Is America Exceptional?--Part 3 The Constitution

No meditation on the exceptional nature of the United States of America would be complete without an analysis of the Constitution. While the Declaration of Independence is the verse that inspired the birth of the nation, the Constitution is the plodding prose that instructs its citizens on how to remain true to the spirit of the verse. The Constitution obviously cannot be discussed thoroughly in this forum, as volumes of the very best scholarship have been produced over the centuries. I will restrict my comments to the uncommon nature of this document, its often overlooked central principles and main features of what its authors hoped would be sustainable, and some commentary on the effect the document had on the character of the nation.

A written document describing the governing principles of a polity--a constitution--was not altogether unique in the Colonial Era. John Adams was the primary drafter of the Massachusetts State Constitution, and Thomas Jefferson was the primary drafter of the Virginia State Constitution. However, in the summer of 1787 both men were thousands of miles away--Jefferson in France and Adams in England--representing the United States' interests in those countries. The act of constructing the document in America was the realization of the vision that Adams described during his fateful speech in the First Continental Congress urging the ratification of the Declaration of Independence.