Colonists, Citizens, Constitutions: Creating the American Republic

(Hardback)

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Description

Colonists, Citizens, Constitutions highlights documents that tell the story of American constitutionalism from the founding era through the turn of the twentieth century. Accompanying a major exhibition at the New-York Historical Society and the Museum of the American Revolution, the book features federal and state constitutional materials - including a rare, privately owned copy of the original 1787 US constitution - that offer essential windows onto the history of the United States. Remarkably numerous and impressively diverse, constitutions enabled Americans to create revolutionary governments of, by, and for the people. Weaving both well-known and less familiar documents into a compelling narrative, the accessible text reveals how Americans have exercised their constitutional powers to shape their communities and why democracy remains an ongoing process, one in which citizens must constantly strive to create 'more perfect' unions among themselves.Contents: Foreword; Preface; Collecting Evidence: The Making of an American Collection; Introduction; 1. Experiments in Self-Government; 2. An Expanding Union; 3. Slavery and Freedom; 4. Reform and Renewal; Epilogue; Works in the Catalogue; Selected Bibliography; Acknowledgments; Index

Reviews

The foreword for the catalog for "Colonists, Citizens, Constitutions" was written by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg of the Supreme Court, who died in September. In the foreword, Justice Ginsburg notes that "original Constitutions permitted slavery and severely limited who counted among 'We the People.'" Although much of that changed as a result of amendments and court decisions -- what she calls "huge progress" -- "the work of perfection is scarcely done," she writes. "Many stains remain." The exhibition also demonstrates that the road to perfection is not necessarily linear.--Exhibition Review "The New York Times"

Author Bio

James F. Hrdlicka is a postdoctoral research scholar in the School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies and the Program in Political History and Leadership at Arizona State University. Previously he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Andrea Mitchell Center for the Study of Demoracy at the University of Pennsylvania. He received his PhD in History from the University of Virginia. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, where she has served since 1993. She is the second of four female justices to be appointed to the Court.