Political Reflections on the Original American Constitution - Assignment Example

Political Reflections on the Original American Constitution In this work, I reflect on the original text of the American Constitution from the perspective of pragmatic politics. I assess the text of the original constitution of the United States of America in relation with the political situation of America during the period. 1.0. Did the original American constitution create a representative democracy, pluralist democracy based on factions, democracy based on a rule of a handful or a hyperpluralism with a weak central government? One best way to answer the question is to use “facts” as documented by the official government archives. According to an official government online archive that was constructed by a consortium of government and private groups1, the original four-page American constitution that established the United States of America was secretly drafted during the summer of 1787 and signed on 17 September 1787 (www.ourdocuments.gov). The official online archive narrated that drafting the constitution met difficulties. Earlier, the Federal Convention met in the State House of Philadelphia on 14 May 1787 but failed to muster a quorum because representatives from only two states managed to attend. Meetings were adjourned several times until a quorum of seven states attended on 25 May (www.ourdocuments.gov). Throughout summer, the delegates discussed, debated, and redrafted the constitution (www.ourdocuments.gov). According to the government archive, the key debates were on the power of the central government, number of representatives, and how representatives may be elected or whether directly by the people or by legislators. A documentation by another official government online archive, www.archives.gov, reported that then General George Washington, reluctantly at first to attend the convention, doubting whether the convention would accomplish something significant and whether men of his stature should attend. The said official government archive reported that Washington “delayed accepting the invitation to attend for several months.” General George Washington was elected unanimously as the president of the constitutional convention that drafted the original constitution that established the US but Virginia delegate James Madison earns a good credit for being a key organizer of the constitutional convention (www.archives.gov). According to the documentation of an official government archive (www.archives.gov), James Madison has been convinced of the “futility and weaknesses of confederacies of independent states” and has been equally convinced that the Articles of Confederation has to be replaced. According to the documentation of an official online government archive, www.archives.gov, the Articles of Confederation had been in-forced since 1781 and merely approximated a “league of friendship” between sovereign and independent states. According to the documentation of the official government online archive, the confederate government “could not tax and was generally impotent in setting commercial policy” and “could not even effectively support a war effort.” As a result of the political weakness of a confederate government, “paper money was flooding the country, creating extraordinary inflation---a pound of tea in some areas could be purchased for a tidy $100.” The hyperinflationary situation of the period probably brought tremendous hardships for the American people. Leaders such as Madison, believed in a strong state as the important key towards achieving economic stability. A weak state implies, for instance, a weak currency. A weak currency implies hyperinflation and hyperinflation means tremendous hardships for agricultural farmers and workers. Madison wanted a strong government to provide order and stability (www.archives.gov). According to the documentation of the official government archive (www.archives.gov), the constitutional convention had its origins in the proposal by Madison and John Tyler in the Virginia assembly that “Continent Congress be given power to regulate commerce through the Confederation” (www.archives.gov). Thus, originally, it appears that the original plan was merely to give Continental Congress the power to revise the Articles of Confederation so that the central government can be stronger in regulating commerce. In other words, the original plan was to modify the Articles of Confederation and was not yet to build a United States of America. This is probably the reason why the debates and the convention had been in secret in the first place. The documentation of the official government online archive even reports that the activities of the constitutional convention held in Philadelphia had been widely viewed as usurpation of congressional authority even if the Congress then issued a call for a convention (www.archives.gov). Representatives of the Rhode Island and Patrick Henry refused to participate in the convention while Jefferson and Adams were abroad on foreign missions (www.archives.gov). On the other hand, other than Washington and Madison, those supporting a United States constitution included Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, George Mason, and many others (www.archives.gov). One of the important debates in framing the constitution was on representation. One proposal was for from Oliver Ellsworth in which representation will be based on number of free persons and 3/5 on all other persons which