essay about the principles of constitution

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Constitution

By: History.com Editors

Updated: March 28, 2023 | Original: October 27, 2009

The Constitution of the United States established America’s national government and fundamental laws, and guaranteed certain basic rights for its citizens. 

It was signed on September 17, 1787, by delegates to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. Under America’s first governing document, the Articles of Confederation, the national government was weak and states operated like independent countries. At the 1787 convention, delegates devised a plan for a stronger federal government with three branches—executive, legislative and judicial—along with a system of checks and balances to ensure no single branch would have too much power. 

The Preamble to the U.S. Constitution

The Preamble outlines the Constitution's purpose and guiding principles. It reads:

The Bill of Rights were 10 amendments guaranteeing basic individual protections, such as freedom of speech and religion, that became part of the Constitution in 1791. To date, there are 27 constitutional amendments.

Articles of Confederation

America’s first constitution, the Articles of Confederation , was ratified in 1781, a time when the nation was a loose confederation of states, each operating like independent countries. The national government was comprised of a single legislature, the Congress of the Confederation; there was no president or judicial branch.

The Articles of Confederation gave Congress the power to govern foreign affairs, conduct war and regulate currency; however, in reality these powers were sharply limited because Congress had no authority to enforce its requests to the states for money or troops.

Did you know? George Washington was initially reluctant to attend the Constitutional Convention. Although he saw the need for a stronger national government, he was busy managing his estate at Mount Vernon, suffering from rheumatism and worried that the convention wouldn't be successful in achieving its goals.

Soon after America won its independence from Great Britain with its 1783 victory in the American Revolution , it became increasingly evident that the young republic needed a stronger central government in order to remain stable.

In 1786, Alexander Hamilton , a lawyer and politician from New York , called for a constitutional convention to discuss the matter. The Confederation Congress, which in February 1787 endorsed the idea, invited all 13 states to send delegates to a meeting in Philadelphia.

Forming a More Perfect Union

On May 25, 1787, the Constitutional Convention opened in Philadelphia at the Pennsylvania State House, now known as Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence had been adopted 11 years earlier. There were 55 delegates in attendance, representing all 13 states except Rhode Island , which refused to send representatives because it did not want a powerful central government interfering in its economic business. George Washington , who’d become a national hero after leading the Continental Army to victory during the American Revolution, was selected as president of the convention by unanimous vote.

The delegates (who also became known as the “framers” of the Constitution) were a well-educated group that included merchants, farmers, bankers and lawyers. Many had served in the Continental Army, colonial legislatures or the Continental Congress (known as the Congress of the Confederation as of 1781). In terms of religious affiliation, most were Protestants. Eight delegates were signers of the Declaration of Independence, while six had signed the Articles of Confederation.

At age 81, Pennsylvania’s Benjamin Franklin (1706-90) was the oldest delegate, while the majority of the delegates were in their 30s and 40s. Political leaders not in attendance at the convention included Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) and John Adams (1735-1826), who were serving as U.S. ambassadors in Europe. John Jay (1745-1829), Samuel Adams (1722-1803) and John Hancock (1737-93) were also absent from the convention. Virginia’s Patrick Henry (1736-99) was chosen to be a delegate but refused to attend the convention because he didn’t want to give the central government more power, fearing it would endanger the rights of states and individuals.

Reporters and other visitors were barred from the convention sessions, which were held in secret to avoid outside pressures. However, Virginia’s James Madison (1751-1836) kept a detailed account of what transpired behind closed doors. (In 1837, Madison’s widow Dolley sold some of his papers, including his notes from the convention debates, to the federal government for $30,000.)

Debating the Constitution

The delegates had been tasked by Congress with amending the Articles of Confederation; however, they soon began deliberating proposals for an entirely new form of government. After intensive debate, which continued throughout the summer of 1787 and at times threatened to derail the proceedings, they developed a plan that established three branches of national government–executive, legislative and judicial. A system of checks and balances was put into place so that no single branch would have too much authority. The specific powers and responsibilities of each branch were also laid out.

Among the more contentious issues was the question of state representation in the national legislature. Delegates from larger states wanted population to determine how many representatives a state could send to Congress, while small states called for equal representation. The issue was resolved by the Connecticut Compromise, which proposed a bicameral legislature with proportional representation of the states in the lower house ( House of Representatives ) and equal representation in the upper house (Senate).

Another controversial topic was slavery. Although some northern states had already started to outlaw the practice, they went along with the southern states’ insistence that slavery was an issue for individual states to decide and should be kept out of the Constitution. Many northern delegates believed that without agreeing to this, the South wouldn’t join the Union. For the purposes of taxation and determining how many representatives a state could send to Congress, it was decided that enslaved people would be counted as three-fifths of a person. Additionally, it was agreed that Congress wouldn’t be allowed to prohibit the slave trade before 1808, and states were required to return fugitive enslaved people to their owners.

Ratifying the Constitution

By September 1787, the convention’s five-member Committee of Style (Hamilton, Madison, William Samuel Johnson of Connecticut, Gouverneur Morris of New York, Rufus King of Massachusetts ) had drafted the final text of the Constitution, which consisted of some 4,200 words. On September 17, George Washington was the first to sign the document. Of the 55 delegates, a total of 39 signed; some had already left Philadelphia, and three–George Mason (1725-92) and Edmund Randolph (1753-1813) of Virginia , and Elbridge Gerry (1744-1813) of Massachusetts–refused to approve the document. In order for the Constitution to become law, it then had to be ratified by nine of the 13 states.

James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, with assistance from John Jay, wrote a series of essays to persuade people to ratify the Constitution. The 85 essays, known collectively as “The Federalist” (or “The Federalist Papers”), detailed how the new government would work, and were published under the pseudonym Publius (Latin for “public”) in newspapers across the states starting in the fall of 1787. (People who supported the Constitution became known as Federalists, while those opposed it because they thought it gave too much power to the national government were called Anti-Federalists.)

7 Things You May Not Know About the Constitutional Convention

Seven surprising facts about the framers and the Constitutional Convention.

All Amendments to the US Constitution

Since the Constitution was ratified in 1789, hundreds of thousands of bills have been introduced attempting to amend the nation's founding document. But only 27 amendments to the U.S. Constitution have been ratified.

How the US Constitution Has Changed and Expanded Since 1787

Through amendments and legal rulings, the Constitution has transformed in some critical ways.

Beginning on December 7, 1787, five states– Delaware , Pennsylvania, New Jersey , Georgia and Connecticut–ratified the Constitution in quick succession. However, other states, especially Massachusetts, opposed the document, as it failed to reserve un-delegated powers to the states and lacked constitutional protection of basic political rights, such as freedom of speech, religion and the press. 

In February 1788, a compromise was reached under which Massachusetts and other states would agree to ratify the document with the assurance that amendments would be immediately proposed. The Constitution was thus narrowly ratified in Massachusetts, followed by Maryland and South Carolina . On June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the document, and it was subsequently agreed that government under the U.S. Constitution would begin on March 4, 1789. George Washington was inaugurated as America’s first president on April 30, 1789. In June of that same year, Virginia ratified the Constitution, and New York followed in July. On February 2, 1790, the U.S. Supreme Court held its first session, marking the date when the government was fully operative.

Rhode Island, the last holdout of the original 13 states, finally ratified the Constitution on May 29, 1790.

The Bill of Rights

In 1789, Madison, then a member of the newly established U.S. House of Representatives , introduced 19 amendments to the Constitution. On September 25, 1789, Congress adopted 12 of the amendments and sent them to the states for ratification. Ten of these amendments, known collectively as the Bill of Rights , were ratified and became part of the Constitution on December 10, 1791. The Bill of Rights guarantees individuals certain basic protections as citizens, including freedom of speech, religion and the press; the right to bear and keep arms; the right to peaceably assemble; protection from unreasonable search and seizure; and the right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury. For his contributions to the drafting of the Constitution, as well as its ratification, Madison became known as “Father of the Constitution.”

8 Things You Should Know About the Bill of Rights

The first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution, known collectively as the Bill of Rights, became law on December 15, 1791.

Before Drafting the Bill of Rights, James Madison Argued the Constitution Was Fine Without It

The founding father worried that trying to spell out all of Americans' rights in the series of amendments could be inherently limiting.

To date, there have been thousands of proposed amendments to the Constitution. However, only 17 amendments have been ratified in addition to the Bill of Rights because the process isn’t easy–after a proposed amendment makes it through Congress, it must be ratified by three-fourths of the states. The most recent amendment to the Constitution, Article XXVII, which deals with congressional pay raises, was proposed in 1789 and ratified in 1992.

The Constitution Today

In the more than 200 years since the Constitution was created, America has stretched across an entire continent and its population and economy have expanded more than the document’s framers likely ever could have envisioned. Through all the changes, the Constitution has endured and adapted.

The framers knew it wasn’t a perfect document. However, as Benjamin Franklin said on the closing day of the convention in 1787: “I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such, because I think a central government is necessary for us… I doubt too whether any other Convention we can obtain may be able to make a better Constitution.” Today, the original Constitution is on display at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Constitution Day is observed on September 17, to commemorate the date the document was signed.

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Constitutional Convention

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Constitution of the United States of America , the fundamental law of the U.S. federal system of government and a landmark document of the Western world. The oldest written national constitution in use, the Constitution defines the principal organs of government and their jurisdictions and the basic rights of citizens. (For a list of amendments to the U.S. Constitution, see below .)

Click here for the text of the Constitution of the United States of America .

The Constitution was written during the summer of 1787 in Philadelphia , Pennsylvania , by 55 delegates to a Constitutional Convention that was called ostensibly to amend the Articles of Confederation (1781–89), the country’s first written constitution. The Constitution was the product of political compromise after long and often rancorous debates over issues such as states’ rights , representation , and slavery . Delegates from small and large states disagreed over whether the number of representatives in the new federal legislature should be the same for each state—as was the case under the Articles of Confederation—or different depending on a state’s population ( see New Jersey Plan and Virginia Plan ). In addition, some delegates from Northern states sought to abolish slavery or, failing that, to make representation dependent on the size of a state’s free population. At the same time, some Southern delegates threatened to abandon the convention if their demands to keep slavery and the slave trade legal and to count slaves for representation purposes were not met. Eventually the framers resolved their disputes by adopting a proposal put forward by the Connecticut delegation. The Great Compromise , as it came to be known, created a bicameral legislature with a Senate , in which all states would be equally represented, and a House of Representatives , in which representation would be apportioned on the basis of a state’s free population plus three-fifths of its enslaved population. (The inclusion of the enslaved population was known separately as the three-fifths compromise .) A further compromise on slavery prohibited Congress from banning the importation of enslaved people until 1808 (Article I, Section 9). After all the disagreements were bridged, the new Constitution was signed by 39 delegates on September 17, 1787, and it was submitted for ratification to the 13 states on September 28.

In 1787–88, in an effort to persuade New York to ratify the Constitution, Alexander Hamilton , John Jay , and James Madison published a series of essays on the Constitution and republican government in New York newspapers. Their work, written under the pseudonym “Publius” and collected and published in book form as The Federalist (1788), became a classic exposition and defense of the Constitution. In June 1788, after the Constitution had been ratified by nine states (as required by Article VII), Congress set March 4, 1789, as the date for the new government to commence proceedings (the first elections under the Constitution were held late in 1788). Because ratification in many states was contingent on the promised addition of a Bill of Rights , Congress proposed 12 amendments in September 1789; 10 were ratified by the states, and their adoption was certified on December 15, 1791. (One of the original 12 proposed amendments, which prohibited midterm changes in compensation for members of Congress, was ratified in 1992 as the Twenty-seventh Amendment . The last one, concerning the ratio of citizens per member of the House of Representatives, has never been adopted.)

The authors of the Constitution were heavily influenced by the country’s experience under the Articles of Confederation, which had attempted to retain as much independence and sovereignty for the states as possible and to assign to the central government only those nationally important functions that the states could not handle individually. But the events of the years 1781 to 1787, including the national government’s inability to act during Shays’s Rebellion (1786–87) in Massachusetts , showed that the Articles were unworkable because they deprived the national government of many essential powers, including direct taxation and the ability to regulate interstate commerce . It was hoped that the new Constitution would remedy this problem.

The framers of the Constitution were especially concerned with limiting the power of government and securing the liberty of citizens. The doctrine of legislative, executive , and judicial separation of powers , the checks and balances of each branch against the others, and the explicit guarantees of individual liberty were all designed to strike a balance between authority and liberty—the central purpose of American constitutional law .

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Constitution Annotated: A Research Guide

Guide to constitution annotated essays.

• Introduction
• How to Use the Constitution Annotated Website
• Resources for Constitution Annotated Research
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As a starting point to your constitutional research, you can begin to explore the Constitution Annotated by subject matter using the menu below or by inputting keywords in the search bar .

The links in the section below take you to the browse section for each constitutional provision's annotated essays. Individual essays can be accessed by clicking the serial numbers left of each essay title.

Introductory Essays

• U.S. Constitution (Articles 1-7)
• Bill of Rights (1-10)
• Early Amendments (11-12)
• Reconstruction Amendments (13-15)
• Early 20th Century Amendments (16-22)
• Post-War Amendments (23-27)

Unratified Amendments

These essays introduce the reader to various components underpinning the Constitution Annotated and how the Constitution is interpreted today.

• Constitution Annotated Methodology This section of essays explains the methodology for the current edition of the Constitution Annotated—that is, the rules and principles that dictate the organization and construction of the document.
• Organization of the Constitution Annotated The section of essays covers how the Constitution Annotated is organized.
• Historical Background of the Constitution This section of essays covers the historical background of the creation of the Constitution in 1787, looking at the Articles of Confederation and the Constitutional Convention.
• Basic Principles Underlying the Constitution This section of essays explores the basic principles underlying and permeating the Constitution, such as federalism, separation of powers, and rights.
• Ways to Interpret the Constitution This section of essays explores the various current frameworks by which the Constitution is interpreted by the Supreme Court, such as textualism, pragmatism, and moral reasoning.

The U.S. Constitution

The foundational legal document of the United States of America.

Legislative Power (Article I)

This section encompasses essays on Article I of the Constitution dealing specifically with the Legislative branch, its powers, and functions. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Historical Origin Limits on Federal Power .

Executive Power (Article II)

This section encompasses essays on Article II of the Constitution dealing specifically with the Executive branch, the Presidency, its powers, and functions. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Overview of Article II, Executive Branch .

Judicial Power (Article III)

This section encompasses essays on Article III of the Constitution dealing specifically with the Judicial branch, its powers, and functions. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on Marbury v. Madison and Judicial Review .

Interstate Relations (Article IV)

This section encompasses essays on Article IV of the Constitution dealing specifically with the relationships between states. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Purpose of Privileges and Immunities Clause.

Amending the Constitution (Article V)

This section encompasses essays on Article V of the Constitution dealing specifically with the creation of constitutional amendments. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on Congressional Proposals of Amendments .

Supreme Law (Article VI)

This section encompasses essays on Article VI of the Constitution dealing specifically with the establishment of the Constitution as the Supreme Law of the Land. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Overview of the Supremacy Clause.

Ratification (Article VII)

This section encompasses essays on Article VII of the Constitution dealing specifically with the ratification of the Constitution.

Bill of Rights

The first ten amendments to the Constitution.

First Amendment: Fundamental Freedoms

This section encompasses essays on the First Amendment dealing specifically with fundamental freedoms. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on State Action Doctrine and Free Speech .

Second Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Second Amendment dealing specifically with the right to bear arms. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on Early Second Amendment Jurisprudence.

Third Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Third Amendment dealing specifically with the quartering of soldiers. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on Government Intrusion .

Fourth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Fourth Amendment dealing specifically with searches and seizures. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Amendment’s Historical Background .

Fifth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Fifth Amendment dealing specifically with the rights of persons. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay overviewing Due Process .

Sixth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Sixth Amendment dealing specifically with rights in criminal prosecutions. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on Prejudice and the Right to a Speedy Trial.

Seventh Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Seventh Amendment dealing specifically with civil trial rights. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay overviewing the Seventh Amendment.

Eighth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Eighth Amendment dealing specifically with cruel and unusual punishment. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the standard of cruel and unusual punishment.

Ninth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Ninth Amendment dealing specifically with unenumerated rights. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Amendment’s modern doctrine.

Tenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Tenth Amendment dealing specifically with rights reserved to states and the people. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on State Sovereignty .

Early Amendments

The two earliest amendments ratified after the Bill of Rights.

Eleventh Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Eleventh Amendment dealing specifically with suits against states. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the Amendment’s historical background.

Twelfth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twelfth Amendment dealing specifically with the election of the President.

Reconstruction Amendments

Also referred to as the Civil War Amendments, the 13th-15th Amendments were passed in the immediate aftermath of the Civil War to enshrine constitutional protections for newly-freed Black Americans.

Thirteenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Thirteenth Amendment dealing specifically with the abolition of slavery. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on Defining Badges and Incidents of Slavery

Fourteenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Fourteenth Amendment dealing specifically with equal protection and other rights. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay overviewing Substantive Due Process .

Fifteenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Fifteenth Amendment dealing specifically with the right to vote. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the right to vote generally .

Early Twentieth Century Amendments

The constitutional amendments ratified in the early twentieth century prior to the Second World War.

Sixteenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Sixteenth Amendment dealing specifically with income tax. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the historical background of the Amendment.

Seventeenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Seventeenth Amendment dealing specifically with the popular election of senators. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on the historical background of the Amendment.

Eighteenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Eighteenth Amendment dealing specifically with the prohibition of alcohol.

Nineteenth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Nineteenth Amendment dealing specifically with women’s suffrage. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay overviewing the amendment .

Twentieth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twentieth Amendment dealing specifically with the presidential terms and succession.

Twenty-First Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-First Amendment dealing specifically with the repeal of prohibition. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay on interstate commerce .

Twenty-Second Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-Second Amendment dealing specifically with Presidential term limits.

Post-War Amendments

Constitutional amendments passed in the twentieth century after the conclusion of the Second World War.

Twenty-Third Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-Third Amendment dealing specifically with District of Columbia electors.

Twenty-Fourth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-Fourth Amendment dealing specifically with the abolition of poll tax.

Twenty-Fifth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-Fifth Amendment dealing specifically with Presidential vacancy.

Twenty-Sixth Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-Sixth Amendment dealing specifically with the reduction of voting age.

Twenty-Seventh Amendment

This section encompasses essays on the Twenty-Sixth Amendment dealing specifically with the congressional compensation. A recommended first stop is the annotated essay overviewing the amendment .

Six amendments have been proposed by Congress, but have not been ratified by the States.

• Proposed Amendments Not Ratified by the States This essay covers amendments proposed by Congress, but as of yet unratified by the States.
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The first amendment, the declaration, the constitution, and the bill of rights.

by Jeffrey Rosen and David Rubenstein

At the National Constitution Center, you will find rare copies of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. These are the three most important documents in American history. But why are they important, and what are their similarities and differences? And how did each document, in turn, influence the next in America’s ongoing quest for liberty and equality?

There are some clear similarities among the three documents. All have preambles. All were drafted by people of similar backgrounds, generally educated white men of property. The Declaration and Constitution were drafted by a congress and a convention that met in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia (now known as Independence Hall) in 1776 and 1787 respectively. The Bill of Rights was proposed by the Congress that met in Federal Hall in New York City in 1789. Thomas Jefferson was the principal drafter of the Declaration and James Madison of the Bill of Rights; Madison, along with Gouverneur Morris and James Wilson, was also one of the principal architects of the Constitution.

Most importantly, the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are based on the idea that all people have certain fundamental rights that governments are created to protect. Those rights include common law rights, which come from British sources like the Magna Carta, or natural rights, which, the Founders believed, came from God. The Founders believed that natural rights are inherent in all people by virtue of their being human and that certain of these rights are unalienable, meaning they cannot be surrendered to government under any circumstances.

At the same time, the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are different kinds of documents with different purposes. The Declaration was designed to justify breaking away from a government; the Constitution and Bill of Rights were designed to establish a government. The Declaration stands on its own—it has never been amended—while the Constitution has been amended 27 times. (The first ten amendments are called the Bill of Rights.) The Declaration and Bill of Rights set limitations on government; the Constitution was designed both to create an energetic government and also to constrain it. The Declaration and Bill of Rights reflect a fear of an overly centralized government imposing its will on the people of the states; the Constitution was designed to empower the central government to preserve the blessings of liberty for “We the People of the United States.” In this sense, the Declaration and Bill of Rights, on the one hand, and the Constitution, on the other, are mirror images of each other.

Despite these similarities and differences, the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are, in many ways, fused together in the minds of Americans, because they represent what is best about America. They are symbols of the liberty that allows us to achieve success and of the equality that ensures that we are all equal in the eyes of the law. The Declaration of Independence made certain promises about which liberties were fundamental and inherent, but those liberties didn’t become legally enforceable until they were enumerated in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. In other words, the fundamental freedoms of the American people were alluded to in the Declaration of Independence, implicit in the Constitution, and enumerated in the Bill of Rights. But it took the Civil War, which President Lincoln in the Gettysburg Address called “a new birth of freedom,” to vindicate the Declaration’s famous promise that “all men are created equal.” And it took the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, ratified in 1868 after the Civil War, to vindicate James Madison’s initial hope that not only the federal government but also the states would be constitutionally required to respect fundamental liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights—a process that continues today.

Why did Jefferson draft the Declaration of Independence?

When the Second Continental Congress convened in Philadelphia in 1775, it was far from clear that the delegates would pass a resolution to separate from Great Britain. To persuade them, someone needed to articulate why the Americans were breaking away. Congress formed a committee to do just that; members included John Adams from Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin from Pennsylvania, Roger Sherman from Connecticut, Robert R. Livingston from New York, and Thomas Jefferson from Virginia, who at age 33 was one of the youngest delegates.

Although Jefferson disputed his account, John Adams later recalled that he had persuaded Jefferson to write the draft because Jefferson had the fewest enemies in Congress and was the best writer. (Jefferson would have gotten the job anyway—he was elected chair of the committee.) Jefferson had 17 days to produce the document and reportedly wrote a draft in a day or two. In a rented room not far from the State House, he wrote the Declaration with few books and pamphlets beside him, except for a copy of George Mason’s Virginia Declaration of Rights and the draft Virginia Constitution, which Jefferson had written himself.

The Declaration of Independence has three parts. It has a preamble, which later became the most famous part of the document but at the time was largely ignored. It has a second part that lists the sins of the King of Great Britain, and it has a third part that declares independence from Britain and that all political connections between the British Crown and the “Free and Independent States” of America should be totally dissolved.

The preamble to the Declaration of Independence contains the entire theory of American government in a single, inspiring passage:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,—That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

When Jefferson wrote the preamble, it was largely an afterthought. Why is it so important today? It captured perfectly the essence of the ideals that would eventually define the United States. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,” Jefferson began, in one of the most famous sentences in the English language. How could Jefferson write this at a time that he and other Founders who signed the Declaration owned slaves? The document was an expression of an ideal. In his personal conduct, Jefferson violated it. But the ideal—“that all men are created equal”—came to take on a life of its own and is now considered the most perfect embodiment of the American creed.

When Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address during the Civil War in November 1863, several months after the Union Army defeated Confederate forces at the Battle of Gettysburg, he took Jefferson’s language and transformed it into constitutional poetry. “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” Lincoln declared. “Four score and seven years ago” refers to the year 1776, making clear that Lincoln was referring not to the Constitution but to Jefferson’s Declaration. Lincoln believed that the “principles of Jefferson are the definitions and axioms of free society,” as he wrote shortly before the anniversary of Jefferson’s birthday in 1859. Three years later, on the anniversary of George Washington’s birthday in 1861, Lincoln said in a speech at what by that time was being called “Independence Hall,” “I would rather be assassinated on this spot than to surrender” the principles of the Declaration of Independence.

It took the Civil War, the bloodiest war in American history, for Lincoln to begin to make Jefferson’s vision of equality a constitutional reality. After the war, the Declaration’s vision was embodied in the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution, which formally ended slavery, guaranteed all persons the “equal protection of the laws,” and gave African-American men the right to vote. At the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848, when supporters of gaining greater rights for women met, they, too, used the Declaration of Independence as a guide for drafting their Declaration of Sentiments. (Their efforts to achieve equal suffrage culminated in 1920 in the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote.) And during the civil rights movement in the 1960s, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said in his famous address at the Lincoln Memorial, “When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men—yes, black men as well as white men—would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

In addition to its promise of equality, Jefferson’s preamble is also a promise of liberty. Like the other Founders, he was steeped in the political philosophy of the Enlightenment, in philosophers such as John Locke, Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui, Francis Hutcheson, and Montesquieu. All of them believed that people have certain unalienable and inherent rights that come from God, not government, or come simply from being human. They also believed that when people form governments, they give those governments control over certain natural rights to ensure the safety and security of other rights. Jefferson, George Mason, and the other Founders frequently spoke of the same set of rights as being natural and unalienable. They included the right to worship God “according to the dictates of conscience,” the right of “enjoyment of life and liberty,” “the means of acquiring, possessing and protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety,” and, most important of all, the right of a majority of the people to “alter and abolish” their government whenever it threatened to invade natural rights rather than protect them.

In other words, when Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence and began to articulate some of the rights that were ultimately enumerated in the Bill of Rights, he wasn’t inventing these rights out of thin air. On the contrary, 10 American colonies between 1606 and 1701 were granted charters that included representative assemblies and promised the colonists the basic rights of Englishmen, including a version of the promise in the Magna Carta that no freeman could be imprisoned or destroyed “except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.” This legacy kindled the colonists’ hatred of arbitrary authority, which allowed the King to seize their bodies or property on his own say-so. In the revolutionary period, the galvanizing examples of government overreaching were the “general warrants” and “writs of assistance” that authorized the King’s agents to break into the homes of scores of innocent citizens in an indiscriminate search for the anonymous authors of pamphlets criticizing the King. Writs of assistance, for example, authorized customs officers “to break open doors, Chests, Trunks, and other Packages” in a search for stolen goods, without specifying either the goods to be seized or the houses to be searched. In a famous attack on the constitutionality of writs of assistance in 1761, prominent lawyer James Otis said, “It is a power that places the liberty of every man in the hands of every petty officer.”

As members of the Continental Congress contemplated independence in May and June of 1776, many colonies were dissolving their charters with England. As the actual vote on independence approached, a few colonies were issuing their own declarations of independence and bills of rights. The Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776, written by George Mason, began by declaring that “all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.” 

When Jefferson wrote his famous preamble, he was restating, in more eloquent language, the philosophy of natural rights expressed in the Virginia Declaration that the Founders embraced. And when Jefferson said, in the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, that “[w]hen in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another,” he was recognizing the right of revolution that, the Founders believed, had to be exercised whenever a tyrannical government threatened natural rights. That’s what Jefferson meant when he said Americans had to assume “the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.”

The Declaration of Independence was a propaganda document rather than a legal one. It didn’t give any rights to anyone. It was an advertisement about why the colonists were breaking away from England. Although there was no legal reason to sign the Declaration, Jefferson and the other Founders signed it because they wanted to “mutually pledge” to each other that they were bound to support it with “our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.” Their signatures were courageous because the signers realized they were committing treason: according to legend, after affixing his flamboyantly large signature John Hancock said that King George—or the British ministry—would be able to read his name without spectacles. But the courage of the signers shouldn’t be overstated: the names of the signers of the Declaration weren’t published until after General George Washington won crucial battles at Trenton and Princeton and it was clear that the war for independence was going well.

What is the relationship between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution?

In the years between 1776 and 1787, most of the 13 states drafted constitutions that contained a declaration of rights within the body of the document or as a separate provision at the beginning, many of them listing the same natural rights that Jefferson had embraced in the Declaration. When it came time to form a central government in 1776, the Continental Congress began to create a weak union governed by the Articles of Confederation. (The Articles of Confederation was sent to the states for ratification in 1777; it was formally adopted in 1781.) The goal was to avoid a powerful federal government with the ability to invade rights and to threaten private property, as the King’s agents had done with the hated general warrants and writs of assistance. But the Articles of Confederation proved too weak for bringing together a fledgling nation that needed both to wage war and to manage the economy. Supporters of a stronger central government, like James Madison, lamented the inability of the government under the Articles to curb the excesses of economic populism that were afflicting the states, such as Shays’ Rebellion in Massachusetts, where farmers shut down the courts demanding debt relief. As a result, Madison and others gathered in Philadelphia in 1787 with the goal of creating a stronger, but still limited, federal government.

The Constitutional Convention was held in Philadelphia in the Pennsylvania State House, in the room where the Declaration of Independence was adopted. Jefferson, who was in France at the time, wasn’t among them. After four months of debate, the delegates produced a constitution.

During the final days of debate, delegates George Mason and Elbridge Gerry objected that the Constitution, too, should include a bill of rights to protect the fundamental liberties of the people against the newly empowered president and Congress. Their motion was swiftly—and unanimously—defeated; a debate over what rights to include could go on for weeks, and the delegates were tired and wanted to go home. The Constitution was approved by the Constitutional Convention and sent to the states for ratification without a bill of rights.

During the ratification process, which took around 10 months (the Constitution took effect when New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify in late June 1788; the 13th state, Rhode Island, would not join the union until May 1790), many state ratifying conventions proposed amendments specifying the rights that Jefferson had recognized in the Declaration and that they protected in their own state constitutions. James Madison and other supporters of the Constitution initially resisted the need for a bill of rights as either unnecessary (because the federal government was granted no power to abridge individual liberty) or dangerous (since it implied that the federal government had the power to infringe liberty in the first place). In the face of a groundswell of popular demand for a bill of rights, Madison changed his mind and introduced a bill of rights in Congress on June 8, 1789.

Madison was least concerned by “abuse in the executive department,” which he predicted would be the weakest branch of government. He was more worried about abuse by Congress, because he viewed the legislative branch as “the most powerful, and most likely to be abused, because it is under the least control.” (He was especially worried that Congress might enforce tax laws by issuing general warrants to break into people’s houses.) But in his view “the great danger lies rather in the abuse of the community than in the legislative body”—in other words, local majorities who would take over state governments and threaten the fundamental rights of minorities, including creditors and property holders. For this reason, the proposed amendment that Madison considered “the most valuable amendment in the whole list” would have prohibited the state governments from abridging freedom of conscience, speech, and the press, as well as trial by jury in criminal cases. Madison’s favorite amendment was eliminated by the Senate and not resurrected until after the Civil War, when the 14th Amendment required state governments to respect basic civil and economic liberties.

In the end, by pulling from the amendments proposed by state ratifying conventions and Mason’s Virginia Declaration of Rights, Madison proposed 19 amendments to the Constitution. Congress approved 12 amendments to be sent to the states for ratification. Only 10 of the amendments were ultimately ratified in 1791 and became the Bill of Rights. The first of the two amendments that failed was intended to guarantee small congressional districts to ensure that representatives remained close to the people. The other would have prohibited senators and representatives from giving themselves a pay raise unless it went into effect at the start of the next Congress. (This latter amendment was finally ratified in 1992 and became the 27th Amendment.)

To address the concern that the federal government might claim that rights not listed in the Bill of Rights were not protected, Madison included what became the Ninth Amendment, which says the “enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” To ensure that Congress would be viewed as a government of limited rather than unlimited powers, he included the 10th Amendment, which says the “powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Because of the first Congress’s focus on protecting people from the kinds of threats to liberty they had experienced at the hands of King George, the rights listed in the first eight amendments of the Bill of Rights apply only to the federal government, not to the states or to private companies. (One of the amendments submitted by the North Carolina ratifying convention but not included by Madison in his proposal to Congress would have prohibited Congress from establishing monopolies or companies with “exclusive advantages of commerce.”)

But the protections in the Bill of Rights—forbidding Congress from abridging free speech, for example, or conducting unreasonable searches and seizures—were largely ignored by the courts for the first 100 years after the Bill of Rights was ratified in 1791. Like the preamble to the Declaration, the Bill of Rights was largely a promissory note. It wasn’t until the 20th century, when the Supreme Court began vigorously to apply the Bill of Rights against the states, that the document became the centerpiece of contemporary struggles over liberty and equality. The Bill of Rights became a document that defends not only majorities of the people against an overreaching federal government but also minorities against overreaching state governments. Today, there are debates over whether the federal government has become too powerful in threatening fundamental liberties. There are also debates about how to protect the least powerful in society against the tyranny of local majorities.

What do we know about the documentary history of the rare copies of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights on display at the National Constitution Center?

Generally, when people think about the original Declaration, they are referring to the official engrossed —or final—copy now in the National Archives. That is the one that John Hancock, Thomas Jefferson, and most of the other members of the Second Continental Congress signed, state by state, on August 2, 1776. John Dunlap, a Philadelphia printer, published the official printing of the Declaration ordered by Congress, known as the Dunlap Broadside, on the night of July 4th and the morning of July 5th. About 200 copies are believed to have been printed. At least 27 are known to survive.

The document on display at the National Constitution Center is known as a Stone Engraving, after the engraver William J. Stone, whom then Secretary of State John Quincy Adams commissioned in 1820 to create a precise facsimile of the original engrossed version of the Declaration. That manuscript had become faded and worn after nearly 45 years of travel with Congress between Philadelphia, New York City, and eventually Washington, D.C., among other places, including Leesburg, Virginia, where it was rolled up and hidden during the British invasion of the capital in 1814.

To ensure that future generations would have a clear image of the original Declaration, William Stone made copies of the document before it faded away entirely. Historians dispute how Stone rendered the facsimiles. He kept the original Declaration in his shop for up to three years and may have used a process that involved taking a wet cloth, putting it on the original document, and creating a perfect copy by taking off half the ink. He would have then put the ink on a copper plate to do the etching (though he might have, instead, traced the entire document by hand without making a press copy). Stone used the copper plate to print 200 first edition engravings as well as one copy for himself in 1823, selling the plate and the engravings to the State Department. John Quincy Adams sent copies to each of the living signers of the Declaration (there were three at the time), public officials like President James Monroe, Congress, other executive departments, governors and state legislatures, and official repositories such as universities. The Stone engravings give us the clearest idea of what the original engrossed Declaration looked like on the day it was signed.

The Constitution, too, has an original engrossed, handwritten version as well as a printing of the final document. John Dunlap, who also served as the official printer of the Declaration, and his partner David C. Claypoole, who worked with him to publish the Pennsylvania Packet and Daily Advertiser , America’s first successful daily newspaper founded by Dunlap in 1771, secretly printed copies of the convention’s committee reports for the delegates to review, debate, and make changes. At the end of the day on September 15, 1787, after all of the delegations present had approved the Constitution, the convention ordered it engrossed on parchment. Jacob Shallus, assistant clerk to the Pennsylvania legislature, spent the rest of the weekend preparing the engrossed copy (now in the National Archives), while Dunlap and Claypoole were ordered to print 500 copies of the final text for distribution to the delegates, Congress, and the states. The engrossed copy was signed on Monday, September 17th, which is now celebrated as Constitution Day.

The copy of the Constitution on display at the National Constitution Center was published in Dunlap and Claypoole’s Pennsylvania Packet newspaper on September 19, 1787. Because it was the first public printing of the document—the first time Americans saw the Constitution—scholars consider its constitutional significance to be especially profound. The publication of the Constitution in the Pennsylvania Packet was the first opportunity for “We the People of the United States” to read the Constitution that had been drafted and would later be ratified in their name.

The handwritten Constitution inspires awe, but the first public printing reminds us that it was only the ratification of the document by “We the People” that made the Constitution the supreme law of the land. As James Madison emphasized in The Federalist No. 40 in 1788, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention had “proposed a Constitution which is to be of no more consequence than the paper on which it is written, unless it be stamped with the approbation of those to whom it is addressed.” Only 25 copies of the Pennsylvania Packet Constitution are known to have survived.

Finally, there is the Bill of Rights. On October 2, 1789, Congress sent 12 proposed amendments to the Constitution to the states for ratification—including the 10 that would come to be known as the Bill of Rights. There were 14 original manuscript copies, including the one displayed at the National Constitution Center—one for the federal government and one for each of the 13 states.

