Divinely inspired? No way

The National Center for Constitutional Studies a group based in Idaho, promotes the idea that the U.S. Constitution was divinely inspired.  Now the Tea Party Patriots is telling its members to remind teachers that September 17 is Constitution Day.  It also wants schools to use teaching material from the Idaho group.

I have great respect for the Founding Fathers who met in Philadelphia in 1787 to hammer out the Constitution.  I think Madison’s Federalist Paper Number 10 and Number 51 defending the Constitution are among the finest documents of political theory ever written.  It is the “divinely inspired” idea I find repulsive.

I’ve read that the first constitution or governing charter containing a provision for amendments was the one William Penn devised for Pennsylvania.  Prior to that, constitution writers thought their documents were perfect and would not need change.

Approximately a hundred years after Penn’s charter, the Founding Fathers put in their own procedure for amendments.  (It’s Article V.)  They sensed that subsequent generations might want to change a few provisions.

The whole Philadelphia summer was spent arguing about all kinds of issues.  Some northern delegates wanted to put an end date on slavery, but when the southern delegates threatened to walk out, that idea was shelved.  The battle over representation between the Virginia plan and the New Jersey plan ended with the Connecticut compromise, a political deal worked out behind closed doors.  (No open meeting laws then.)

The final version lacked a Bill of Rights. It did list a few protections in the text--habeas corpus, no bill of attainder, no ex post facto laws--but it had no actual list of rights.  The Federalists (the pro-constitution side) promised to add a list if the document were approved, and they were true to their word.  That’s the first ten amendments.

The election of 1800 exposed a flaw in the document, when Burr and Jefferson received the same number of electoral votes, and Burr, the vice presidential candidate, argued that he should be president, since neither candidate was specifically labeled.  Whoops.  The oversight was fixed by the 12th Amendment.  

Here is how you should think of our Constitution. It is a product of compromise and debate, improved over time by amendments and occasionally by Supreme Court decisions.  Most of the delegates held a rather negative view of political power, and that viewpoint has been embraced by our political culture.   

The men who wrote it deserve our gratitude and thanks.  To a person, however, if they knew people thought of them as divinely inspired, I can guarantee you they would laugh.