January 5, 2011 The Constitution

I read John Merline’s take on the recent decision by House Republicans to read the entire U.S. Constitution at the start of the new Congress.   First, I agree with the House Republicans that this is an excellent idea.  Too many of us (most of us?), including our elected officials, don’t really know what the Constitution says.  Everybody likes to quote it, but hardly anybody really has read it.  Second, I agree with Mr. Merline who contends that rather than letting some boring, unknown lawmaker read the constitution, let’s get some big names in there.  He suggests William Shatner (as Captain James T. Kirk), James Earl Jones, or Sam Elliot.  Some suggestions I’d add would be Kathleen Turner or Fran Drescher.  Any of these guys or gals could really give some character to the reading of the U.S. Constitution.

With all this talk of the U.S. Constitution, I decided I should read it, too.  So, I downloaded it from the internet and learned a few things right off the bat:

1.       The Constitution is comprised of a Preamble, 7 Articles, and 27 Amendments.

2.       The Constitution and the original 10 Amendments (the Bill of Rights) is 22 pages long (if the type isn’t too big and the margins aren’t too wide).  If you add in the other 17 Amendments the total number of pages is 32.

3.       The Constitution, when annotated with all the rulings made by the Supreme Court, goes from 20 pages (original) to 942 pages.  That’s just the 7 Articles.

4.       The 27 Amendments, when annotated with all the rulings by the Supreme Court, goes from 12 total pages to:

a.       1^st Amendment—Religion and Expression—264 pages

b.      2^nd Amendment—Bearing Arms—4 pages

c.        3^rd Amendment—Quartering Soldiers—2 pages

d.      4^th Amendment—Search and Seizure—80 pages

e.      5^th Amendment—Rights of Persons—132 pages

f.        6^th Amendment—Rights of Accused in Criminal Prosecurtion—54 pages

g.       7^th Amendment—Civil Trials—18 pages

h.      8^th Amendment—Further Guarantees in Criminal Cases—42 pages

i.         9^th Amendment—Unenumerated Rights—4 pages

j.        10^th Amendment—Reserved Powers—14 pages

k.       11^th Amendment—Suits Against States—30 pages

l.         12^th Amendment—Election of President—2 pages

m.    13^th Amendment—Slavery and Involuntary Servidtude—10 pages

n.      14^th Amendment—Rights Guaranteed, Privileges and Immunities of Citizenship, Due Process and Equal Protection—384 pages

o.      15^th Amendment—Rights of Citizens to Vote—16 pages

p.      16^th Amendment—Income Tax—14 pages

q.      17^th Amendment—Popular Election of Senators—2 pages

r.        18^th Amendment—Prohibition of Intoxicating Liquors—4 pages

s.       19^th Amendment—Women’s Suffrage Rights—2 pages

t.        20^th Amendment—Commencement of the Terms of Office—4 pages

u.      21^st Amendment—Repeal of the 18^th Amendment—12 pages

v.       22^nd Amendment—Presidential Tenure—2 pages

w.     23^rd Amendment—Presidential Electors for D.C.—2 pages

x.       24^th Amendment—Abolition of the Poll Tax—2 pages

y.       25^th Amendment—Presidential Vacancy and Disability—4 pages

z.       26^th Amendment—Reduction of Voting Age—2 pages

aa.   27^th Amendment—Congressional Pay Limitation—2 pages

bb.  Total Pages = 1,106 pages

Pretty amazing, huh?  What I find interesting is looking at the topics with the most discussions by the Supreme Court:  Amendments 1 and 14.  I also find it interesting that Amendment 18, which was really the only Amendment that TOOK RIGHTS AWAY, was eventually repealed (thank God).

I haven’t read any of the annotated versions yet (just the originals), but I will and I’ll let you know what I think.  Or maybe I could get a celebrity to read them to me.