The Preamble: Introduction

I have no idea whom to credit for this diagram since it's displayed without citation on dozens of webpages. Isn't it beautiful, though?


For those who prefer their sentences in a more linear form:

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

For those who prefer their Preamble in comedy form:

For the Trekkies:

The Preamble is the most memorized sentence in the US Constitution. Weighing in at a hefty fifty-two words, it is purely expository. That is to say it explains, it even "sells" the rest of the document, but does not act. It neither grants authority nor recognizes rights.

Comments welcome and even appreciated (moderated).

Tomorrow: Preamble: Outside the Commas, Part I of II

Experts, scholars, and professionals dissect Constitutional conservatism into several more specific interpretive methodologies using terms like original intent, original meaning, plain meaning, strict construction, and formalism. While such distinctions are useful on a second, third, or fourth study, or in the course of a scholarly examination, they are largely ignored here because they aren't necessary to a basic familiarization with the text.

Logic insists that the Constitution was written to be understood as a self-contained document by ordinary citizens leading industrious private lives. We don't have to read the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist Papers, the Articles of Confederation, the Magna Carta, or the Holy Bible. We don't have to know the hearts and minds of the signatories or their constituents. We don't have to know which words are the result of compromise or who among the Founders were federalists or anti-federalists. While the study of such contextual elements results in deeper insight (and they will be mentioned from time to time), the focus here is to encourage and share the experience of a simple textual reading which can be the entirety or the beginning of an acquaintance with our Constitution.

Tomorrow: The Preamble.

About one hundred and twenty-three million people voted in the Presidential election in 2008. The winner of that election will swear or affirm that he will, to the best of his ability, "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

But the winner, who has an annoying habit referring to our Constitution in the past tense, had this to say in a 2001 Chicago Public Radio interview (stutters and stammers edited out for clarity):

"I think we can say that the Constitution reflected a [sic] enormous blind spot in this culture that carries on until this day.
And that the Framers had that same blind spot. I don't think the
two views are contradictory--to say that it was a remarkable political document that paved the way for where we are now, and to say
that it also reflected the fundamental flaw of this country that
continues to this day." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11OhmY1obS4)

It's no wonder this man has promised to appoint only judges who have proven a willingness to ignore our Constitution and substitute instead "one's deepest values, one's core concerns, one's broader perspectives on how the world works, and the depth and breadth of one's empathy." (http://obama.senate.gov/press/050922-remarks_of_sena/ paragraph 6) In other words, justices who will override our collective judgement expressed through the democratic process with their judgement, the products of which are called "rulings" for good reason.

He chose a running mate and potential Vice President who claimed during a televised debate that the Executive branch is established in Article I. Neither the moderator, nor the throng of reporters, nor the average viewer picked up on this shocking error. The few who commented called it a "gaffe." Gaffes are harmless and often humorous blunders like calling Bosnians "Bosniaks." On the contrary, when a person running for the Vice Presidency, a person with a law degree who has six times taken the oath to preserve, protect, and defend our Constitution, emphatically and with conviction asserts that Article I is the establishment of the Executive branch, and further, that the Vice President's only Constitutionally defined role in the legislature is to break tie votes in the Senate, this is a display of ignorance that should frighten us all. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89FbCPzAsRA at 1:15 to 1:17)

The losing ticket was topped by a US Senator who has counted among his greatest achievements the co-sponsorship of a bill to abridge First Amendment freedom of speech. Today he may feel differently about it. Maybe if this man had won, and had kept his promise to appoint conservative judges, Campaign Finance Reform would have been overturned.

That brings us to his running mate, the only self-described conservative of the four major party candidates. Here was a woman who unequivocally stated that that our Constitution means exactly what it says. But then she expressed unqualified support for the Federal Marriage Amendment, which would grossly and irreversibly alter its original underlying principles, saying,

"I have voted along with the vast majority of Alaskans who had the opportunity to vote to amend our Constitution defining marriage as between one man and one woman. I wish on a federal level that that's where we would go because I don't support gay marriage." (http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/467179.aspx)

No better example of the difference between generic conservatism and originalism can be offered.

Of the one hundred and twenty three million people who exercised their most precious right by voting in this election, how many have ever read the full text of the document which establishes that right and all others under the law? How many of the people we elected have ever read it? Our Constitution deserves better. We, the non-elected citizens, will have to become the better preservers, protectors, and defenders if we are to "secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity," and that begins with a careful originalist reading.