Constitutionalism, Nationalism & the Dismantling of Democracy. Part Two.

The broad assumption that a Constitution offers citizens protection & rights that might not otherwise be available is not always a correct one. Despite the legal underpinnings & guarantees that may be present under a nation’s constitution, governments can subvert the legalities even as they promote them as benefits.

The tennis court oath at Versailles (1789). A key moment that set off the French Revolution when the men of the National Assembly swore an oath to not stop meeting until a constitution had been agreed. From a sketch by Jacques Louis David made between 1790–1794. The painting itself was never actually finished.

‘The separation of children in the public schools of Boston, on account of color or race, is in the account of Caste, and on this account is a violation of Equality. Caste makes distinctions where God has made none.’

Charles Sumner, U.S. Senator and abolitionist, on the failures of the U.S. Constitution to hold good and true. From: Life and public services of Charles Sumner by C. Edwards Lester, 1874.

Democratic deficiency as enshrined in the U.S. Constitution

Of the post-Civil Wars years W.E.B. DuBois wrote that, there was ‘a chance to try democratic rule in a new way…a unique chance to realise a new modern democracy in industry in the southern United States which would point the way to…