The Declaration of Independence states that ... it is to ensure these [unalienable] rights that governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
Trouble is, for the first few years of the United States, that laudable goal
of ensuring god-given rights was never achieved. The Articles of Confederation, under which the nation
functioned from 1777 till 1787, had no
teeth. That’s what brought about the
Constitutional Convention. The new charter for our country was written in Philadelphia from May to
September in 1787, as was the Bill of Rights, its first 10 Amendments. Both the
core document and the Bill were fully ratified in 1789. That ratification was based at least in part on
the Federalist Papers, the latter the work of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and
James Madison.
Based upon the Bill
of Rights and other significant amendments, I’m going to offer, in effect if not in fact, a curriculum I'm calling Constitution 101 - the foundational documents of our society and government. There will be a bakers’ dozen of topics, beginning with freedom of religion. All topics will provides
a lecture, assignments, and additional resources.
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