The Declaration, The Constitution, or The Communist Manifesto?

This is a ten-question multiple choice quiz that I put together in order to encourage any readers to explore America's founding documents and all they stand for: freedom, liberty, and limited government, as opposed to the Communist Manifesto, which stands for none of the above.

You have three options to choose from for every question: the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, and the Communist Manifesto.

Have fun, share, and enjoy!

Questions

1. "[A] graduated income tax."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

2. "[W]henever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

3. "Do you charge us with wanting to stop the exploitation of children by their parents? To this crime we plead guilty."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

4. "[M]ake all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this... in the Government... or in any Department or Officer thereof."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

5. "Centralization... by means of a national bank with State capital."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

6. "[W]hen a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

7. "We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

8. "The enumeration... of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

9. "That culture, the loss of which he laments, is, for the enormous majority, a mere training to act as a machine."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

10. "[N]o Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted."

a. The Declaration of Independence
b. The U.S. Constitution
c. The Communist Manifesto
d. No Answer

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Answers:

1. The Communist Manifesto.

"Nevertheless in the most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable: Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax."

2. The Declaration of Independence.

"Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."

3. The Communist Manifesto.

"Do you charge us with wanting to stop the exploitation of children by their parents? To this crime we plead guilty. But, you say, we destroy the most hallowed of relations, when we replace home education by social. And your education! Is not that also social, and determined by the social conditions under which you educate, by the intervention direct or indirect, of society, by means of schools? The Communists have not invented the intervention of society in education; they do but seek to alter the character of that intervention, and to rescue education from the influence of the ruling class. The bourgeois clap-trap about the family and education, about the hallowed co-relation of parents and child, becomes all the more disgusting, the more, by the action of Modern Industry, all the family ties among the proletarians are torn asunder, and their children transformed into simple articles of commerce and instruments of labour."

4. The U.S. Constitution.

"To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof."

5. The Communist Manifesto.

"Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly."

6. The Declaration of Independence.

"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

7. The Declaration of Independence.

"Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them, from time to time, of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They, too, have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind - Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends."

8. The U.S. Constitution.

“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

9. The Communist Manifesto."

According to this, bourgeois society ought long ago to have gone to the dogs through sheer idleness; for those who acquire anything, do not work. The whole of this objection is but another expression of the tautology: There can no longer be any wage labor when there is no longer any capital. All objections urged against the communistic mode of producing and appropriating material products, have, in the same way, been urged against the communistic mode of producing and appropriating intellectual products. Just as to the bourgeois, the disappearance of class property is the disappearance of production itself, so the disappearance of class culture is to him identical with the disappearance of all culture. That culture, the loss of which he laments, is, for the enormous majority, a mere training to act as a machine."

10. The U.S. Constitution.

"Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. The Congress shall have power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted."