Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from radiotopia.

My name is Jody Avergan.

This day, March 21st, 1972, Montana's Constitutional Convention is meeting and they are

agreeing on a new state constitution that, among other things, includes a provision

about a quote, right of privacy. We'll get into the

context for why this was enshrined into the Constitution. It says a lot about Montana

but also about the country as a whole in that period.

And then of course, there's the fallout of such a provision.

Privacy rights have been used to establish all sorts of laws and rulings in the years since,

perhaps most famously, the right to an abortion and also I'll just say a

constitutional convention is a super fascinating process I will already go on the

record saying there should be way more of them if only for the theater of it all but let's have a

convention of our of our own here no constitutional scholars but just regular

folks interested in history and politics much like Montana's constitutional

convention here as always Nicole Hammer of

Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of Welsley. Hello there. Hello Jody.

Hey there. So I actually want to start there with like why is Montana having a constitutional convention what is a constitutional convention it is really fascinating and then we'll kind of wind our way towards this idea of the right of privacy enshrined in there and what that means.

But you know, I just feel like when we all hear a constitutional convention, we think of the

original constitutional conventions and all the founding fathers and their wigs and it was very hot and

they're gathered in Philadelphia and they're screaming about you know but

states can do it too basically whenever they get the will together to make it happen

right? They can and they do.

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