This is
a really thorough book. It covers every phrase in the Constitution and its
amendments from 1 to 26, the most recent. I came out of it with a much greater
appreciation for many of our founders and the genius of the Constitution. I
also came away understanding that a major part of that genius was the knowledge
that it would need to be amended and the way that the founders set forth a
standard for amendment.
Before
the American Revolution, no people had ever explicitly voted on their own
written constitution. Athens’s Solon had unilaterally ordained his country’s
constitution. That makes the USA extremely unique, and our Constitution was
very liberal at the time in many issues, though very accommodating towards
slavery. The words “private property” do not appear in the Constitution at all.
“Property” only appears once, in a reference to government property. While the
Revolution dealt heavily with the rights to private property, the Constitution
itself is truly based on popular sovereignty, beginning with the words, “We the
People…”
Slavery
The Constitution did more to
increase slavery than to destroy it. Article 1 temporarily banned Congress from
using its power over immigration and international trade to end the importation
of slaves until 1808. In addition, they codified the 3/5 clause, that allowed
slave states to count their slaves as population for voting apportionment but
not as actual, eligible voters. This compounded in effect in the state
legislatures, which were heavily tilted in Southern states toward the plantation
belts, that would eventually drive them into the Civil War. In the interim
between the Constitution’s signing and the Civil War, slave states were
encouraged to buy and breed as many slaves as they could to increase their
voting power.
The statistics are disturbing. New
Hampshire and South Carolina each had 140,000 free citizens according to the
1790 census, but NH only got four seats in the House compared to SC’s 6 due to
its 100,000 slaves. Connecticut had 20,000 more free citizens than Maryland but
one less seat due to Maryland’s 100,000 slaves. Virginia, thanks to its 300,000
slaves, earned five more seats than Massachusetts, which had a “significantly
larger free population.” Surely the lesson from this is that in a compromise
like the Constitution was, it pays to be on the side that receives long-term
dividends. Slavery was able to grow much stronger as an institution thanks to
the failings of the Constitution providing undue representation to the South,
which manifested itself in slavery-friendly laws enacted and judges appointed.
All in all, the first Congress convened in 1793 with the North having 58 seats
and the South 47. If the 3/5 clause had not been enacted the South would have
had just 33 and the North 57. Signers of the Constitution from the South also
assured their voters that Congress would have no power to abolish slavery.
Interesting point about the American Revolution: If
negotiations prevailed and Americans gained representation in Parliament, how
could they participate in parliament while representing and meeting their
constituents? It took months to cross the Atlantic and it would have been an
impossible job.
Englishmen celebrated their strong Navy and weak Army as a
cause for their liberal, democratic successes. A navy was a defensive tool
because it could stop other armies from landing on their shores but could not
oppose its own tyranny because of its weakness on land.
Only six men signed both the Declaration of Independence and
the Constitution
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