Since this week has been declared Constitution Week I thought I might share why the Constitution is so important to me.

In my opinion, there are two areas of the U.S. Constitution that make it the greatest document ever written.

The first area is the Bill of Rights. The Bill Of Rights gave us the First Amendment, which protects free speech. It protects freedom of the press, our right to peaceably assemble, and freedom of religion. Its the Second Amendment that protects our right to bear arms, and that right shall not be infringed. The Fourth Amendment protects you from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. Then there is the Tenth Amendment, which was the founders way of humbly saying that they werent right all the time. They knew that the federal government didnt always know what was best for the country, and that it should be up to the states to decide what is in their best interest.

The second part of the constitution that is brilliant, again came from the founders. They knew that as our great country grew, developed, and changed, we would need to change the Constitution with Amendments. Perfect examples of those Amendments are the 13th, which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime; and the 19th amendment, which prohibits the states and the federal government from denying the right to vote to citizens of the United States on the basis of sex.

This Divine Document is, and always will be defined as the Peoples Document. Not because the constitution GIVES you your rights, but because it PROTECTS your rights from a tyrannical, out-of-control government.

At the time the Constitution was written, someone asked Benjamin Franklin, What did you give us? and he replied, A Republic, if you can keep it. In the 1960s, it was Ronald Reagan who said in his Time for Choosing speech, This idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of mans relation to man.

The 17th day of September, marks 232 years since the most influential set of American laws were enacted. As we celebrate the U.S. Constitution, every day we are fortunate to be guided by such a remarkable document.

Byron H. Pelton

Logan County Commissioner

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Celebrating Constitution Week - Journal Advocate