Rewriting The Constitutional Conventions of The American Constitution

While I don’t think that completely rewriting the Constitution every generation is the correct move, I will say that it is both possible and advantageous for generational leaders to look at the Constitution as the foundation of our country and make changes and adaptations to it in order to keep up with the times. Currently, there are multiple ways that our government interprets the Constitution, and there is controversy over which way is correct: the literal interpretation side of the argument, opposed by the “Living Constitution” theory side. If instead we could find a way to create a Constitution that holds the fundamental principles our founding fathers had in mind while also properly addressing new generational societal issues, our government would not only be more efficient, but also more consistent with it’s rulings on different matters. Because of this, I believe that finding the properly balanced middle ground between keeping the Constitution completely stagnant and completely rewriting the Constitution every generation is the most effective method to address this historical argument.

Throughout the history of the United States, there have been many political figures who have addressed the issue of rewriting the Constitution. One of the most notable of these influencers is Thomas Jefferson, both a former President and Founding Father of the United States of America. On numerous occasions ranging from the late eighteenth century until his time of passing in the early nineteenth century, Jefferson voiced his opinions about the issue. In an address to James Madison, another former President and fellow Founding Father, Jefferson states “Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of nineteen years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force, and not of right” (Jefferson, 1789). In this statement, Jefferson makes the argument that as times progress and the norms of the society change, previous laws become outdated and need to be changed, and I agree. It was impossible for our Founding Fathers to predict the technological and social advances that our country would undergo centuries later, so generational modifications of the Constitution to address these issues make sense. And completely rewriting the Constitution isn’t the only option available for this to happen; if Constitutional conventions were held around every twenty years with elected representatives from each state acting on behalf of their constituents, they could make propose edits and additions to the Constitution while keeping the fundamental values that our country holds in tact.

Jefferson also makes a few other statements about rewriting the Constitution and the ideological changes undergone by each generation. “Each generation is as independent as the one preceding…” (Jefferson, 1816). In this statement, Jefferson recognizes the nuances and changes that large groups of people have over time, possibly referencing the revolutionary era of Americans gaining independence from Britain as an example of these changes in ideology. He also asks the question: “Can one generation bind another and all others in succession forever? I think not” in a discussion about this topic with John Cartwright, known as the Father of Reform due to his campaign works in the United Kingdom regarding Parliament reform, an issue very similar to Constitutional reformation (Jefferson, 1824). Overall, Jefferson recognized early the struggles that keeping such a static Constitution could have on this country in the future and proposed this idea of generational rewriting to preemptively address this.

Another historical figure whose opinion about the state of the Constitution supports these generational rewrites or modifications is Thurgood Marshall, an African American justice of the Supreme Court during the twentieth century. Marshall recognized that the Constitution was originally written with the purpose of creating a political checks and balances system while protecting the property rights of the white men in power at the time. When asked to give a speech celebrating the Founding Fathers for creating the Constitution, Marshall instead decided to address the weaknesses and shortcomings of the Constitution. “I do not believe that the meaning of the Constitution was forever ‘fixed’ at the Philadelphia Convention… the government [the Framers] devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments, a civil war, and momentous social transformation to attain the system of constitutional government, and its respect for the individual freedoms and human rights we hold as fundamental today” (Jillson, 54). By saying this, Marshall argues that the Constitution that contemporary Americans reference isn’t representative of what the original writers had in mind.

Marshall’s statement also brings up another reason why not having generational adaptations to the Constitution have affected our country in significant ways: internal conflicts. While there are numerous reationalizations and reasons cited by the South for seceding from the United States in 1860, the core issues that sparked the Civil War revolved around the abolishment of slavery, later ratified in the 13th Amendment. If generational modifications to the Constitution had been in place before and during this turbulent time, it’s possible that both sides on this issue could have come to a consensus about the issue of slavery that plagued our country for centuries without leading to complete secession and a declaration of war. There are also numerous contemporary issues that could be addressed and dealt with during the proposed generational Constitutional Conventions before they develop into large national protests and movements.

While I debated on the side of continuing the status-quo and keeping the Constitution and amendment methods the same as they have been during our in-class debate, I made sure to argue solely against completely rewriting the Constitution as opposed to making modifications to the current process. There are a lot of complications associated with completely rewriting the Constitution every generation, with the biggest being the time required to complete this process. If these Constitutional Conventions were to be held, they would require significant political representation from all 50 states, and making sure to address and finalize all the points made by each representative could take weeks or even months; all of that is time spent rewriting the Constitution instead of addressing the many political concerns that our country faces on a daily basis. By instead only making the necessary modifications to the Constitution while keeping the core principles intact, the time needed to complete these conventions would be a fraction of the time spent with the complete overhaul method.

The current amendment system that the Constitution outlines could serve as a solid foundation for generational modifications to the Constitution. The amendment system outlined by the original framers of the Constitution served its purpose at the time, but it’s much too arduous and tedious in today’s modern era. It currently requires a ⅔ majority vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. With almost every individual citizen of the country having their own unique stances and opinions on a variety of political issues, this makes it nearly impossible for Congress to pass amendments that address contemporary issues without fairly large-scale provoking stimuli. If this process was instead reformed into generational conventions, it would give representatives ample time to articulate their own beliefs along with the beliefs of their constituents about modern issues, allowing others who hold similar beliefs to advocate for and those with opposing beliefs to argue against. Even if a lot of the issues aren’t completely resolved during these conventions, it allows both sides of the debates to recognize the thoughts and reasonings of each other and potentially come to a compromise down the road.

The idea of rewriting the Constitution has been discussed and debated for centuries with no clear winner on either side. Because of this, I believe that finding a middle ground is the best approach in regards to this issue. By not completely rewriting the Constitution every generation and instead making modifications or adaptations to it, the core principles that our country was founded on would remain and more modern and contemporary issues could be addressed. Instead of politicians spending ample amounts of time disputing different interpretations of the issues that were present during the eighteenth century, they could be addressing the more pressing issues that we are currently facing during the twenty-first century.

Works Cited

1. Jefferson, T. (1789). Letter to James Madison. Founders Online. National Archives. https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-12-02-0302
2. Jefferson, T. (1816). Letter to Samuel Kercheval. Founders Online. National Archives. https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-09-02-0176
3. Jefferson, T. (1824). Letter to John Cartwright. Founders Online. National Archives. https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/98-01-02-2397
4. Jillson, C. (Ed.). (2002). American Constitutionalism: Powers, Rights, and Liberties. Houghton Mifflin.
5. Amar, A. R. (2015). The Constitution Today: Timeless Lessons for the Issues of Our Era. Basic Books.
6. Amar, V. (2017). The Living Constitution. Oxford University Press.
7. Tribe, L. H. (2010). The Invisible Constitution. Oxford University Press.
8. Balkin, J. M. (2006). Constitutional Redemption: Political Faith in an Unjust World. Harvard University Press.
9. Sunstein, C. R. (2017). Constitutional Personae: Heroes, Soldiers, Minimalists, and Mutes. Oxford University Press.
10. Strauss, D. A. (2010). The Living Constitution. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History. Oxford University Press.