[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 6 (Tuesday, January 18, 2011)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E64]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE HOUSE'S READING OF THE CONSTITUTION
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HON. RUSH D. HOLT
of new jersey
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, when we read the Constitution in this body on
January 6, 2011, we missed a good opportunity. I joined in the reading.
I was certainly not going to allow one political party to claim the
Constitution for its own, as it has sometimes tried to claim the U.S.
flag. However, by reading an altered version of the Constitution and by
doing so without warrant we lost a great educational moment.
I revere the U.S. Constitution and carry a copy of the Constitution
with me every day. I often ask students what they think is the greatest
invention of humans. Because they know that I am a scientist, they
usually say something technical like the laser or a microchip in answer
to my question. I reply that the greatest invention is the U.S.
Constitution. It is truly ingenious: Because of this document, our
brilliant, resilient, self-correcting system of government, dreamed up
in Philadelphia so many years ago, still functions well today. The
system inspires and motivates people around the world.
Instead of reading the full Constitution, members of the House took
turns reading an altered text based on the amendments. I was further
troubled to learn that because of human error we skipped two pages
during our reading.
The altered text omitted the original language of Article I, Section
2 that counted each black individual as only three-fifths of a person
for the purposes of apportionment of Representatives, omitting it and
reading only the text of the 14th Amendment that apportioned
Representatives according to the total number of all male citizens.
Yet, Article I, Section 3 that proscribes that the two Senators from
each state be chosen by the state legislature, a passage of the
Constitution subsequently amended by the 17th Amendment, was read in
its original format.
The decision to not read the full text ignores the fundamental
strength of the U.S. Constitution--its implicit recognition that the
United States of America is an imperfect, ever evolving, self-
correcting union. The Constitution is not a perfect document, and the
Founders did not have all the answers. African American were counted as
three-fifths of a person. Women were disenfranchised. The concept of
privacy was glossed over. The full text of the Constitution and its
Amendments should have been read today to help American recall and
understand how we have strived and still strive ``to form a more
perfect Union.''
The Constitution was a compromise throughout. In addition to counting
each black individual as only three-fifths of a person, it was
virtually silent on slavery, the great injustice of the day. But after
a way that almost destroyed the Union, after more than half a million
died, and when brother fought brother, the Constitution was amended and
updated to reflect the will of the people. Today, the American
experiment continues to improve. Freedoms and protections of rights
keep growing in the face of both consistent and ever-changing threats.
Langston Hughes--an American who was denied the rights and freedoms
that all of us deserve--wrote in Let America Be America Again, 1938,
O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!
Students attending under-performing schools, millions of Americans
without health insurance, and widespread poverty demonstrate that even
today, America never was America for far too many of us. But our
Constitution lets us admit when we are wrong and correct our mistakes.
Our collective vision of America must include an expanding sphere of
freedom, liberty, and opportunity for all. And most importantly, we
must never believe we are so infallible that we fail to strive for a
``more perfect Union.''
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