The curriculum presented in this unit is to be used in a business law class next year and the years to come. We will study the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights, with a major focus on the 1st and 4th Amendments and how they relate to the Internet and constitutional privacy in the 21st century.
In the twenty-first century we find ourselves surrounded by a world of mass communication, high technology and instantaneous transmissions of words and visions. People all over the globe can communicate by telephone, by computer and by facsimile machine in seconds. We can talk, we can write, and we can send pictures. This ability to communicate via the Internet has enhanced the lives of people around the globe in many ways. It has also raised new legal and ethical questions.
In particular this unit addresses issues regarding the 1st and 4thAmendment rights of American citizens. The 1st Amendment focuses on your right of free speech while the 4th Amendment deals with your right to privacy. However, both these Amendments are limited to the powers of the federal government. They do not protect citizens from other private individuals or businesses.
The 21st century promises to bring even more technological advancement than the 20th century. Already, the Internet has expanded far greater than ever imagined. If you compare the growth of the Internet to the Industrial Revolution it has grown exponentially times faster. One of the problems faced during the Industrial Revolution was the governments ability to create laws fast enough to protect citizens. Many share this same concern with regard to the Internet.
Leaders of the Industrial Revolution, like Rockefeller, Carnegie and J. P. Morgan, just to name a few, took the country by surprise. They created a new world in which the ways society functioned and business was conducted was changed forever. New laws were enacted which changed the way business is done. Laws that made business monopolies illegal were created. Other laws to protect American citizens from corporate malfeasance were created as well.
We are now experiencing a problem with the Internet similar to that of the Industrial Revolution. The legal system, businesses, Internet users and members of society must now look and ask themselves the following questions:
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Are laws being made and passed to protect users on the Internet?
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How long will it take for laws to be made to protect citizens?
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Who will the laws protect? Honest citizens, sleazy citizens, all citizens or just big business?
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How will all the parties be protected?
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Will the laws protect people’s privacy, while permitting legitimate business on the Internet?
