essay on importance of preamble to the constitution

Explore the Constitution

The constitution.

• Read the Full Text

Dive Deeper

Constitution 101 course.

• The Drafting Table
• Supreme Court Cases Library
• Founders' Library
• Constitutional Rights: Origins & Travels

Start your constitutional learning journey

• News & Debate Overview
• Constitution Daily Blog
• America's Town Hall Programs
• Special Projects
• Media Library

America’s Town Hall

Watch videos of recent programs.

• Education Overview

Constitution 101 Curriculum

• Classroom Resources by Topic
• Classroom Resources Library
• Live Online Events
• Professional Learning Opportunities
• Constitution Day Resources

Explore our new 15-unit high school curriculum.

• Explore the Museum
• Plan Your Visit
• Exhibits & Programs
• Field Trips & Group Visits
• Host Your Event
• Buy Tickets

New exhibit

The first amendment, interpretation & debate, the preamble, matters of debate, common interpretation, giving meaning to the preamble, the preamble’s significance for constitutional interpretation.

by Erwin Chemerinsky

Dean of Berkeley Law School; Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law at the University of California - Berkley Law School

by Michael Stokes Paulsen

Distinguished University Chair and Professor at University of St. Thomas School of Law

The Preamble of the U.S. Constitution—the document’s famous first fifty-two words— introduces everything that is to follow in the Constitution’s seven articles and twenty-seven amendments. It proclaims who is adopting this Constitution: “We the People of the United States.” It describes why it is being adopted—the purposes behind the enactment of America’s charter of government. And it describes what is being adopted: “ this Constitution ”—a single authoritative written text to serve as fundamental law of the land. Written constitutionalism was a distinctively American innovation, and one that the framing generation considered the new nation’s greatest contribution to the science of government. 

The word “preamble,” while accurate, does not quite capture the full importance of this provision. “Preamble” might be taken—we think wrongly—to imply that these words are merely an opening rhetorical flourish or frill without meaningful effect. To be sure, “preamble” usefully conveys the idea that this provision does not itself confer or delineate powers of government or rights of citizens. Those are set forth in the substantive articles and amendments that follow in the main body of the Constitution’s text. It was well understood at the time of enactment that preambles in legal documents were not themselves substantive provisions and thus should not be read to contradict, expand, or contract the document’s substantive terms.  

But that does not mean the Constitution’s Preamble lacks its own legal force. Quite the contrary, it is the provision of the document that declares the enactment of the provisions that follow. Indeed, the Preamble has sometimes been termed the “Enacting Clause” of the Constitution, in that it declares the fact of adoption of the Constitution (once sufficient states had ratified it): “We the People of the United States . . . do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

Importantly, the Preamble declares who is enacting this Constitution—the people of “the United States.” The document is the collective enactment of all U.S. citizens. The Constitution is “owned” (so to speak) by the people, not by the government or any branch thereof. We the People are the stewards of the U.S. Constitution and remain ultimately responsible for its continued existence and its faithful interpretation. 

It is sometimes observed that the language “We the People of the United States ” was inserted at the Constitutional Convention by the “Committee of Style,” which chose those words—rather than “We the People of the States of . . .”, followed by a listing of the thirteen states, for a simple practical reason: it was unclear how many states would actually ratify the proposed new constitution. (Article VII declared that the Constitution would come into effect once nine of thirteen states had ratified it; and as it happened two states, North Carolina and Rhode Island, did not ratify until after George Washington had been inaugurated as the first President under the Constitution.) The Committee of Style thus could not safely choose to list all of the states in the Preamble. So they settled on the language of both “We the People of the United States.”

Nonetheless, the language was consciously chosen. Regardless of its origins in practical considerations or as a matter of “style,” the language actually chosen has important substantive consequences. “We the People of the United States” strongly supports the idea that the Constitution is one for a unified nation , rather than a treaty of separate sovereign states. (This, of course, had been the arrangement under the Articles of Confederation, the document the Constitution was designed to replace.) The idea of nationhood is then confirmed by the first reason recited in the Preamble for adopting the new Constitution—“to form a more perfect Union.” On the eve of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln invoked these words in support of the permanence of the Union under the Constitution and the unlawfulness of states attempting to secede from that union. 

