American history, James Madison, Still Current, The Articles of Confederation, The Bill of Rights, The United States Constitution, Uncategorized

We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments Part three: “A bill of rights is what the people are entitled to against any government on earth,” -Thomas Jefferson.

The 1st Congress of the United States of America, 1789

Ron Current

We’ve been on the incredible journey toward the birth of a nation. Its beginnings were in the words of the Declaration of Independence, words that projected a vision of a nation for its people. This vision however wasn’t reflected in the first two documents of governance, the Articles of Confederation and the Federal Constitution that followed.
This is best described by B.J. Lossing in his 1848 book, Lives of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence, when comparing the differences, “The former (the Declaration of Independence) was based upon declared right; the foundation of the latter (Articles of Confederation) was asserted power.” Lossing goes on to explain, “The former was based upon a superintending Providence, and the inalienable rights of man; the latter rested upon…,” Lossing then uses this 1839 writing by John Quincy Adams, “… sovereignty of declared power – one ascending for the foundation of human government, to the laws of nature and of nature’s God, written upon the hearts of man – the other resting upon the basis of human institutions, and prescriptive law, and colonial charters.”
What Lossing and Adams were saying was that in their quests to form a new government the framers lost that grand vision laid out in the Declaration of Independence, and instead focused too much on the rules of order and the laws of governess.
Thankfully this was about to change, as the 1st. Congress of the United States began their work on crafting a Bill of Rights.

The 1st. Congress of the United States of America begins fulfilling its promise
With the Constitution finally ratified on June 21st 1788, the 1st Congress of the United States came together for the first time in New York City, then the capital of the country, at Federal Hall on March 4th 1789.
The Federalist had faired pretty well with representation in the new congress, having gained the majority of the seats in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. But now they needed to begin working with the Anti-Federalist to fulfill the promise made to gain ratification, and that was to amend the new Constitution to include a bill of rights.
As the 1st. Congress came together to begin the bill of rights debate the big question was, how do you go about amending the document? Articles V gave the Congress the ability to amend, make changes, to the Constitution, but not the form it should be done in.
Enter, again, James Madison

James Madison (1751-1836)

As I presented in Part I, James Madison had been one of the most vocal at the constitutional convention in not seeing a need for a bill of rights in the Constitution, but as the debate went on during the convention, and after Washington and Jefferson had written to him, he began to see the concerns that the Anti-Federalist and States had. He was now willing to work on amending the Constitution with a bill of rights.
Madison, now a congressman, feared that a contentious argument on what form the amendments should take, and what those amendments should be, could drive Congress into calling for a second constitutional convention, and in doing so bring the entire Constitution into question. Still a Federalist he was determined to preserve what he had worked so hard on, and the only way he saw to avoid a Constitution/bill of rights issue was to take the lead in writing those amendments himself.

The Virginia Declaration of Rights
In writing his proposed amendments James Madison again turned to the sources he’d used with the Constitution: the Magna Carta (Great Charter) of 1215, the English Bill of Rights of 1689, as well as other existing state constitutions. But mostly he turned to his own state’s Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776, that pre-dated the Declaration of Independence by almost a month.

George Mason (1725-1792)

The Virginia Declaration of Rights is one of the most pivotal documents in the early forming of our government and our national vision. Initially drafted by George Mason, who had also proposed adding a bill of rights to the Constitution at the constitutional convention, the Virginia Declaration of Rights was use as seed material not only by Madison, in the Constitution and Bill of Rights, but also Thomas Jefferson when writing the Declaration of Independence.
Here’s an example of what I mean: in Article I of the Virginia Declaration of Rights it states, “That all men are by nature equally free and have certain inherent rights… they cannot, by any compact, derive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty…and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.” What Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence was, “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, among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
The influences of the Virginia Declaration of Rights is found throughout the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, but it’s most obvious usage is by Madison in the Bill of Rights. This is very obvious in the Virginia Declaration of Rights’ Articles 12 and 16, which would become part of the first amendment, and its Article 13 that’s in the second amendment, and also Article 9 in the eighth amendment. I’ll be reviewing this in my upcoming posts on the individual ten amendments.

