Suppose that you were able to go back in time and were able to gain the ear of one (or several, if necessary) of the authors of the U.S. constitution. For whatever reason, they assure you that they will include any one major change (or several minor ones) to the constitution/bill of rights. What do you change and why?
Do you try to avoid some historical tragedy? Some current political situation? What are the unintended consequenses of your or other posters changes? Say for example you convince the founding fathers to outlaw slavery. Does the infant republic survive?
they will include any one major change (or several minor ones) to the constitution/bill of rights. What do you change and why?
Do you try to avoid some historical tragedy? Some current political situation? What are the unintended consequenses of your or other posters changes? Say for example you convince the founding fathers to outlaw slavery. Does the infant republic survive?
Ending slavery would have been at the top of my list, sparing the nation the Civil War and hundreds of years of poisonous racial animosity. But I would have wanted to end it in a way that did not break up the “infant republic.”
Instead of outright outlawing the institution of slavery, guaranteeing the secession of the entire South, suppose various aspects of slavery were changed so that the institution would disintegrate over time? First step: provide that every person born in the U.S. is a free citizen. Children born to slaves would themselves be free, and have the same rights as anybody else. Second step: prohibit the importation of slaves. Those two provisions by themselves would have ended slavery slowly as slaves aged and died and couldn’t be replaced, but would have given the South plenty of time to adjust to an economy where they had to pay fair wages to free workers. There certainly would have been resistance, but people who were rich plantation owners at the time the Constitution was ratified would have continued to be rich plantation owners.
Just thinking out loud, really–I suppose it would have been much more complicated than this.
Yeah, the slavery thing would be my first choice. Since that’s already been done, my second choice would be to just leave out the 2nd Amendment altogether. It’s just poorly worded and really doesn’t need to be in there at all. All it does is divide the country. No 2nd Amendment, no controversy over interpreting it.
No legislature. No provision for amendments. One law: “Government shall guarantee every citizen freedom from initiated force and deception.” The reason is because I believe that peace and honesty is the only efficacious context in which free people may pursue their own happiness in their own way.
I agree with you about slavery, of course. But don’t forget about the slaves in the North. I believe that Vermont was the first state to abolish slavery, but that was after the Constitution was written.
My change would be a statement disallowing discrimination based on gender.
At the time the Constitution was written, this would have been impossible. However, the original Constitution could have been written in such a way to make it clear that at some future date the slavery issue WOULD be decided nationally, and everyone would have to go along with the decision. What was actually done is that just Congress was prohibited from making any law about slavery for 20 years, and it was hoped that in the future some peaceful solution would be worked out.
Politically impossible at that time. In the 1800s, the idea of women voting was largely seen as silly. And, unlike the slavery issue, it should be noted that when the time was right, universal suffrage was enacted without major bloodshed.
How about something making it clear that once a state has joined the Union, secession is explicitly not allowed? That might have changed any number of Southern minds in the 1860s. Of course, it still might have been worth it to have abolished slavery then and there even at the cost of having two allied republics-- with the benefit of hindsight it might be possible to contrive a later union.
I might also suggest one of the election reforms that have been bandied about over the past two elections, like instant runoffs.
And as long as so many of us are trying to end slavery in 1787, I think we should also give women suffrage while we’re at it.
A clearer 2nd Amendment. I wouldn’t do aware with it, but it would be clearer on a private citizen’s right to arms, and the limitations thereof. This would make it ten times as long and one hundred times less pithy, but I don’t care.
I’d introduce the 14th amendment extension of the federal bill of rights to the states earlier.
"1790 Acts of the Fifteenth General Assembly of New Jersey. This document refers to voters as both “he” and “she,” 1790.
1797 Women at the Polls in New Jersey; a newspaper engraving from 1880 picturing women voting in 1797.
1797 An Act to regulate the election of members of the legislative council and general assembly, sheriffs and coroners, in this State. This act allowed voting by women, 1797. "
There’s the famous Abigail Adams to John Adams quote from 20 years earlier as well.
One extremely vague law to be interpreted by the courts (are they still unelected in your world? They’d better not be, they have absolute power) with no recourse to amend or change it without overthrowing the government. The entirety of government would be decided by court precident, which could never be overturned by the people, but could be thrown out whenever a jurist feels like it. Rule by lawyers, but not rule by law. Even if you are a magic man from the future, I doubt the founding fathers would be so dumb as to adopt this one.
Going on the assumption that eliminating slavery would have been politically impossible, I’d have told the founders to carefully consider and define the term “interstate commerce.”
No other provision in the constitution has been subject to so much abuse, and I really think it’s because the founders were shortsighted on this point. The power to regulate interstate commerce quickly becomes the power to regulate intrastate commerce, and the power to regulate commerce generally quickly become tantamount to power to regulate everything.
The notion of a limited federal government constrained to its enumerated powers is something of a joke today because of the ever-expanding commerce clause. A little more foresight on the part of the founders could have preserved their vision of limited federal government.
Of course, the authors of the 14th amendment never intended such an extension. That extension was judicially created several generations after the 14th amendment was added to the constitution.
Well, I would have them better define what they ment by the “Interstate Commerce” & “General Welfare” clauses. For the 2nd Amendment, I would try to convice them to split it into two more clearly separeted parts, one protecting the right of private individuals to own weapons, the other protecting the rights of States to have militias.
As for the slavery issue, I would push for a clause banning it - in 1860. That way, everyone knows it will end, but it is far enough away that most of the people signing will let it by, figuring they will be dead by then.