The Constitution and the Bill of Rights

Civics 101

NHPR

Government, Society & Culture, History

4.2 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 22 March 2022

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Long before we could decide and insist upon what they mean to us, a handful of powerful men had to put pen to paper. We're revisiting two episodes from our Foundational Documents series: The Constitution and The Bill of Rights. This is the story of how these now-indispensable documents came to be during a time when independence and unity was new and highly vulnerable. Our understanding and interpretation of these documents has grown and changed in the hundreds of years since they were ratified and in the three years since these episodes were released. Take some time to get reacquainted. Understanding how and why we work is a lifelong practice here at Civics 101. CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, donate to the podcast, sign up for our newsletter, get free educational materials, and more! To see Civics 101 in book form, check out A User's Guide to Democracy: How America Works by Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice, featuring illustrations by Tom Toro. Check out our other weekly NHPR podcast, Outside/In - we think you'll love it! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	The US Constitution is a constant partner in everything we do here at Civics 101.
0:11.7	Can the government do that?
0:13.2	Who is in charge here?
0:15.1	What did the Supreme Court say?
0:17.6	How are those votes counted?
0:20.2	We go beyond the Constitution, sure, but nine times out of ten we start there.
0:25.0	It's the foundation.
0:26.3	It's a paramount importance.
0:28.7	It's the revered beacon.
0:31.2	But I recently spoke to someone who dramatically shifted how I see this remarkable document.
0:37.0	And as I'm getting ready to share that conversation with you, I figured it's a good time to
0:41.0	remind us all what the US Constitution, the thing that we reference so often, it's basically
0:47.3	a person in the room, actually is, says, and does.
0:51.9	So today we are revisiting how this 200-plus-year-old rulebook came to be.
0:58.0	And after that, speaking of looking at Hollywood documents in a new light, Hannah, I'm going
1:02.4	to be sharing an episode that features my most overused metaphor in my many years of
1:07.3	working with Civics 101.
1:09.0	But we got to start with the Constitution.
1:10.7	And by the way, everyone, the opening scene with George Washington having breakfast used
1:15.0	to be like twice as long.
1:16.9	We made Hannah cut it.
1:17.9	You know, the fact that no one gets to hear what the weather was like on November 5, 1786
	...

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