Twelve of the 14 copies are known to have survived. Two copies —those of the federal government and Delaware — are in the National Archives. Eight states currently have their original documents; Georgia, Maryland, New York, and Pennsylvania do not. There are two existing unidentified copies, one held by the Library of Congress and one held by The New York Public Library. The copy on display at the National Constitution Center is from the collections of The New York Public Library and will be on display for several years through an agreement between the Library and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; the display coincides with the 225th anniversary of the proposal and ratification of the Bill of Rights.

The Declaration, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights are the three most important documents in American history because they express the ideals that define “We the People of the United States” and inspire free people around the world.

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The Constitution

PDF: The Constitution

When was the Constitution Written?

The Constitution was written in the summer of 1787 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by delegates from 12 states, in order to replace the Articles of Confederation with a new form of government. It created a federal system with a national government composed of 3 separated powers, and included both reserved and concurrent powers of states. The president of the Constitutional Convention, the body that framed the new government, was  George Washington , though  James Madison  is known as the “Father of the Constitution” because of his great contributions to the formation of the new government.  Gouverneur Morris  wrote the Constitution’s final language. The Constitution was a compact – though Federalists and Anti-Federalists disagreed over whether the states or the people were the agents of the compact.

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When was the Constitution Ratified?

In September of 1787, it was sent to the states for ratification. Nine of the 13 states would have to ratify it for the Constitution to become effective for those ratifying states. The future was not certain at all—a debate began among the states over ratification. Those who argued that the Constitution should be approved were called Federalists; those who argued against it were called Anti-Federalists.

Many of the state conventions ratified the Constitution, but called for amendments specifically protecting individual rights from abridgement by the federal government. The debate raged for months. By June of 1788, 9 states had ratified the Constitution, ensuring it would go into effect for those 9 states. However, key states including Virginia and New York had not ratified. James Madison, the principal author of the Constitution, knew that grave doubts would be cast on the Constitution if those states (the home states of several of its chief architects, including Madison himself) did not adopt it.

During the ratification debate in Virginia, Madison promised that a bill of rights would be added after ratification. His promise reassured the convention and the Constitution was approved in that state by the narrowest margin. New York soon followed, but submitted proposed amendments. Two states, Rhode Island and North Carolina, refused to ratify without a bill of rights. A year later in June of 1789, Madison proposed a series of amendments to be debated in the first Congress.

Principles of the Constitution include checks and balances, individual rights, liberty, limited government, natural rights theory, republican government, and popular sovereignty.

Antecedent documents to the Constitution include the political writings about natural rights theory and forms of government by John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, and Montesquieu, and English charters of liberty including the Magna Carta and the English Bill of Rights. James Madison saw one important difference between those documents and the Constitution, however: “In Europe, charters of liberty have been granted by power. America has set the example . . . of charters of power granted by liberty.”

Preamble to the 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 defense, 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.

Article. I.

Section. 1..

All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives .

Section. 2.

The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states, and the electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature.

No person shall be a representative who shall not have attained to the age of twenty five years, and been seven years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that state in which he shall be chosen.

Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this union, according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other persons. The actual enumeration shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such manner as they shall by law direct. The number of representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand, but each state shall have at least one representative; and until such enumeration shall be made, the state of New Hampshire shall be entitled to chose three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations one, Connecticut five, New-York six, New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five, South Carolina five, and Georgia three.

When vacancies happen in the representation from any state, the Executive authority thereof shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies.

The House of Representatives shall chose their speaker and other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment. 

Section. 3.

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State,  chosen by the Legislature thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one Vote.

Immediately after they shall be assembled in consequence of the first Election, they shall be divided as equally as may be into three classes. The seats of the Senators of the first class shall be vacated at the expiration of the second year, of the second class at the expiration of the fourth year, and of the third class at the expiration of the sixth year, so that one third may be chosen every second year; and if vacancies happen by resignation, or otherwise, during the recess of the legislature of any state, the executive thereof may make temporary appointments until the next meeting of the legislature, which shall then fill such vacancies.

No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the age of thirty years, and been nine years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that state for which he shall be chosen.

The Vice President of the United States shall be President of the Senate, but shall have no vote, unless they be equally divided.

The Senate shall chose their other officers, and also a President pro tempore, in the absence of the Vice President, or when he shall exercise the Office of President of the United States.

The Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments . When sitting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of two thirds of the members present.

Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust or profit under the United States: but the party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment and punishment, according to law.

Section. 4.

The times, places and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives , shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by law make or alter such regulations, except as to the places of choosing Senators.

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall be on the first Monday in December , unless they shall by law appoint a different Day. 

Section. 5.

Each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns and qualifications of its own members, and a majority of each shall constitute a quorum to do business; but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner, and under such penalties as each House may provide.

Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings , punish its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of two thirds, expel a member.

Each House shall keep a Journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such parts as may in their judgment require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the members of either house on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those present, be entered on the journal.

Neither House, during the session of Congress , shall, without the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other place than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting. 

Section. 6.

The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in all cases, except treason, felony and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective Houses , and in going to and returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in either, they shall not be questioned in any other place.

No Senator or Representative shall, during the time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil office under the authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no person holding any office under the United States, shall be a member of either House during his continuance in office.

Section. 7.

All Bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other Bills.

Every bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it become a law, be presented to the President of the United States; If he approve he shall sign it, but if not he shall return it, with his objections to that House in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the objections at large on their journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such reconsideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the bill, it shall be sent, together with the objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and if approved by two thirds of that House, it shall become a law. But in all such cases the votes of both houses shall be determined by yeas and nays, and the names of the persons voting for and against the bill shall be entered on the journal of each house respectively. If any bill shall not be returned by the President within ten days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, the same shall be a law, in like manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their adjournment prevent its return, in which case it shall not be a law.

Every order, resolution, or vote to which the concurrence of the Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary (except on a question of Adjournment) shall be presented to the President of the United States; and before the same shall take effect, shall be approved by him, or being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by two thirds of the Senate and House of Representatives, according to the rules and limitations prescribed in the Case of a Bill.

Section. 8.

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

To borrow money on the credit of the United States;

To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian Tribes;

To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization , and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;

To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;

To establish Post Offices and post roads;

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;

To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;

To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offences against the Law of Nations;

To declare war , grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;

To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;

To provide and maintain a navy;

To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;

To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

To exercise exclusive Legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the State in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dock-yards, and other needful buildings;—And

To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof. 

Section. 9.

The migration or importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each person.

The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.

No bill of attainder or ex post facto law shall be passed.

No Capitation, or other direct, tax shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or enumeration herein before directed to be taken.

No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any state.

No preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or revenue to the ports of one state over those of another: nor shall vessels bound to, or from, one state, be obliged to enter, clear, or pay duties in another.

No money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in consequence of appropriations made by law; and a regular statement and account of the receipts and expenditures of all public money shall be published from time to time.

No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no person holding any office of profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.

Section. 10.

No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

No state shall, without the consent of the Congress, lay any imposts or duties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it’s inspection laws: and the net produce of all duties and imposts, laid by any state on imports or exports, shall be for the use of the Treasury of the United States; and all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of the Congress.

No state shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops, or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay.

Article. II.

The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of four years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same term, be elected, as follows

Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the state may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.

The Electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by ballot for two persons, of whom one at least shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves. And they shall make a list of all the persons voted for, and of the number of votes for each; which list they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates, and the votes shall then be counted. The person having the greatest number of votes shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if there be more than one who have such majority, and have an equal number of votes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately chose by ballot one of them for President; and if no person have a majority, then from the five highest on the list the said house shall in like manner chose the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; A quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. In every case, after the choice of the President, the person having the greatest number of votes of the electors shall be the Vice President. But if there should remain two or more who have equal votes, the Senate shall chose from them by ballot the Vice President .

The Congress may determine the time of choosing the electors, and the day on which they shall give their votes; which day shall be the same throughout the United States.

No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty five years, and been fourteen years a resident within the United States.

In case of the removal of the President from office, or of his death, resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said office, the same shall devolve on the Vice President, and the Congress may by law provide for the case of removal, death, resignation or inability, both of the President and Vice President, declaring what officer shall then act as President, and such officer shall act accordingly, until the disability be removed, or a President shall be elected.

The President shall, at stated times, receive for his services, a Compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during the period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that period any other emolument from the United States, or any of them.

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation :—”I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States , and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States, when called into the actual service of the United States; he may require the opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each of the executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices, and he shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offences against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.

He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate , to make treaties , provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the supreme court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law: but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.

The President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session.

He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the laws be faithfully executed , and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.

The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.

Article III.

The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their Offices during good behaviour, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in Office.

The judicial Power shall extend to all cases , in law and equity, arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority;—to all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls;—to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction;—to controversies to which the United States shall be a party;—to controversies between two or more states;— between a state and citizens of another State,—between citizens of different States,—between citizens of the same state claiming lands under grants of different states, and between a state, or the citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens or subjects.

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.

The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by jury ; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed.

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

Article. IV.

Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.

The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states.

A person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime.

No Person held to Service or labor in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or labor, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom such Service or labor may be due.

New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the Jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the Junction of two or more States, or Parts of States, without the Consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.

The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to Prejudice any Claims of the United States, or of any particular State.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government , and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.

Article. V.

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.

Article. VI.

All Debts contracted and Engagements entered into, before the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this Constitution, as under the Confederation.

This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land ; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.

Article. VII.

The ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same.

Done in convention by the unanimous consent of the states present the seventeenth day of September in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty seven and of the independence of the United States of America the twelfth.  In witness whereof We have hereunto subscribed our Names,

Bill of Rights

First amendment.

(ratified December 15, 1791)

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion , or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech , or of the press ; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Second Amendment

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.

Third Amendment

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

Fourth Amendment

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures , shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Fifth Amendment

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself , nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Sixth Amendment

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.

Seventh Amendment

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

Eighth Amendment

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishment s inflicted.

Ninth Amendment

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Tenth Amendment

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution , nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Eleventh Amendment

Passed by Congress March 4, 1794. Ratified February 7, 1795.

Note:  Article III, section 2, of the Constitution was modified by amendment 11.

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.

Twelfth Amendment

Passed by Congress December 9, 1803. Ratified June 15, 1804.

Note:  A portion of Article II, section 1 of the Constitution was superseded by the 12th amendment.

The Electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for President and Vice-President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate; — the President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted; — The person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President . But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. [And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President. –]* The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States. *Superseded by section 3 of the 20th amendment.

Thirteenth Amendment

Passed by Congress January 31, 1865. Ratified December 6, 1865.

Note:  A portion of Article IV, section 2, of the Constitution was superseded by the 13th amendment.

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Fourteenth Amendment

Passed by Congress June 13, 1866. Ratified July 9, 1868.

Note:  Article I, section 2, of the Constitution was modified by section 2 of the 14th amendment.

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age,* and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

*Changed by section 1 of the 26th amendment.

Fifteenth Amendment

Passed by Congress February 26, 1869. Ratified February 3, 1870.

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude–

The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Sixteenth Amendment

Passed by Congress July 2, 1909. Ratified February 3, 1913.

Note:  Article I, section 9, of the Constitution was modified by amendment 16.

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.

Seventeenth Amendment

Passed by Congress May 13, 1912. Ratified April 8, 1913.

Note:  Article I, section 3, of the Constitution was modified by the 17th amendment.

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof , for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each State shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures.

When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.

This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.

Eighteenth Amendment

Passed by Congress December 18, 1917. Ratified January 16, 1919. Repealed by amendment 21.

After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited.

The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

Nineteenth Amendment

Passed by Congress June 4, 1919. Ratified August 18, 1920.

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

Twentieth Amendment

Passed by Congress March 2, 1932. Ratified January 23, 1933.

Note:  Article I, section 4, of the Constitution was modified by section 2 of this amendment. In addition, a portion of the 12th amendment was superseded by section 3.

The terms of the President and the Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3d day of January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day.

If, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term of the President, the President elect shall have died, the Vice President elect shall become President. If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified; and the Congress may by law provide for the case wherein neither a President elect nor a Vice President elect shall have qualified, declaring who shall then act as President, or the manner in which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall have qualified.

The Congress may by law provide for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the House of Representatives may choose a President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them, and for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the Senate may choose a Vice President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them.

Sections 1 and 2 shall take effect on the 15th day of October following the ratification of this article.

This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission.

Twenty-First Amendment

Passed by Congress February 20, 1933. Ratified December 5, 1933.

The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.

The transportation or importation into any State, Territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited.

This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several States, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the States by the Congress.

Twenty-Second Amendment

Passed by Congress March 21, 1947. Ratified February 27, 1951.

No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice , and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.

This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.

Twenty-Third Amendment

Passed by Congress June 16, 1960. Ratified March 29, 1961.

The District constituting the seat of Government of the United States shall appoint in such manner as the Congress may direct:

A number of electors of President and Vice President equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives in Congress to which the District would be entitled if it were a State, but in no event more than the least populous State; they shall be in addition to those appointed by the States, but they shall be considered, for the purposes of the election of President and Vice President, to be electors appointed by a State; and they shall meet in the District and perform such duties as provided by the twelfth article of amendment.

The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Twenty-Fourth Amendment

Passed by Congress August 27, 1962. Ratified January 23, 1964.

The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax.

Twenty-Fifth Amendment

Passed by Congress July 6, 1965. Ratified February 10, 1967.

Note:  Article II, section 1, of the Constitution was affected by the 25th amendment.

In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President.

Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.

Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

Twenty-Sixth Amendment

Passed by Congress March 23, 1971. Ratified July 1, 1971.

Note:  Amendment 14, section 2, of the Constitution was modified by section 1 of the 26th amendment.

The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

Twenty-Seventh Amendment

Originally proposed Sept. 25, 1789. Ratified May 7, 1992.

No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.

The Constitution Explained

U.S. Constitution | Primary Source Essentials

Related Resources

James Madison

No other Founder had as much influence in crafting, ratifying, and interpreting the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights as he did. A skilled political tactician, Madison proved instrumental in determining the form of the early American republic.

Gouverneur Morris

Morris spoke more often (173 times) than any other delegate at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Though he was often on the losing side of issues and was not a political theorist on the level of Madison, Morris was a leader of the nationalist bloc at the Convention that ultimately carried the day.

George Washington

Washington secured American independence as commander of the Continental Army and established traditions as the nation’s first president.

America's Founding Documents

Constitution of the United States—A History

A more perfect union: the creation of the u.s. constitution.

General George Washington

He was unanimously elected president of the Philadelphia convention.

May 25, 1787, freshly spread dirt covered the cobblestone street in front of the Pennsylvania State House, protecting the men inside from the sound of passing carriages and carts. Guards stood at the entrances to ensure that the curious were kept at a distance. Robert Morris of Pennsylvania, the "financier" of the Revolution, opened the proceedings with a nomination--Gen. George Washington for the presidency of the Constitutional Convention. The vote was unanimous. With characteristic ceremonial modesty, the general expressed his embarrassment at his lack of qualifications to preside over such an august body and apologized for any errors into which he might fall in the course of its deliberations.

To many of those assembled, especially to the small, boyish-looking, 36-year-old delegate from Virginia, James Madison, the general's mere presence boded well for the convention, for the illustrious Washington gave to the gathering an air of importance and legitimacy But his decision to attend the convention had been an agonizing one. The Father of the Country had almost remained at home.

Suffering from rheumatism, despondent over the loss of a brother, absorbed in the management of Mount Vernon, and doubting that the convention would accomplish very much or that many men of stature would attend, Washington delayed accepting the invitation to attend for several months. Torn between the hazards of lending his reputation to a gathering perhaps doomed to failure and the chance that the public would view his reluctance to attend with a critical eye, the general finally agreed to make the trip. James Madison was pleased.

The Articles of Confederation

The determined Madison had for several years insatiably studied history and political theory searching for a solution to the political and economic dilemmas he saw plaguing America. The Virginian's labors convinced him of the futility and weakness of confederacies of independent states. America's own government under the Articles of Confederation, Madison was convinced, had to be replaced. In force since 1781, established as a "league of friendship" and a constitution for the 13 sovereign and independent states after the Revolution, the articles seemed to Madison woefully inadequate. With the states retaining considerable power, the central government, he believed, had insufficient power to regulate commerce. It could not tax and was generally impotent in setting commercial policy it could not effectively support a war effort. It had little power to settle quarrels between states. Saddled with this weak government, the states were on the brink of economic disaster. The evidence was overwhelming. Congress was attempting to function with a depleted treasury; paper money was flooding the country, creating extraordinary inflation--a pound of tea in some areas could be purchased for a tidy $100; and the depressed condition of business was taking its toll on many small farmers. Some of them were being thrown in jail for debt, and numerous farms were being confiscated and sold for taxes.

In 1786 some of the farmers had fought back. Led by Daniel Shays, a former captain in the Continental army, a group of armed men, sporting evergreen twigs in their hats, prevented the circuit court from sitting at Northampton, MA, and threatened to seize muskets stored in the arsenal at Springfield. Although the insurrection was put down by state troops, the incident confirmed the fears of many wealthy men that anarchy was just around the corner. Embellished day after day in the press, the uprising made upper-class Americans shudder as they imagined hordes of vicious outlaws descending upon innocent citizens. From his idyllic Mount Vernon setting, Washington wrote to Madison: "Wisdom and good examples are necessary at this time to rescue the political machine from the impending storm."

Madison thought he had the answer. He wanted a strong central government to provide order and stability. "Let it be tried then," he wrote, "whether any middle ground can be taken which will at once support a due supremacy of the national authority," while maintaining state power only when "subordinately useful." The resolute Virginian looked to the Constitutional Convention to forge a new government in this mold.

The convention had its specific origins in a proposal offered by Madison and John Tyler in the Virginia assembly that the Continental Congress be given power to regulate commerce throughout the Confederation. Through their efforts in the assembly a plan was devised inviting the several states to attend a convention at Annapolis, MD, in September 1786 to discuss commercial problems. Madison and a young lawyer from New York named Alexander Hamilton issued a report on the meeting in Annapolis, calling upon Congress to summon delegates of all of the states to meet for the purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation. Although the report was widely viewed as a usurpation of congressional authority, the Congress did issue a formal call to the states for a convention. To Madison it represented the supreme chance to reverse the country's trend. And as the delegations gathered in Philadelphia, its importance was not lost to others. The squire of Gunston Hall, George Mason, wrote to his son, "The Eyes of the United States are turned upon this Assembly and their Expectations raised to a very anxious Degree. May God Grant that we may be able to gratify them, by establishing a wise and just Government."

