighborhoods. Why is it so hard to research what you’re voting for or NOT voting for? Is everyone stupid, lazy or what? Don’t you want to know what “good ole boy” politicians have in store for you? They count on you not caring!! Then you act so surprised or put upon when it affects you! Idiots! I have NEVER missed an election of any kind that affects me or my family since I turned 18. A stupid populace is easier to control!!! MAKE it your business to be informed or STHU when something negative ruins your life or livelihood. It’s NOT rocket science!!
Politicians KEEP KIDS IN THE DARK. That’s how the Democrats win , they give out FREE STUFF thereby insuring re election . Any one who has been around Democrats KNOWS that as a FACT
And we need to return civics and real American history to our public schools and make them both mandatory..
Yup.. I remember my father going insane when they took History out of the classroom and replaced it with “social studies” in the 70’s.
I was there is the 70’s when they made the move. It made me realize that I hated sociologists and didn’t need to waste electives in college.
THAT WAS THE LEFTIST/MARXIST PLAN ALL ALONG
“social studies”, the touchy feely history class of indoctrination
https://goo.gl/vZCZ3D
The pigs never wanted the other animals to know HOW they ran things.
Animal Farm was a warning as was 1984 but Hillary recently admitted she sees them as instruction manuals.
As I have long expected.
My, that sounds familiar…
BRAVO I HAVE BEEN USING THAT QUOTE FOR MONTHS NOW
What I’ve said for decades now, even though we’ll never see something like this implemented, is that there ought to be an amendment such that no one currently on welfare can vote in major elections. As soon as they’re off welfare or with a few months waiting period at most, then they can vote again. And that goes for any form of welfare, e.g., food stamps, housing subsidies, aid for dependent children, etc. — but of course this does NOT include programs such as SS & Medicare where you pay into them your entire life, so they’re not welfare. That would immediately remove all incentive for politicians to pander to them, and remove the ability of people to simply vote for whoever promises the greatest handouts.
Plus, I’d sure go for a very simple straight forward test required in the polling booth before you can vote. If you pass it with no errors, you vote, if you don’t, sorry, come back and try next year. And I do mean VERY basic questions like “how many branches of government are there, and what are their names,” “who is the vice president,” “who is the speaker of the House,” “who is the Senate majority leader” – just a very few very basic questions like that that everyone has to answer to vote.
Of course we’ll never see provisions like that – heck, it’s been difficult just getting voter ID laws passed to help stop the disenfranchisement of voters and help protect the integrity of our entire system.
I gather Arizona passed a law awhile back that requires all high school students to take and pass the citizenship test that all immigrants have to take to become citizens. That’s a good start at least, and hopefully every state will pass a similar law. But I won’t hold my breath.
Voting is a right not a privilege as written in the Constitution.
And the Founding Fathers required you to be a land owner in order to vote. So your point is??
Actually, more to the point try actually READING the Constitution. There is nothing in it that would prevent my suggestions from being implemented. https://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm There is no right in the Constitution for each and every person to be allowed to vote, period, as you are suggesting.
Rat: Actually, if you look at it historically, the Constitution created a federal government of defined and limited powers. The Supreme Court has let that bedrock underpinning be completely ignored.
Yes, on that we totally agree – but it has no bearing on the issue of voting rights in the Constitution. Even so, on the issue of the Constitution bedrock…. Not just the Supreme Court, but Constitutional Amendments that were passed also. The Constitution started being seriously shredded back around 1913, and we’ve been sliding every more rapidly since. In 1913 three things happened (in no particular order):
1) A Constitutional amendment was passed (17th Amendment) such that Senators were no longer appointed by state legislators (incentive to look out for states rights), but elected in a popularity contest that’s often heavily influenced by forces outside the state.
2) Federal reserve was established.
3) A Constitutional Amendment was passed (16th Amendment) allowing, for the first time, for the federal government to collect income taxes.
These actions really got the ball rolling, giving the federal government ways to collect enough money that they could grow government and social programs, while drastically weakening states rights that might have limited such mission creep by the federal government. Meanwhile, establishment of the federal reserve helped divorce economics from the market and extend government control even further.
Then in 1942 there was a landmark case, Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111, where basically the Supreme Court in a most twisted “logic” said essentially that farmers who grew products for their own family’s consumption could be taxed on those products, because ‘if they didn’t consume it themselves, it might be sold over the border and therefore the commerce clause applies and we can tax you on food you grow and eat yourself – or if you hadn’t grown it, you might have bought products from across state lines, so again, that was used as justification to tax the product. Essentially that opened the door for massive abuse of the commerce clause – basically it’s been used to justify virtually anything that any member of Congress decides they want. It’s probably the most abused Constitutional clause in existence.
And they’ve been stripping our freedoms faster and faster ever since then, but it’s gone into overdrive since Obama took office. He and his minions have managed to essentially turn the USA into a lawless banana republic in just a few short years.
Trey Gowdy did an amazing speech that’s key also – it’s about 6 min long and I’d highly recommend that everyone watch it and pass it along.
