It was 221 years ago today that the Constitution was signed by it’s drafters in Philadelphia:
What’s the most important day in American history? Most of us would answer the Fourth of July. But think about today, Sept. 17.
For on this date in 1787, the convention in Philadelphia completed work on one of the greatest acts of creative leadership of all time, “this Constitution of The United States.” The framers rescued America from what James Madison later described as “so gloomy a chaos” and set the world marching toward what we can now see as the Age of Democracy.
Yet there will be no parades today, no picnics or fireworks. Perhaps a library somewhere is sponsoring a talk, but Constitution Day will pass largely unnoticed. Americans have, over the past 40 years, drifted away from a connection to our Constitution, the document that invented the United States as we now understand it and helped it to become the longest enduring democracy in history.
Sadly, this is largely true, but I don’t think a parade is necessary. All you really need to do is read the document itself, and ponder what has become of it.
September 17th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
Maybe if we made this a national holiday, and scrapped Labor Day (a political payoff, in any case).
‘Course, it would have the advantage of extending summer by an average of two weeks….