Worshipping Words On Paper

EVERY TIME some self righteous, right wing, flag waving patriot proclaims the sacrosanctity of the United states constitution, I hurl. Figuratively, not literally. Always, its the righteous Christian conservatives, with their original intent blather and phony founding father idolatry, who just adore the United States constitution, all the while knowing nothing about actual history, nor the intent of the actual framers themselves. Invariably, those who elevate words on paper to the status of the sacred are not familiar with the words themselves but only have a vague, passing knowledge of what the document says. Its the thought that counts, the appearance of patriotic virtue. Conservatives ape those they most admire, establishment types, the types who wax patriotic and religious, as if the two are the same. Psychologically, they may be. If you're looking to follow the actual intent of the founders of the American constitutional system, consider this. Madison, who wrote the constitution, and Jefferson, his mentor, agreed that the document was imperfect at best, seriously flawed and makeshift at worst. They both believed that its primary flaw was that it left open the possibility of the central government devolving into a tyranny, despite the safeguards against such an eventuality written into the law. Thus was added the bill of rights, about which Madison was highly skeptical, thinking it would largely be ignored. Jefferson calculated that the average length of a generation in the United States was just over nineteen years. He therefore concluded that a new and improved version of the constitution would need to be written and enacted about every nineteen years, by violent revolution if necessary, as the new generation came into power, and the old faded away. Jefferson reasonably reckoned that every generation would be confronted with a different, unique set of circumstances, requiring a new legal framework suitable to the changing times. He believed strongly that each new generation had the inalienable right to remake the world, culturally, and in every way, in its own image, so as not to be constrained by the behavior of its predecessors. Liberalism at its finest. By 2019, Jefferson and Madison would have assumed that the nation, if it still existed as a constitutional republic, would be using its eight or ninth version of the constitution, a much improved version. That there would be a conservative citizenry venerating them and their imperfect creation they would find laughable, if not horrifying. They knew one thing we seem to have forgotten; words on paper are not sacred, and can always be improved. Words on paper are put there by people, people no better than we modern folk, not by God or supermen. Every time some scholarly, venerated fossil of a conservative "originalist" magistrate espouses the necessity of interpreting the constitution according to the strict construction of the original intent of the founders, I want to hurl, figuratively. Why bother with what the founders wanted? What matters is what we the living want and need, and what we want and need is what has been wanted and needed for a very long time, and from time to time: a new American constitution, made in our image, for our use, for our benefit and protection, not for the sacred honor of people who lived and died two hundred years ago. And, ironically, the people who lived an died two hundred years ago would agree totally, because they, unlike ourselves, understood their own limitations.