The other purposes for adopting the Constitution, recited by the Preamble— to “establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity”—embody the aspirations that We the People have for our Constitution, and that were expected to flow from the substantive provisions that follow. The stated goal is to create a government that will meet the needs of the people. 

As noted, the Preamble’s statements of purpose do not themselves grant powers or confer rights; the substantive provisions in the main body of the Constitution do that. There is not, for example, a general government power to do whatever it judges will “promote the general Welfare.” The national government’s powers are specified in Article I and other provisions of the Constitution, not the Preamble. Congress has never relied on the Preamble alone as the basis for a claimed power to enact a law, and the Supreme Court has never relied on the Preamble as the sole basis for any constitutional decision. Still, the declared purposes for the Constitution can assist in understanding, interpreting, and applying the specific powers listed in the articles, for the simple reason that the Constitution should be interpreted in a manner that is faithful to its purposes.

Finally, the Preamble declares that what the people have ordained and established is “ this Constitution”—referring, obviously enough, to the written document that the Preamble introduces. That language is repeated in the Supremacy Clause of Article VI, which declares that “this Constitution” shall be the supreme law for the entire nation. The written nature of the Constitution as a single binding text matters and was important to the framing generation. The U.S. Constitution contrasts with the arrangement of nations like Great Britain, whose “constitution” is a looser collection of written and unwritten traditions constituting the established practice over time. America has a written constitution, not an unwritten one. The boundaries of what may be said and done in the name of the Constitution are marked by the words, phrases, and structure of the document itself. To be sure, there are disputes over what those words mean and how they are to be applied. But the enterprise of written constitutionalism is, at its core, the faithful interpretation and application of a written document adopted by the people as supreme law: “this Constitution for the United States of America.”

The Preamble to the Constitution has been largely ignored by lawyers and courts through American history. Rarely has a Supreme Court decision relied on it, even as a guide in interpreting the Constitution. But long ago, in Marbury v. Madison (1803), the Court declared “it cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect; and therefore such construction is inadmissible, unless the words require it.” If the Preamble is read carefully and taken seriously, basic constitutional values can be found within it that should guide the interpretation of the Constitution.

The Court has rejected the relevance of the Preamble in constitutional decisions. In 1905, in Jacobson v. Massachusetts , the Supreme Court ruled that laws cannot be challenged or declared unconstitutional based on the Preamble. The Court declared: “Although that Preamble indicates the general purposes for which the people ordained and established the Constitution, it has never been regarded as the source of any substantive power conferred on the Government of the United States or on any of its Departments.” In the few occasions over the last century in which the Preamble has been mentioned, the Court has summarily denied its relevance to constitutional law.

But the Preamble states basic values that should guide the understanding of the Constitution.  First, it is created by “We the People.” It is the people who are sovereign. This makes clear that the United States is to be a democracy, not a monarchy or a theocracy or a totalitarian government that were the dominant forms of government throughout world history. Early in American history, in McCulloch v. Maryland (1819), Chief Justice John Marshall stressed the importance of the government being created by the people. The State of Maryland claimed that it was the state governments who formed the United States and that therefore it is the states who are sovereign. The Court rejected this, quoting the Preamble and declaring: “The government proceeds directly from the people; is ‘ordained and established,’ in the name of the people.”

Second, the Constitution exists to create effective governance for the nation. The Preamble states that the Constitution exists “to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, [and] promote the general Welfare.” The emphasis on establishing a “Union” and a successful government for it is not surprising because the Constitution was created in response to the failures of the Articles of Confederation which was a compact among the states where there was a weak national government with little power.  Throughout American history there have been battles over federalism and the authority of the federal government to take actions of unquestionable desirability: limiting slavery, banning child labor, prohibiting race discrimination, protecting the environment. The guidance of the Preamble has been overlooked: the Constitution exists to ensure that the national government has the authority to do all of these things which are part of a “more perfect Union” and “the general Welfare.”

