After taking third place in the Park County Republican Men’s Club’s essay contest, Jaxton Braten poses with his certificate and author/speaker Ovie Muntean on Sunday, May 16. Braten won $200.

Courtesy photo

We the people of the United States…” The United States Constitution is vital to everyone’s life. It positively impacts and influences everyone whether they realize it or not. People often use the Constitution to justify their actions. Most people often use the First Amendment to their advantage. They often quote it saying, “They have the freedom of speech.” This is true and is extremely critical to our society. Without these freedoms that are listed, we no longer have the freedom the Constitution grants: The freedom of speech, the freedom of religion, and the freedom of the press. All these freedoms work together and end up causing more freedom and it shapes our society.  

Speech

People will often say something and be just fine, and even commended, whereas in other countries without the freedom of speech, they would be tried or killed for saying such a thing. The freedom to say whatever you want is important. This gives the American people the right to voice their opinion on the government and many other topics openly and verbally.

If citizens do not like something, they are allowed to use their freedom of speech and voice their opinion. Without this right, or limiting this right, is wrong and would cause our country to do poorly. Other countries — Russia, Germany and China — have all tried this and ended up becoming a socialist/communistic society.

The minute the government starts to control what the people can and cannot say, that is the minute you know that your country is in trouble, and if nothing happens to fix this, it will often be detrimental to that society. Freedom of speech also influences other things, like the freedom of religion.  

Religion

Freedom of religion is important to me and everyone else — the right to decide if you want to be religious or secular. In other countries, people are often killed or criticized for the religion that they choose to follow. Having the right to choose your religion is important. Without this right, the government can easily force people to go to a specific church and influence people from an early age to think a certain way.

In Hitler’s Germany, you can often see that people were not allowed to believe in a specific religion. They were told and trained from an early age that Hitler was the best and in a sense was their god. This is not OK, and if that were to happen in America our country would not last long. Religion is important and should be treated as so. The right to choose what religion, if any, is important.

Press

Freedom of the press is one of the most important rights that we are given. Letting the press inform the public on matters without bias is especially important.

Our country currently has a problem with most of the news sources being biased against conservative Republicans. Many of the news sources are giving out false, biased information to many people. If the government could control the press it would be even worse. They could easily make everyone believe the same thing, as only one thing would be released to the country.

If we look again at Hitler’s Germany, he controlled what the media put out. He changed the narrative to make the Jewish people look bad and himself into a hero. After years of this propaganda, the people believed him and that is what caused a lot of hatred. In America, the freedom of the press is extremely important, and without it, it could cause many issues.

In conclusion, the First Amendment is particularly important to our civilization and heavily influences people’s lives, whether they realize it or not. Without the First Amendment, our country would easily turn into a dictatorship or socialist society. 

The Constitution is very important and shapes everyone’s lives every day. People saying that we need to change it often are not informed on what it means, and what it says. People in today’s society are misinformed, and need to learn more about different topics. The Constitution is one thing that many people are misinformed about, but with the right amount of knowledge, the Constitution is vital to our everyday lives.

(Jaxton Braten is a senior at Powell High School. Braten submitted this essay for a contest hosted by the Park County Republican Men’s Club, in which he took third place.)