The Delegates

Seventy-four delegates were appointed to the convention, of which 55 actually attended sessions. Rhode Island was the only state that refused to send delegates. Dominated by men wedded to paper currency, low taxes, and popular government, Rhode Island's leaders refused to participate in what they saw as a conspiracy to overthrow the established government. Other Americans also had their suspicions. Patrick Henry, of the flowing red Glasgow cloak and the magnetic oratory, refused to attend, declaring he "smelt a rat." He suspected, correctly, that Madison had in mind the creation of a powerful central government and the subversion of the authority of the state legislatures. Henry along with many other political leaders, believed that the state governments offered the chief protection for personal liberties. He was determined not to lend a hand to any proceeding that seemed to pose a threat to that protection.

With Henry absent, with such towering figures as Jefferson and Adams abroad on foreign missions, and with John Jay in New York at the Foreign Office, the convention was without some of the country's major political leaders. It was, nevertheless, an impressive assemblage. In addition to Madison and Washington, there were Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania--crippled by gout, the 81-year-old Franklin was a man of many dimensions printer, storekeeper, publisher, scientist, public official, philosopher, diplomat, and ladies' man; James Wilson of Pennsylvania--a distinguished lawyer with a penchant for ill-advised land-jobbing schemes, which would force him late in life to flee from state to state avoiding prosecution for debt, the Scotsman brought a profound mind steeped in constitutional theory and law; Alexander Hamilton of New York--a brilliant, ambitious former aide-de-camp and secretary to Washington during the Revolution who had, after his marriage into the Schuyler family of New York, become a powerful political figure; George Mason of Virginia--the author of the Virginia Bill of Rights whom Jefferson later called "the Cato of his country without the avarice of the Roman"; John Dickinson of Delaware--the quiet, reserved author of the "Farmers' Letters" and chairman of the congressional committee that framed the articles; and Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania-- well versed in French literature and language, with a flair and bravado to match his keen intellect, who had helped draft the New York State Constitution and had worked with Robert Morris in the Finance Office.

There were others who played major roles - Oliver Ellsworth of Connecticut; Edmund Randolph of Virginia; William Paterson of New Jersey; John Rutledge of South Carolina; Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts; Roger Sherman of Connecticut; Luther Martin of Maryland; and the Pinckneys, Charles and Charles Cotesworth, of South Carolina. Franklin was the oldest member and Jonathan Dayton, the 27-year-old delegate from New Jersey was the youngest. The average age was 42. Most of the delegates had studied law, had served in colonial or state legislatures, or had been in the Congress. Well versed in philosophical theories of government advanced by such philosophers as James Harrington, John Locke, and Montesquieu, profiting from experience gained in state politics, the delegates composed an exceptional body, one that left a remarkably learned record of debate. Fortunately we have a relatively complete record of the proceedings, thanks to the indefatigable James Madison. Day after day, the Virginian sat in front of the presiding officer, compiling notes of the debates, not missing a single day or a single major speech. He later remarked that his self-confinement in the hall, which was often oppressively hot in the Philadelphia summer, almost killed him.

The sessions of the convention were held in secret--no reporters or visitors were permitted. Although many of the naturally loquacious members were prodded in the pubs and on the streets, most remained surprisingly discreet. To those suspicious of the convention, the curtain of secrecy only served to confirm their anxieties. Luther Martin of Maryland later charged that the conspiracy in Philadelphia needed a quiet breeding ground. Thomas Jefferson wrote John Adams from Paris, "I am sorry they began their deliberations by so abominable a precedent as that of tying up the tongues of their members."

The Virginia Plan

On Tuesday morning, May 29, Edmund Randolph, the tall, 34-year- old governor of Virginia, opened the debate with a long speech decrying the evils that had befallen the country under the Articles of Confederation and stressing the need for creating a strong national government. Randolph then outlined a broad plan that he and his Virginia compatriots had, through long sessions at the Indian Queen tavern, put together in the days preceding the convention. James Madison had such a plan on his mind for years. The proposed government had three branches--legislative, executive, and judicial--each branch structured to check the other. Highly centralized, the government would have veto power over laws enacted by state legislatures. The plan, Randolph confessed, "meant a strong consolidated union in which the idea of states should be nearly annihilated." This was, indeed, the rat so offensive to Patrick Henry.

The introduction of the so-called Virginia Plan at the beginning of the convention was a tactical coup. The Virginians had forced the debate into their own frame of reference and in their own terms.

For 10 days the members of the convention discussed the sweeping and, to many delegates, startling Virginia resolutions. The critical issue, described succinctly by Gouverneur Morris on May 30, was the distinction between a federation and a national government, the "former being a mere compact resting on the good faith of the parties; the latter having a compleat and compulsive operation." Morris favored the latter, a "supreme power" capable of exercising necessary authority not merely a shadow government, fragmented and hopelessly ineffective.

The New Jersey Plan

This nationalist position revolted many delegates who cringed at the vision of a central government swallowing state sovereignty. On June 13 delegates from smaller states rallied around proposals offered by New Jersey delegate William Paterson. Railing against efforts to throw the states into "hotchpot," Paterson proposed a "union of the States merely federal." The "New Jersey resolutions" called only for a revision of the articles to enable the Congress more easily to raise revenues and regulate commerce. It also provided that acts of Congress and ratified treaties be "the supreme law of the States."

For 3 days the convention debated Paterson's plan, finally voting for rejection. With the defeat of the New Jersey resolutions, the convention was moving toward creation of a new government, much to the dismay of many small-state delegates. The nationalists, led by Madison, appeared to have the proceedings in their grip. In addition, they were able to persuade the members that any new constitution should be ratified through conventions of the people and not by the Congress and the state legislatures- -another tactical coup. Madison and his allies believed that the constitution they had in mind would likely be scuttled in the legislatures, where many state political leaders stood to lose power. The nationalists wanted to bring the issue before "the people," where ratification was more likely.

Hamilton's Plan

Alexander Hamilton

On June 18 called the British government "the best in the world" and proposed a model strikingly similar. The erudite New Yorker, however, later became one of the most ardent spokesmen for the new Constitution.

On June 18 Alexander Hamilton presented his own ideal plan of government. Erudite and polished, the speech, nevertheless, failed to win a following. It went too far. Calling the British government "the best in the world," Hamilton proposed a model strikingly similar an executive to serve during good behavior or life with veto power over all laws; a senate with members serving during good behavior; the legislature to have power to pass "all laws whatsoever." Hamilton later wrote to Washington that the people were now willing to accept "something not very remote from that which they have lately quitted." What the people had "lately quitted," of course, was monarchy. Some members of the convention fully expected the country to turn in this direction. Hugh Williamson of North Carolina, a wealthy physician, declared that it was "pretty certain . . . that we should at some time or other have a king." Newspaper accounts appeared in the summer of 1787 alleging that a plot was under way to invite the second son of George III, Frederick, Duke of York, the secular bishop of Osnaburgh in Prussia, to become "king of the United States."

Alexander Hamilton on June 18 called the British government "the best in the world" and proposed a model strikingly similar. The erudite New Yorker, however, later became one of the most ardent spokesmen for the new Constitution.

Strongly militating against any serious attempt to establish monarchy was the enmity so prevalent in the revolutionary period toward royalty and the privileged classes. Some state constitutions had even prohibited titles of nobility. In the same year as the Philadelphia convention, Royall Tyler, a revolutionary war veteran, in his play The Contract, gave his own jaundiced view of the upper classes:

Exult each patriot heart! this night is shewn A piece, which we may fairly call our own; Where the proud titles of "My Lord!" "Your Grace!" To humble Mr. and plain Sir give place.

Most delegates were well aware that there were too many Royall Tylers in the country, with too many memories of British rule and too many ties to a recent bloody war, to accept a king. As the debate moved into the specifics of the new government, Alexander Hamilton and others of his persuasion would have to accept something less.

By the end of June, debate between the large and small states over the issue of representation in the first chamber of the legislature was becoming increasingly acrimonious. Delegates from Virginia and other large states demanded that voting in Congress be according to population; representatives of smaller states insisted upon the equality they had enjoyed under the articles. With the oratory degenerating into threats and accusations, Benjamin Franklin appealed for daily prayers. Dressed in his customary gray homespun, the aged philosopher pleaded that "the Father of lights . . . illuminate our understandings." Franklin's appeal for prayers was never fulfilled; the convention, as Hugh Williamson noted, had no funds to pay a preacher.

On June 29 the delegates from the small states lost the first battle. The convention approved a resolution establishing population as the basis for representation in the House of Representatives, thus favoring the larger states. On a subsequent small-state proposal that the states have equal representation in the Senate, the vote resulted in a tie. With large-state delegates unwilling to compromise on this issue, one member thought that the convention "was on the verge of dissolution, scarce held together by the strength of an hair."

By July 10 George Washington was so frustrated over the deadlock that he bemoaned "having had any agency" in the proceedings and called the opponents of a strong central government "narrow minded politicians . . . under the influence of local views." Luther Martin of Maryland, perhaps one whom Washington saw as "narrow minded," thought otherwise. A tiger in debate, not content merely to parry an opponent's argument but determined to bludgeon it into eternal rest, Martin had become perhaps the small states' most effective, if irascible, orator. The Marylander leaped eagerly into the battle on the representation issue declaring, "The States have a right to an equality of representation. This is secured to us by our present articles of confederation; we are in possession of this privilege."

The Great Compromise

Also crowding into this complicated and divisive discussion over representation was the North-South division over the method by which slaves were to be counted for purposes of taxation and representation. On July 12 Oliver Ellsworth proposed that representation for the lower house be based on the number of free persons and three-fifths of "all other persons," a euphemism for slaves. In the following week the members finally compromised, agreeing that direct taxation be according to representation and that the representation of the lower house be based on the white inhabitants and three-fifths of the "other people." With this compromise and with the growing realization that such compromise was necessary to avoid a complete breakdown of the convention, the members then approved Senate equality. Roger Sherman had remarked that it was the wish of the delegates "that some general government should be established." With the crisis over representation now settled, it began to look again as if this wish might be fulfilled.

For the next few days the air in the City of Brotherly Love, although insufferably muggy and swarming with blue-bottle flies, had the clean scent of conciliation. In this period of welcome calm, the members decided to appoint a Committee of Detail to draw up a draft constitution. The convention would now at last have something on paper. As Nathaniel Gorham of Massachusetts, John Rutledge, Edmund Randolph, James Wilson, and Oliver Ellsworth went to work, the other delegates voted themselves a much needed 10-day vacation.

During the adjournment, Gouverneur Morris and George Washington rode out along a creek that ran through land that had been part of the Valley Forge encampment 10 years earlier. While Morris cast for trout, Washington pensively looked over the now lush ground where his freezing troops had suffered, at a time when it had seemed as if the American Revolution had reached its end. The country had come a long way.

The First Draft

On Monday August 6, 1787, the convention accepted the first draft of the Constitution. Here was the article-by-article model from which the final document would result some 5 weeks later. As the members began to consider the various sections, the willingness to compromise of the previous days quickly evaporated. The most serious controversy erupted over the question of regulation of commerce. The southern states, exporters of raw materials, rice, indigo, and tobacco, were fearful that a New England-dominated Congress might, through export taxes, severely damage the South's economic life. C. C. Pinckney declared that if Congress had the power to regulate trade, the southern states would be "nothing more than overseers for the Northern States."

On August 21 the debate over the issue of commerce became very closely linked to another explosive issue--slavery. When Martin of Maryland proposed a tax on slave importation, the convention was thrust into a strident discussion of the institution of slavery and its moral and economic relationship to the new government. Rutledge of South Carolina, asserting that slavery had nothing at all to do with morality, declared, "Interest alone is the governing principle with nations." Sherman of Connecticut was for dropping the tender issue altogether before it jeopardized the convention. Mason of Virginia expressed concern over unlimited importation of slaves but later indicated that he also favored federal protection of slave property already held. This nagging issue of possible federal intervention in slave traffic, which Sherman and others feared could irrevocably split northern and southern delegates, was settled by, in Mason's words, "a bargain." Mason later wrote that delegates from South Carolina and Georgia, who most feared federal meddling in the slave trade, made a deal with delegates from the New England states. In exchange for the New Englanders' support for continuing slave importation for 20 years, the southerners accepted a clause that required only a simple majority vote on navigation laws, a crippling blow to southern economic interests.

The bargain was also a crippling blow to those working to abolish slavery. Congregationalist minister and abolitionist Samuel Hopkins of Connecticut charged that the convention had sold out: "How does it appear . . . that these States, who have been fighting for liberty and consider themselves as the highest and most noble example of zeal for it, cannot agree in any political Constitution, unless it indulge and authorize them to enslave their fellow men . . . Ah! these unclean spirits, like frogs, they, like the Furies of the poets are spreading discord, and exciting men to contention and war." Hopkins considered the Constitution a document fit for the flames.

On August 31 a weary George Mason, who had 3 months earlier written so expectantly to his son about the "great Business now before us," bitterly exclaimed that he "would sooner chop off his right hand than put it to the Constitution as it now stands." Mason despaired that the convention was rushing to saddle the country with an ill-advised, potentially ruinous central authority.  He was concerned that a "bill of rights," ensuring individual liberties, had not been made part of the Constitution. Mason called for a new convention to reconsider the whole question of the formation of a new government. Although Mason's motion was overwhelmingly voted down, opponents of the Constitution did not abandon the idea of a new convention. It was futilely suggested again and again for over 2 years.

One of the last major unresolved problems was the method of electing the executive. A number of proposals, including direct election by the people, by state legislatures, by state governors, and by the national legislature, were considered. The result was the electoral college, a master stroke of compromise, quaint and curious but politically expedient. The large states got proportional strength in the number of delegates, the state legislatures got the right of selecting delegates, and the House the right to choose the president in the event no candidate received a majority of electoral votes. Mason later predicted that the House would probably choose the president 19 times out of 20.

In the early days of September, with the exhausted delegates anxious to return home, compromise came easily. On September 8 the convention was ready to turn the Constitution over to a Committee of Style and Arrangement. Gouverneur Morris was the chief architect. Years later he wrote to Timothy Pickering: "That Instrument was written by the Fingers which wrote this letter." The Constitution was presented to the convention on September 12, and the delegates methodically began to consider each section. Although close votes followed on several articles, it was clear that the grueling work of the convention in the historic summer of 1787 was reaching its end.

Before the final vote on the Constitution on September 15, Edmund Randolph proposed that amendments be made by the state conventions and then turned over to another general convention for consideration. He was joined by George Mason and Elbridge Gerry. The three lonely allies were soundly rebuffed. Late in the afternoon the roll of the states was called on the Constitution, and from every delegation the word was "Aye."

On September 17 the members met for the last time, and the venerable Franklin had written a speech that was delivered by his colleague James Wilson. Appealing for unity behind the Constitution, Franklin declared, "I think it will astonish our enemies, who are waiting with confidence to hear that our councils are confounded like those of the builders of Babel; and that our States are on the point of separation, only to meet hereafter for the purpose of cutting one another's throats." With Mason, Gerry, and Randolph withstanding appeals to attach their signatures, the other delegates in the hall formally signed the Constitution, and the convention adjourned at 4 o'clock in the afternoon.

Weary from weeks of intense pressure but generally satisfied with their work, the delegates shared a farewell dinner at City Tavern. Two blocks away on Market Street, printers John Dunlap and David Claypoole worked into the night on the final imprint of the six-page Constitution, copies of which would leave Philadelphia on the morning stage. The debate over the nation's form of government was now set for the larger arena.

As the members of the convention returned home in the following days, Alexander Hamilton privately assessed the chances of the Constitution for ratification. In its favor were the support of Washington, commercial interests, men of property, creditors, and the belief among many Americans that the Articles of Confederation were inadequate. Against it were the opposition of a few influential men in the convention and state politicians fearful of losing power, the general revulsion against taxation, the suspicion that a centralized government would be insensitive to local interests, and the fear among debtors that a new government would "restrain the means of cheating Creditors."

The Federalists and the Anti-Federalists

Because of its size, wealth, and influence and because it was the first state to call a ratifying convention, Pennsylvania was the focus of national attention. The positions of the Federalists, those who supported the Constitution, and the anti-Federalists, those who opposed it, were printed and reprinted by scores of newspapers across the country. And passions in the state were most warm. When the Federalist-dominated Pennsylvania assembly lacked a quorum on September 29 to call a state ratifying convention, a Philadelphia mob, in order to provide the necessary numbers, dragged two anti-Federalist members from their lodgings through the streets to the State House where the bedraggled representatives were forced to stay while the assembly voted. It was a curious example of participatory democracy.

On October 5 anti-Federalist Samuel Bryan published the first of his "Centinel" essays in Philadelphia's Independent Gazetteer. Republished in newspapers in various states, the essays assailed the sweeping power of the central government, the usurpation of state sovereignty, and the absence of a bill of rights guaranteeing individual liberties such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion. "The United States are to be melted down," Bryan declared, into a despotic empire dominated by "well-born" aristocrats. Bryan was echoing the fear of many anti-Federalists that the new government would become one controlled by the wealthy established families and the culturally refined. The common working people, Bryan believed, were in danger of being subjugated to the will of an all-powerful authority remote and inaccessible to the people. It was this kind of authority, he believed, that Americans had fought a war against only a few years earlier.

The next day James Wilson, delivering a stirring defense of the Constitution to a large crowd gathered in the yard of the State House, praised the new government as the best "which has ever been offered to the world." The Scotsman's view prevailed. Led by Wilson, Federalists dominated in the Pennsylvania convention, carrying the vote on December 12 by a healthy 46 to 23.

The vote for ratification in Pennsylvania did not end the rancor and bitterness. Franklin declared that scurrilous articles in the press were giving the impression that Pennsylvania was "peopled by a set of the most unprincipled, wicked, rascally and quarrelsome scoundrels upon the face of the globe." And in Carlisle, on December 26, anti-Federalist rioters broke up a Federalist celebration and hung Wilson and the Federalist chief justice of Pennsylvania, Thomas McKean, in effigy; put the torch to a copy of the Constitution; and busted a few Federalist heads.

In New York the Constitution was under siege in the press by a series of essays signed "Cato." Mounting a counterattack, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay enlisted help from Madison and, in late 1787, they published the first of a series of essays now known as the Federalist Papers. The 85 essays, most of which were penned by Hamilton himself, probed the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation and the need for an energetic national government. Thomas Jefferson later called the Federalist Papers the "best commentary on the principles of government ever written."

Against this kind of Federalist leadership and determination, the opposition in most states was disorganized and generally inert. The leading spokesmen were largely state-centered men with regional and local interests and loyalties. Madison wrote of the Massachusetts anti-Federalists, "There was not a single character capable of uniting their wills or directing their measures. . . . They had no plan whatever." The anti-Federalists attacked wildly on several fronts: the lack of a bill of rights, discrimination against southern states in navigation legislation, direct taxation, the loss of state sovereignty. Many charged that the Constitution represented the work of aristocratic politicians bent on protecting their own class interests. At the Massachusetts convention one delegate declared, "These lawyers, and men of learning and moneyed men, that . . . make us poor illiterate people swallow down the pill . . . they will swallow up all us little folks like the great Leviathan; yes, just as the whale swallowed up Jonah!" Some newspaper articles, presumably written by anti-Federalists, resorted to fanciful predictions of the horrors that might emerge under the new Constitution pagans and deists could control the government; the use of Inquisition-like torture could be instituted as punishment for federal crimes; even the pope could be elected president.

One anti-Federalist argument gave opponents some genuine difficulty--the claim that the territory of the 13 states was too extensive for a representative government. In a republic embracing a large area, anti-Federalists argued, government would be impersonal, unrepresentative, dominated by men of wealth, and oppressive of the poor and working classes. Had not the illustrious Montesquieu himself ridiculed the notion that an extensive territory composed of varying climates and people, could be a single republican state? James Madison, always ready with the Federalist volley, turned the argument completely around and insisted that the vastness of the country would itself be a strong argument in favor of a republic. Claiming that a large republic would counterbalance various political interest groups vying for power, Madison wrote, "The smaller the society the fewer probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing it; the fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently will a majority be found of the same party and the more easily will they concert and execute their plans of oppression." Extend the size of the republic, Madison argued, and the country would be less vulnerable to separate factions within it.

Ratification

By January 9, 1788, five states of the nine necessary for ratification had approved the Constitution--Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, and Connecticut. But the eventual outcome remained uncertain in pivotal states such as Massachusetts, New York, and Virginia. On February 6, withFederalists agreeing to recommend a list of amendments amounting to a bill of rights, Massachusetts ratified by a vote of 187 to 168. The revolutionary leader, John Hancock, elected to preside over the Massachusetts ratifying convention but unable to make up his mind on the Constitution, took to his bed with a convenient case of gout. Later seduced by the Federalists with visions of the vice presidency and possibly the presidency, Hancock, whom Madison noted as "an idolater of popularity," suddenly experienced a miraculous cure and delivered a critical block of votes. Although Massachusetts was now safely in the Federalist column, the recommendation of a bill of rights was a significant victory for the anti-Federalists. Six of the remaining states later appended similar recommendations.

When the New Hampshire convention was adjourned by Federalists who sensed imminent defeat and when Rhode Island on March 24 turned down the Constitution in a popular referendum by an overwhelming vote of 10 to 1, Federalist leaders were apprehensive. Looking ahead to the Maryland convention, Madison wrote to Washington, "The difference between even a postponement and adoption in Maryland may . . . possibly give a fatal advantage to that which opposes the constitution." Madison had little reason to worry. The final vote on April 28 63 for, 11 against. In Baltimore, a huge parade celebrating the Federalist victory rolled through the downtown streets, highlighted by a 15-foot float called "Ship Federalist." The symbolically seaworthy craft was later launched in the waters off Baltimore and sailed down the Potomac to Mount Vernon.

On July 2, 1788, the Confederation Congress, meeting in New York, received word that a reconvened New Hampshire ratifying convention had approved the Constitution. With South Carolina's acceptance of the Constitution in May, New Hampshire thus became the ninth state to ratify. The Congress appointed a committee "for putting the said Constitution into operation."

In the next 2 months, thanks largely to the efforts of Madison and Hamilton in their own states, Virginia and New York both ratified while adding their own amendments. The margin for the Federalists in both states, however, was extremely close. Hamilton figured that the majority of the people in New York actually opposed the Constitution, and it is probable that a majority of people in the entire country opposed it. Only the promise of amendments had ensured a Federalist victory.

The Bill of Rights

The call for a bill of rights had been the anti-Federalists' most powerful weapon. Attacking the proposed Constitution for its vagueness and lack of specific protection against tyranny, Patrick Henry asked the Virginia convention, "What can avail your specious, imaginary balances, your rope-dancing, chain-rattling, ridiculous ideal checks and contrivances." The anti-Federalists, demanding a more concise, unequivocal Constitution, one that laid out for all to see the right of the people and limitations of the power of government, claimed that the brevity of the document only revealed its inferior nature. Richard Henry Lee despaired at the lack of provisions to protect "those essential rights of mankind without which liberty cannot exist." Trading the old government for the new without such a bill of rights, Lee argued, would be trading Scylla for Charybdis.

A bill of rights had been barely mentioned in the Philadelphia convention, most delegates holding that the fundamental rights of individuals had been secured in the state constitutions. James Wilson maintained that a bill of rights was superfluous because all power not expressly delegated to thenew government was reserved to the people. It was clear, however, that in this argument the anti-Federalists held the upper hand. Even Thomas Jefferson, generally in favor of the new government, wrote to Madison that a bill of rights was "what the people are entitled to against every government on earth."

By the fall of 1788 Madison had been convinced that not only was a bill of rights necessary to ensure acceptance of the Constitution but that it would have positive effects. He wrote, on October 17, that such "fundamental maxims of free Government" would be "a good ground for an appeal to the sense of community" against potential oppression and would "counteract the impulses of interest and passion."

Madison's support of the bill of rights was of critical significance. One of the new representatives from Virginia to the First Federal Congress, as established by the new Constitution, he worked tirelessly to persuade the House to enact amendments. Defusing the anti-Federalists' objections to the Constitution, Madison was able to shepherd through 17 amendments in the early months of the Congress, a list that was later trimmed to 12 in the Senate. On October 2, 1789, President Washington sent to each of the states a copy of the 12 amendments adopted by the Congress in September. By December 15, 1791, three-fourths of the states had ratified the 10 amendments now so familiar to Americans as the "Bill of Rights."

Benjamin Franklin told a French correspondent in 1788 that the formation of the new government had been like a game of dice, with many players of diverse prejudices and interests unable to make any uncontested moves. Madison wrote to Jefferson that the welding of these clashing interests was "a task more difficult than can be well conceived by those who were not concerned in the execution of it." When the delegates left Philadelphia after the convention, few, if any, were convinced that the Constitution they had approved outlined the ideal form of government for the country. But late in his life James Madison scrawled out another letter, one never addressed. In it he declared that no government can be perfect, and "that which is the least imperfect is therefore the best government."

The Document Enshrined

The fate of the United States Constitution after its signing on September 17, 1787, can be contrasted sharply to the travels and physical abuse of America's other great parchment, the Declaration of Independence . As the Continental Congress, during the years of the revolutionary war, scurried from town to town, the rolled-up Declaration was carried along. After the formation of the new government under the Constitution, the one-page Declaration, eminently suited for display purposes, graced the walls of various government buildings in Washington, exposing it to prolonged damaging sunlight. It was also subjected to the work of early calligraphers responding to a demand for reproductions of the revered document. As any visitor to the National Archives can readily observe, the early treatment of the now barely legible Declaration took a disastrous toll. The Constitution, in excellent physical condition after more than 200 years, has enjoyed a more serene existence. By 1796 the Constitution was in the custody of the Department of State along with the Declaration and traveled with the federal government from New York to Philadelphia to Washington. Both documents were secretly moved to Leesburg, VA, before the imminent attack by the British on Washington in 1814. Following the war, the Constitution remained in the State Department while the Declaration continued its travels--to the Patent Office Building from 1841 to 1876, to Independence Hall in Philadelphia during the Centennial celebration, and back to Washington in 1877. On September 29, 1921, President Warren Harding issued an Executive order transferring the Constitution and the Declaration to the Library of Congress for preservation and exhibition. The next day Librarian of Congress Herbert Putnam, acting on authority of Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes, carried the Constitution and the Declaration in a Model-T Ford truck to the library and placed them in his office safe until an appropriate exhibit area could be constructed. The documents were officially put on display at a ceremony in the library on February 28, 1924. On February 20, 1933, at the laying of the cornerstone of the future National Archives Building, President Herbert Hoover remarked, "There will be aggregated here the most sacred documents of our history--the originals of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitution of the United States." The two documents however, were not immediately transferred to the Archives. During World War II both were moved from the library to Fort Knox for protection and returned to the library in 1944. It was not until successful negotiations were completed between Librarian of Congress Luther Evans and Archivist of the United States Wayne Grover that the transfer to the National Archives was finally accomplished by special direction of the Joint Congressional Committee on the Library.

On December 13, 1952, the Constitution and the Declaration were placed in helium-filled cases, enclosed in wooden crates, laid on mattresses in an armored Marine Corps personnel carrier, and escorted by ceremonial troops, two tanks, and four servicemen carrying submachine guns down Pennsylvania and Constitution avenues to the National Archives. Two days later, President Harry Truman declared at a formal ceremony in the Archives Exhibition Hall.

"We are engaged here today in a symbolic act. We are enshrining these documents for future ages. This magnificent hall has been constructed to exhibit them, and the vault beneath, that we have built to protect them, is as safe from destruction as anything that the wit of modern man can devise. All this is an honorable effort, based upon reverence for the great past, and our generation can take just pride in it."

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U.S. Constitution.net

Federalist papers and the constitution.

During the late 1780s, the United States faced significant challenges with its initial governing framework, the Articles of Confederation. These issues prompted the creation of the Federalist Papers, a series of essays aimed at advocating for a stronger central government under the newly proposed Constitution. This article will examine the purpose, key arguments, and lasting impact of these influential writings.

Background and Purpose of the Federalist Papers

The Articles of Confederation, though a pioneer effort, left Congress without the power to tax or regulate interstate commerce, making it difficult to pay off Revolutionary War debts and curb internal squabbles among states.

In May 1787, America's brightest political minds convened in Philadelphia and created the Constitution—a document establishing a robust central government with legislative, executive, and judicial branches. However, before it could take effect, the Constitution needed ratification from nine of the thirteen states, facing opposition from critics known as Anti-Federalists.

The Federalist Papers, a series of 85 essays written by Alexander Hamilton , James Madison , and John Jay under the pseudonym "Publius," aimed to calm fears and win support for the Constitution. Hamilton initiated the project, recruiting Madison and Jay to contribute. Madison drafted substantial portions of the Constitution and provided detailed defenses, while Jay, despite health issues, also contributed essays.

The Federalist Papers systematically dismantled the opposition's arguments and explained the Constitution's provisions in detail. They gained national attention, were reprinted in newspapers across the country, and eventually collated into two volumes for broader distribution.

Hamilton emphasized the necessity of a central authority with the power to tax and enforce laws, citing specific failures under the Articles like the inability to generate revenue or maintain public order. Jay addressed the need for unity and the inadequacies of confederation in foreign diplomacy.

The Federalist Papers provided the framework needed to understand and eventually ratify the Constitution, remaining essential reading for anyone interested in the foundations of the American political system.

Key Arguments in the Federalist Papers

Among the key arguments presented in the Federalist Papers, three themes stand out:

• The need for a stronger central government
• The importance of checks and balances
• The dangers of factionalism

Federalist No. 23 , written by Alexander Hamilton, argued for a robust central government, citing the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation. Hamilton contended that empowering the central government with the means to enforce laws and collect taxes was essential for the Union's survival and prosperity.

In Federalist No. 51 , James Madison addressed the principle of checks and balances, arguing that the structure of the new government would prevent any single branch from usurping unrestrained power. Each branch—executive, legislative, and judicial—would have the means and motivation to check the power of the others, safeguarding liberty.

Federalist No. 10 , also by Madison, delved into the dangers posed by factions—groups united by a common interest adverse to the rights of others or the interests of the community. Madison acknowledged that factions are inherent within any free society and cannot be eliminated without destroying liberty. He argued that a well-constructed Union would break and control the violence of faction by filtering their influence through a large republic.

Hamilton's Federalist No. 78 brought the concept of judicial review to the forefront, establishing the judiciary as a guardian of the Constitution and essential for interpreting laws and checking the actions of the legislature and executive branches. 1

The Federalist Papers meticulously dismantled Anti-Federalist criticisms and showcased how the proposed system would create a stable and balanced government capable of both governing effectively and protecting individual rights. These essays remain seminal works for understanding the underpinnings of the United States Constitution and the brilliance of the Founding Fathers.

Analysis of Federalist 10 and Federalist 51

Federalist 10 and Federalist 51 are two of the most influential essays within the Federalist Papers, elucidating fundamental principles that continue to support the American political system. They were carefully crafted to address the concerns of Anti-Federalists who feared that the new Constitution might pave the way for tyranny and undermine individual liberties.

In Federalist 10 , James Madison addresses the inherent dangers posed by factions. He argues that a large republic is the best defense against their menace, as it becomes increasingly challenging for any single faction to dominate in a sprawling and diverse nation. The proposed Constitution provides a systemic safeguard against factionalism by implementing a representative form of government, where elected representatives act as a filtering mechanism.

Federalist 51 further elaborates on how the structure of the new government ensures the protection of individual rights through a system of checks and balances. Madison supports the division of government into three coequal branches, each equipped with sufficient autonomy and authority to check the others. He asserts that ambition must be made to counteract ambition, emphasizing that the self-interest of individuals within each branch would serve as a natural check on the others. 2

Madison also delves into the need for a bicameral legislature, comprising the House of Representatives and the Senate. This dual structure aims to balance the demands of the majority with the necessity of protecting minority rights, thereby preventing majoritarian tyranny.

Together, Federalist 10 and Federalist 51 form a comprehensive blueprint for a resilient and balanced government. Madison's insights address both the internal and external mechanisms necessary to guard against tyranny and preserve individual liberties. These essays speak to the enduring principles that have guided the American republic since its inception, proving the timeless wisdom of the Founding Fathers and the genius of the American Constitution.

Impact and Legacy of the Federalist Papers

The Federalist Papers had an immediate and profound impact on the ratification debates, particularly in New York, where opposition to the Constitution was fierce and vocal. Alexander Hamilton, a native of New York, understood the weight of these objections and recognized that New York's support was crucial for the Constitution's success, given the state's economic influence and strategic location. The essays were carefully crafted to address New Yorkers' specific concerns and to persuade undecided delegates.

The comprehensive detail and logical rigor of the Federalist Papers succeeded in swaying public opinion. They systematically addressed Anti-Federalist critiques, such as the fear that a strong central government would trample individual liberties. Hamilton, Madison, and Jay argued for the necessity of a powerful, yet balanced federal system, capable of uniting the states and ensuring both national security and economic stability.

In New York, the Federalist essays began appearing in newspapers in late 1787 and continued into 1788. Despite opposition, especially from influential Anti-Federalists like Governor George Clinton, the arguments laid out by "Publius" played a critical role in turning the tide. They provided Federalists with a potent arsenal of arguments to counter Anti-Federalists at the state's ratification convention. When the time came to vote, the persuasive power of the essays contributed significantly to New York's eventual decision to ratify the Constitution by a narrow margin.

The impact of the Federalist Papers extends far beyond New York. They influenced debates across the fledgling nation, helping to build momentum towards the required nine-state ratification. Their detailed exposition of the Constitution's provisions and the philosophic principles underlying them offered critical insights for citizens and delegates in other states. The essays became indispensable tools in the broader national dialogue about what kind of government the United States should have, guiding the country towards ratification.

The long-term significance of the Federalist Papers in American political thought and constitutional interpretation is substantial. Over the centuries, they have become foundational texts for understanding the intentions of the Framers. Jurists, scholars, and lawmakers have turned to these essays for guidance on interpreting the Constitution's provisions, shaping American constitutional law. Judges, including the justices of the Supreme Court, have frequently cited these essays in landmark rulings to elucidate the Framers' intent.

The Federalist Papers have profoundly influenced the development of American political theory, contributing to discussions about federalism, republicanism, and the balance between liberty and order. Madison's arguments in Federalist No. 10 have become keystones in the study of pluralism and the mechanisms by which diverse interests can coexist within a unified political system.

The essays laid the groundwork for ongoing debates about the role of the federal government, the balance of power among its branches, and the preservation of individual liberties. They provided intellectual support for later expansions of constitutional rights through amendments and judicial interpretations.

Their legacy also includes a robust defense of judicial review and the judiciary's role as a guardian of the Constitution. Hamilton's Federalist No. 78 provided a compelling argument for judicial independence, which has been a cornerstone in maintaining the rule of law and protecting constitutional principles against transient political pressures.

The Federalist Papers were crucial in the ratification of the Constitution, particularly in the contentious atmosphere of New York's debates. Their immediate effect was to facilitate the acceptance of the new governing framework. In the long term, their meticulously argued positions have provided a lasting blueprint for constitutional interpretation, influencing American political thought and practical governance for over two centuries. The essays stand as a testament to the foresight and philosophical acumen of the Founding Fathers, continuing to illuminate the enduring principles of the United States Constitution.

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The Six Principles of The Constitution

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Published: Mar 16, 2024

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Popular sovereignty, separation of powers, checks and balances, judicial review, limited government.

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The Federalist Papers

7 h total length

Discover the Genius of the Constitution

Thomas Jefferson described The Federalist Papers as “the best commentary on the principles of government, which ever was written.”

In this free ten-lecture course you will gain a deeper understanding of the purpose and structure of the American Founding by studying the arguments of America’s most influential Founders. Written between October 1787 and August 1788, The Federalist Papers  is a collection of newspaper essays written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay in defense of the Constitution.

Taught by Hillsdale College’s politics faculty, this course explores the major themes of this classic work of American politics, such as the problem of majority faction, the importance of separation of powers, the nature of the three branches of government, and the argument concerning the Bill of Rights.

By enrolling in this course you will receive free access to the course lectures, readings, and quizzes to aid you in this examination of the greatest Constitution ever written.

We invite you to join us today in this urgent study of the Constitution and what has been lost by the modern assault on it.  

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Lessons in this course.

Introduction: Articles of Confederation and the Constitutional Convention

Written following the Constitutional Convention of 1787,  The Federalist Papers  is the foremost American contribution to political thought. Originally published as newspaper essays in New York, they were written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay under the pen name Publius. The essays defended the merits of the Constitution as a necessary and good replacement for the Articles of Confederation, which had proven defective as a means of governance.

The Improved Science of Politics

Publius argued that the “science of politics . . . has received great improvement” in his own day. These improvements include separation of powers, legislative checks and balances, judges who serve a life term during good behavior, and what he called “the ENLARGEMENT of the ORBIT” of government. Contrary to the practice of previous republics, Publius argued that a republic had a much greater chance of achieving success if it is spread out over a large or extended territory, rather than a small or contracted one.

The Problem of Majority Faction

In  Federalist  10, Publius confronts one of the most important Anti-Federalist arguments against ratification: Republican government is impossible on a territory as large as the United States. In fact, such an undertaking had never been successful. In response, Publius proposes that the principal remedy for the political disease of faction—a disease “most incident to republican government”—is the large or extended sphere or territory.

Federalism and Republicanism

In the summer of 1787, the Framers labored to set up a political regime that would not only secure liberty and republicanism, but also bring energy and stability to the national government. Because of the failures of government under the Articles of Confederation, American political institutions were at risk. In order to secure these institutions, the Framers constructed a republican form of government that—among many other important features—instituted a new form of federalism.

Separation of Powers

In constituting a new government, the Framers knew that written rules—what Publius calls “parchment barriers”—would not be enough by themselves to protect liberty and prevent tyranny. Instead, Publius looks to the “interior structure” as the best means for keeping the branches properly and effectively separated. Separation of powers, the most important of the Constitution’s “auxiliary precautions,” works to prevent governmental tyranny, and by keeping each branch within its proper sphere of authority allows each branch to do its job well.

The Legislative: House and Senate

The Founders understood that the legislative branch is by nature the most powerful in a republican government. Experience of government under the Articles of Confederation, when state legislatures routinely encroached on executive and judicial powers, confirmed this. Thus, the Framers divided the legislative branch into two parts—the House and the Senate. In addition, they differentiated them as much as possible, consistent with the principles of republican government, with the goal of preventing tyranny and encouraging good government.

The Executive

Following their experience under the Articles of Confederation, and armed with the improved science of politics, the Framers instituted a unitary executive in the office of the president. Unlike the executive office in any previous republic, it was designed so as to ensure energy and responsibility in the executive, which are absolutely essential for good execution of the laws, and therefore for good government.

The Judiciary

In the Declaration of Independence, one charge leveled against King George III was that he had “made Judges dependent on his Will alone.” In framing a republican government, the Founders believed that an independent judiciary was indispensable. Publius argues that the term of life tenure during good behavior and a protected salary ensure this independence.

“The Constitution Is Itself . . . a Bill of Rights”

In  Federalist  84, Publius writes, “The truth is, after all the declamation we have heard, that the constitution is itself, in every rational sense, and to every useful purpose, A BILL OF RIGHTS.” In other words, the structure of the Constitution protects the rights of the people. In addition, the American people retain all powers not granted to the federal and state governments.

Conclusion: Constitutionalism Today

American government today is much different from the constitutional republic outlined in  The Federalist Papers —which relies on structure, representation, and limitations on the functions of the federal government. Administrative regulations and entitlements are two distinguishing features of modern government. These new features require a kind of government that is unlimited, disregards separation of powers, and violates the supreme law under which it claims to operate.

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First Principles of the American Founding (Web)

Essay #1 – INTRODUCTION

• Introduction: First Principles of the American Founding by Adam M. Carrington, Associate Professor of Politics, Hillsdale College; Author, Justice Stephen Field’s Cooperative Constitution of Liberty: Liberty in Full.

Essay #2 – Principle of government exists to secure liberty of the people rather than government existing to benefit itself. “We ought to consider, what is the end of government, before we determine which is the best form.” – John Adams, Thoughts on Government , in a letter in reply to William Hooper 1742-1790, North Carolina Continental Congress Delegate and John Penn 1740-1788, North Carolina Continental Congress Delegate, written spring 1776 in reply to NC delegates Hooper and Penn requesting Adams’ considerations on republican government for America upon gaining independence from Great Britain.

• Principle of Governing to Secure Liberty of the People, Not Government by George Landrith, President, Frontiers of Freedom.

Essay #3 – Principle of regard for history, order, and tradition.

• Essentially Bound: The Principle of Regard for History, Order, and Tradition by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #4 – Further on drawing from history, order and tradition in the formation of America’s founding documents such as the Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution of the 1700s. In 1639, a new colony, Connecticut, later a state gaining the motto “The Constitution State,” was founded by Reverends Thomas Hooker and John Davenport. Along with others, the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut were drafted, forming what is considered the first constitution in America. “…so to order and dispose of things that we the Inhabitants and Residents of Windsor, Hartford and Wethersfield are now cohabiting and dwelling in and upon the River of Connecticut and the lands thereunto adjoining; and well knowing where a people are gathered together the word of God requires that to maintain the peace and union of such a people there should be an orderly and decent Government established…General Assemblies or Courts…Court of Election…Magistrates…liberty of speech…Governor…promote the public good and peace of the same…maintain all lawful privileges of this Commonwealth; as also that all wholesome laws that are or shall be made by lawful authority here established, be duly executed…” – segments from the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, January 1639.

• History, Order and Tradition in the Formation of America’s Founding Documents by Ron Meier, West Point Graduate and Vietnam War Veteran; Constituting America Senior Essay Contest Winner; Author, Common Sense Rekindled: A Rejuvenation of the American Experiment.

Essay #5 – Principle of classical history discussed by the American founders for the purpose of applying its lessons toward a new and different governing system devoted to freedom and independence.

• Principle of Applying Lessons from Classical History toward New Governing Devoted to Freedom and Independence   by Winfield Rose, Distinguished Professor of Political Science Emeritus, Murray State University.

Essay #6 – Further on the principle of classical history discussed by the American founders for the purpose of applying its lessons toward a new and different governing system devoted to freedom and independence. In 1641, the Massachusetts Body of Liberties was written by a Puritan minister, Nathaniel Ward, considered the first bill of rights in America, continuing influences gained from those such as Magna Carta and others in the 1600s and into the 1700s for American law to come, and recognizing one is born with rights no government may take away. “The free fruition of such liberties, immunities and privileges as humanity, civility, and Christianity call for as due to every man in his place and proportion without impeachment and infringement hath ever been and ever will be the tranquility and stability of churches and commonwealths. And the denial or deprival thereof, the disturbance if not the ruin of both. We hold it therefore our duty and safety whilst we are about the further establishing of this government to collect and express all such freedoms as for present we foresee may concern us, and our posterity after us, and to ratify them with our solemn consent…” – With enumerated sections, in its original English spelling, the document was entitled, A Coppie of the Liberties of the Massachusets Collonie in New England, December 1641.

• Classical History and Governing Devoted to Freedom and Independence Through Restraining Power of Elected Representatives by Winfield Rose, Distinguished Professor of Political Science Emeritus, Murray State University.

Essay #7 – Classical history and significance of republican government as adopted by the United States and its influence during the American Revolutionary War.

• Republic or Democracy? Classical History, Republican Governing as Adopted by the United States, and the American Revolutionary War by Jay McConville, Military Veteran; Aerospace and Defense Industry Executive; Certified Personal Trainer, and Doctoral Candidate at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Essay #8 – Principle of constitutional restraints to prevent the undermining of interests of the entire Union. The Founders’ Join or Die efforts to protect the new Union of colonies to become a United States with state governments and one federal government with limits, resulted in Benjamin Franklin’s editorial cartoon running May 9, 1754 in his Pennsylvania Gazette, a picture of a snake cut in pieces representing the colonies. It served as a warning to join together or be destroyed by opponents of America. During tumultuous events of the French and Indian War, fighting the Stamp Act, and working toward independence from Britain, Americans agreed on protecting the Union.

• Principle of Constitutional Restraints To Prevent the Undermining of Interests of the Entire Union by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Essay #9 – Principle of natural law opposition to tyranny that binds a free people together and cannot disjoin them. “ When the law is the will of the people, it will be uniform and coherent: but fluctuation, contradiction, and inconsistency of councils must be expected under those governments where every revolution in the ministry of a court produces one in the state. Such being the folly and pride of all ministers, that they ever pursue measures directly opposite to those of their predecessors…We shall neither be exposed to the necessary convulsions of elective monarchies, nor to the want of wisdom, fortitude, and virtue, to which hereditary succession is liable. In your hands it will be to perpetuate a prudent, active and just legislature, and which will never expire until you yourselves lose the virtues which give it existence…Our Union is now complete; our constitution composed, established, and approved. You are now the guardians of your own liberties.” – Samuel Adams, Speech on American Independence, August 1, 1776.

• Keeping a Free People Securely Bound Together Through the Principle of Natural Law Opposition to Tyranny by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Essay #10 – Further on principle of appropriate role and purpose of government in protecting liberty of the citizenry and the function of running their own government.

• Principle of Appropriate Role and Purpose of Government in Protecting Liberty of the Citizenry by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #11 – Principle of educating based on ethical, philosophical self-evident truths of good government, designed for a free people, recognized as important for acquiring civic virtue. “ when the legislative or executive functionaries act unconstitutionally, they are responsible to the people in their elective capacity. the exemption of the judges from that is quite dangerous enough. I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society, but the people themselves: and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their controul with a wholsome discretion, the remedy is, not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. this is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.” – Thomas Jefferson in a letter to William Charles Jarvis, Monticello, September 28, 1820.

• Civic Virtue and a Free People: Principle of Educating on Ethical, Philosophical, Self-Evident Truths of Good Government by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #12 – Principle of educating based on ethical, philosophical self-evident truths of self-government and a good system of government for the country, designed for a free people, recognized as important for securing and continuing the blessings of liberty for future generations of Americans. The New England Primer , published in 1690, served as the main textbook through the nineteenth century. It was used to educate Americans on virtue, morals, and how to read.

• Educating a Free People to Secure the Blessings of Liberty for Future Generations of Americans by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Essay #13 – Principle of civic duty, civic engagement. In a letter, John Adams wrote from Philadelphia to his wife, Abigail, April 26, 1777. Battle weary, Adams stated as he closed, “Posterity! You will never know, how much it cost the present Generation, to preserve your Freedom! I hope you will make a good Use of it.” Adams hoped future Americans would accept responsibility to preserve what was being established in his day. Declaration of Independence grievance: “He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.”

• Principle of Civic Duty, Civic Engagement by Joseph M. Knippenberg, Professor of Politics, Oglethorpe University.

Essay #14 – Principle of civic duty to petition their own government for a redress of grievances.

• Principle of Civic Duty to Petition the Government for a Redress of Grievances by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #15 – Principle of civic duty to rein in overreaching government. “They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house?” – Patrick Henry, speech delivered at St. Johns Church, Richmond, Virginia, March 23, 1775 (“Give me liberty” quote was attributed to Patrick Henry, believed originally from William Wirt).

• A Founding Built Against Unbridled Power: Principle of Civic Duty to Rein In Overreaching Government by Scot Faulkner, Served as Chief Administrative Officer, U.S. House of Representatives and as a Member of the Reagan White House Staff; Financial Adviser; President, Friends of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

Essay #16 – Principle of citizenship, love of country. “The Unity of Government which constitutes you one people is also now dear to you. It is justly so; for it is a main Pillar in the Edifice of your real independence, the support of your tranquility at home; your peace abroad; of your safety; of your prosperity; of that very Liberty which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment, that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness” – George Washington, Farewell Address, first published September 19, 1796 in Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser and given the date September 17, 1796.

• Principle of Citizenship and Love of Country by Tom Hand, Creator and Publisher, Americana Corner; West Point Graduate; Serves on the Board of Trustees, American Battlefield Trust and the National Park Foundation’s National Council.

Essay #17 – Principle of America’s national sovereignty. “That these are our grievances which we have thus laid before his majesty, with that freedom of language and sentiment which becomes a free people claiming their rights, as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate: Let those flatter who fear; it is not an American art. To give praise which is not due might be well from the venal, but would ill beseem those who are asserting the rights of human nature. They know, and will therefore say, that kings are the servants, not the proprietors of the people.” – Thomas Jefferson in his pamphlet, “A Summary View of the Rights of British America” July 1774, Williamsburg, Virginia.

• Principle of America’s National Sovereignty by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Essay #18 – Further on principle of America’s national sovereignty upon preventing loss of independence to foreign or global governments acting as with binding authority in attempts to undermine the United States.

• Preventing Loss of Independence to Foreign or Global Governments by Upholding the Principle of America’s National Sovereignty by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Essay #19 – Principle of peace through strength. “Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance, by lying supinely on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?…It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!” – Patrick Henry, speech delivered at St. Johns Church, Richmond, Virginia, March 23, 1775 (“Give me liberty” quote was attributed to Patrick Henry, believed originally from William Wirt).

• Principle of Peace Through Strength by Robert Brescia, Board Director, Past Chairman, Basin PBS Television; Top Leadership Roles in Education, Corporate Business, Nonprofit, and Defense; Twenty-Seven Years of Public Service as an Airborne Ranger Cavalry Soldier, NCO, Commissioned Officer, U.S. Army; Appointed by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, State Board for Educator Certification.

Essay #20 – Principle of foreign policy based on a standard of freedom and independence. Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, December 19, 1776, Pamphlet 1, speech on “These are the times that try men’s souls” – not quitting in their fight for independence, writing how tyranny is not easily conquered, “Britain, with an army to enforce her tyranny, has declared that she has a right (not only to tax) but “to bind us in all cases whatsoever.”

• Principle of Foreign Policy Based on a Standard of Freedom and Independence by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Essay #21 – Principle of Creator-endowed unalienable rights.

• Human Flourishing and the Principle of Creator-Endowed Unalienable Rights by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #22 – Principle of natural law as the foundation for constitutional law. “ government by election and representation has its origin in the natural and eternal rights of man” – Thomas Paine, Dissertation on First Principles of Government, 1795.

• Principle of Natural Law as the Foundation for Constitutional Law by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #23 – Principle of appropriate role and purpose of government upon protection of unalienable rights, unchangeable, inherent, natural rights. The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for, among old parchments, or musty records. They are written, as with a sun beam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power. – Alexander Hamilton in his pamphlet, The Farmer Refuted, February 23, 1775, New York.

• Principle of Appropriate Role and Purpose of Government Upon Protection of Natural, Unchangeable, Unalienable Rights by Gary Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative.

Essay #24 – Principle of a written United States Constitution that is the supreme law of the land, designed for the preservation of liberty for each generation of future Americans since its ratification. “…a voyage to plant the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one of another, covenant and combine our selves together into a civil body politic, for our better ordering and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions and offices…” After high winds blew the ship off course landing the Pilgrims hundreds of miles off their destination, the first American document designed for self-governing, called the Mayflower Compact, was signed November 21, 1620 (November 11, old calendar) aboard the Mayflower ship at Cape Cod, what is now Massachusets. With an understanding, from experience about tyrannical rule, the early American settlers knew the importance of good governing and that a document to form it should be written for doing so themselves at the place they landed. Forty-one men signed the agreement that would help lay the framework for the new nation’s future Constitution.

• Principle of a Written United States Constitution as the Supreme Law of the Land, Designed for the Preservation of Liberty by Benjamin Slomski, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Ashland University.

Essay #25 – Further on the principle of a written United States Constitution, a contract allowing, under strict limits, a government to run under the authority of the American people within the states. “There are in the productions of all of them, among many excellent things, some sentiments, however, that it will be difficult to reconcile to reason, experience, the constitution of human nature, or to the uniform testimony of the greatest statesmen, legislators, and philosophers of all enlightened nations, ancient and modern.” – John Adams in his 1787-1877 A Defense of the Constitution of Government of the United States of America , Letter I, Volume I, Preliminary Observations, Grosvenor-Square, October 4, 1786, part of a three-volume response sparked by a 1778 letter degrading American constitutions as not enough in republican form for the people to remain in control but were only repeating dictatorships America was trying to escape. Adams argues this is not the case.

• Under Strict Limits: Principle of a Written U.S. Constitution, a Contract Allowing Government to Run Under Authority of the American People by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #26 – Principle of self-governing. “Let us also be mindful that the cause of freedom greatly depends on the use we make of the singular opportunities we enjoy of governing ourselves wisely; for if the event should prove, that the people of this country either cannot or will not govern themselves, who will hereafter be advocates for systems, which however charming in theory and prospect, are not reducible to practice. If the people of our nation, instead of consenting to be governed by laws of their own making, and rulers of their own choosing, should let licentiousness, disorder, and confusion reign over them, the minds of men every where, will insensibly become alienated from republican forms, and prepared to prefer and acquiesce in Governments, which, though less friendly to liberty, afford more peace and security…Receive this Address with the same candor with which it is written; and may the spirit of wisdom and patriotism direct and distinguish your councils and your conduct.” – John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, in his pamphlet, A Citizen of New York: An Address to the People of the State of New York, April 15, 1788.

• Principle of Self-Governing by Josh Herring, Dean of Classical Education, Director of Debate, Thales Academy.

Essay #27 – Principle of decision making by the majority within a constitutional framework.

• Principle of Decision Making by the Majority Within a Constitutional Framework by Eric C. Sands, Department Chair, Pre-Law Advisor, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs, Berry College.

Essay #28 – Principle of law and order based on immutable, constant laws of nature and of nature’s God rather than the arbitrary will of any human ruler or mob rule. “I am an Enemy to Vice, and a Friend to Vertue. I am one of an extensive Charity, and a great Forgiver of private Injuries: A hearty Lover of the Clergy and all good Men, and a mortal Enemy to arbitrary Government and unlimited Power. I am naturally very jealous for the Rights and Liberties of my Country; and the least appearance of an Incroachment on those invaluable Priviledges, is apt to make my Blood boil exceedingly.” Silence Dogood, a pseudonym used by Benjamin Franklin, No. 2, April 16, 1722, New-England Courant.

• Principle of Law and Order Based on Immutable Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God, Not Arbitrary Will or Mob Rule by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #29 – Principle of decentralized government where power is on the local level with each individual American and the states.   “Sir, I contemplate the abolition of the state constitutions as an event fatal to the liberties of America. These liberties will not be violently wrested from the people; they will be undermined and gradually consumed. On subjects of the kind we cannot be too critical…Will it not give occasion for an innumerable swarm of officers, to infest our country and consume our substance? People will be subject to impositions which they cannot support, and of which their complaints can never reach the government.” – Melancton Smith, Delegate, First Provincial Congress in New York; June 27, 1788 Notes during days beginning the New York Ratifying Convention.

• Principle of Decentralized Government: Keeping Power on the Local Level With Each Individual American and the States by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #30 – Principle of limited government. “W ith respect to the words ‘general welfare,’ I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.” – James Madison in a letter to James Roberts, Jr on April 20, 1831.

• Principle of Limited Government: Why the United States Constitution Is Designed To Prevent Centralized Power by Patrick Garry, Professor of Law, University of South Dakota; Author, Limited Government and the Bill of Rights.

Essay #31 – Principle of equality over equity, equal opportunities instead of guaranteed outcomes which cannot be guaranteed unless free market choices, competition, product development and improvements are extinguished.

• Principle of Equality Over Equity by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #32 – Principle of meritocracy.

• Principle of Meritocracy and Its Importance Within the Framework of the U.S. Socio-Economic and Political Systems by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #33 – Principle of representative government under direction of the people rather than king rule, a principle applied by the American Founders in the United States Constitution. “But where says some is the King of America? I’ll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain. Yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far we approve of monarchy, that in America the law is king. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other. But lest any ill use should afterwards arise, let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished, and scattered among the people whose right it is.” – Thomas Paine, Common Sense, February 14, 1776.

• Principle of Representative Government Under Direction of the People Rather Than King Rule by Ron Meier, West Point Graduate and Vietnam War Veteran; Constituting America Senior Essay Contest Winner; Author,  Common Sense Rekindled: A Rejuvenation of the American Experiment.

Essay #34 – Principle of representative government over a hereditary system. “…for it is impossible to discover superiority of right in any family, by virtue of which hereditary government could begin… It is one step toward liberty, to perceive that hereditary government could not begin as an exclusive right in any family…With respect to the first of these heads, that of a family establishing itself with hereditary powers on its own authority independent of the nation, all men will concur in calling it despotism…It operates to preclude the consent of the succeeding generations, and the preclusion of consent is despotism.” – Thomas Paine, Dissertation on the First Principles of Government 1795.

• Of the People, by the People, and for the People: Founding a Representative Government in America, Not Hereditary Succession by Ron Meier, West Point Graduate and Vietnam War Veteran; Constituting America Senior Essay Contest Winner; Author, Common Sense Rekindled: A Rejuvenation of the American Experiment.

Essay #35 – Principle of free government and free society, entrusted to the hands of the American people, never confiscated by a tyrannical government system working to control rather than serve the citizenry.

• Principle of Free Government and Free Society by Adam M. Carrington, Associate Professor of Politics, Hillsdale College; Author, Justice Stephen Field’s Cooperative Constitution of Liberty: Liberty in Full.

Essay #36 – Principle of separation of powers, involving checks and balances on those powers: maintaining separation for any power of office held in order to prevent development of tyranny, to prevent concentration where power is built up into one place which prevents checks or restraints by the people. The first grievance in the Declaration of Independence where the king refused to pass laws; The first of the seven Articles of the United States Constitution, Articles I, II, and III, show separate branches of governing and their powers including how they are chosen.

• Principle of the Separation of Powers, Involving Checks and Balances on Those Powers by Patrick Garry, Professor of Law, University of South Dakota; Author, Limited Government and the Bill of Rights.

Essay #37 – Principle of duty of the American people to continually observe government decisions and maintain checks on government power. “ Where are your checks in this government? Your strongholds will be in the hands of your enemies. It is on a supposition that your American governors shall be honest, that all the good qualities of this government are founded; but its defective and imperfect construction puts it in their power to perpetrate the worst of mischiefs, should they be bad men; and, sir, would not all the world, from the eastern to the western hemisphere, blame our distracted folly in resting our rights upon the contingency of our rulers being good or bad? Show me that age and country where the rights and liberties of the people were placed on the sole chance of their rulers being good men, without a consequent loss of liberty! I say that the loss of that dearest privilege has ever followed, with absolute certainty, every such mad attempt…The most valuable end of government is the liberty of the inhabitants. No possible advantages can compensate for the loss of this privilege.” – Patrick Henry, speech before the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 5, 1788.

• Principle of Duty of the American People to Continually Maintain Checks on Government Power by Scot Faulkner, Served as Chief Administrative Officer, U.S. House of Representatives and as a Member of the Reagan White House Staff; Financial Adviser; President, Friends of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

Essay #38 – Principle of a Legislative Branch, first within a system of government closest and as local to the people as possible with a limited federal government and strong local and state governing so that the people remain in control of their own government, with the Legislative Branch having been listed first in the Constitution for this purpose and to show it as the most important, then the Executive, then the Judiciary.

• Principle of a Legislative Branch Within a System of Government Closest to the People by Scot Faulkner, Served as Chief Administrative Officer, U.S. House of Representatives and as a Member of the Reagan White House Staff; Financial Adviser; President, Friends of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

Essay #39 – Principle of an Executive Branch , a strong executive but a role accountable to the people, the legislature, which seats a president and not a king, and the Executive Branch is controlled by the Legislative Branch which is closest to the people. The Executive Branch is listed second in the Constitution after the Legislative Branch.

• Principle of an Executive Branch, Strong but a Role Accountable to the People by Benjamin Slomski, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Ashland University.

Essay #40 – Principle of a Judicial Branch , forming a Supreme Court and having the least amount of power of the three branches and no legislative power. The third branch of United States government, the Judicial Branch, is listed last in the Constitution after the Legislative and then Executive Branch.

• Principle of a Judicial Branch for Ensuring Justice Without Political Interference by Eric C. Sands, Department Chair, Pre-Law Advisor, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs, Berry College.

Essay #41 – Principle of rule of law, not of men; careful observance of the formation and execution of laws.

• Careful Observance Upon Forming and Executing Laws: Principle of the Rule of Law, Not of Men by George Landrith, President, Frontiers of Freedom.

Essay #42 – Principle of consent of the governed, that government without consent is overreaching its appropriate bounds, having moved from governing to tyranny. “…that the King with and by the authority of parliament, is able to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity to limit and bind the crown, and the descent, limitation, inheritance and government thereof” is founded on the principles of liberty and the British constitution: And he that would palm the doctrine of unlimited passive obedience and non-resistance upon mankind, and thereby or by any other means serve the cause of the Pretender, is not only a fool and a knave, but a rebel against common sense, as well as the laws of God, of Nature, and his Country…These are their bounds, which by God and nature are fixed, hitherto have they a right to come, and no further…The sum of my argument is, That civil government is of God…That this constitution is the most free one, and by far the best, now existing on earth: That by this constitution, every man in the dominion is a free man: That no parts of his Majesty’s dominions can be taxed without their consent: That every part has a right to be represented in the supreme or some subordinate legislature…” – James Otis, Rights of British Colonies Asserted and Proved, pamphlet, 1763.

• Principle of Consent of the Governed: Upholding Appropriate Boundaries Against Governing by Tyranny by Winfield Rose, Distinguished Professor of Political Science Emeritus, Murray State University.

Essay #43 – Further on the principle of rule of law: difference between a mandate and a law, Founders’ warnings against arbitrary laws or mandates handed out as having the force of law which dilute the meaning of true law and order that protect the liberty of the people.

• Mandate or Law: The American Founders on Warning Against Arbitrary, Tyrannical Dictates Diluting Rule of Law by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #44 – Principle of justice for all.

• Principle of Justice for All by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #45 – Principle of equal justice under the law.

• Principle of Equal Under the Law by Daniel A. Cotter, Attorney and Counselor; Author of The Chief Justices ; A past president of The Chicago Bar Association.

Essay #46 – Principle of a political system with criminal and civil law, enacted by a legislative body, and accessible to all American citizens. “…it ought not to be overlooked, that such an additional accumulation of power in the judicial department would not only furnish pretexts for clamor against it, but might create a general dread of its influence, which could hardly fail to disturb the salutory effects of its ordinary functions…There is nothing, of which a free people are so apt to be jealous,, as of the existence of political functions, and political checks, in those, who are not appointed by, and mde directly responsible to themselves.” – Joseph Story, United States Supreme Court Justice appointed by James Madison, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States: With A Preliminary Review of the Constitutional History of the Colonies and States, Before the Adoption of the Constitution. Published in 1833.

• Principle of a Political System with Criminal and Civil Law by James C. Clinger, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Murray State University; Past President, Kentucky Political Science Association.

Essay #47 – Principle of due process of law.

• Principle of Due Process of Law by James C. Clinger, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Murray State University; Past President, Kentucky Political Science Association.

Essay #48 – Principle of innocent of any crime until proven guilty.

• Principle of Innocent of Any Crime Until Proven Guilty by Ben Peterson, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Abilene Christian University.

Essay #49 – Principle of freedom of a person under the protection of habeas corpus.

• Principle of Freedom of a Person Under the Protection of Habeas Corpus by Eric C. Sands, Department Chair, Pre-Law Advisor, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs, Berry College.

Essay #50 – Principle of courts with justices who hold their offices during good behavior; importance of the phrase “during good behavior” for public servants. “Every man ought to be amenable for his conduct, and there are no persons so proper to complain of the public officers as the representatives of the people at large. The representatives of the people know the feelings of the people at large, and will be ready enough to make complaints. If this power were not provided, the consequences might be fatal. It will be not only the means of punishing misconduct but it will prevent misconduct. A man in public office who knows that there is no tribunal to punish him may be ready to deviate from his duty; but if he knows there is a tribunal for that purpose, although he may be a man of no principle, the very terror of punishment will perhaps deter him.” – James Iredell, U.S. Supreme Court Justice placed by George Washington, North Carolina Ratification Convention, July 24, 1788.

• Principle of Courts With Justices Who Hold Their Offices During Good Behavior by Benjamin Slomski, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Ashland University.

Essay #51 – Principle of no unreasonable searches or seizures.

• Principle of No Unreasonable Searches and Seizures by James S. Humphreys, Professor of History, Murray State University.

Essay #52 – Principle of right to a speedy trial by a jury of peers, public, impartial, without cruel or unusual punishments, as part of the judicial system. “I consider [trial by jury] as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.” – Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Thomas Paine, 1789.

• Principle of Right to a Speedy Trial by a Jury of Peers, Public and Impartial, Without Cruel or Unusual Punishments by Tony Williams, Author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America;  Senior Teaching Fellow, Bill of Rights Institute; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #53 – Principle of a Grand Jury indictment of capital crimes before a person may be held to account.

• Principle of a Grand Jury Indictment of Capital Crimes Before a Person May Be Held to Account by James C. Clinger, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Murray State University; Past President, Kentucky Political Science Association.

Essay #54 – Principle of no passage, federal or state, of ex post facto laws of bills of attainder so that an individual is not held guilty of a crime and inflicted a punishment without a trial, to prevent abuse of the law.

• Principle of No Passage, Federal or State, of Ex Post Facto Laws by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #55 – Principle of republican and limited form of government, representative through American citizens voting in free and frequent elections. “ There are however some things deducible from reason, and evidenced by experience, that serve to guide our decision upon the case. The one is never to invest any individual with extraordinary power; for besides his being tempted to misuse it, it will excite contention and commotion in the nation for the office. Secondly, never to invest power long in the hands of any number of individuals. The inconveniences that may be supposed to accompany frequent changes are less to be feared than the danger that arises from long continuance.” – Thomas Paine, Dissertation on First Principles of Government, 1795.

• Principle of Republican and Limited Form of Government, Representative Through American Citizens Voting in Free and Frequent Elections by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #56 – Principle of free, fair, independent elections involving preservation of the electoral college.

Principle of Free, Fair, Independent Elections Involving Preservation of the Electoral College by Tara Ross, Nationally Recognized Expert on the Electoral College, Author of Why We Need the Electoral College ;  The Indispensable Electoral College :  How the Founders’ Plan Saves Our Country from Mob Rule ;  Prager University video,  Do You Understand the Electoral College?

Essay #57 – Further on principle of representative government only under authority of the American people.

• Principle of Representative Government Only Under Authority of the American People by J. Eric Wise, Partner, Alston & Bird.

Essay #58 –Principle of establishing justice through the rule of law.

• Principle of Establishing Justice Through The Rule of Law by Joerg Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow

Essay #59 – Principle of one nation under God.

• Principle of One Nation Under God by Gary Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative.

Essay #60 – Principle of maintaining freedom and independence through an armed citizenry, right to protect one’s person and property by the personal keeping and bearing of arms. “to preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms.” – Richard Henry Lee, Federal Farmer XVIII, January 25, 1788.

• Principle of Maintaining Freedom and Independence Through an Armed Citizenry: Right To Protect One’s Person and Property by the Personal Keeping and Bearing of Arms by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #61 – Principle of peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none. The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith…Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people under an efficient government. the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel. Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice? It is our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements…Taking care always to keep ourselves by suitable establishments on a respectable defensive posture, we may safely trust to temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies.” – George Washington, Farewell Address, first published September 19, 1796 in Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser and given the date September 17, 1796.

• Principle of Peace, Commerce and Honest Friendship With All Nations, Entangling Alliances With None by Tony Williams, Author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America;  Senior Teaching Fellow, Bill of Rights Institute; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #62 – Principle of civil over military authority – protection against corruption, foreign or domestic attempts to divide and destroy America. The way is plain, says the anonymous Addresser. If War continues, remove into the unsettled Country; there establish yourselves, and leave an ungrateful Country to defend itself. But who are they to defend? Our Wives, our Children, our Farms, and other property which we leave behind us. or, in this state of hostile separation, are we to take the two first (the latter cannot be removed), to perish in a Wilderness, with hunger, cold and nakedness? If Peace takes place, never sheath your Swords Says he until you have obtained full and ample justice; this dreadful alternative, of either deserting our Country in the extremest hour of her distress, or turning our Arms against it…what can this writer have in view, by recommending such measures? Can he be a friend to the Army? Can he be a friend to this Country? – George Washington, Speech to the Officers of the Army at Newburgh, in response to petitions for the United States military to protest in mutiny. March 15, 1783.

• Principle of Civil Over Military Authority: Protection Against Corruption, Foreign or Domestic Attempts To Divide and Destroy America by Tony Williams, Author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America;  Senior Teaching Fellow, Bill of Rights Institute; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #63 – Principle of unity as Americans, preventing faction or division through election only of representatives who understand the United States Constitution and are willing to uphold it. “They were likewise sensible that on a subject so comprehensive, and involving such a variety of points and questions, the most able, the most candid, and the most honest men will differ in opinion…Although many weeks were passed in these discussions, some points remained, on which a unison of opinions could not be effected. Here again that same happy disposition to unite and conciliate, induced them to meet each other; and enabled them, by mutual concessions, finally to complete and agree to the plan they have recommended, and that too with a degree of unanimity which, considering the variety of discordant views and ideas, they had to reconcile, is really astonishing…Reflect that the present plan comes recommended to you by men and fellow citizens who have given you the highest proofs that men can give, of their justice, their love for liberty and their country, of their prudence, of their application, and of their talents. They tell you it is the best that they could form; and that in their opinion, it is necessary to redeem you from those calamities which already begin to be heavy upon us all.” – John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, in his pamphlet, A Citizen of New York: An Address to the People of the State of New York, April 15, 1788.

• Principle of Unity as Americans, Limiting Faction Through Election Only of Representatives Who Understand and Will Uphold the United States Constitution by Ron Meier, West Point Graduate and Vietnam War Veteran; Constituting America Senior Essay Contest Winner; Author, Common Sense Rekindled: A Rejuvenation of the American Experiment.

Essay #64 – Principle of strong defense capability to protect the United States against the danger and severity of treason.

• Principle of Strong Defense Capability To Protect the United States Against the Danger and Severity of Treason by James P. Pinkerton, who worked in the White House domestic policy offices of Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush and in their 1980, 1984, 1988 and 1992 presidential campaigns.

Essay #65 – Principle of appropriate role and purpose of government upon protecting the people from violence and fraud. “I do believe that men of genius will be deterred unless possessed of great virtues. We may well dispense with the first characters when destitute of virtue I should wish them never to come forward–But if we do not provide against corruption, our government will soon be at an end: nor would I wish to put a man of virtue in the way of temptation. Evasions, and caballing would evade the amendment. Nor would the danger be less, if the executive has the appointment of officers. The first three or four years we might go on well enough; but what would be the case afterwards? I will add, that such a government ought to be refused by the people–and it will be refused.” – George Mason, Farrand’s Records, Federal Convention, Saturday, June 23, 1787, regarding provisions against fraud and corruption regardless of an invasion’s origin slowly eroding the United States.

• Principle of Appropriate Role and Purpose of Government Upon Protecting the People From Violence and Fraud by Andrew Langer

Essay #66 – Corruption and the Constitution: Principle of Constitutional Law and a Foundation of a Virtuous and Moral People

• Corruption and the Constitution: Principle of Constitutional Law and a Foundation of a Virtuous and Moral People by Will Morrisey, Professor Emeritus of Politics at Hillsdale College; editor and publisher of Will Morrisey Reviews, an online book review publication.

Essay #67 – Principle of private property ownership of land to encourage self-reliance for maintaining and strengthening individual liberty and American independence.

• Principle of Private Property Ownership of Land To Encourage Self-Reliance for Maintaining and Strengthening Individual Liberty and American Independence by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #68 – Principle of individual free enterprise.

• Principle of Individual Free Enterprise by Guest Essayist: Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #69 – Principle of individual rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of one’s own happiness, to make and reach one’s own goals. “ That property will ever be unequal is certain. Industry, superiority of talents, dexterity of management, extreme frugality, fortunate opportunities, or the opposite, or the means of those things, will ever produce that effect, without having recourse to the harsh, ill-sounding names of avarice and oppression; and besides this there are some men who, though they do not despise wealth, will not stoop to the drudgery or the means of acquiring it, nor will be troubled with it beyond their wants or their independence; while in others there is an avidity to obtain it by every means not punishable; it makes the sole business of their lives, and they follow it as a religion.   All that is required with respect to property is to obtain it honestly, and not employ it criminally; but it is always criminally employed when it is made a criterion for exclusive rights.” – Thomas Paine, Dissertation on First Principles of Government, 1795.

• Principle of Individual Rights to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of One’s Own Happiness by Gary Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative.

Essay #70 – Principle of freedom of speech in a marketplace of ideas.

• Principle of Freedom of Speech in a Marketplace of Ideas by Patrick Garry, Professor of Law, University of South Dakota; Author, Limited Government and the Bill of Rights.

Essay #71 – Principle of Money With Intrinsic Value and Standards of Weights and Measures, Printing Money.   “And since a Plentiful Currency will be so great a Cause of advancing this Province in Trade and Riches…I cannot think it the Interest of England to oppose’ us in making as great a Sum of Paper Money here, as we, who are the best Judges of our own Necessities, find convenient. And if I were not sensible that the Gentlemen of Trade in England, to whom we have already parted with our Silver and Gold, are misinformed of our Circumstances, and therefore endeavour to have our Currency stinted to what it now is, I should think the Government at Home had some Reasons for discouraging and impoverishing this Province, which we are not acquainted with…” – Benjamin Franklin, A Modest Enquiry into the Nature and Necessity of Paper Currency, Benjamin Franklin, April 3, 1729.

• Principle of Money With Intrinsic Value and Standards of Weights and Measures, Printing Money by Robert E. Wright, Senior Research Fellow, American Institute for Economic Research.

Essay #72 – Principle of making personal contracts.

• Principle of Making Personal Contracts by James C. Clinger, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Murray State University; Past President, Kentucky Political Science Association.

Essay #73 – Principle of free market trade, industry, innovation and competition. “ That is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, where arbitrary restrictions, exemptions, and monopolies deny to part of its citizens that free use of their faculties, and free choice of their occupations, which not only constitute their property in the general sense of the word; but are the means of acquiring property strictly so called.” – Property, an essay by James Madison, March 29, 1792.

Essay #74 – Principle of Private Property Ownership To Sustain Liberty, Encourage Commerce and Independence.  “Government is instituted to protect property of every sort; as well that which lies in the various rights of individuals, as that which the term particularly expresses. This being the end of government, that alone is a just government, which impartially secures to every man, whatever is his own… That is not a just government, nor is property secure under it, where arbitrary restrictions, exemptions, and monopolies deny to part of its citizens that free use of their faculties.” Property, an essay by James Madison, March 29, 1792.

• Principle of Private Property Ownership To Sustain Liberty, Encourage Commerce and Independence by Tony Williams, Author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America; Senior Teaching Fellow, Bill of Rights Institute; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #75 – Principle of freedom of the press. “Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such Thing as Wisdom; and no such Thing as publick Liberty, without Freedom of Speech” – Part of an article by Benjamin Franklin, under the pseudonym Silence Dogood, a name he used due to threats against free speech. Franklin wrote it on freedom of speech and of the press; it published in a newspaper: No. 8 on July 9, 1722, The New-England Courant.

• Principle of a Free Press by Patrick Garry, Professor of Law, University of South Dakota; Author, Limited Government and the Bill of Rights.

Essay #76 – Principle of keeping the fruits of one’s own labor. “A just security to property is not afforded by that government, under which unequal taxes oppress one species of property and reward another species: where arbitrary taxes invade the domestic sanctuaries of the rich, and excessive taxes grind the faces of the poor; where the keenness and competitions of want are deemed an insufficient spur to labor, and taxes are again applied, by an unfeeling policy, as another spur; in violation of that sacred property, which Heaven, in decreeing man to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow, kindly reserved to him, in the small repose that could be spared from the supply of his necessities.” – Property, an essay by James Madison, March 29, 1792.

• Principle of Keeping the Fruits of One’s Own Labor by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #77 – Defending Liberty and Rights in Property Through the Fruits of One’s Own Labor

• Defending Liberty and Rights in Property Through the Fruits of One’s Own Labor by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #78 – Principle of Freedom of Religion. “ Whereas Almighty God hath created the mind free; that all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments or burthens, or by civil incapacitations, tend only to beget habits of hypocrisy and meanness, and are a departure from the plan of the Holy author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercions on either, as it was in his Almighty power to do;…that to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves, is sinful and tyrannical;…and finally, that truth is great and will prevail if left to herself; that she is the proper and sufficient antagonist to error, and has nothing to fear from the conflict, unless by human interposition disarmed of her natural weapons, free argument and debate, errors ceasing to be dangerous when it is permitted freely to contradict them:…Be it enacted by the General Assembly, That no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or Ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief;” – Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, January 16, 1786.

• Principle of Freedom of Religion Patrick Garry, Professor of Law, University of South Dakota; Author, Limited Government and the Bill of Rights.

Essay #79 – Principle of freedom of assembly.

• Principle of Freedom of Assembly by Scot Faulkner, Served as Chief Administrative Officer, U.S. House of Representatives and as a Member of the Reagan White House Staff; Financial Adviser; President, Friends of Harpers Ferry National Historical Park.

Essay #80 – Principle of civil discourse to keep representative government, unhindered freedom of speech in the airing of grievances. “To suppress Enquiries into the Administration is good Policy in an arbitrary Government: But a free Constitution and freedom of Speech have such a reciprocal Dependence on each other that they cannot subsist without consisting together.” – Pennsylvania Gazette, November 17, 1737, printed by Benjamin Franklin, later reprinted in the Barbados Gazette, 1738, and attributed to Andrew Hamilton, a Pennsylvania Colonial Representative, and lawyer who defended John Peter Zenger who was arrested for criticizing the government, as having possibly been the author of the article.

• Principle of Civil Discourse To Keep Representative Government, Unhindered Freedom of Speech in the Airing of Grievances by Andrew Langer, President, Institute for Liberty; Chairman and Founder, Institute for Regulatory Analysis and Engagement.

Essay #81 – Principle of a nation’s longevity upon consisting of public and private virtue. Religious freedom, assembling, speaking freely and defending the nation’s liberty. “ While the People are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their Virtue they will be ready to surrender their Liberties to the first external or internal Invader. How necessary then is it for those who are determind to transmit the Blessings of Liberty as a fair Inheritance to Posterity, to associate on publick Principles in Support of publick Virtue. I do verily believe, and I may say it inter Nos, that the Principles & Manners of New England produced that Spirit which finally has establishd the Independence of America; and Nothing but opposite Principles and Manners can overthrow it.” – Samuel Adams, in a letter to James Warren, Philadelphia, February 12, 1779.

• Principle of a Nation’s Longevity Upon Consisting of Public and Private Virtue by Joerg W. Knipprath, Professor of Law, Southwestern Law School; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #82 – Principle of Constitutional Limits on the United States Government To Tax. “How then will it be possible, under these circumstances, to endure this Tax which is laid upon us by Parliament? –Add to this, that it will drain the Province of the little Cash left among us, which at present barely serves for a Medium of Trade…And if you should be active in bringing this Tax upon yourselves, at it will inevitably destroy our constitutional Privileges, so it will perpetuate to the latest Posterity, a most despicable Opinion of the civil Principles of their Ancestors…But should your Representatives be instructed by you, (which God forbid!) by a solemn and public Act to promote the Operation of this Law, you will implicitly declare that you resign that inestimable Right; and, in Consequence of such Resignation, you may next expect a Tax on your Lands; and after that one Burthen on the Back of another, till you are reduced to a State of the most abject Poverty…The Effects I presage are dreaded far and wide. –Would to God our Terror was merely panic, and that the Disagreeableness of the Act arose only from its Novelty. –But our Fears are founded on Reason and universal Experience…Consider gentlemen, that the least infraction of your Liberties is a Prelude to Encroachments…Indolence –Indolence has been the Source of irretrievable Ruin –Languor and Timidity, when the Public is concerned, are the origin of Evils mighty and innumerable” –A letter authored only using the initials W.B. “To the Inhabitants of the Province of the Massachusetts-Bay,” concerning the Stamp Act, appeared in The Boston-Gazette and Country Journal, October 7, 1765.

• Principle of Constitutional Limits on the United States Government To Tax by Tony Williams, Author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America;  Senior Teaching Fellow, Bill of Rights Institute; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #83 – Principle of freedom of association, undissolved and unweakened, either to associate or not associate and neither under coercion or force. “…there must be Associations of Men of unshaken Fortitude. A general Dissolution of Principles & Manners will more surely overthrow the Liberties of America than the whole Force of the Common Enemy.” – Samuel Adams, in a letter to James Warren, Philadelphia, February 12, 1779.

• Principle of Freedom of Association, Undissolved and Unweakened by Guest Essayist: George Landrith, President, Frontiers of Freedom.

Essay #84 – Principle of Free Thought and Speech. “The freedom of speech is a principal Pillar in a free Government: when this support is taken away the Constitution is dissolved, and Tyranny is erected on its Ruins.” – Pennsylvania Gazette, November 17, 1737, printed by Benjamin Franklin, later reprinted in the Barbados Gazette, 1738, and attributed to Pennsylvania Lawyer and Pennsylvania Colonial Representative as having possibly been the author of the article.

• Principle of Free Thought and Speech by Tony Williams, Author of six books including Washington and Hamilton: The Alliance that Forged America;  Senior Teaching Fellow, Bill of Rights Institute; Constituting America Fellow.

Essay #85 – Principle of distinguishing between purpose of federal, and governments of the states: maintaining the Union while preventing federal encroachments on the states and individual Americans. Though we might give to such a government certain powers with safety, yet to give them the full and unlimited powers of taxation and the national forces would be to establish a despotism, the definition of which is, a government in which all power is concentrated in a single body. To take the old Confederation, and fashion it upon these principles, would be establishing a power which would destroy the liberties of the people… It was seen that the necessary powers were too great to be trusted to a single body; they, therefore, formed two branches, and divided the powers, that each might be a check upon the other…The State governments possess inherent advantages, which will ever give them an influence and ascendency over the National Government, and will for ever preclude the possibility of federal encroachments. That their liberties, indeed, can be subverted by the federal head, is repugnant to every rule of political calculation. – Alexander Hamilton, Speech, Compromises of the Constitution, June 20, 1788..

• Principle of Distinguishing Between Purpose of Federal, and Governments of the States: Maintaining the Union While Preventing Federal Encroachments on the States and Individual Americans  by Amanda Hughes, 90-Day Study Director, Constituting America; Author,  Who Wants to Be Free?

Essay #86 – Principle of secure borders.

• Principle of Secure Borders by Guest Essayist: Kevin Portteus, Professor of Politics, Director of American Studies, Lawrence Fertig Chair in Politics, Hillsdale College.

Essay #87 – Principle of a United States Constitution prescribing within itself the only lawful methods of amendments by its keepers, the American people.

• Principle of a United States Constitution Prescribing Within Itself the Only Lawful Methods of Amendments, by Its Keepers, the American People by Gary Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative.

Essay #88 – Upholding the Principle of Amending the United States Constitution by the American People, Its Rightful Keepers.

• Upholding the Principle of Amending the United States Constitution by the American People, Its Rightful Keepers by Gary Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative.

Essay #89 – Further on principle of free civil discourse and public debate without censorship – American government based on opportunities to discuss political and policy issues by reflection and choice rather than by accident and force. And what a Compliment does he pay to our Understandings, when he recommends measures in either alternative, impracticable in their Nature?…for if Men are to be precluded from offering their Sentiments on a matter, which may involve the most serious and alarming consequences, that can invite the consideration of Mankind, reason is of no use to us; the freedom of Speech may be taken away, and , dumb and silent we may be led like sheep, to the Slaughter. – George Washington, Speech to the Officers of the Army at Newburgh, the Newburgh Address, March 15, 1783.

• Upholding the Principle of Free Civil Discourse and Public Debate Without Censorship  by Gary Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative.

Essay #90 – CONCLUSION

Guest Essayist: Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

• Conclusion: Preserving the First Principles of the American Founding  by Christopher C. Burkett, Associate Professor of History and Political Science; Director, Ashbrook Scholar Program, Ashland University.

Principle of constitutional limits on the United States government to spend taxes collected from the people with prompt payment of public debt.

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2-Day Seminar on Directive Principles in the Constitution: Fulfilling the Promise of Socio-Economic Rights by Nawada Vidhi Mahavidyala: Register by Sep 21

• Opportunities Webinars and Conferences
• August 30, 2024

About Nawada Vidhi Mahavidyala

This Vidhi Mahavidyalaya was established in the year of 1988 in the district headquarters of Nawada to impart high-standard Law Education to uplift the academic standard of the entire Magadh Region. Nawada Vidhi Mahavidyalaya is well equipped for the teaching of law course of LL.B. standard of Magadh University, Bodh Gaya as per rules of the Bar Council of India New Delhi matter of pride that this college is permanently affiliated by Govt. of Bihar, to M.U.Bodhgaya, Bar Council of India, New Delhi has also given continued recognition.

Eligibility

Students, Research Scholars/Faculties/Academicians, Corporate Delegates, and Lawyers.

• Right to Adequate Livelihood: How DPSPs ensure the right to an adequate standard of living by promoting economic and social welfare policies.
• Universal Education: The role of DPSPs in mandating free and compulsory education for children and its impact on socio-economic development.
• Healthcare and Social Services: The principles guiding the state in providing access to healthcare and other essential social services to improve public health and well-being.
• Economic Equality and Social Justice: How DPSPs aim to reduce economic disparities and promote social justice through policies and regulations.
• Workers’ Rights and Employment: The influence of DPSPs on ensuring fair wages, safe working conditions, and employment opportunities.
• Land Reforms and Rural Development: The directive principles related to land reforms and rural development, and their impact on agrarian society and rural livelihoods.
• Housing and Urban Development: The role of DPSPs in promoting affordable housing and urban planning to address housing shortages and improve living conditions.
• Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development: How DPSPs guide environmental protection efforts and sustainable development practices to ensure long-term socio-economic well-being.
• Empowerment of Marginalized Groups: The principles aimed at empowering women, scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, and other marginalized communities.
• Social Security and Welfare Programs: The contribution of DPSPs to the development and implementation of social security schemes and welfare programs.
• Making corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) mandatory in India but not DPSPs: CSP & DPSP both aim to promote societal welfare, but they operate at different levels. CSR refers to the responsibilities that businesses have towards society, including ethical practices and contributions to community development. DPSP, Part of the Indian Constitution, guides the state in making policies for the welfare of its citizens focusing on economics and Social Justice.

Above mentioned sub-themes are not exhaustive but only illustrative.- Authors are open to research on any topic related to the above-mentioned themes introspecting their scholarly interests in this igniting area.

Procedure for Submission of Abstracts

• The abstract (of about 250 words) should be sent as an attachment in a Word file.
• The following information, in the given format, should be sent along with the Abstract:
• Name of the Participant, Official Designation/Institution Details, Contact Number Address and Email ID, Title of Abstract.
• Submit your abstract to [email protected]

Guidelines for Paper Submission and Other Guidelines

• The title of the paper should be followed by Name, Designation, Name of the Organization / University / Institution and Email address. It is mandatory to mention the Email address, as all future correspondence will be through it;
• Name and details of Co-author, if any;
• Chapter: The chapter should be in Times New Roman 12-point font and double-spaced. Main Title should be in full capitals, bold and centered 12-point font. Sub-titles should be in sentence case, bold and 12-point font. Author’s names should be in small capitals and centered 12-point font Footnotes should be in TimesNewRoman12-point font.
• Citation Format: Please use footnotes rather than endnotes. Footnotes should conform to The Indian Law Institute, New Delhi Style;
• Submission of the abstract: A cover letter with the name(s) of the author(s) and address, designation, institution/affiliation, the title of the manuscript and contact information (email, phone, etc.) is compulsory to submit. All submissions must contain an abstract of not more than 300 words with 5 Minimum Keywords;
• Any plagiarized work will be more than 20% rightly rejected;
• The title of the Chapter should be followed by Name, Designation, Name of the Organization / University / Institution and Email address. It is mandatory to mention the Email address, as all future correspondence will be through it;
• The paper should be typed in MS WORD format (preferably 2007 or 2010);
• The paper must be in single column layout with margins justified on both sides;
• The length of the paper for short Papers below 4,000 words (including footnotes) and long papers not more than 7000 (Including Footnotes).

Rules for the Presentation

• No abstract or full paper shall be accepted after the last date of submission respectively;
• Participants/Paper Presenters have to register after the payment of required fees;
• For participation, registration is mandatory upon confirmation of the participation. Only registered participants will be allowed to take part in the Conference;
• All the registered participants will be provided a participation certificate;

Registration Fee

• For the Student category is Rs 300 (Per Individual)
• For Faculty/Professional/Research Scholar/Other is Rs 500 (Per Individual).
• Attendee 200 & other
• The author and Co-Author have to register separately.
• All communication should be emailed to: [email protected]

Important Dates

• Submission of Abstract: 10th September, 2024
• Confirmation of Abstract Selection: 12th September, 2024
• Registration: Up to 21st September, 2024
• Seminar Date: 21st and 22ND September, 2024
• Submission of Final Paper: 28th September, 2024

Registration Procedure

For Payments:

• Bank Name – SBI
• Account no – 40791342922
• IFSC CODE – SBIN0002362

Click Here To Register .

Contact information.

• +91-9709581064, 8083880786, 9065457964 (NVM Office)
• Email: [email protected] .
• Click here to join – https://chat.whatsapp.com/LjPzKVT6cupFR77nQ2jytT

The brochure is here .

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