The United States Constitution

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The preamble to The United States Constitution posted above, spells out the goals that were set for a new nation; established by free men and born through the violent labor of revolution. Before the critics clamor, the spelling and capitalization of certain words were not changed and appear as they did in the original document. The most powerful phrase in that document is the first three words of the first sentence: We the People.

This was not to be a government created through the concessions of a monarch as was the case with the British Parliament. This was not to be a totalitarian regime, as was created after the fall of the German Kaiser or the Russian Tsar. Even the French revolution spawned the rise of a militaristic emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte before they discovered democracy. This was a government formed by free people seeking to create a framework of just and sensible laws to preserve a union of states while at the same time providing a guarantee of the people’s ideals, beliefs and liberties.

Since the inception of this country, the rights of the people were clearly proclaimed to have existed without the consent of government. As such, The Constitution is not a document that grants our rights, it is a document that acknowledges and defends them. It not only defines the structure and role of our government but is a powerful shield meant to deny that same Federal Government any power that would impinge upon the sovereignty of the states or our personal rights.

In May of 1787 twelve of the thirteen states met by invitation, to begin the work of amending the Articles of Confederation that the colonies had established as their governmental structure. Only Rhode Island declined that invitation. By June of that year it was proposed that they abandon the amendment process and endeavor to write a new Constitution and to draft a new government structure. On September 17, 1787 the Constitution was complete and presented to the Congress of the Confederation who approved the draft for ratification.

Even though only nine states were needed to ratify the proposed constitution for it to pass into law, Benjamin Franklin recognized the importance of unity in what they were doing and urged that ratification be unanimous among the thirteen states. On June 21, 1788 the ninth state, New Hampshire, ratified the Constitution upon which the Congress set a timetable for the start of operations under the new Constitution. On March 4, 1789 the Articles of Confederation were officially replaced by the United States Constitution. It would be more than a year before Franklin would get the unanimity he had hoped for when the thirteenth and final state, Rhode Island, ratified the Constitution on May 29, 1790 with a majority of only two votes. It was done!

After the Preamble, The United States Constitution contains seven sections or “Articles”.

Article 1 - The Legislative Branch
Article 2 - The Executive Branch
Article 3 - The Judicial Branch
Article 4 - The States
Article 5 - Amendments
Article 6 - Debts, Supremacy, Oaths
Article 7 - Ratification

A link to an on-line complete copy of the Constitution can be found at: http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html for those that would like to refer to it.

Articles 1, 2 and 3 consist of the rules regulating the requirements for office, election, compensation, duties and disqualifications for the Legislative, Executive and Judicial branches of government.

Article 4 directs the interaction between states where vital records and the extradition of criminals are concerned. It also enumerates the requirements for the admittance of new states into the union and guarantees each state the right to a republican form of government for the business of state, separate and apart from the Federal government.

Article 5 contains the specific requirements for the introduction and adoption of amendments altering the Constitution.

Article 6 affirms that all government debts accrued prior to the adoption of the Constitution will remain valid against the United States. That laws made pursuant to the Constitution and the treaties entered into by the authority of the Constitution will be the law of the land and recognized by all states and judges. This article also requires that Legislators, Judges and the Executives of the Federal government and the State governments will be bound by oath to support the Constitution.

Article 7 names the requirements to ratify the Constitution.

After the Constitution was adopted and the first session of the United States Legislature convened, the first ten amendments to the Constitution were introduced by James Madison in 1789 as a series of articles. The articles were eventually adopted into the Constitution on December 15, 1791. Those articles or amendments are know to all as the Bill of Right and combined; they are the fortress that protects our freedoms and rights from unlawful government interference.

In subsequent years, there have been an additional seventeen amendments made to the Constitution to bring it to the form we know today. Some clarify aspects of the government structure such as term limits and succession, some to institute new requirements such as the income tax, immigration and naturalization laws and some addressed social issues like the abolition of slavery and women’s suffrage (right to vote).

The amendment process breathes life into the Constitution by allowing it to change and adapt in response to the needs of the times. That process is exceedingly difficult and requires that a proposed amendment pass by a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress before a Constitutional Convention be called to consider the matter. It further requires a three-fourths majority in the Constitutional Convention before a proposed amendment can be adopted. This is to insure that only matters of critical importance are ever adopted as an amendment to alter the Constitution thus protecting the integrity of the document.

Our biggest failure has been in accepting the politicization of Constitutional law. Rather than reading the Constitution for the direct meaning of the text, legislators and judges have taken to interpreting meaning of the Constitution to gain political advantage or to enact legislation that espouses a particular ideological bent outside the word of the law. They ignore the Federalist papers that would clearly define the intent of the crafters of the Constitution and insert their own ideas of what the law means to further their ends. This is a dangerous and potentially destructive school of thought.

The Founding Fathers knew that allowing the Constitution to become too dynamic would make it subject to the whim of the people; changing every time the proverbial winds shift. Allowing politicians and judges to reinterpret the Constitution for their own purposes negates the principal reasoning of requiring a super-majority to amend the document. It can allow unjust laws to be passed, it can assume Presidential or Federal authority where none exists or worse, that the rights established in the first ten amendments may become so diluted that they eventually become meaningless.

So long as the government is so interested in dissecting the bill of rights, we might as well join in and see if our idea of what it means differs from theirs and more importantly, how it differs from the founding fathers ideas as they laid their thoughts out in the Federalist papers.

Please join me tomorrow for our look at the first amendment to the United States Constitution.

Paul