Ironically, a majority of Americans don't have the slightest idea why they have the right to participate in such public demonstrations and openly express their opinions - no matter how deplorable.
A recent survey conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago, on behalf of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, asked 1,140 individuals if they could name any of the specific rights protected by the First Amendment.
The findings betray an alarming level of ignorance among most Americans about the amendment itself and the five individual rights it guarantees.
Almost a third of Americans could not name a single enumerated right protected by the First Amendment and another 40% could name only one - usually freedom of speech.
Among Americans who named one or more enumerated rights, roughly two-thirds named freedom of speech, about a quarter named freedom of religion, 20% named the right to assemble, 15% named freedom of the press, and 8% named the right to petition.
Combined with government mandates and shutdowns, the public's ignorance of their rights did long term harm to the nation's public health and its economy.
In the letter quoted in the first paragraph, Jefferson goes on to write the following: "The functionaries of every government have propensities to command at will the liberty and property of their constituents." He well understood that all governments tend toward tyranny and that the only defense against despotism is historically literate Americans who understand and are willing to demand their rights under the Constitution.
https://spectator.org/rights-high-price-of-historical-illiteracy/
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