Display the Constitution

Tom Digby sent around the following email (and then later gave me permission to blog it):

If you're concerned that civil liberties may suffer unnecessarily in the name of "security", or that Bush & Company are otherwise overstepping their authority, here's a way you might show that concern to the public: Display the Constitution.

The President's oath of office includes a promise to "... preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States." Many oaths of office for lesser positions include similar language. Thus any argument that being concerned about the Constitution is "un-American" won't be very persuasive. The Constitution is perhaps the most American thing there is.

You might want to display it as a photo-reproduction of the first page, with the prominent "We the People" headline. Even if people can't read the rest, most Americans should recognize it as being the Constitution. A JPEG image of that first page is available as a link from:
http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall/charters_of_freedom/constitution/constitution.html

Here's the same URL broken into two chunks you can paste together (no spaces or anything) if the full thing doesn't survive emailing:

http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall/charters_of_freedom/
constitution/constitution.html

You could print the image out on a full page and put it in an outside window. Or maybe print it postage-stamp size and wear it as a button or badge.

If you don't like the idea of displaying a bunch of handwriting that can't be read easily, then display the Preamble (the paragraph that starts out "We the People ...") in some readable typeface. That pretty much sums up what the Constitution is all about. The text is linked from that same page. Or here it is:

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, 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."

I would recommend against displaying just the Bill of Rights by itself. That would be much more open to argument, especially in times of peril, than the whole Constitution (or something like the first page or the Preamble that symbolizes the whole Constitution) would be.

If you think this is a good idea, spread the word in the appropriate forums.

-- Tom Digby 15:24 03/20/2003