That is a topic worthy of a long essay. Our Constitution was a bulwark against the worst aspect of human political nature, the tendency to accumulate power. It worked this way until we let the courts run wild.
You bring up so many other great points . . . among the saddest is denial of the Judeo-Christian foundation of our governing philosophy.
Indeed, Jacquerie: Many federal (and state) courts appear to be "not sympatico" with the idea of constitutional constraints; so they just ignore them. No wonder our society is increasingly a madhouse these days! To undermine the rule of law leaves the society in a state of moral ambiguity, turmoil, uncertainty....
I think it's safe to say that the Framers recognized that state-vs.-individual political power was perhaps the only true zero-sum game in the world. In this we can discern the influence of Thomas Hobbes (Leviathan) and John Locke, the philosophical genie behind the Glorious Revolution of 1688.
The zero-sum consists in the fact that the more the power of the state, the less the power (liberty) of the person. Thomas Jefferson accordingly spoke of how this zero-sum power game plays out in political reality: "When the government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny."
I imagine that many/most Americans nowadays are simply terrified of Washington... and with good reason....
FWIW. Thanks so very much for writing, Jacquerie!