|
Good morning, Democrats!
Tomorrow, 99.9% of Americans will be completely oblivious to the fact that it’s the 237th birthday of our nation. No, it’s not the 4th of July again already. There will be no fireworks displays. It won’t start or finish a long holiday weekend and there’ll be no backyard barbeques to celebrate this under-observed event. Very few people will even be aware of its passing, but it’s the true anniversary of the day that 13 former British colonies, often barely civil to each other, became one unified nation.
I’m referring, of course, to Constitution Day. It was on September 17th of 1787 that the delegates to the Convention of 1787 formally declared that this nation needed to discard the Articles of Confederation, which were really little more than a mutual defense treaty much like today’s NATO and establish a strong central government and become a nation governed by “We the People”.
Although many people in Philadelphia at the time were aware of the fact that a small group of leaders from the various states, many of whom had been involved in the beginnings of the separation from Great Britain 11 years earlier, were gathering five, and often six, days a week in the Pennsylvania State House (now known as Independence Hall), they only knew that the delegates were doing something very important. Most of the rest of the country was completely unaware of the gathering, and Philadelphians, for the most part, knew nothing about the nature of the work being done in that building.
It was HOT in Philadelphia that summer, yet almost every day the delegates would gather, close and shutter the windows and bar the doors, to work in complete secrecy. There was no air conditioning in 1787, and the delegates did not even open a window to let fresh air in. From early May to mid-September they worked, proposing, arguing, compromising, amending and ultimately producing the document that has stood for 237 years as the framework of the young nation’s government, the Constitution of the United States of America.
By Saturday, September 15th, the hard work was done. There was only the task of getting all of the delegates to agree to the final wording, but there were still some holdouts who were arguing for minor changes. On Monday morning, September 17th, the Constitution, as it was at that point, was read aloud. Dr. Benjamin Franklin, the oldest and generally considered to be the wisest of the delegates rose with a speech that he had written. At 81 years of age and in declining health, just formally “rising” to deliver a speech was about as much as Franklin could do. He passed his written speech to fellow Pennsylvanian James Wilson and asked Wilson to read it aloud on his behalf as the older man stood, leaning on his cane.
Franklin’s written speech on September 17th of 1787, is one for the history books. Although he personally was not completely happy with every provision of the new Constitution, he knew that it needed to be adopted and that he needed to persuade the handful of holdouts to vote for approval.
“In these sentiments, Sir” he had written, “I agree to this Constitution with all of its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other.” For those who would like to read Franklin’s speech in its entirety, it can be found online here. I encourage everyone to read and embrace this small part of Ben’s wisdom. Following the speech, all those who had previously opposed one point or another in the document changed their minds and either voted “aye” or “present”. And a new nation was officially born, pending ratification by at least 9 of the 13 small independent nations.
The question before us this November is the question that Franklin alluded to. Have we, as a people, truly become “so corrupted as to need a despotic Government”? Will supposedly patriotic Americans vote to elect a man who has admitted that he not just might, but WILL, suspend portions of the Constitution when they get in the way of him doing whatever he wants? Will Americans give up their liberty to empower a man who admits that he wants dictatorial power?
I sincerely hope not! I truly hope that on September 17th of 2025, we get to celebrate 238 years of government of the people, by the people and for the people. Let’s work to save our Constitution!
Bill
| 