was a euphemism for slaves (www.archives.gov). There was a tremendous debate on this but many of the delegates that a compromise was necessary to avoid a “complete breakdown” of the convention. Other than this, there were also debates on the issues of slavery and commerce (www.archives.gov). These were the contexts of the version of the US Constitution that was ratified on 17 September 1787. Thus, from the foregoing, it follows that the original constitution of the United States of America reflects our forefathers’ attempt to combat hyperpluralism. The act to establish a constitution of the United States in 1787 was one of our forefathers’ attempts to establish a strong central authority in the United States to combat the mere “friendship of states” in the confederate government. It was also a serious attempt to build a genuinely representative government but the prevailing mind-set of the period failed to see the evils of slavery. Slavery was thought to be normal and natural in the same way that slavery was considered normal and natural in both the Old and New Testaments of the Christian and Jewish bibles. Many of our forefathers’ who formulated the original constitution of the United States were confronted with the possibility of being charged with treason for going against the prevailing positions of their respective states who were for a confederation or a “friendship of states” or a weaker central government. Thus, at that time, it was important to take a moderate posture. Otherwise, there was a risk that the federal government would not have moved forward nor took off. Our more enlightened forefathers had to put the issue of slavery, particularly Negro slaves, temporarily in the background so the more important issue of a relatively strong federal government can take off. Our enlightened forefathers were pragmatic. Slavery is an important issue but the survival of America during that period rested more on the establishment of a strong central authority that can give more impetus for commerce and industry. There was a crisis in the 1780s: hyperinflation and the problem of fragmented markets that were causing much harm both to the agricultural and nascent industrial workers of the period. Our more enlightened forefathers attempted to establish a representative democracy but only managed to achieve an imperfect one. Of course, it can also be argued that what resulted is a government of a handful but this was not the intent of the more enlightened fathers of America. Further, there is inadequate basis to say that it was the rule of factions that dominated early America. The leadership of our forefathers were supported by people’s militias or a mass of people as indicated in the war for independence as well as in the American civil war. 2.0. Were the acts of the founding fathers the American Constitution just or unjust? What is justice? It may inappropriate to assess the justness of the actions of our forefathers given the values and situation of today. Firstly, it was necessary to be politically pragmatic in building America. More so in the situation of 1787 or the year of the ratification of the US constitution. A solution to a problem or an idea of what may constitute as a just or correct arrangement may not be obtained overnight but only after several decades and centuries of labor of humanity. In the same way, slavery was only abolished only after several centuries of existence. To this day, modern slaveries even exist as what can be concluded from the reports of several nongovernmental groups like the Anti-Slavery Society of the United Kingdom. The Old and New Testaments and even the early apostles of Christianity had considered slavery to be normal and not unjust (for example, see Colossians 3:22). The early democracy (some call it the first democracy) in Greece several thousand years ago considered slaves as non-citizens and, therefore, the early Greeks found nothing wrong to deprive them of rights that are exclusive for their republic. We must remember that the United States at that time had been a colony of the British. It took a while for even the early Americans to find that something is wrong with British power lording over the American people. The founding fathers of the future United States of America were whites. The extermination of the native American Indians have been going on prior to the birth of the American Constitution. Have anybody from our enlightened forefathers gave a thought that the they have been enjoying lands that were taken away from the American Indians? Unfortunately, there were ideological blinders the moment that men are born into society. The original framers of our constitution, for example, have managed to see what the lack of a central government authority can bring to Americans. Thus, they were strongly motivated to build a strong America through a stronger central government. Unfortunately, they were unable to see how their race has decimated the men, women, and children of American Indian ancestry. They were unable to see the lack of justice in having slaves or in the existence of slavery. For many of our forefathers, the citizens of the United States were those that were free, those who were not slaves, those who were not negroes, and those who were not Indians. Is the original American constitution just? To answer this, we look into the data of www.uscontitution.net. The first ten amendments known as the bill of rights were only introduced in 15 December 1791 or about four years from the ratification