Final answer:
The U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights were built on the realization that government should derive its power from the consent of the governed, with influence from Enlightenment thinkers and past experiences with British rule. These documents created a system of checks and balances to maintain a balance of power, which has remained largely intact with only 27 amendments to date.
Step-by-step explanation:
The realization that a government must be based on the consent of the governed led to the creation of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The Constitution was the culmination of ideas from the Enlightenment and experiences under British rule. Inspired by a deeply rooted belief that political power stems from the people, the Founding Fathers designed the new federal government to embody these concepts through a system of checks and balances across three branches of government: legislative, executive, and judicial. The introduction of the Bill of Rights within the first two years of the Constitution’s existence was critical to ensuring individual liberties and was an essential component in gaining the support of those who were initially skeptical of the new federal government.
The framework established by the Founding Fathers in 1789 has endured with only 27 amendments, ten of which comprise the Bill of Rights. This demonstrated the robustness of the initial Constitution and the Bill of Rights in encompassing foundational principles that would stand the test of time, allowing the document to work for over 227 years with minimal changes.
The process underlying the drafting of the Constitution was informed by England’s Bill of Rights, the writings of thinkers such as Montesquieu and Rousseau, and the relatively powerless system under the Articles of Confederation. These experiences and philosophical insights were intrinsic to the Founding Fathers' approach to constructing a government that balanced authority with individual rights, thereby rectifying the weaknesses they perceived in the Articles of Confederation.