Raymond Smock Quotes
The Constitution was actually published in two languages in 1787: English and German.
There are many Americans who resent the fact that states and localities publish official documents in Spanish and other foreign languages as well as English. They often argue that the Founders wanted English to be the only language of the American government. It comes as a shock and surprise that the Constitution was published in English AND German to reach the many German immigrants who were a part of early America.
Raymond Smock, Historian & Director, Robert Byrd Center for Legislative Studies, Interview, C-SPAN, March 4, 2005
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Conason was refuting the argument of Presidential Press Secretary Ari Fleischer {618120} who had used the secrecy of the Constitutional Convention in 1789 to justify the Vice President’s secret meetings with energy businessman to make government energy policy.
Most of the delegates to the Constitutional Convention were aristocrats, and all were elites of different types. However, they wanted and knew that they would have to submit their work product to the people for ratification. So while each had their own views, most were heavily influenced by their perception of public opinion reaction to their draft. Even with that, in order to get the ratification votes, they had to add the first 10 amendments—the Bill of Rights in order to get the votes of the men who were NOT at the convention.
at the NSA collection of every American’s private e-mails, phone calls, and other digital communications. Referring to the NSA program of collecting information on all electronic communications of all American Citizens. See {636963} for more on the case.
George W. Bush. See {618119} for the rejoinder to the defense.
It was commonly asked of Blacks applying to register. There are few people who could give a cogent response to this. What made it terrible was that the white racist registrars had the unilateral authority to determine whether or not the oral response was adequate. Recording of responses were prohibited so that no Black who was disenfranchised could ever appeal when he/she was rejected. This is one of the thousands of techniques that were used throughout the South to prevent Negro voting. They were so egregious that Lyndon Johnson was abe to force through Southern filibusters The Voting Rights Act which has eliminated the worst of the racist restrictions on Black voting. As the worst of the racist white generation has died off, Southern discrimination in voting has lessened and the situation is better each year. By 2012 there were some who claimed that the law was no longer necessary do to changes in attitude and practice, but others worried that if there were no longer any forms of discrimination in voting, why some wanted to repeal the Voting Rights Act.
The political battles over the ratification of the Constitution were vicious and brutal even by modern standards.
The 10th Amendment was created to take care of this objection which Jefferson and many others had.
Most of the states would not ratify the proposed 1787 constitution as it was. Congress then added a version of what became known as the Bill of Rights in order to obtain the required concurrence of the people. Most scholars look at the 1787 Constitution and observe how little trust it had in the men who would rule and implement it. However, the people in general were even more skeptical than the intellectual leaders who drafted the Constitution and wanted even more assurances. Many people believed that most of the issues in the Bill of Rights were either implicit in the original 1787 draft or were unnecessary to spell out, but Congress had to sell the Constitution to the people as a whole and it took some very specific text to get people to believe that their rights would be protected.
Raymond W. Smock is an American historian, who is the Director Emeritus of the Robert C. Byrd Center for Congressional History and Education at Shepherd University, and formerly the Historian of the United States House of Representatives (1983-1995).