Third, the Constitution exists to provide “Justice.” Long ago, the Magna Carta declared that justice requires both a fair process and fair results. In fact, even before that the Bible, in Deuteronomy 16:20, says, “Justice, justice shalt thou pursue.” Commentators have suggested that the word “justice” is repeated twice to convey the importance of both procedural and substantive fairness. In American constitutional law, this means a requirement for both procedural due process (the government must follow adequate procedures when depriving a person of life, liberty, or property) and substantive due process (the government must have adequate reasons when taking away a person’s life, liberty, or property).

Fourth, the Preamble states that the Constitution exists to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” The Constitution is founded to protect individual freedom. It is a society where personal liberty, not a duty to the state, is central. Interestingly, despite this commitment, the Framers of the Constitution saw no need to provide a detailed statement of rights in the Constitution they drafted. In part, this is because they thought the structure of government they were creating would ensure liberty. Also, they were afraid that enumerating some rights inherently would be taken to deny the existence of other rights that were not mentioned. They wanted liberty to be broadly protected and not confined to specific aspects of freedom mentioned in the text of the Constitution.

Equality is not mentioned in the Preamble. This is not surprising for a Constitution that explicitly protected the institution of slavery and gave women no rights. But as the Supreme Court has explained for over a half century, equality is an implicit and inherent part of liberty.

The Preamble thus does much more than tell us that the document is to be called the “Constitution” and establish a government. The Preamble describes the core values that the Constitution exists to achieve: democratic government, effective governance, justice, freedom, and equality.   

The Preamble—or “Enacting Clause”—of the Constitution is more than just a pitcher’s long wind-up before delivering the pitch to home plate. It is the provision that declares the enactment of “this Constitution” by “We the People of the United States.”  That declaration has important consequences for constitutional interpretation. While the Preamble does not itself confer powers and rights, it has significant implications both for how the Constitution is to be interpreted and applied and who has the power of constitutional interpretation—the two biggest overall questions of Constitutional Law. 

Consider two big-picture ways that the Preamble affects how the Constitution is to be interpreted. First, the Preamble specifies that what is being enacted is “ this Constitution ”—a term that unmistakably refers to the written document itself. This is at once both obvious and hugely important. America has no “unwritten constitution.” Ours is a system of written constitutionalism —of adherence to a single, binding, authoritative, written legal text as supreme law.

This defines the territory and boundaries of legitimate constitutional argument: the enterprise of constitutional interpretation is to seek to faithfully understand, within the context of the document (including the times and places in which it was written and adopted), the words, phrases, and structural implications of the written text . 

The words of the Constitution are not optional. Nor are they mere springboards or points of departure for individual (or judicial) speculation or one’s subjective preferences: where the provisions of the Constitution set forth a sufficiently clear rule for government, that rule constitutes the supreme law of the land and must be followed. By the same token, where the provisions of the Constitution do not set forth a rule—where they leave matters open—decision in such matters must remain open to the people, acting through the institutions of representative democracy. And finally, where the Constitution says nothing on a topic, it simply says nothing on the topic and cannot be used to strike down the decisions of representative government. It is not open for courts, legislatures, or any other government officials to “make up” new constitutional meanings that are not supported by the document itself. 

Second, the Preamble, by stating the purposes for which the Constitution has been enacted, might well be thought to exert a very gentle interpretive “push” as to the direction in which a specific provision of the Constitution should be interpreted in a close case. The Preamble does not confer powers or rights, but the provisions that follow should be interpreted in a fashion consistent with the purposes for which they were enacted. As Justice Joseph Story put it in his treatise on the Constitution, published in 1833, using the example of the Preamble’s phrase to "provide for the common defence”: 

No one can doubt, that this does not enlarge the powers of congress to pass any measures, which they may deem useful for the common defence.  But suppose the terms of a given power admit of two constructions, the one more restrictive, the other more liberal, and each of them is consistent with the words . . . ; if one would promote, and the other defeat the common defence, ought not the former, upon the soundest principles of interpretation to be adopted?  Are we at liberty, upon any principles of reason, or common sense, to adopt a restrictive meaning, which will defeat an avowed object of the constitution, when another equally natural and more appropriate to the object is before us?  2 Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States §462 at 445 (1833).

Finally, the Preamble has important implications for who has the ultimate power of constitutional interpretation. In modern times, it has become fashionable to identify the power of constitutional interpretation almost exclusively with the decisions of courts, and particularly the U.S. Supreme Court. And yet, while it is true that the courts legitimately possess the province of constitutional interpretation in cases that come before them, it is equally true that the other branches of the national government—and of state government, too—possess a like responsibility of faithful constitutional interpretation. None of these institutions of government, created or recognized by the Constitution, is superior to the Constitution itself. None is superior to the ultimate power of the people to adopt, amend, and interpret what is, after all, the Constitution ordained and established by “We the People of the United States.” 

James Madison, one of the leading architects of the Constitution, put it best in The Federalist No. 49 : 

[T]he people are the only legitimate fountain of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter, under which the several branches of government hold their power, is derived . . . . The several departments being perfectly coordinate by the terms of their common commission, neither of them, it is evident, can pretend to an exclusive or superior right of settling the boundaries between their respective powers; and how are the encroachments of the stronger to be prevented, or the wrongs of the weaker to be redressed, without an appeal to the people themselves, who, as the grantors of the commission, can alone declare its true meaning, and enforce its observance?

The Preamble thus may have much to say—quietly—about how the Constitution is to be interpreted and who possesses the ultimate power of constitutional interpretation. It enacts a written constitution, with all that that implies. It describes the purposes for which that document was adopted, which has implications for interpreting specific provisions.  And it boldly declares that the document is the enactment of, and remains the property of, the people —not the government and not any branch thereof— with the clear implication that We the People remain ultimately responsible for the proper interpretation and application of what is, in the end, our Constitution.

Further Reading:

Michael Stokes Paulsen & Luke Paulsen, The Constitution: An Introduction (2015) (Chapters 1 and 2).

Michael Stokes Paulsen, Does the Constitution Prescribe Rules for Its Own Interpretation? , 103 Nw. U. L. Rev. 857 (2009).

Michael Stokes Paulsen, The Irrepressible Myth of Marbury , 101 Mich. L. Rev. 2706 (2003).

Michael Stokes Paulsen, Captain James T. Kirk and the Enterprise of Constitutional Interpretation: Some Modest Proposals from the Twenty-Third Century, 59 Albany L. Rev. 671 (1995).

Michael Stokes Paulsen, The Most Dangerous Branch: Executive Power to Say What the Law Is, 83 Geo. L.J. 217 (1994). 

Modal title

Modal body text goes here.

Share with Students

Preamble to the US Constitution

• U.S. Constitution & Bill of Rights
• History & Major Milestones
• U.S. Legal System
• U.S. Political System
• Defense & Security
• Campaigns & Elections
• Business & Finance
• U.S. Foreign Policy
• U.S. Liberal Politics
• U.S. Conservative Politics
• Women's Issues
• Civil Liberties
• The Middle East
• Race Relations
• Immigration
• Crime & Punishment
• Canadian Government
• Understanding Types of Government
• B.S., Texas A&M University

The Preamble to the U.S. Constitution summarizes the Founding Fathers’ intention to create a federal government dedicated to ensuring that “We the People” always live in a safe, peaceful, healthy, well-defended—and most of all—free nation.  The preamble states:

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

As the Founders intended, the Preamble has no force in law. It grants no powers to the federal or state governments, nor does it limit the scope of future government actions. As a result, the Preamble has never been cited by any federal court , including the U.S. Supreme Court , in deciding cases dealing with constitutional issues.

Also known as the “Enacting Clause,” the Preamble did not become a part of the Constitution until the final few days of the Constitutional Convention after Gouverneur Morris, who had also signed the Articles of Confederation , pressed for its inclusion. Before it was drafted, the Preamble had not been proposed or discussed on the floor of the convention.

