The United States holds citizens responsible for their rights and responsibilities. These include obeying laws, paying taxes, be an informed voter, support and defend the constitution, defend the country, and serving on a jury when summoned. Every U.S. citizen must obey federal, state and local laws, and pay the penalties that can be incurred when a law is broken.
All citizens must pay taxes in one form or another, including federal, state, local, Social Security, property and sales taxes. Each tax funds services and programs – examples: schools, roads, police and fire protection, Medicare and national defense. These things would be impossible to maintain without the support of tax payments. Whether a citizen or not, all persons have a right to a trial by jury made up of a panel of their peers. Jurors are drawn by lot from the general population of citizens in a jurisdiction and once, randomly summoned to jury duty are required to be available to serve. A citizen also may be summoned to serve as a witness during a trial and, if called, has the responsibility to appear and testify under oath regarding information pertinent to a given event.
While voting is a right and privilege of citizenship, it is also a duty or responsibility. U.S. citizens have a responsibility to participate in their government by registering to vote and voting in elections. By voting, citizens have a voice in their government and help ensure that the democratic representative system of government is maintained. The United States Government holds the citizens accountable for their responsibilities and rights, but most people expect something in return, and the law itself assigns duties and responsibilities to the government.
The government has many roles and responsibilities. The three main responsibilities include protection and defense, the economy, and social services. The most basic duty of a government is to protect its people. The government protects citizens from each other by organizing police to enforce the law.
It also protects by defending the country from outside forces. For this purpose, most governments are in charge of creating and commanding a military that can repel invasions or even fight for the country’s interests abroad. A market economy is ideally controlled by buyers and sellers, with the government staying out of things. However, most people today expect their governments to take action to promote national prosperity and quality of life. At the minimum, this might just mean refereeing the system to ensure fairness and competition, but it can also involve protecting local businesses, creating jobs, or other measures to actively stabilize and grow the economy. Governments are almost always expected to provide basic services to their citizens, such as building roads and fighting fires, but they sometimes offer much more. To ensure basic well-being for their citizens, many governments provide assistance such as food, housing and medical care to those in need.
This is a basic government service in most governments but is a controversial topic in the United States as many people take advantage and misuse this service. In conclusion the government holds responsibilities to the citizens and in return the citizens expect responsibilities to be fulfilled by the government.
