The US Constitution- Written By Mortals, Subject To Change.

This post was originally written on 3/16/2012

The Founding Fathers, those men who sat down together and drafted the Constitution on which our system of government is based, came together in 1787 in the hopes that they could reach an agreement that would give their struggling new country the ability to survive and thrive into the future.  A mere decade after gaining independence from England, the independent country that had been formed after the Revolution was already struggling.  It had become apparent to those who were trying to lead the people of this new nation that merely declaring it's citizens free and independent of foreign rule was not going to be enough to get everyone's needs met and keep the bills paid.
     Prior to the drafting of the Constitution that many of us hold sacred today, there had already been a form of government established.  Before the earliest Americans had even gained their independence from those who had ruled over them in the past, The Continental Congress had been formed.  Had that experiment in self government proved to be successful, our country would never have seen the need for anything more, and our Constitution would never have been written.  The brave men who had led our country to revolt, and who had sent the Declaration of Independence to King George III, came together before all the battles had even been won to draft the documents that they felt were appropriate to establish a form of government under which the citizens of this new country would live.  That document was the Articles of Confederation, which you can follow a link to here.  Unfortunately, the government that was formed by this document did not work to meet the needs of the people, which proves that while our founding fathers may have been very brave and fairly wise, they were still fallible men.
     Our Constitution, and the Bill of Rights which was added to it in the form of it's first ten amendments, was a do over.  Another try at getting right what these men had failed at the first time around.  It was also the first example of political wrangling in our new independent and representative form of government.  There is nothing wrong with admitting that you need a do over, it shows that even heroes make mistakes and that the wisest men are those who are willing to adapt when it is necessary to do so in order to move forward into a brighter future.
     In the words of George Washington, the problem with the Articles of Confederation were "No Money." Everyone was so worried about getting free of England's king that they forgot to make sure that the government they were replacing the monarchy with was going to be able to pay the bills.  Even then, the government had bills.  War, even for a cause as righteous as gaining independence for your country's people, is always expensive.  Soldiers must be paid, fed, and clothed.  Ammunition must be paid for, and the postage to send that Declaration of Independence back across the sea probably cost a pretty penny too.  There were several others, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and Benjamin Franklin to name a few, who felt that the Articles of Confederation had missed the mark on some points.  By the time that the framers of the Constitution sat down together in 1787, The united States of America was broke, in debt up to it's asshole, and there were all ready a whole bunch of it's new citizens bitching and complaining that they didn't like the American government any better than they had liked the British one.
     The Constitution was an attempt at compromise, made by the leaders of the day, and necessary for the continued survival of our experiment in being free and controlling our own destiny without depending on the benevolence of a monarch who had been invested with the God given right to rule over us.  The first ten Amendments that were added to the Constitution were a further attempt at reaching even more compromises to make our system of government viable and responsive to the needs of the people.  Our founding fathers were not rigid men who believed that they knew everything (well, some of them were, but even they knew that they had to give a little to get a little), they were ordinary men who had the extraordinary wisdom to recognize that governments, like men, must be able to adapt to survive.
     Starting out, it was believed that all that was necessary was to create a system of government that could replace the monarchy system that England had going on with one that did not invest all the power in one man, and to make this government one that could not be controlled by one small group to the detriment of all others.  That is was the purpose for which the Constitution was written, and that is the purpose that it serves.  Before the edicts of the Constitution could even be carried out however, there were those who demanded that additions be made to it in order to protect the rights of the individuals who would be governed by this new system.
     The Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution because the rights enumerated in those ten amendments were not clearly expressed within the body of the Constitution.  They were intended specifically to address the individual rights of the people being governed (please note that word, individual). They hadn't been included because they were not deemed necessary for the establishment of the government.  Were it not for a couple of loudmouths who refused to go home and implement the changes called for by the Constitution without getting something that they wanted in return, those amendments might never have been written.  That is how the Constitution became a "living, breathing document".  Because of a bunch of loudmouth non conformists who wouldn't just do what they were told to do.  As a loudmouth non conformist myself, I will gladly accept your thanks on their behalf.
     The irony that "Constitutionalists" and "Conservatives" fail to grasp is that, but for the fact that our founding fathers were liberal and progressive for their time, we'd all be singing "God Save The Queen" before every football game that we sat down to watch.  And that football game would actually be soccer.  Many of these people who are screaming their heads off about how we need to get back to the traditional values that this country was founded on are missing a key point, and that is that the system of government that we have, and the documents on which it are based, were totally non traditional at the time that they came into being, and were never intended as the be all end all, this is the way that everyone is going to be from now into infinity.  The Constitution was a starting point from which to build on, and to which we could look back and make sure that we were still holding true to the same basic path.  Very much unlike a religion, this government was expected to change as the people that it governed changed.
     The religions of man are based on beliefs that have been held sacred for thousands of years, and the documents from which those religious beliefs are derived have not been updated for a long ass time either.  That is not to say that they have not been updated and edited at all since their creation, but I'll address that in another piece.  Those governments that govern men, and do so successfully in a way that advances the societies of those they govern, change all the time.  Our own government was completely revamped before the men who formed it were even in their graves.  The documents that set the groundwork for the work carried out by our government, or any semi-successful government for that matter, are edited and updated almost every day.
     Adaptation is necessary for survival.  Whether you are talking about a person who has to change the path they are walking along to get out of a speeding car's way, or a government that changes it's laws to meet the needs of a growing and more diverse society.  Refusal to adapt can only lead to destruction by that which will move on in spite of you.  A person refusing to adjust their path to accommodate that car will be run over by that car.  A government refusing to adapt and accommodate the needs of it's people will be abandoned and overthrown by those people.  Now, in a free society, a person may choose to take their chances with the car, and they may get lucky and survive the broken bones and trauma inflicted when they are hit.  A government may also willfully ignore the demands and needs of it's people, and it may survive the unrest and revolt by it's citizens that results.  What is inevitable in either of these scenarios is that the person or government that does not adapt will suffer a consequence, and be changed in some way by that consequence.  It will come out on the other side weakened by the damage it has suffered.