Madison’s first proposed amendments
On June 8, 1789, James Madison presented his nine proposed amendments to the House of Representatives. Two of these proposals read as follows:
“First. That there be a prefixed to the constitution a declaration that all power is originally vested in, and consequently derived from the people.”
And another was his fourth proposed change:
“Fourthly. That article 2nd, section 9, between clauses 3 and 4, be inserted these clauses, to wit, ”The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall an national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience by in any manner, or in any pretext be infringed…”
As you can see from these two examples that Madison’s original idea was to make the amended changes directly onto the main body of the exciting Constitution itself, in fact rewriting articles and sections themselves. But both the House and the Senate where concerned with amending the Constitution by that method.
Congress’s fear was from the public perception of the amendment process. Although the Senate was closed to the public the House wasn’t, and their concern was that the citizens watching, as Congressman Fisher Ames of Massachusetts put it, “dissection of the constitution” so soon after its implementation could be seen as a sign of instability among the citizenry watching, causing them to lose confidence in the new Constitution, and its government.

Roger Sherman (1721-1793)

It was Congressman Roger Sherman of Connecticut who proposed to the House that the amendments not be made to the existing ratified document, as Madison had proposed, but rather placed separately at the bottom, keeping the original document to, “remain inviolate.” The House also voted to have a preamble added to the beginning of the list of amendments. This preamble was added to explained why these changes were being made, and to what end. Again in hopes of keeping the public’s confidence in their new government (please read my Part Two post on the preamble).
The House debated Madison’s nine amendments for eleven days, in which time they took his original nine, rewriting them into twenty, one sentence paragraphs. They continued to revise and combine those amendments until they finally agreeing on seventeen. Also, the House removed most of Madison’s preamble, feeling that it was to close to the wording of the Declaration of Independence, and added the phases: “freedom of speech, and of the press,” which would finally be incorporated into the first amendment.

Original copy of the Senate’s markup to the proposed amendments

On August 24, 1789 the House sent their seventeen proposed amendment to the Senate for their review and revision. The Senate then made twenty-six additional changes of their own, which included the elimination of the rest of Madison’s preamble, and removing the extension of parts of the Bill of Rights to the states as well as to the Federal government. In their process they condensed the House’s seventeen amendments to twelve. These changes were approved by the Senate on September 9, 1789.
On September 21, 1789 the two versions were taken up by the House-Senate Conference Committee that resolved the differences between the two versions. What they presented to Congress were twelve Constitutional Amendments that were then approved in a joint resolution of Congress to be sent to the States for ratification on September 28, 1789.

The Process of ratifying the Bill of Rights
For the twelve articles approved by Congress, under Article V, to become part of the Constitution they had to be ratified by each State’s legislature, according to Article VII of the Constitution. Each one of the twelve had to be separately voted on and ratified by at least three-fourths of the 14 States (Vermont had been added to the Union during the ratification).

Of the twelve amendments that were sent only ten gained the needed states. It was Articles Three through Twelve that received the needed 11 state minim for ratification. These became the first ten amendments to the Constitution, the Bill of Rights.
One of the interesting facts about the Constitution is that it doesn’t set a time limit for ratification to be accomplished, and the 1st. Congress also failed to set a time limit. So, the original Article’s One and Two, that didn’t make the original state ratification, were still considered pending, and open for ratification. So what has happened to those two amendments?

Article Two, which dealt with Senators and Representative’s pay, originally only received seven states approval when first presented. However when there was a national protest over Congressional pay raises in the 1970’s it was again revived. This article then picked up the additional states needed for ratification becoming the Twenty-seventh Amendment, eighty seven years after it was first presented.
As for the original Article One, which deals with the number of Representative in the House, it missed ratification by only one vote, and is still pending, needing only an additional 27 states approval to become another amendment to the Constitution.