This ought to be required viewing for every single person in the USA – citizens and others who are legal or illegal included. Gowdy: Prosecutorial Discretion Not a Synonym for Anarchy This is the very foundation of our nations – that the rule of law applies equally to all, and that Congress makes the laws, the President ensures he enforces them equally (not make laws up at his own whim). Basic founding principles that this president has violated time and again – and so far Congress has failed to stop.
Excellent, well structured summary of where the nation began it’s demise, Db8! Kudos…as always! đŸ˜‰
Thanks so much Top! Weather has finally broken here from summer scorch, just a few days ago – pretty nice now and a heck of a nice change over what we’d been having. Hope all’s well with you and yours!
Trump needs to pick some of the laws that his base don’t like and refuse to enforce them. Then see what happens.
I’m afraid I can’t agree with that at all. That’s the way of the left – we desperately need to return to equal justice for all and the rule of law. Not degrade things further in a tit for tat.
With that right comes the responsibility to be informed BEFORE you vote.
Don’t start on the rights and responsibilities schtick, it makes gun-owners (sorry, militia members) very worried.
And welfare and healthcare are freebees given out by the Dems, not a right.
So is bearing arms. Do you support lessening the restrictions that have been imposed upon American citizens who choose to exercise that right or does your hypocrisy only extend to “rights” that you guys invent (such as abortion) or just agree with? Do you think that people should, at least, prove who they are and that they actually possess the “right” to vote or does your limited reasoning intellect just go along with the destructive (to America) party line that claims that such common sense precautions are somehow (though it’s never intelligently explained just how or why) racist? I love it when libs try to defend positions that are related to a document that they don’t even understand.
Back then, the only people allowed to vote were property owners. Even women, as long as they owned property, could vote.
Fred; read post below
You are exactly right on!!!! How can those with no actual “skin in the game” (remember who said that within the last eight years?) should have absolutely no say in where taxpayer monies go. It seems as though corrupt democrats (and, their evil minions–liberals) are always interested in forming their own voting blocks (illegals, felons, the mentally disabled, etc) because they can’t win elections if they just speak honestly and do things on the up and up. If something is unconstitutional, anti-American and destructive to our nation and our sacred liberty dems and libs are all for it. Only when the colossally corrupt democrat party (and, hopefully, the eunuch Republican party too) is destroyed by their obstruction of our duly elected president and liberalism is finally acknowledged (as those of us with IQ’s above 70 have long known) to be the most dangerous domestic terrorist threat that the US currently faces–with those who are engaged in violence, fascism and sedition properly imprisoned–will this country once again become the happy, prosperous, free and safe nation it was and is meant to be.
At this point the left has gotten to be so extreme, and so illogical and inconsistent that I’m hoping they just keep doubling down – and eating their own. Obviously it’s driving a lot of people away from them – witness the 1,100+ major election seats they’ve lost since Obama took office.
The down side is that it seems that the younger generations are increasingly indoctrinated into this insanity and are too clueless to learn from history. Gawd I hope that changes. Also bad is that much of the western world seems to be even further down this rathole than we are – just look at what the EU is doing with immigration… they’re voluntarily committing national suicide and allowing their own culture to be erased and replace by far far worse culture. That’s leaving us even more isolated…
But there are a huge number of great people in the USA – so hopefully we’ll be able to work through and escape without too much damage. The level of debt, however, is getting awfully worrisome – that, and the tremendous polarization in our own citizenry.
AMEN!!!!
Maybe do the same for those who rort their taxes or hide behind financial shell games.
People who receive welfare, or are incarcerated are wards of the state. They will always vote for more redistribution of wealth from the working to the non working
never going to happen. This is how communism takes over.
wah too little too late……….nice sentiment thoe, too bad society didnt push this 40 years ago.
Remember Civics begins and ends with all things related to the civil rights movement of the 60s. Nothing else to see here move right along. Oh this week we can worry about NFL kneeling.
guess who going to opse that vihementely
https://goo.gl/cSqtnp
Far from being ended, the Electoral College actually should be applied at the State level as well. Seattle, Portland, Vegas, Chicago, NYC … SF and LA in Cali and even Dallas and Houston in Texas effectively disenfranchise the rest of the voters not living in those areas.
A repeal of the seventeenth amendment that effectively made the Senate nothing more than an extension of the Congress would not be a bad idea either.
https://goo.gl/xwhZ2p
“In reality, illegal immigrants residing in the U.S. are usually afforded a number of rights…”
This line is evidence that government-supremacists either don’t know the law or are blatantly ignoring it.
Actually, anyone physically present on US soil DOES have certain rights, whether they are here legally or not. Specifically, the 4th, 5th, 6th and 8th amendments.
The three branches of government?
That’s easy:
Greed, cronyism, and propaganda.
Or Welfare, Medicaid, and BlackLivesMatter.
One third could name ONE of the branches of the federal government, the other two thirds being open-minded liberals.
The dumbing down of America
how are we going to fight a war with some many unamericans
And every one with the right to vote. Yikes!