Preamble to the Constitution of the United States

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” In the last day of the Democratic Convention, a Muslim immigrant and father of a fallen soldier gave a moving speech which put our Constitution into the spotlight. He asked whether Donald Trump had ever read it, reached into his pocket, took out a pamphlet containing the Constitution and offered to loan it to him. Given the Constitution’s current prominence, I would like to discuss its Preamble and give my interpretation of what it means in the current era. In reading it again, I noticed the Preamble has a number of words capitalized where they might normally not be. I assume this was done to elevate their importance. People, Order, Union, Justice, Tranquility, Welfare Blessings of Liberty, and Posterity (defence was not capitalized). It is interesting that in today’s political climate, defense is a major theme of the presidential candidates, each stressing that the most important part of a president’s job is to keep us safe and they would be the best Commander in Chief and be able to do that better than the other candidate. In fact the oath the President swears is not to keep us safe but to “faithfully execute the Office of the President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States”. WE THE PEOPLE: From the very beginning there is an emphasis on the “People” and there is no mention of government until later in the Articles. It is we, the People, who established the Constitution and are thus responsibility to for its charter. Subsequent Articles describe the structure of the government and broad responsibilities. Too often we think of our government as some foreign entity that mistreats us. We forget that government serves at our pleasure and is responsible to us, “the People”. So if we feel mistreated, it is not the government but we who elected it and who it is accountable to and works for, who are responsible. The tasks enumerated in the Preamble and listed below are our responsibility and government is just a tool to help accomplish them. Note: At the preamble stage there is no differentiation between people. Article one talks about legislative power, staffing and taxation. Here is where a bag of worms is opened and is created a source of much criticism. The way I read the section regarding the tallying of people is that it was not directly a division by race but maybe by position and taxes. At the time of the writing a segment of the population felt that only land owners should have a right to vote and this may have been a compromise to appease them. Native Americans, if they pay taxes are counted (“excluding Indians NOT taxed”). But I don’t know if there were any “Indians” taxed at this time though there were Native American farmers in some New England communities who stayed loyal to the Colonials during King Philip’s War I assume they were taxed. It also does not discount Africans per se by stating that all Free Persons are counted as one “including those bound to service for a term of years”. This inclusion of indentured servants, who are predominantly white, in the count of “whole people”, and exclusion of slaves, all black, counting them as a fraction of a person, is troubling but may be in part a financial matter and not strictly a racial one. FORM A MORE PERFECT UNION: One of a number of common usages of the term union is defined as “a number of persons, states, etc. joined or associated together for some common purpose”. A “more perfect Union” recognizes that we are a community as opposed to a bunch of individuals and requires us to work on ways for us to complement each other. ESTABLISH JUSTICE: There is a difference between legal and just. Legality tests adherence to a written word. Justice is more complex and gets into subjective areas based on morality and what is just in one person’s eye is not just in another. Justice is one of the responsibilities we delegate to our legislature. If we are true to our charter, we require our representatives to pass laws and implement policies that are perceived as just by larger and larger disparate elements of our society. INSURE DOMESTIC TRANQUILIT: Tranquility is defined as “quality or state of being tranquil; calmness; peacefulness; quiet; serenity.” Though we tend to think of tranquility primarily as freedom from crime, I think the founders took a broader view. PROVIDE FOR THE COMMON DEFENCE: This refers to us (all of us) getting together and defending ourselves against foreign aggression. Not much nuance. PROMOTE THE GENERAL WELFARE: I believe this is the most neglected portion of the Preamble (particularly by the Right). We the People have a duty to work for the overall wellbeing, not just the material, of all of our citizens. This is particularly challenging, but no less necessary, during rapid changes in global economics, technology, demography and world order we face today. Though the notion of “I am my brother’s keeper” is a very important portion of the “general welfare”, it is not the only one. SECURE THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY TO OURSELVES AND OUR POSTERITY: There are a number of definitions of liberty. 1. “freedom from arbitrary or despotic control”. The key terms here are ARBITRARY and DESPOTIC. To fulfill our responsibilities stated in the preamble there needs to be some level of control though it cannot be arbitrary or despotic. We the People need to ensure that policies implemented by the government on our behalf are not. 2. “freedom from external or foreign rule, independence”. 3. “freedom from control, interference, obligation, restriction, hampering conditions, etc; power or right of doing, thinking, speaking, etc., according to choice”. I believe this definition of liberty is the one we generally think of. At the very extreme, the Right takes this too literally considering any control, however necessary some controls might be to “promote the general Welfare” to be unacceptable. State’s Rights people want as many of these controls moved from the federal to state government though the preamble speaks of “we the People of the United States” not individual states. 4. “freedom from captivity, confinement or physical restraint”. Establishing a just legal system ensures this. The Asian Kingdom of Bhutan has a Minister of Happiness and measures itself against a “happiness standard” rather than GDP. We might consider forming ministries for the six challenges outlined in the Preamble to the Constitution. We already have a Defense Department and a Department of Justice, (though it is more focused on law than justice). We could have a Perfect Union Departments focused on issues that unite us and facilitate the advancement of our society; a Department of Tranquility under which could fall corrections, policing, recreation facilities, parks …..; a Department of General Welfare (we tend to think of welfare in the narrowest of terms as providing assistance to the needy), the department would encompass healthcare, education, transportation, environment, discrimination, labor and food and drugs; and finally the Blessings of Liberty Department would ensure that policies proposed do not put us under despotic and arbitrary control or lead us in a direction that will diminish our power over the workings of our government (Citizens United is such a court decision. Adam Smith, in the Wealth of Nations, warns against allowing people who make a living from profits to influence policy, because their interests are not only not aligned with the wellbeing of the society as a whole but are often conflicting. He goes on to point out that, on the other hand, the interest of people who make their living from wages and rent are generally aligned with the wellbeing of a society as a whole.) I know, I know, more bureaucracies. But the larger and more complex a society, the greater is the cost of governing. We should focus not on how large or small but on how effective our government is in helping us achieve the goals outlined in the Preamble. The charter in the Preamble was not meant to be accomplished piece by piece as broken down above. All segments are interrelated and any one needs to be realized in the context of all the others. The Constitution is a marvelous, well thought out piece of work which has endured these centuries and indeed will continue to guide us for several more centuries.