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Defending the Constitution
the Supreme Court has largely rejected this view, and the Amendment no
longer has the same operative meaning or effect that it once had.
Rights Versus Duties
Some Americans seem to fancy that the whole Constitution is a catalog
of people’s rights. But actually the major part of the Constitution—the
Seven Articles—establishes a framework of national government and
only incidentally deals with individuals’ rights.
In any society, duties are often even more important than rights. For
example, the duty of obeying good laws is more essential than the right
to be exempted from the ordinary operation of the