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Constitutional Law

A Brief History of the United States

The Founding Documents of the United States

With the exception of the Declaration of Independence, I updated the words used in the founding documents to modern English. For the Declaration of Independence, I just gave 5 bullet points on the Rights of Citizens outlined in the Declaration and summarized the rest of its meaning. For the remaining documents, I wrote the text in modern English that is current as of 2020.

Comparing Notes with the US National Archives

For this section, I provided notes on amendments 11 through 27. The Founding Documents series had an introductory paragraph before the modern English text for each document. The Constitution and Bill of Rights were pretty straight forward as amendments 1 through 10 did not attempt to delete or modify any portion of the US Constitution. Of main concern is Article 6, Paragraph 2 which states “any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding”.  The word notwithstanding was found to have a meaning of shall not prevail or will not be an obstacle to in the year 1787. This means there can be no conflict with the original text of the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights or any existing amendment when a new amendment is made.

These notes provide an overview of how amendments would work, if there is a conflict. Obviously deleting or modifying pre-existing text of the US Constitution would create a conflict so it should not prevail or be an obstacle to the pre-existing laws of the US Constitution. Under contract law, any conflict with new amendments and existing text in the US Constitution would be severable or null and void. This series outlines those potential conflicts and gives insight into how amendments 11 through 27 would fit into the US Constitution without creating a conflict.

Summary on Studying the Founding Documents

Organizing Legislative Text

This isn’t necessarily constitutional law, but the US Code and Congressional  Public Laws need to be compliant with the US Constitution so it makes sense to include them here as a final wrap up on writing legislation. Drafters of treaties and agreements that will be made by the United States also need to be cognizant of the existing constitutional rights of US Citizens. A party to a treaty should never be under the impression that they are modifying the US Constitution even if parts of the treaty may ultimately wind up in the US Code or be issued as a Congressional Public Law.

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