But the Reconstruction amendments of marked a second constitutional founding that rested on other premises. Together they made a broader definition of equality part of the constitutional order, and they gave the national government an effective basis for challenging racial inequalities within the states. It sadly took far too long for the Second Reconstruction of the s to implement that commitment, but when it did, it was a fulfillment of the original vision of the s. Two things. When we discuss the Constitutional Convention, we often praise the compromise giving each state an equal vote in the Senate and condemn the Three Fifths Clause allowing the southern states to count their slaves for purposes of political representation.
But where the quarrel between large and small states had nothing to do with the lasting interests of citizens — you never vote on the basis of the size of the state in which you live — slavery was a real and persisting interest that one had to accommodate for the Union to survive. Second, the greatest tragedy of American constitutional history was not the failure of the framers to eliminate slavery in That option was simply not available to them.
The real tragedy was the failure of Reconstruction and the ensuing emergence of Jim Crow segregation in the late 19th century that took many decades to overturn. That was the great constitutional opportunity that Americans failed to grasp, perhaps because four years of Civil War and a decade of the military occupation of the South simply exhausted Northern public opinion. Even now, if you look at issues of voter suppression, we are still wrestling with its consequences.
How did the founding fathers view equality? And how did these diverging interpretations emerge? But after the Revolution succeeded, Americans began reading that famous phrase another way.
It now became a statement of individual equality that everyone and every member of a deprived group could claim for himself or herself. With each passing generation, our notion of who that statement covers has expanded.
It is that promise of equality that has always defined our constitutional creed. At different moments, the Virginia colonists had tried to limit the extent of the slave trade, but the British crown had blocked those efforts. The Founding Fathers, a group of predominantly wealthy plantation owners and businessmen, united 13 disparate colonies, fought for independence from Britain and penned a series of influential governing documents that steer the country to this day.
All the Founding Fathers, including the first four U. The Founders proved equally adept later on in peacetime. When the federal government tottered under the Articles of Confederation , prominent citizens met anew to hammer out the U. Constitution , overcoming major areas of disagreement between large and small states and Southern and Northern ones to form a stable political system.
Showing foresight, they included a Bill of Rights , which enshrined many civil liberties into law and provided a blueprint for other emerging democracies. A prosperous Virginia farmer who owned hundreds of slaves, he came to resent the various taxes and restrictions being imposed on the colonies by the British crown.
Once the Revolutionary War broke out in , he was placed in charge of the Continental Army and quickly suffered a near-disastrous defeat at the Battle of Brooklyn. More defeats followed—all in all, Washington lost more battles than he won. Nonetheless, he kept his ragtag troops together even through a freezing winter at Valley Forge and, with the help of his French allies, was able to expel the British by Washington then returned to Virginia intent on resuming his career as a farmer.
But he was persuaded to re-enter politics as head of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, believing that a stronger federal government was needed to preserve the nation. In , Washington was overwhelmingly elected the first president of the United States. Rising to prominence as an aide-de-camp to Washington during the Revolutionary War, he became an impassioned supporter of a strong central government. Washington then tapped him to serve as the first U.
In the beginning stages of the American Revolution, Franklin was appointed to the five-member committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence. He then traveled to France, where he secured French assistance for the war effort and helped negotiate the Treaty of Paris , the official end to the conflict.
Just prior to his death, Franklin served as a sort of elder statesman at the Constitutional Convention. A distinguished Massachusetts lawyer, John Adams became a relatively early proponent of the revolutionary cause. Just like Franklin, he served on the committee that wrote the Declaration of Independence, journeyed overseas to secure French military aid and helped negotiate the Treaty of Paris.
He chaired other key committees as well and even found time to draft the Massachusetts Constitution which is still in use. Home United States U. Africa 54 - November 11, VOA Africa Listen live.
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