Bill_of_Rights_Pg1of1_AC full size photoshopped

The Bill of Rights, in the National Archives

Madison’s legacy

James Madison fathered the two documents that created our United States government, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But he was more influential with one than the other. It’s been stated that without Madison there would have been a Constitution, but without him there wouldn’t have been a Bill of Rights.

With the Bill of Rights added to the Constitution the full vision set forth in the Declaration of Independence was now realized. The government of the United States of America was now more than just laws and procedures, but with guarantees of personal freedoms for its people.

Upcoming Posts on this subject

What other influences may have guided Madison and the others to choose those particular guarantees? What was the original wording presented by Madison, then changed by the House of Representatives, and then the Senate? And did that effect the intent then, or now. The late Justice to the Supreme Court Antonin Scalia stated that the Constitution, “Says what it says;” but does it really?

Please read my other posts on We the People:

Part One: “…In order to form a more perfect Union.”

Part Two: “…in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers…”

Some of the resources used:

Bill of Rights Institute . “James Madison.” Bill of Rights Institute, Bill of Rights Institute, billofrightsinstitue.org.
Wikipedia. “United States Bill of Rights.” United States Bill of Rights, Wikipedia , 2 July 2018, en.m.wikidia.org/wiki/United_States_Bill_of_Rights.
“The Bill of Rights becomes law.” This Day in History, History, http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-bill-of-rights-becomes-law.
National Archives. “Why a Bill of Rights?” National Archives, Archives.gov, 15 Aug. 2016, http://www.archives.gov/amending-america/explore/why-bill-of-rights-transcript.html.
Greenslade, Bob. “A Re-Write of the Bill of Rights through the Preamble.” Tenth Amendment Center, Tenth Amendment Center, 14 Dec. 2010, tenthamendmentcenter.com/2010/12/14/a-rewrite-of-the-bill-of rights-through-the-preamble.
“Virginia Declaration of Rights.” Wikipedia, Wikipedia, en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Declaration_of_Rights.
“Anti-Federalism.” Wikipedia, Wikipedia, en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Federalism.
“Bill of Rights.” Bill of Rights Institute, Bill of Rights Institute, http://www.billofrightsinstitute.org/founding-documents/bill-of-rights/.

Lossing, B. J. Lives of the Signers of the Declartion of Independence. WallBuilder Press, 2010.

American history, Lost and Found, The Bill of Rights, The United States Constitution, Uncategorized, World history

We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments. Part two: “…in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers…”

The Preamble to the Bill of Rights photoshopped

The Preamble to the Bill of Rights

I love history shot
One of the thrills I get when writing and researching for these posts is finding those little pieces of history that aren’t always presented in the regular telling’s. But when added to the narrative gives the stories so much more depth, and a much clearer understanding. However, what it also ends up doing is to completely change the direction of my original idea.

So it was when I was doing research for these posts on the Bill of Rights. I discovered a little piece of its history that hasn’t always been included in the writings on the first ten amendments. I believe that knowing about, and understanding, what this often left out piece of the Bill of Rights has to say goes to the very essence of the purpose, and the intent of the framers when they crafted the Bill of Rights. To better present this I felt it needed an entire post of its own.

I’d now like to address the preamble to the Bill of Rights, which went before the listing of the amendments.

Preambles

Having a preamble added to their documents was of extreme importance to our framers: the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights all have one.

So what’s a preamble? Dictionary.com defines a preamble as: “an introductory part of a statute, deed, or the like, stating the reasons and intent of what follows.” The preamble was the beginning statement that set the purpose of the document and what it was set up to do.

Federal Hall New York, the first house of the Congress

Federal Hall in New York City, the first capital of the United States (March 4, 1789- July 1790)

The preambles we know also paint a vast vision with inspiring words, such as these from the preamble of the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…” and “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…” And from the Constitution: “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union… do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

The framers did not release an important document without a Preamble. However, its interesting to note that the preamble to the Bill of Rights has been left off most printing, even those published by the government.
One of the books I’ve been using in writing these posts is, “Lives of the Signers of the Declaration of independences” by B.J. Lossing. In his book Lossing includes: the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. Each of them includes their preambles, except the Bill of Rights. He only printed the introductive paragraph, leaving out the important following three paragraphs, especially the second paragraph that gives the reasons why these amendment were added in the first place. And this book was first published in 1848.

