Saturday, September 17, may have gotten some attention because of college football games, but the importance of that day goes largely unnoticed today. On that day, 235 years ago, delegates to what became known as the Constitutional Convention signed the United States Constitution. That document came after months of vigorous, and often vitriolic, debate. Roughly a third of the delegates left Independence Hall in discouragement.

Thanks to the moral force of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, the other two-thirds of the delegates stayed and finished the work. They produced four handwritten sheets of parchment stating the terms on which thirteen independent little republics agreed to try to survive together as one strong nation. They signed the document on September 17, 1787.

The U.S. Constitution is the bedrock – the foundation – of our Republic. That document attempted a delicate balancing act, creating a system of checks and balances to prevent any single branch of government from seizing an excessive amount of power.

They had to create other balances:

Protecting the concerns of states with small populations against those with large populations;

Protecting the interests of northern states and southern states;

Establishing a true federal Republic that recognized certain government powers as belonging to the states and others as powers of the federal government.

The negotiation was long and tedious, but the result was worth all the toil, sweat, and frustration. The delegates set forth the purpose of the Constitution in the document’s Preamble:

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

At one time, every school child faced the task of memorizing the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution. Part of the curriculum included lessons in Civics, during which students learned some of the basic principles of our Republic. I wonder how much honest instruction in the history and the text of the U.S. Constitution goes on in schools today.

The ultimate purpose of the U.S. Constitution was the protection of individual liberties. The reason for checks and balances and separation of powers in our most fundamental legal document is to prevent the government from running roughshod over our rights.

Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798:

“… in questions of power then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the constitution.”

The founders of this nation were pragmatic men who understood the tendency of those with even the best intentions to become tyrannical unless they were kept in check. Jefferson saw the U.S. Constitution as providing “chains” to keep the quest for extreme power in check.

 James McHenry (1753-1816) was a Maryland delegate to the Constitutional Convention. On the page where McHenry recorded the events of the last day of the convention, he wrote on September 18, 1787: “A lady asked Dr. Franklin Well Doctor what have we got a republic or a monarchy – A republic replied the Doctor if you can keep it.”

A Republic – if we can keep it.

Nothing is destroying our Republic as much as the gross ignorance of our Constitution. I wonder when the members of Congress last read the Constitution. I hear them often say they have a “constitutional duty” to perform some task, but I can rarely find a justification in the Constitution for their behavior.

For that matter, when was the last time that you read the U.S. Constitution?

How many public officials take an oath or give affirmation that they will support and defend the Constitution of the United States but have never even read the document?

We must ask ourselves this question: How well are we keeping the Republic the founders established?

A Republic – if we can keep it.

Mike Parker is a columnist for the Neuse News. You can reach him at mparker16@gmail.com.