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Have you ever looked at your teacher with a puzzled face when they explain history? I know we have. In our new Homework Help Series we break down history into easy to understand 5 minute videos to support a better understanding of American History. In our eighth episode, we tackle the Articles of Confederation and the need for a Constitution.

The Constitution | BRI’s Homework Help Series

BRI is a teacher service organization with over 20 years of history growing and supporting our educator network. Learn more about our resources.

Educator Hub

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BRI has over 4,000 resources ready for you, including 650 lessons, 300 essays and nearly 300 videos.

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Oh! The Humanities!

BRI offers free teacher professional development and community programs throughout the year. 

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2021 We the Students Essay Contest Essay Prompt: What is the relationship between Equality and Justice? Answering this question requires considering each of these principles and analyzing the relationship between them. To truly explore this question in an essay that is between 500 -800 words, you’ll need to go beyond &#8220;dictionary definitions,&#8221; and express your [&hellip;]


We the Students Essay Contest

The next presidential election is rapidly approaching, and voters are already being courted by a large field of contenders. In this eLesson, students explore some the major themes that candidates and voters grapple with during every election cycle. First, students will imagine themselves as candidates, craft their own policy platform, and consider the constitutional basis of their platform ideas. Next, they will observe presidential debates from 1960 and 2015 and determine if changes in debate methods help or hinder the election process. Finally, students will learn about the complicated mechanism that is the Electoral College, and think about the arguments for and against such a system.

eLesson: Introducing Think the Vote

In order to be engaged in the world, one must understand the issues and controversial topics that shape the world. This video explores the intricacies of a free and open government by highlighting the necessity of citizens engaging with key issues that surround them. Check out our website thinkthevote.com for more info.

#ThinktheVote: A Debate Project of the Bill of Rights Institute

BRI has events, contests, and current event resources to engage your students throughout the year.

Student Opportunities

Do you understand the key differences between a Republic and a Democracy? The Bill of Rights Institute has created a short, engaging video for Constitution Day on the constitutional principle of representative government. Exciting visuals from current events, an engaging historical narrative, brief scholar interviews, familiar music, and memorable quotes will make this 5-minute video perfect for use on Constitution Day, and every day!

Constitutional Principles: Representative Government

The Constitution's principle of separation of powers is reflected in the President's power to make treaties with the advice and consent of the Senate. The Constitution goes on to require that two-thirds of Senators present must approve a treaty before it can be ratified. As "Chief Diplomat" for the nation, the President represents the United States to other countries, and directs our foreign policy. Various Presidents in our history have approached the concept of "advice and consent" differently, and have had varying degrees of success at persuading Senators of the wisdom of the treaties they have negotiated. George Washington was aware that his actions would set a precedent as to the meaning of the term "advice and consent." Many of his decisions with respect to Jay's Treaty also helped clearly define the separation of powers. Woodrow Wilson all but rejected the Senate's advice of the Treaty of Versailles, and for the first time in American history, the Senate rejected a peace treaty. Perhaps learning from history, Jimmy Carter took a different and more accommodating approach, winning ratification of the initially unpopular Panama Canal Treaties.

Chief Diplomat: Presidents and the Constitution

BRI Senior Teaching Fellow Tony Williams is joined by Dr. Vincent Phillip Muñoz, 
author and Tocqueville Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame, 
to discuss the Warren Court. Muñoz gives detailed accounts of the most significant Supreme Court 
cases of the period and explains how they reflected a time of judicial activism and progressivism 
for civil liberties against a backdrop of the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War. How did 
Court advance the incorporation doctrine at this time? And how did the Warren Court shape the 
principle of federalism in the present day?

Vincent Phillip Muñoz : 
The Warren Court & Progressivism | 
BRI Scholar Talks

How does the Commerce Clause relate to gun regulation? To accompany our recently released U.S. v. Lopez Homework Help video, Tony and Josh break down opinions from the Supreme Court case itself, exploring how the majority and dissenting opinions tackled the relationship between education and commerce after a student brought a gun to school. What lasting impact did this case have on federalism?

Reading Excerpts from U.S. v. Lopez | A Primary Source Close Read w/ BRI

Brown v. Board of Education was a case brought to the Supreme Court in 1954 after Linda Brown, an African American student in Kansas, was denied access to the white-only schools nearby her house. Future Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall was the lawyer for the case, and argued that segregated schools were inherently unequal. Ultimately, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Linda Brown and declared segregation unconstitutional. This is one of the landmark cases that led to the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964.

Brown v. Board of Education | BRI’s Homework Help Series

BRIs has hundreds of video resources to support you in the classroom. From explainer videos to interviews with scholars, all videos are ready for student use.

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Thanks to the generosity of the Ken W. Davis Foundation, the Bill of Rights Institute is honored to provide class sets of pocket constitutions (a maximum of 100 per teacher) to teachers around the United States.

Request Pocket Constitutions

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Established in September 1999, the Bill of Rights Institute is a 501(c)(3) non-profit educational organization that works to engage, educate, and empower individuals with a passion for the freedom and opportunity that exist in a free society.

Bill Of Rights Institute

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In a village of La Mancha, the name of which I have no desire to call to mind, there lived not long since one of those gentlemen that keep a lance in the lance-rack, an old buckler, a lean hack, and a greyhound for coursing.

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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.

Bill of Rights (1791)

Our free online U.S. History resource for high school students!

Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness

Debating matters of public concern is essential in a free, self-governing society. If citizens were not free to decide after listening to opposing views self-government would be distorted. At the core of the Declaration of Independence is the principle that government exists to protect individual rights for us, not that we exist to serve the government. Therefore the people are the master and the government is the servant. If the government can dictate what we can and cannot discuss, then it would imply that the servant can tell the master what to do.

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