So why has the preamble to the Bill of Rights so often been left off? I haven’t been able to find the answer to that yet. However there is a preamble, and it’s very important for you to know what it says. And I’m sure you’ll see the Bill of Rights in a different light after you’ve read it.

So here’s the text of the preamble to the Bill of Rights in

John Adams, Vice President and President of the Senate during the Bill of Rights debate

its entirety:

CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES
begun and held at the City of New York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine.

THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution expressed a desire in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.
RESOLVED by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, two thirds of both the Houses concurring that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of several states as Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all or any of which articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures to be valid to all intents and purposes as part of said Constitution; viz.:
ARTICLES in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.

Armchair Analyzing the Preamble

In reading the above preamble you see that the first paragraph basically states that these articles are an act of the First Congress under the new Constitution while in session in City of New York. The third paragraph states that two thirds of both the Senate and the House of Representatives are presenting these articles (twelve at that time) to the states for consideration and ratification, and how that’s to be done. The fourth paragraph introduces those following amendments as ratified under Article V of the Constitution.

The real meat to the purpose and intent for these amendments, and to the changes to the Constitution, is clearly addressed in its second paragraph;
The second paragraph begins with: “THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution expressed a desire…” This clearly says why the Congress created these amendments, because several States, and other groups within those States, had BIG issues with the Constitution as it was presented for the ratification process. The issue of a Bill of Rights, or the lack of one, in the presented Constitution threated its very ratification (I’ll go deeper into that in my next post).

The preamble then goes on to state what these amendments are supposed to accomplish: “…in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers…” The “it” in this line is the Federal Government. These amendments are to keep the Federal government from overstepping its bounds by taking away certain States and the peoples rights, then becoming a monarchy or tyranny.

It then explains how these amendments are going to prevent that possible abuse of power: “… that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added…” This line says that through these governmental restrictions guaranteed by these amendments will stop government infringement on the certain people’s civil liberties as outlined in these amendments.

The paragraph ends with:“…And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution…” This says that with, and through, these amendments that the people will trust the government more, and this will be a benefit for both.

So you see, the Bill of Rights amendments are not to protect the people from foreign governments, but from the government of the United States of America.

Now that you’ve read the Bill of Rights’ preamble, and my own humble analysis, we’re ready to dive into the history of how these ten amendments came about, how did James Madison, the Federalist, came to be the one that spearhead the writing of these amendments. And what did I mean by “twelve” Bill of Rights amendments?

Stay tuned, my next post will be on the crafting of the Bill of Rights.

And please read my post: We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments Part One: …In order to form a more perfect union.

Sources used:

Lossing, B. J. Lives of the Signers of the Declartion of Independence. WallBuilder Press, 2010.
“The Preamble to the Bill of Rights.” Revolutionary War and Beyond, Revolutionary War and Beyond, revolutionary-war-and-beyond.com/preamble-bill-of-rights.html.
Martin. “Preamble to the Bill of Rights.” What Would The Founders Think?, What Would The Founders Think?, whatwouldthefoundersthink.com/preamble-to-the-bill-of-rights.
“Preamble to the Bill of Rights.” Office of Government and Community Relations, Drexel University, drexel.edu/ogcr/resources/constitution/amendments/preamble/.
“Preamble to the “Bill of Rights”.” Adask’s Law The Profit of Injustice, Adask’s Law The Profit of Injustice, 17 Apr. 2011, adask.wordpress.com/2011/04/17/preamble-to-th-bill-of-rights/.
National Archives. “The Bill of Rights: A Transcription.” Amercica’s Founding Documents, The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, http://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/bill-of-rights-transcript.

