Something as old as the US constitution does not remain meaningful in ensuring individual liberty. The major debated Supreme Court decisions over the last fifty years involve the absence or presence of unremunerated rights. The constitution is currently criticized regarding the rights it protects in a wide range of topics such as substance-control legislation, gun-control legislation, property regulation, and gay marriage ( Calabresi & Vickery, 2014) . Individuals who claim that the unremunerated rights are protected by the Fourteenth Amendment base their argument on the Immunities or Privileges Clause or the doctrine of substantive due process. According to these individuals, some of the unremunerated rights are immunities or privileges of citizenship or are fundamental rights protected substantively by the Due Process Clause. The opponents of the Fourteenth Amendment, on the other hand, argue that it does not protect any rights other than those specifically enumerated in other parts of the constitution or in the Bills of Rights.
Justices in the Supreme Court oppose the expansion of unremunerated rights because the Fourteenth Amendment only protects fundamental and enumerated liberty interests that are deeply rooted in the United States' history and traditions. The individual liberty rights guarantees at the beginning of the American Revolution to the 1860s addressed the divisive issue of slavery. The liberty right guarantee arguments such as claims involving political rights, civil rights, business regulations, legal procedures, and property rights were made ( Calabresi & Vickery, 2014) . The guarantees were crucial for litigants in the protection of their rights and the state courts heavily relied on them in protecting substantive rights. The constitution did not effectively address the individual liberty rights because they did not simply function as vague but their application instead was at a varying degree of judicial vigor in deciding some of the most controversial and challenging issues of today.
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People are a sovereign body, through publically agreed laws corresponding to common sets of public restrictions and serves to protect against violations of despotic power and individual liberty. Individuals are deprived of the protection where no such common body exists. In such situations, people obey without liberty while individuals in power command under a state of license ( Queiroz, 2018) . Individual autonomy, viewing it modernly, has emerged to be the major focus of the Bills of Rights. The Bill of Rights was established to create an appropriate structure to keep the central government in check rather than as an intention of preserving individual autonomy or insulate people from the democratic community. Individuals who framed the constitution were much concerned about the natural rights of an individual as well as their freedom ( Gerstenberg, 2012) . However, the framers denied the judiciary the unbounded power necessary to define and enforce individual natural rights. Moreover, the framers failed to view individuals as living in states of conflict with democratic society ( Garry, 2014 . Individual liberty was not seen as something that would go against the wishes of a democratic society and was not defined in isolation. The Bill of Rights was not ratified to protect or express individual autonomy's view. Instead, the bill was incorporated in the Constitution as a reinforcement and harmonization of the constitution's general structure scheme.
In conclusion, something as old as the US constitution does not remain meaningful in ensuring individual liberty. Even though individual liberty was more important to the framers of the constitution, their only critical issue was to control the character of the new national government. The framers thought the only way to control the government against violating its citizen’s liberty was to provide the people with the capacity to limit the government. The constitutional instruments relied upon by the framers were institutional checks upon the exercise of power. The mistake the framers made was to implement the Bill of Rights with the exclusive concern of individual autonomy and rights rather than providing the government with structural limitations.
Reference
Calabresi, S. G., & Vickery, S. (2014). On Liberty and the Fourteenth Amendment: The Original Understanding of the Lockean Provisos. Northwestern Public Law Research Paper , (14-08), 14-06.
Garry, P. M. (2014). Liberty through limits: The bill of rights as limited government provisions. Risk Governance & Control: Financial Markets & Institutions , 3 (1-1), 122-143.
Gerstenberg, O. (2012). Negative/positive constitutionalism, "fair balance," and the problem of justiciability. International journal of constitutional law , 10 (4), 904-925.
Queiroz, R. (2018). Individual liberty and the importance of the concept of the people. Palgrave Communications , 4 CW-190217231944 (1), 99.