of the original constitution in 1787. This supports the view that the original version of the Constitution was a pragmatic document that attended foremost to the most important need of building the first United States of America. In the original version, issues of slavery and Indian territories were subordinated in favor of the more important task or need of building a central authority. Thus, with the bill of rights or amendments 1 to 10 introduced in 1787, the following rights were enshrined in the constitution: 1) Freedom of religion, press, and expression; 2) Right to bear arms; 3) Right against involuntary quartering by soldiers; 4) Right against unreasonable search and seizures; 5) Right to trial and compensation for takings; 6) Right to speedy trial and confrontation of witnesses; 7) Right to trial by jury in civil cases; 8) Right against unusual punishment; 9) Right against the use of constitution to deny or disparage against certain rights; and 10) Right to reserved rights not granted by people to the United States. The important relevance of pointing this fact out is that when analyzed on its own, it is easy to easy that the original constitution of the United States can be viewed as UNJUST because it does not include the rights articulated by the bill of rights introduced in 1791. However, 1791 is only about 4 years from the ratification of the original constitution in 1787 and as we have pointed out earlier, during that time, it was necessary to stress on the priority issues rather than resolve all issues and lose the chance of establishing a strong United States. Had our forefathers attempted to solve all issues in one single blow, our forefathers may have lost the chance to build a strong United States in 1787 and left the American people to cope with hyperinflation and other economic problems attendant with a weak state. Resolving all issues in a single blow could have led the American nation to chaos. Prolonging the debates in the situation of the 1787 could have led to a situation in which our more enlightened fathers could have been charged for treason in their respective states because they were seeking to put their respective states under the coverage of a United States of America rather than to a mere “friendship of states” under the Confederates. It was only on 6 December 1865 that slavery was abolished through the Constitution in the United States of America. This is in the 13th Amendment of the US Constitution. In the documentation of USconstitution.net, the 13th Amendment of the US Constitution reads as follows, “…neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, nor any place subject to their jurisdiction.” Further, amendment 13 to the US Constitution also required Congress will have to enforce the amendment by appropriate legislation. Thus, going back to the question, were our forefathers who formulated the original US constitution just? It is easy to see that many of our forefathers who formulated the original constitution were federalist but they were for the perpetuation of negro slavery and the slavery of non-Whites! But again, even the first Apostles of Christ were tolerant of slavery and failed to see wrongs in it even with their Church’s teachings of love and serving one’s fellowmen. Slavery is indeed wrong but it took a while for many of our forefathers to realize that it is wrong. The original constitution of the United States did not recognize that situation of the Native American Indians. What is the status of their ancestral lands? How are their claims to be dealt with? Instead, we get a clue from Section 2 of Article I of the US constitution. In Section 2, Article I of the US Constitution, the determination of representation is counted based on free persons, a multiplier of three-fifth of “other persons”, and excludes the untaxed Indians. Of course, the Native American Indians were probably raiding the Whites but, at the same time, the Native American Indians were also defending their land and life. Of course, other than this point, Section 2 Article I of the US constitution confirms that Negro slaves were without rights in the early democratic America. Reading the original American Constitution, it is easy to acquire an impression that our forefathers have been elitist and unjust. However, I maintain that an equally viable hypothesis is that our forefathers were merely pragmatic---solving problems one at a time rather than solving all problems in one blow. Further, a progressive mind-set is something that is only acquired over time. Slavery used to be moral and consistent with what is right. However, the human mind also moves with history and today we consider slavery as unjust. It may be inappropriate to judge the mores of yesteryears with the mores of today. Our forefathers have viewed slavery as just and the notion of justice or just treatment seem to apply only among Whites and non-Indians. Work Cited World Book, Inc. About America: The Constitution of the United States of America with Explanatory Notes adapted from The World Book Encyclopedia. World Book, 2004. Ourdocuments.gov. “Document Info”. Available 15 October 2010 from http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=9 www.archives.gov. “Charters of Freedom: A New World is at Hand”. Retrieved 15 October 2010 from http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_history.html USconstitution.net. “The Constitution of the United States”. Retrieved 15 October 2010 from http://usconstitution.net/const.pdf Read More