American history, history and travel, History in Time, Still Current, The Articles of Confederation, The Bill of Rights, The United States Constitution, Uncategorized, World history

We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments Part one: …In order to form a more perfect Union

744px-Constitution_of_the_United_States,_page_1 croped 2

I love history shot The Constitution of the United States of America is not just the governing foundation of our nation, but the very essence of us as a people. However, when most Americans think of the U.S. Constitution they’re usually referring to one or more of its first ten amendments. A while ago I was talking to a friend about the political state of our country and he said, “We need to go back to the original constitution as it was written,” I said to him, “You mean before freedom of speech, religion, and the press, or the right to bear arms?” “Oh,” he answered, “that’s right, they’re amendments.”
My original plan for these posts was to just write about the history and background around the first ten amendments, and only using the formation of the constitution as background. But as I researched I came to realize that I too only saw the constitution through those amendments, and was missing the amazing journey our founding fathers took in creating this nation of ours.
What were the needs and desires that took us from thirteen separate colonies and turned us into thirteen United States. And what were the fears and concerns that guided those framers to “form a more perfect union,” one that could adapt and grow with the better understanding that comes over time.
So I begin before a nation was born, as we struggled to gain freedom during our Revisionary War.

Copy of the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States.

The Articles of Confederation (1781-1789), the first constitution of the United States
As the Revolutionary War (1775-1783) intensified the Continental Congress saw the urgency to form a stronger union between the states for the purposes of securing loans and other aid from foreign nations.
The first unification proposal was presented by Benjamin Franklin in July of 1775, this was never formally considered. There would be a total of six proposals submitted and rejected. In June of 1776 Pennsylvanian John Dickinson’s proposed Articles were passed on to committee for revisions. The revised Articles were debated by the full Congress, and after a long deliberation were approved and submitted to the thirteen states for ratification on November 15, 1777. On March

John_Hanson_Portrait_1770 1, 1781 John Hanson, President of the Continental Congress, signed the Articles of Confederation into law, creating the new nation of the United States of America. Since Hanson was the President of the first governing congress of the new nation, technically he would be the first President of the United States.
The relationship between the states was described in Article III of the Articles of Confederation as, “a firm league of friendship… for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare.” The biggest fear from the states was that a strong central government would take away states’ rights, but under these new Articles the states remained sovereign. The new government would: have one house of Congress with its members elected by the state’s legislation, the authority to form international alliances and treaties, make war, maintain an army and navy, coin money, establish a postal service, and manage Indian affairs. What it couldn’t do was to regulate foreign commerce or raise taxes; revenue would come from each state based on the value of its privately own lands. Also there would be no restrictions of trade between states, and each state would honor all judicial rulings of other states.
One major issue addressed in the Articles was western expansion. Under original colonial charters coastal states as Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Rhode Island were confined to a few hundred miles of Atlantic coast while other state’s charters allowed them to expand westward. Thomas Jefferson led the way with Virginia, that set limits to states expanding their boarder westward; this allowed the new lands to the west to become new states. It’s this article that set the guidelines for us to become our 50 States.
However it soon became evident that giving the states so much authority was a major weakness with the Articles of Confederation, as well as the inability of taxation, forced Congress to take another look at the document.
The 1787 Constitution of the United State of America (1889-present)

744px-Constitution_of_the_United_States,_page_1

The Constitution of the United States of America

With most of the powers of governance in the hands of the states the Articles of Confederation gave the federal government very little authority. This led to much confusion, infighting, and the eventual strain on relationships between the “firm league of friendship” of the states. Also foreign governments were still reluctant to deal with a United States that didn’t seem very united. To try and fix those issues the Continental Congress called a constitutional convention to meet in Philadelphia in May of 1787 with the purpose of revising the Articles.
Convention delegates were sent by each state, and consisted of all sectors of society. So knowledgeable and versed in issues of self-government were these delegates that Thomas Jefferson referred to them as, “an assembly of demigods.”
The delegates’ instructions were to only work on revising the exciting Articles, but as they discussed different options for revision they found it very difficult. After much debate the delegation, led by the 36 year old James Madison from Virginia, decided to scrap the entire Articles of Confederation for a completely new Constitution.

