Myth #20: The Constitution is an Outdated or Living Document

This is the Twentieth Myth in the series: 25 Myths of the U.S. Constitution.

Note: These articles later were updated and combined into my first book: 25 Myths of the United States Constitution.

By Douglas V. Gibbs

After visiting the United States in 1831 and 1833 to discover why the new nation was meeting with such success, Alexis de Tocqueville observed that "America is great because America is good."

John Adams stated that "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

A moral people is a people that follows set standards in morality, law, and act in a manner that is civil to his fellow citizen. The U.S. Constitution is the set standard for the system of governance in place in the United States. The writers of the Constitution researched history, seeking to form the best system of government that could both protect liberty, and stand the test of time. These men realized that there is no perfect government, and that though political systems are prone to become tyrannical, government is a necessity in a functioning civilization.

The States, as autonomous entities, were less likely to become oppressive against the people because the governments of the States were closer to the people, and more easily managed by the people. However, individually the States could not defend themselves against foreign invaders, nor accomplish establishing uniform standards that would be beneficial to the union. Therefore, the Founding Fathers realized America needed a centralized government to protect and preserve the union.

Centralized systems, as one looks back into history, are always the source of oppression and tyranny. The task the founders realized they were faced with was how to create a central government that did not act in a tyrannical manner.

The answer to their quest lied in the sovereignty of the States, and the value system of standards the people of the United States hold to. As long as the people's ability to self-govern at the State level regarding local issues, and a set of authorities granted to the new government remained limited and strictly followed, the bells of liberty may ring in the young nation for many generations to come. Holding to those standards, however, required that the people be a virtuous people that adhered to a specific set of morals, standards , and an overall practice of goodness.

The moment the people's view of social standards might become relativistic, their view of the law of the land would be soon to follow in kind. In other words, if society was unwilling to follow a system of set moral standards, how could they expect their politicians to follow a system of set constitutional standards?

It is from this belief in relativism that has led to the emergence of a belief that the Constitution is a living document that can be changed based on the whims of one's views of what they think it should mean. Under the onslaught of a relativistic view of the Constitution, the original intent of the set standards contained within the pages of the Constitution seem to have gone out the window.

Those who take a view that the Constitution can be twisted at will because it is somehow a living document that bends and sways with the times believe it to be such because they do not like the system upon which it was founded. Those who claim the Constitution is a living document are simply collectivists who wish to downplay State sovereignty, and expand the powers of the federal system. They call the Constitution a living document because they do not wish the federal system to follow the limitations set forth in its pages. They call it a living document because they wish to circumvent the set standards put forth by the Constitution. They call it a living document because they wish to transform the very foundation of the political system of the United States into a socialist system the Founding Fathers never intended it to be.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary