Tuesday, February 19, 2019

The Constitution of the United States: A Transcription

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

This is a quote from the transcription of the Constitution of the United States. I chose to use this quote for two reasons, the first reason is it basically summarizes the purposes of putting together this transcription. Obviously they wanted to form a more perfect union, promote general welfare, secure blessings of liberty for self and posterity. I wanted to dissect this quote after reading an essay titled "Two Concepts of Liberty", by a philosopher named Isaiah Berlin. Berlin mentions in his essay that the word freedom and liberty seem to be porous. I had to look up the meaning of porous being that I never used it. Porous is having many small holes that liquid and air passes through it like a sponge. It triggered my thoughts about the transcription, because I thought about the limitation of powers and how the articles and sections were broken down. There was no trust in the federal government, but there was also no trust in people in general. It seems as though the founding fathers did not want to overstep their boundaries with the States, but also wanted to ensure that there were limitations for people in power.

My second reason for chosing this quote, because I do believe that the summary of the constitution is porous like the word freedom and liberty. I don't want to copy is exact analogy, but I do feel that the summary can be interpreted in many different ways and has been absorbed into history and carried through even to the present day. The Constitution like the Bill of Rights are documents that should be revisited, because throughout history some people were excluded when these documents were created. I believe that it is important to look at things from another angle. How do I know I am part of the perfect Union?

No comments:

Post a Comment