JamesMadison Those delegates with Madison were generally convinced that an effective central government with a wide range of powers was needed over the weaker Articles of Confederation. Madison, along with fellow Virginians Edmund Randolph and George Mason, presented to the delegation as a whole an outline for a new governmental constitution we now call “the Virginia Plan.” This document would become the bedrock for what would finally be the Constitution of the United States of America that we have today.
It took almost a year for the convention’s delegates to work out the new constitution. When finished it consisted of only seven articles that would give the new federal government limited powers while still protecting states’ rights. With the new constitution: articles I-III laid out the three branches of the government, with their authority and powers: the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial. This balance of powers Madison believed would keep the republic from becoming a dictatorship.
Article IV addressed the relationship between the states, jumping ahead, article VI declared that this Constitution was the supreme law of the nation, and article VII described the ratification process. Now back to article V, this article gave the guidelines for amending the Constitution; this article would be used even as the Constitution was undergoing ratification by the states.
However there were still many delegates, members of the continental congress, and state legislatures that feared that a strong and powerful central government would infringe on states’ and individuals rights. They had just finished a long and terrible revolutionary war where a strong powerful nation had taken away their basic rights as Englishmen. What the British had done to them during the war was crystal clear in their minds (I’ll be addressing those atrocities in my posts on the first ten amendments). They didn’t want to trade one oppressive government for another.
Soon two groups formed: the Federalists, who supported a new stronger central government, and the Anti-Federalists, that were opposed. James Madison, along with fellow Federalists Alexander Hamilton and John Jay published what is known as the Federalist Papers that defended the proposed constitution as what would be best for the country. They saw that their constitution still protected the states as well as individual citizens. The Anti-Federalists, with such revolutionary heroes as Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams, and Richard Henry Lee, didn’t see it that way and began demanding that a “Bill of Rights” be added. They feared that without a guarantee of individuals’ rights that the strong national government could suppress the people, leading to the president to become a king.
At first James Madison still believed that his “balance of power” concept would protect the people, and a Bill of Rights wasn’t needed. But after Thomas Jefferson and George Washington wrote to him that some form of a bill of individuals’ rights be included, and that some of the states would refuse ratification without it, Madison and his Federalist finally vowed to create and include a Bill of Rights.
As Madison and the other delegates began deliberating on the addition of individual rights to the constitution the Continental Congress decided to begin the state ratification process without it. But they promised the states that the new Congress, under the new Constitution, would make changes under its Article V.
On September 13, 1788 in New York the Continental Congress, with the required minimum of eleven state ratification under Article VII, began transferring to the new Constitutional government. On March 4, 1889 the new government began operation under the new Constitution of the United States of American, and on April 30 George Washington was inaugurated as the first President under this Constitution.
As promised the new Congress began debate on amending the Constitution with a Bill of Rights.

My upcoming posts
I’ll be exploring what could have been the reasoning for, what resources used, and what caused James Madison and the other framers to select those individual rights to protect in the first ten amendments. I’ll also give the history of how those amendments are looked at today.
Resources:
Wikipedia. “United States Constitution.” Wikipedia, 24 May 2018, en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Consitiution.
Researchers. “Primary Documents in American History.” The Articles of Confederation, Library of Congress, 25 Apr. 2017, http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/articles.html.
“James Madison.” Bill of Rights Institute , Bill of Rights Institute, 2018, http://www.billofrightsinstitute.org.
“Bill of Rights Institute.” Bill of Rights, Bill of Rights Institute, 2018, http://www.billofrightsinstitute.org.

Still Current

The adventures and misadventures of a would-be historian.

Category Archives: The United States Constitution

We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments Part three: “A bill of rights is what the people are entitled to against any government on earth,” -Thomas Jefferson.

We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments. Part two: “…in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers…”

We the People: A brief history of the United States Constitution and its first ten amendments Part one: …In order to form a more perfect Union

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this: