Why The Constitution Is Not a Racist Document

Recently, it has become quite popular to say that the American Constitution is founded on racism, and therefore, so is our country.

I believe this is incorrect and will attempt to show you why.

I have a great interest in the American Constitution and took a month to study the history around it and the document itself intensely. My goal was to memorize every rule put forward in the Constitution, all seven articles, and twenty-seven amendments. In this process, I discovered the story that America was founded on racism is incorrect.

Now, a disclaimer, every single person who founded America or was involved in the Constitution was by today's standards - racist. Because this was 1789, that was the common consensus. Just like it was the common consensus that bloodletting was a good idea. Just because Charles Darwin believed in bloodletting and doesn't know about black holes, that doesn't mean evolution isn't true and he was a bad scientist. We all truly stand on the shoulders of giants, and we stand on the shoulders of the giants of the founding fathers, but inherent on standing on their shoulders, they are below us in some senses of morality. They had wrong and immoral views on race.

But I think it is hubris and hypocrisy to say that just because you were lucky enough to be born in a time when we have advanced in some senses of morality to say you are wiser, better, and more moral than the founding fathers.

The founding fathers were more forward-thinking than the men around them, less racist, sexists, classists, and greedy than the general population. They were founding a country on the idea of freedom, individual worth, and that everyone is created equal, which is a revolutionary idea. They were willing to stake their wealth, renown, and very lives on these ideas and the rights of their fellow men. We should all hope that if we lived in a time where those ideas were so new and the ideas of racism so normal, that we would have had the wisdom and moral strength to be as principled and forward-thinking as the founding fathers.

Many of them admitted the ideas of individual liberty and inherent human rights, contradicted slavery. Many of the same who owned slaves admitted that. For example, George Washington said after the war in a letter that he "never mean[s] . . . to possess another slave by purchase; it being among my first wishes to see some plan adopted by which slavery in this country may be abolished."

James Madison, one of the driving forces behind the Constitution, said "If slavery, as a national evil, is to be abolished, and it be just that it be done at the national expense, the amount of the expense is not a paramount consideration." The other founding fathers shared similar views, but to go through each of their opinions and thoughts on the matter would take too much time and is not the purpose of this document. But I would encourage you to do research for yourself, and make sure to read actual quotes from the founding fathers and be wary of modern historians claiming they know what was going on inside the heads of people who have now been dead for hundreds of years. But if the founding fathers did understand slavery went against the freedom they fought so hard for, why didn't they use the Constitution to make slavery illegal?

There are three primary reasons they didn't.

Ending slavery would be a massive economic overturn.

Ending slavery is not as easy as letting all the enslaved people go. In a perfect world, that would be the answer, and maybe morally, it is, but when you're building a country, there are some complexities. If a major part of your economy comes from free labor, ending that, with nothing to replace it, would not just cause major poverty and economic downturn, but possibly even starvation and chaos. When we eventually did actually end slavery, we could do it because it was economically viable to do so, because machinery had been invented to replace the cheap labor. But if you did it in the founding of the country, countless farmers would lose their income. More importantly, huge amounts of previously enslaved people would be in need of jobs, places to live, and education, all of which would be hard to grant if your country was in a recession caused by this very overturn. A much smaller version of this did in fact, happen after the civil war, but obviously, in the end, it was the greater good to give these people their freedom than to preserve a good economy. But the founding fathers hoped and believed they could do this proccess slowly to avoid such economic downturns.

2: They needed the support of the southern states

I think we sometimes pretend that the writing of the Constitution was when a bunch of peaceful gentlemen sat down and in complete agreement and ease, decided to write the beautiful document. This is a myth. The Constitution was not ratified until a decade after the independence of the united states, and unsurprisingly was a political endeavor. It was up in the air whether we'd even adopt it, let alone what should go in it. Many of these men had different views on what this beautiful new government should look like, and even more, many of them wanted to protect the sovereignty and power of their individual states. But they all had to admit - after a decade of the country barely functioning on their original plan of almost complete state sovereignty - something had to change. So the constitutional convention began, and the arguing inseud. The making of the Constitution was a game of persuasion, rewriting, and compromise. They needed 9 of the 13 states to ratify the document, so they had to please the majority.

This is actually one of the beautiful parts of the document. Since many of them were so different in their views, and all wanted to protect their states, they created a document filled with checks and balances, which was not skewed toward any particular ideology. But because of this, the founding fathers were sometimes forced to compromise in less than ideal ways. They needed the support of the southern states to ratify it. Since the southern states were also the rich states, they had a great amount of influence on the other. To get them to sign on to this idea of a well built government based in freedom, they weren't able to completely abolish slavery. Most of them justifying that this was the only way to preserve America and freedom, so in the long run, the ability to free the enslaved peoples.

3: Fear

We must acknowledge that some of the founding fathers didn't know what would happen if they let go of a huge part of the country in one fail swoop. They were afraid of creating a mass of people who they had, by their own immortality, made unemployed, uneducated, and they thought, unreligious. After watching the bloody slave revolutions of South America, they were afraid that might happen to them if they freed such a large group of people they had bought.

Thomas Jefferson said on the subject, "But as it is, we have the wolf by the ear, and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go."

Many of the founding fathers believed the way to combat these problems was to end slavery slowly. This plan was in practice but interrupted by the rebellion of the south, causing the process to actually be speeded along.

But I am not here to define the racism or lack thereof in the founding fathers, So but whether the document they wrote, the Constitution, is.

First off, the Constitution was building a government based on freedom, small government, individual rights, and all men being created equal, therefore the philosophy behind it is inherently opposed to slavery and racism.

But, there are three sections of the Constitution that people point to say the document is racist. I will unpack those sections today, going in the order of how they appear in the Constitution.

First off, the three-fifths compromise, which goes:

"Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other Persons."

This point has been levied to say that the constitution values black lives at 3/5s of white. This can't be completely accurate because 59 thousand free black people in America would have been counted as full people, and theoretically, would have had the right to vote. So it was not a point of race, but a point of taxes and ability to vote, and slaves did or had neither.

And secondly, the historical context of this can clear up a lot of confusion:

When the Constitution was being written, there was a lot of debate over how we would count how to count the power of each State. Therefore, how much they should be taxed and how many representatives they should have in the house of Representatives.

One of the original proposals was to count the value of the property from each State, which would have meant that slaves would have been counted by their value as a commodity, not as people. This idea was scrapped for various reasons, the main two being that a state's value in representation does not come from wealth, and the fact it would have been too hard to count and manage. So they decided instead to count the people from each State.

But, how were they supposed to count the people who weren't voting - like slaves? In fact, the states with the most slaves wanted the slaves to be counted as full people, since that would have meant that they had more power, and their votes as slave owners would have counted for more than the votes of their brothers in states with few slaves. So, the three-fifths compromise was reached.

Obivlsy, not allowing slaves to vote and thinking of them as commodities is wrong, but the Constitution itself is not promoting this activity, merely dealing with it. It obviously was not a value judgment on those people since native Americans were not being counted at all, but that was just because they weren't being taxed, and nor were the enslaved people.

Next was one of the major compromises that were made for the southern states. It goes as follows:

"The Migration or Importation of such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the Year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a Tax or duty may be imposed on such Importation, not exceeding ten dollars for each Person."

This is in the section of the powers denied Congress. Basically, the southern states had it written into the Constitution that the government could not majorly tax or make the importation of slaves, illegal. This is one of the sadder stains in the Constitution, but I think it is a happy note that it was written with an end in sight. It had an expiration date because the founding fathers knew that slavery couldn't last in good conscious.

And it didn't. As soon as the date was reached, the importation of enslaved people was made illegal under the Jefferson administration. In his address to Congress, he said, "I congratulate you, fellow-citizens, on the approach of the period at which you may interpose your authority constitutionally to withdraw the citizens of the United States from all further participation in those violations of human rights which have been so long continued on the unoffending inhabitants of Africa, and which the morality, the reputation, and the best interests of our country have long been eager to proscribe."

So obviously, the president was happy and eager to end this terrible practice of buying enslaved people from Africa and saw them as just as valuable as anyone else.

This last one is found in a section about how states need to respect the laws of other states, so though sad, it makes sense considering the need for order and consistency.

"No Person held to Service or Labour in one State, under the Laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in Consequence of any Law or Regulation therein, be discharged from such Service or Labour, but shall be delivered up on Claim of the Party to whom such Service or Labour may be due."

I think reading the sections around it can clear up some of the problems with it.

"Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof."

Basically, if I get married in Tennessee, I'm still legally married if I'm in Alabama. Or if I'm found guilty of murder in New York, I also am in Main. This section is just trying to say that even though the states may handle those things differently if it's been done in one State, it counts in all.

"Section 2

The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States."

Your fundamental rights apply no matter where you are.

"A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime."

Basically, you have to be held for the crime for the State in which that crime was committed, or it could get confusing. If I used aerial fireworks in North Carolina, where they are illegal, but then ran from the law to South Carolina where they weren't, a court case to arrest me for a law that doesn't exist in that State would be strange, and go against the basic sovereignty of the states.

So though it is sad and wrong that people were enslaved in America, if all of the past things are true, and if people are enslaved, it would only make sense also to hold true that:

What if I was enslaved in one State, ran to a state where there was no slavery, I should be returned to my original place of enslavement.

In the end, the document was ahead of its time, and in a way, even ahead of the men who wrote it. Many of the founding fathers were pro-slavery prevolution, but after fighting sweat and blood, and aguing day by day for freedom, many of them realized the inheritance paradox of human rights and liberty and slavery, so they became anti-slavery. The ideas in the Constitution and its system of government are amazing and were and are still revolutionary.

And though I will admittedly argue that the Constitution is not a racist document, I also believe with as much vigor that it does defend your right to be racist. Primary in the first amendment.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

The Constitution defends your right to believe whatever you want, say whatever you want. Because if I can't say something because the majority of people find it offensive and immoral, they might eventually find something that is good, offensive, and immoral. They might say LGTBQ+ rights are or religious beliefs or any number of things are offensive and immoral. This country was founded on the idea that you could believe and say whatever you wanted to say, regardless of skin color, class, or creed. It is your right to believe immoral things because if it isn't, then you also lose your right to believe moral things.

And that's the beauty of the Constitution. It defends your right to be whoever you want to be and believe whatever you want, without persecution. As long as you don't hurt anyone or restrict anyone else's freedom, the American Constitution protects us from the government using the justification of morality, kindness and stopping offense to take away our rights. It was the first document to put into law the idea that all men are created equal and as a consequence, it has helped found the most accessible country in the world.

"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear."

― George Orwell

Post Script:

In England, the average black British person makes 32 thousand pounds, which is equal to 44 thousand dollars, and in America, the average black person makes 58 thousand, so, you'd think that if the Constitution is the basis of racism, that in the country without it black people would be richer, but they simply aren't.

Sources:

https://www.amazon.com/Plain-Honest-Men-American-C...

https://constitutioncenter.org/

https://www.monticello.org/

https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory...

https://www.gilderlehrman.org/sites/default/files/...

https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/sp...

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1010169/black-and-slave-population-us-1790-1880/

https://www.azquotes.com/author/9277-James_Madison...

https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2020/jun/23/white-household-income-in-uk-is-63-higher-than-black-households-ons-finds

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States

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Thu Jul 08, 2021 3:10 am

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Riverlight wrote a review...

Hey, Andrew! I am here to provide both a partial counterargument and also a review! Let's dive in, shall we?

Now, a disclaimer, every single person who founded America or was involved in the Constitution was by today's standards - racist. Because this was 1789, that was the common consensus. Just like it was the common consensus that bloodletting was a good idea. Just because Charles Darwin believed in bloodletting and doesn't know about black holes, that doesn't mean evolution isn't true and he was a bad scientist. We all truly stand on the shoulders of giants, and we stand on the shoulders of the giants of the founding fathers, but inherent on standing on their shoulders, they are below us in some senses of morality. They had wrong and immoral views on race.
But I think it is hubris and hypocrisy to say that just because you were lucky enough to be born in a time when we have advanced in some senses of morality to say you are wiser, better, and more moral than the founding fathers.

This sets up your opening argument quite nicely. However, I must question what you mean by "wise, better, and more moral" when things such as slavery, the 4/5s compromise, and other issues included in the Constitution were, by today's standards, unethical and amoral. While I believe in a good compromise, and I believe that we have come a long way since the 1780s, I do think that it is important to note here that had each of us lived in that time period, we likely would have had similar views. That would strengthen your argument. However, I also believe that it is unwise to call someone else unwise or less wise than someone else (not that I am calling you unwise-- I find the action itself to be unwise as a general rule). It might be better to reword this particular section.

The founding fathers were more forward-thinking than the men around them, less racist, sexists, classists, and greedy than the general population. They were founding a country on the idea of freedom, individual worth, and that everyone is created equal, which is a revolutionary idea. They were willing to stake their wealth, renown, and very lives on these ideas and the rights of their fellow men. We should all hope that if we lived in a time where those ideas were so new and the ideas of racism so normal, that we would have had the wisdom and moral strength to be as principled and forward-thinking as the founding fathers.

I have several issues with this statement here. While many of the Founders (and, by extent, many of the Framers) were philanthropists that gave to the poor, one must keep in mind that most were slave-owners, and many of them did not release their slaves when they died, even if they acknowledged slavery as a moral wrong. These men include Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, and others. Jefferson specifically wrote the words that "all men are created equal," and yet he did not act on these words until he was on his death bed, and even then only 9 of the 600+ he had owned throughout his life. I see and understand your main three arguments (I will also add here that many of the representatives and most of the political power was from the South, particularly Virginia), but it is worth noting that a better, more moral compromise could have been found. In my opinion, sharecropping would have been better than slavery, though it is hardly better at all. Guaranteeing the right to vote would have been phenomenal, though unlikely.

Even if they were forward thinking, I find it unfair to say that the Founders were not sexist. Many were very much ahead of the other men at the time-- particularly John Adams, who so often took advice from his wife Abigail-- but that does not mean that they did not believe women to be inferior. Benjamin Franklin was known in England as a very flirtatious man. I will point out that this Varsity article in particular shares Jefferson's thoughts on the role of women and their inferiority to men.

I would argue that Thomas Paine and Aaron Burr were the most forward thinking of them all, as both supported voting rights for women, in addition to other extremely progressive issues. It would be wise to mention them and their contributions here to strengthen your arguments.

This point has been levied to say that the constitution values black lives at 3/5s of white. This can't be completely accurate because 59 thousand free black people in America would have been counted as full people, and theoretically, would have had the right to vote. So it was not a point of race, but a point of taxes and ability to vote, and slaves did or had neither.

This could have been worded better, especially since land-owning free blacks in just one state (New Jersey) until the federal government established the 1790 Naturalization Law. Then, states adjusted their laws slightly, but again the very vast majority of blacks could not vote. I find it unlikely that you could find 59,000 free blacks that could vote just in New York, let alone across all of New England, the South, and the West combined.

Regarding your postscript, there are too many economic factors involved, including what kinds of jobs people of African descent begin, how well an economy is doing, what the economic laws of a nation are, how wealth is redistributed... too many variables for that to really matter, so I recommend cutting that completely.

I hope that this was helpful and that you have a nice [*insert time of day here*]!

MaybeAndrew says...

Thank you for your review! I would like to quickly clear up some confusion that seems to have been created throughout your counterarguments.
You seemed to think I was trying to say these men weren't racist or sexist, but I was trying my best - and maybe I did not word this well - to drive home the point that yes, in comparison to us, they were. Just like in comparsaint to us, their scientist were dumb. And just like when we compare ourselves to people three centires in the future, we will seem imoral. That is why I was trying to judge them in their context, I was trying to say they were less racist, less sexist, and more forward-thinking than the men around them. We cannot demand that a scientist from the eighteen hundreds knows everything we know, and that his theories are without flaw, so nor can we demand that these men who were making great leaps forward in morality and freedom would be perfect in their understanding as well.
I acknowledge what you said about Black peoples right to vote being abridged, though i have not studied the topic extensively. But my point was not that they could vote, it was merely that the condition was not making a values judgment on black lives. I would never argue that the 1770s-1800s' were not a racist time, but I am arguing that the constitution, upon which America is founded, is far ahead of its time. Their are few times when flawed people, but still great people, can peak far ahead of the curve, like Albert Einstein with general relativity, and find ideas so powerful and revolutionary that we are still reeling with the implications today. Not everything the framers said was correct, and not everything albert eintsitn said is correct, but merely because they are flawed men in a flawed time - as we all are - we should not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Or to be more direct, tare down a document which is out best hope at preserving these freedoms we have fought so hard for, in the American Revolution, in the civil war, in the civil rights movement, and still today.
I agree the postscript is obviously more complicated than that simple statement, and therefore maybe I should get rid of it, but I feel today we oftentimes forget questions of race are complex, and it is not so easy as to say, this outcome occurs differently for people of different races, so, therefore, the root must be racism. So I hoped to remind people that it is a little more complicated than that and that the data does not always go with the story that America is the most racist of the western countries.
Once again, thank you for your review! I will be sure to edit those points you saw as weak or confusing and clear them up. I hope you have a nice day.

MaybeAndrew says...

I posted my reply without rereading it for grammatical mistakes, XD, so here is the edited version

Thank you for your review! I would like to quickly clear up some confusion that seems to have been created throughout your counterarguments.
You seemed to think I was trying to say these men weren't racist or sexist, but I was trying my best - and maybe I did not word this well - to drive home the point that yes, in comparison to us, they were. Just like in comparison to us, their scientists were dumb. And just like when we compare ourselves to people three centuries in the future, we will seem immoral. That is why I was trying to judge them in their context, I was trying to say they were less racist, less sexist, and more forward-thinking than the men around them. We cannot demand that a scientist from the 1790s knows everything we know and that his theories are without flaw, so nor can we demand that these men who were making great leaps forward in morality and freedom would be perfect in their understanding as well.
I acknowledge what you said about Black people's right to vote being abridged, though I have not studied the topic extensively. But my point was not that they could vote, it was merely that the constitution was not making a values judgment on black lives, and according to the constitution, they should be able to vote. I would never argue that the 1790s were not a racist time, but I am arguing that the constitution, upon which America is founded, was and is far ahead of its time. There are few times in history when flawed people, but still great people, peaked far ahead of the curve, like Albert Einstein did with general relativity, and find ideas so powerful and revolutionary that we are still reeling with the implications today. Not everything the framers said was correct, and not everything Albert Eintsitn said is correct, but merely because they are flawed men in a flawed time - as we all are - we should not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Or to be more direct, tear down a document which is our best hope at preserving these freedoms we have fought so hard for, in the American Revolution, in the civil war, in the civil rights movement, and still today.
I agree the postscript is obviously more complicated than that simple statement, and therefore maybe I should get rid of it, but I feel today we oftentimes forget questions of race are complex. We forget it is not so easy to say, 'this outcome occurs differently for people of different races, so, therefore, the root must be racism.' So I hoped to remind people that it is a little more complicated than that and that the data does not always go with the story that America is the most racist of the western countries. That there are many other factors at play in every question.
Once again, thank you for your review! I will be sure to edit those points you saw as weak or confusing and clear them up. I hope you have a nice day.

Riverlight says...

In response to whether or not we should keep the Constitution itself, I personally believe that we ought to hold a modern day Constitutional Convention. States could elect candidates, all of whom would be independents so as to keep party politics out of the issue, who would represent them at a modern day convention. The delegates would create the best document that they could. The states, in turn, would vote on whether or not it ought to be ratified. Modernizing the 9/13 usage, it would require at least 35 (rounded up from 34.6153846154) states to make the new Constitution a legal document.

MaybeAndrew says...

I think that is defiantly an intresting idea, but I believe the current system of the amendment is quite well built and could do all the work needed to well amend the constitution by designing a new one.

Riverlight says...

I think that the system needs to be fine-tuned nonetheless. Many other nations often rewrite their constitutions so that they can remain modern and efficient. It would be better, I think, to create a modernized document so that we can deal with core issues, such as civil rights, and reaffirm what it means to be an American.

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Mon Jul 05, 2021 5:24 pm

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MailicedeNamedy wrote a review...

Hi MaybeAndrew,

Mailice here with a short review!

I'm not an expert on the Constitution of Amercia and I only know the first few amendments, so I'll focus more on the structure and the composition. Since it's supposed to be an essay, I'll refer to it more and also see if there's a conclusion at the end and if you've answered the question you asked. My review will probably be more on the whole of essays / academic papers, so you might learn some tips and tricks for the future.

Recently, it has become quite popular to say that the American Constitution is founded on racism, and therefore, so is our country.

The very first point is good and not so good. You refer to a lot of people who are unnamed, and would do better to note such information with a footnote where you indicate where you read it. Here you could also choose a quote from a newspaper (pay attention to the political direction it takes) from which you develop your question. You still create a good approach, because the reader asks himself what they thinks about it.

Because this was 1789, that was the common consensus.

I understand what you are saying here, and how it relates to the previous sentence, but I would rewrite it a little bit, because you come here with an opinion of your own that you later reject in other scholars; you assume here that in 1789 it was common sense to be racist. As you describe it here, it seems as if racism is an instinct that one has at birth, whereas racism is a (false) doctrine that one learns (or rejects) by means of the environment / where one grows up / school.

For example, George Washington said after the war in a letter that he "never mean[s] . . . to possess another slave by purchase; it being among my first wishes to see some plan adopted by which slavery in this country may be abolished."

I would be very interested to know here if there is any way of knowing what the founding fathers thought about slavery and if there was any talk of inserting it into the Constitution.

But I would encourage you to do research for yourself, and make sure to read actual quotes from the founding fathers and be wary of modern historians claiming they know what was going on inside the heads of people who have now been dead for hundreds of years.

I would remove this here and add more at the end that you have further literature here that you recommend for the reader, instead of indirectly throwing at the modern historians here. You are building your opinion on the assumption that it is correct and not that one should pay attention to what one reads. (e.g. Did aliens build the pyramids?

)

I like your layout very much so far. It has structure and is a great introduction to your topic. I also like how you go into your main reasons afterwards, where even before reading I think you've done a good job of working out / summarising the most important ones from the amount of information to give the reader a rough overview of the argument.

1. Ending slavery would be a massive economic overturn.

Kudos for your first point. I think this is always a problem where young people (cough cough Gretha Thunberg.

) have. They don't understand that the economy is a construct that humans have created (similar to evolution) but that it evolves on its own, guided by an invisible hand. That is why climate change cannot be eliminated overnight, but must be worked towards, because millions of jobs are built on it. Economy is something wonderful and something cruel at the same time. You've made a good show of that on this point. At about this same time, when the Age of Enlightenment (Aufklärung) and Reformation took place, independence took place, the US was, in that sense, a modern state (if not the most modern in the Western world) if you compare with Europe, which was then always embroiled in wars, divided into monarchies), economics also began to develop more as a discipline. I think you've summed that up in good words without going into too much detail.

2: They needed the support of the southern states

I like this point too, but I think you could partly incorporate it into the first point, because this support is also economic in nature. But there is also the political problem of founding another state, as well as the threat from outside by means of other European powers (Louisiana Purchase Act; former French colony); like France or the English colonies in what is now Canada. Spain, too, was still present in Mexico at that time and partly as far as present-day California.

After watching the bloody slave revolutions of South America, they were afraid that might happen to them if they freed such a large group of people they had bought.

I think you're referring to the revolution in Haiti, if I'm not mistaken. Many slave revolutions in South America did not take place until the 19th century, when the US was already standing on its own two feet.

3: Fear

I think your third point still needs a bit of development, even though you have shown good approaches. I see in your text that the founding fathers were not politicians but philosophers who wanted to work for the best for the people. They wanted justice and peace, away from Britain. The Americans of that time were not represented in their parliament and still had to pay taxes. The basic idea of Washington and Co. Was to end this injustice, to be exploited as a kind of "Garden of Eden" by the British King. I would expand the point more here and add information that there was a greater fear of one day being exploited even more deeply than there already was. Wars in Europe led to the state budget being used for military and there was a great danger that one day human ammunition would also have to be collected from the American colonies at that time.
The last argument should always be the strongest. It should be a summary of your idea that you want to present, as well as develop an impression on the reader / listener. Since this point is the weakest one in my opinion, you would have to change the layout a bit or replace this point with a completely new one.

Towards the end, it becomes a little more confusing and I think you could bring in a little structure and perhaps make a similar division as before. Otherwise, I liked the ideas behind it. Your last paragraphs are a good summary and also with a look into the future. Your approach is interesting with a dangerous yet fascinating subject matter.

I see the Constitution as a product of the times. Ideas and philosophies, thoughts and religion played a big role. In my opinion, people struggled to think about slaves at the time and whether they were human or commodities, and that's what gave rise to this kind of racism in the first place. With industrialisation, slavery became increasingly void and that was the biggest threat to the southern states in the 19th century. By then (which was around 2 - 3 generations of people) this mentality of seeing slaves more as commodities had developed. This is not to say that Southerners are racist, but to emphasise the political and economic point where millions of livelihoods were affected. By abolishing slavery, it would have had drastic consequences on the economy and probably put the US in the ditch for a long time. This would probably have prevented the expeditions to the Pacific, the purchases of the new territories, the build up as a new world power etc... ( Now I've made my point though.

)

"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear."
- George Orwell

You don't know freedom until you have laws that tell you not to do things.

Your PS was unnecessary in my opinion, because it seemed here as if you were still throwing a snowball at someone who had already closed the door behind him.

You could have put that somewhere else, if at all, since it only indirectly had something to do with your question.

You answered the question you wanted to ask at the beginning and gave the sources. I think that is very good and also shows that you have sought more than one opinion to enrich your knowledge. If I am still wrong about anything I wrote, feel free to correct me.

Structurally, it was a great essay. In your argumentation, you could see that you tried to read in well and put in your argumentation. There are still a few points to develop, but in terms of the idea, it was a great essay. As a teacher, I would let you pass with it; because the approach is good.

Have fun writing!

Mailice

Young Writers Society

Why The Constitution Is Not a Racist Document

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