The first version of the preamble did not refer to, “We the People of the United States…” Instead, it referred to the people of the individual states. The word “people” did not appear, and the phrase “the United States” was followed by a listing of the states as they appeared on the map from north to south. However, the Framers changed to the final version when they realized that the Constitution would go into effect as soon as nine states gave their approval, whether any of the remaining states had ratified it or not.

The Value of the Preamble

The Preamble explains why we have and need the Constitution. It also gives us the best summary we will ever have of what the Founders were considering as they hashed out the basics of the three branches of government .

In his highly acclaimed book, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, Justice Joseph Story wrote of the Preamble, “its true office is to expound the nature and extent and application of the powers actually conferred by the Constitution.”

In addition, no less noted authority on the Constitution than Alexander Hamilton himself, in Federalist No. 84, stated that the Preamble gives us “a better recognition of popular rights than volumes of those aphorisms which make the principal figure in several of our State bills of rights, and which would sound much better in a treatise of ethics than in a constitution of government.”

James Madison , one of the leading architects of the Constitution, may have put it best when he wrote in The Federalist No. 49:

[T]he people are the only legitimate fountain of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter, under which the several branches of government hold their power, is derived . . . .

While is common and understandable to think of the Preamble as merely a grand rhetorical “preview” of the Constitution, with no without meaningful effect, this is not entirely the case. The Preamble has been called the “Enacting Clause” or “Enabling Clause” of the Constitution, meaning that it confirms the American peoples’ freely agreed-to adoption of the Constitution—through the state ratification process—as the exclusive document conferring and defining the powers of government and the rights of citizens. However, the Framers of the Constitution clearly understood that in the legal context of 1787, preambles to legal documents were not binding provisions and thus should not be used to justify the expansion, contraction, or denial of any of the substantive terms in the remainder of the Constitution.

Most importantly, the Preamble confirmed that the Constitution was being created and enacted by the collective “People of the United States,” meaning that “We the People,” rather than the government, “own” the Constitution and are thus ultimately responsible for its continued existence and interpretation. 

Understand the Preamble, Understand the Constitution

Each phrase in the Preamble helps explain the purpose of the Constitution as envisioned by the Framers.

‘We the People’

This well-known key phrase means that the Constitution incorporates the visions of all Americans and that the rights and freedoms bestowed by the document belong to all citizens of the United States of America.

‘In order to form a more perfect union’

The phrase recognizes that the old government based on the Articles of Confederation was extremely inflexible and limited in scope, making it hard for the government to respond to the changing needs of the people over time. 

‘Establish justice’

The lack of a system of justice ensuring fair and equal treatment of the people had been the primary reason for the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution against England. The Framers wanted to ensure a fair and equal system of justice for all Americans.

‘Insure domestic tranquility’

The Constitutional Convention was held shortly after Shays’ Rebellion , a bloody uprising of farmers in Massachusetts against the state caused by the monetary debt crisis at the end of the Revolutionary War. In this phrase, the Framers were responding to fears that the new government would be unable to keep peace within the nation’s borders.

‘Provide for the common defense’

The Framers were acutely aware that the new nation remained extremely vulnerable to attacks by foreign nations and that no individual state had the power to repel such attacks. Thus, the need for a unified, coordinated effort to defend the nation would always be a vital function of the U.S. federal government .

‘Promote the general welfare’

The Framers also recognized that the general well-being of the American citizens would be another key responsibility of the federal government.

‘Secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity’

The phrase confirms the Framer’s vision that the very purpose of the Constitution is to protect the nation’s blood-earned rights for liberty, justice, and freedom from a tyrannical government.

‘Ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America’

Simply stated, the Constitution and the government it embodies are created by the people, and that it is the people who give America its power.

The Preamble in Court

While the Preamble has no legal standing, the courts have used it in trying to interpret the meaning and intent of various sections of the Constitution as they apply to modern legal situations. In this way, courts have found the Preamble useful in determining the “spirit” of the Constitution.

Since the Constitution's enactment, the Supreme Court of the United States has cited the Preamble in several important decisions. However, the Court largely disclaimed the legal importance of the Preamble in making those decisions. As Justice Story noted in his Commentaries, “the Preamble never can be resorted to, to enlarge the powers confided to the general government or any of its departments.”

The Supreme Court subsequently endorsed Justice Story's view of the Preamble, holding in Jacobson v. Massachusetts that, "while the Constitution's introductory paragraph indicates the general purposes for which the people ordained and established the Constitution, it has never been regarded by the Court as the source of any substantive power conferred on the federal government.” While the Supreme Court has not viewed the Preamble as having any direct, substantive legal effect, the Court has referenced its broad general rules to confirm and reinforce its interpretation of other provisions within the Constitution. As such, while the Preamble does not have any specific legal status, Justice Story's observation that the true purpose of the Preamble is to enlarge on the nature, and extent, and application of the powers actually conferred by the Constitution.

More broadly, while the Preamble may have little significance in a court of law, the preface to the Constitution remains an important part of the nation's constitutional dialogue, inspiring and fostering broader understandings of the American system of government.

Whose Government is it and What is it For?

The Preamble contains what may be the most important three words in our nation’s history: “We the People.” Those three words, along with the brief balance of the Preamble, establish the very basis of our system of “ federalism ,” under which the states and central government are granted both shared and exclusive powers, but only with the approval of “We the people.”

Compare the Constitution’s Preamble to its counterpart in the Constitution’s predecessor, the Articles of Confederation. In that compact, the states alone formed “a firm league of friendship, for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare” and agreed to protect each other “against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretence whatever.”

Clearly, the Preamble sets the Constitution apart from the Articles of Confederation as being an agreement among the people, rather than the states, and placing an emphasis on rights and freedoms above the military protection of the individual states. 

• Fast Facts About the U.S. Constitution
• Basic Structure of the US Government
• Who Were the Anti-Federalists?
• What Is Federalism? Definition and How It Works in the US
• The Implied Powers of Congress
• The 10th Amendment: Text, Origins, and Meaning
• The U.S. Constitution
• What Is the "Necessary and Proper" Clause in the US Constitution?
• Ninth Amendment Supreme Court Cases
• Overview of United States Government and Politics
• Federalism and the United States Constitution
• What Is Constitution Day in the United States?
• The Powers of Congress
• Due Process of Law in the US Constitution
• 14th Amendment Summary
• What Is Judicial Review?

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The Preamble’s origins predate the Constitutional Convention—preambles to legal documents were relatively commonplace at the time of the Nation’s Founding. In several English laws that undergird American understandings of constitutional rights, including the Petition of Rights of 1628, 1 Footnote 3 Car. 1, c. 1 . the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679, 2 Footnote 31 Car. 2, c. 2 . the Bill of Rights of 1689, 3 Footnote 1 W. & M. c. 2 . and the Act of Settlement of 1701, 4 Footnote 12 & 13 Will. 3, c. 2 . the British Parliament included prefatory text that explained the law’s objects and historical impetus. The tradition of a legal preamble continued in the New World. The Declarations and Resolves of the First Continental Congress in 1774 included a preamble noting the many grievances the thirteen colonies held against British rule. 5 Footnote The Declarations and Resolves of the First Continental Congress (Oct. 14, 1774) , reprinted in 1 Sources and Documents of the U.S. Constitutions: National Documents 1492–1800 , at 291 (William F. Swindler ed., 1982) [hereinafter Sources & Documents ]. Building on this document, in perhaps the only preamble that rivals the fame of the Constitution’s opening lines, the Declaration of Independence of 1776 announced: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” The Declaration then listed a series of complaints against King George III, before culminating in a formal declaration of the colonies’ independence from the British crown. 6 Footnote See The Declaration of Independence para. 1 (U.S. 1776) , reprinted in Sources & Documents , supra note 5, at 321 . Moreover, several state constitutions at the time of the founding contained introductory text that echoed many of the themes of the 1776 Declaration. 7 Footnote See, e.g. , Mass. Const. of 1780 , pmbl. (stating the “objects” of the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780 were “to secure the existence of the body-politic, to protect it, and to furnish the individuals who compose it, with the power of enjoying in safety and tranquillity their natural rights, and blessings of life” and, to this end, a government was created “for Ourselves and Posterity” ); N.H. Const. of 1776 , pmbl. (creating a government “for the preservation of peace and good order, and for the security of the lives and properties of the inhabitants of this colony” ); N.Y. Const. of 1777 , pmbl. (creating a government “best calculated to secure the rights and liberties of the good people of this State” ); Pa. Const. of 1776 , pmbl. (stating the government was created for the “protection of the community as such, and to enable the individuals who compose it to enjoy their natural rights” ); Vt. Const. of 1786 , pmbl. (establishing a constitution to “best promote the general happiness of the people of this State, and their posterity” ); Va. Const. of 1776 , Bill of Rights, pmbl. (stating “the representatives of the good people of Virginia” created their bill of rights, which “pertain to them and their posterity” ). The Articles of Confederation that preceded the Constitution had their own preamble—authored by “we the undersigned Delegates of the States” —declaring the “Confederation and perpetual Union” of the thirteen former colonies. 8 Footnote See Articles of Confederation of 1781 , pmbl. , reprinted in Sources & Documents , supra note 5, at 335 .

While the concept of a preamble was well-known to the Constitution’s Framers, little debate occurred at the Philadelphia Convention with respect to whether the Constitution required prefatory text or as to the particular text agreed upon by the delegates. For the first two months of the Convention, no proposal was made to include a preamble in the Constitution’s text. 9 Footnote See Morris D. Forkosch , Who Are the “People” in the Preamble to the Constitution? , 19 Case W. Res. L. Rev. 644 , 688–89 & n.187 (1968) (examining various records of the first two months of the Philadelphia Convention and concluding that “the Preamble was completely ignored” in the early debates). In late July 1787, the Convention’s Committee of Detail was formed to prepare a draft of a constitution, and during those deliberations, Committee member Edmund Randolph of Virginia suggested for the first time that “[a] preamble seems proper.” 10 Footnote See 2 The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 , at 137 (Max Farrand ed., 1966) [hereinafter Farrand’s Records ]. Importantly, however, Randolph considered the Constitution to be a legal, as opposed to a philosophical document, and rejected the idea of having a lengthy “display of theory” to explain “the ends of government and human politics” akin to the Declaration of Independence’s preamble or those of several state constitutions. 11 Footnote Id. Articulating what would ultimately become the Preamble’s underlying rationale, Randolph instead argued that any prefatory text to the Constitution should be limited to explaining why the government under the Articles of Confederation was insufficient and why the “establishment of a supreme legislative[,] executive[,] and judiciary” was necessary. 12 Footnote Id.

The initial draft of the Constitution’s Preamble was, however, fairly brief and did not specify the Constitution’s objectives. As released by the Committee of Detail on August 6, 1787, this draft stated: “We the People of the States of New-Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New-York, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North-Carolina, South-Carolina, and Georgia, do ordain, declare and establish the following Constitution for the Government of Ourselves and our Posterity.” 13 Footnote Id. at 177 . While this draft was passed unanimously by the delegates, 14 Footnote Id. at 193 . the Preamble underwent significant changes after the draft Constitution was referred to the Committee of Style on September 8, 1787. Perhaps with the understanding that the inclusion of all thirteen of the states in the Preamble was more precatory than realistic, 15 Footnote See Charles Warren , The Making of the Constitution 394 (1928) (arguing it was “necessary to eliminate from the preamble the names of the specific States; for it could not be known, at the date of the signing of the Preamble and the rest of the Constitution by the delegates, just which of the thirteen States would ratify” ). the Committee of Style, led by Gouverneur Morris of Pennsylvania, 16 Footnote It is generally acknowledged that the Preamble’s author was Gouverneur Morris, as the language from the federal preamble echoes that of Morris’s home state’s Constitution. See Carl Van Doren , The Great Rehearsal: The Story of the Making and Ratifying of the Constitution of the United States 160 (1948) ; see also Richard Brookhiser , Gentleman Revolutionary: Gouverneur Morris, the Rake Who Wrote the Constitution 90 (2003) (claiming the “Preamble was the one part of the Constitution that Morris wrote from scratch” ). replaced the opening phrase of the Constitution with the now-familiar introduction “We, the People of the United States.” 17 Footnote Farrand’s Records , supra note 10, at 590 . Moreover, the Preamble, as altered by Morris, listed six broad goals for the Constitution: “to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty.” 18 Footnote Id. The record from the Philadelphia Convention is silent, however, as to why the Committee of Style altered the Preamble, and there is no evidence of any objection to the changes the Committee made to the final version of the Preamble. 19 Footnote See Dennis J. Mahoney , Preamble , in 3 Encyclopedia of the American Constitution 1435 (Leonard W. Levy et al. eds., 1986) (noting “there is no record of any objection to the Preamble as it was reported by the committee” ).

While the Preamble did not provoke any further discussion in the Philadelphia Convention, the first words of the Constitution factored prominently in the ratifying debates that followed. 20 Footnote See Akhil Reed Amar , America’s Constitution: A Biography 7 (2005) ( “In the extraordinary extended and inclusive ratification process . . . Americans regularly found themselves discussing the Preamble itself.” ). For instance, Anti-Federalists, led by Patrick Henry of Virginia, criticized the opening lines of the Constitution at the Virginia ratifying convention:

Who authorized them to speak the language of We, the people, instead of We, the States? States are the characteristics and the soul of a confederation. If the states be not the agents of this compact, it must be one great, consolidated, national government, of the people of all the states. 21 Footnote See Jonathan Elliot , 3 Elliot’s Debates on the Federal Constitution 22 (2d. ed. 1996) .

In response, Edmund Pendleton replied: “[W]ho but the people can delegate powers? Who but the people have a right to form government?” 22 Footnote See id. at 37 . Similarly, John Marshall declared that both state and federal “governments derive [their] powers from the people, and each was to act according to the powers given it.” 23 Footnote Id. at 419 . Echoing these themes at the Pennsylvania Ratification Convention, James Wilson defended the “We the People” language, arguing that “all authority is derived from the people” and that the Preamble merely announces the inoffensive principle that “people have a right to do what they please with regard to the government.” 24 Footnote Id. at 434–35 .

The Preamble also figured into the written debates over whether to ratify the Constitution. For instance, countering criticisms that the Constitution lacked a bill of rights, Alexander Hamilton in the Federalist No. 84 quoted the Preamble, arguing it obviated any need for an enumeration of rights. 25 Footnote See The Federalist No. 84 (Alexander Hamilton) ( “Here is a better recognition of popular rights, than volumes of those aphorisms which make the principal figure in several of our State bills of rights, and which would sound much better in a treatise of ethics than in a constitution of government.” ). An Anti-Federalist pamphlet authored under the pseudonym Brutus, noting the Preamble’s references to a “more perfect union” and “establish[ment] [of] justice,” argued that the Constitution would result in the invalidation of state laws that interfered with these objectives, resulting in the abolition of “all inferior governments” and giving “the general one complete legislative, executive, and judicial powers to every purpose.” 26 Footnote See Brutus No. XII (Feb. 7 & 14, 1788) , reprinted in The Debate on the Constitution: Federalist and Anti-Federalist Speeches, Articles and Letters During the Struggle Over Ratification, Part Two: January to August 1788 , at 174 (Bernard Bailyn ed., 1993) . While not disputing the need for national union in the wake of their experience under the Articles of Confederation, 27 Footnote See The Federalist No. 5 (John Jay) ( “[W]eakness and divisions at home would invite dangers from abroad; and that nothing would tend more to secure us from them than union, strength, and good government within ourselves.” ). supporters of the Constitution rejected the notion that their proposed government was truly a “ national one” because “its jurisdiction extends to certain enumerated objects only, and leaves to the several States a residuary and inviolable sovereignty over all other objects.” 28 Footnote See The Federalist No. 39 (James Madison) .

In particular, those writing in support of the Constitution’s ratification cited the Preamble’s language. The Constitution’s goals of “establish[ing] justice” and “secur[ing] the blessings of liberty” —prompted by the perception that state governments at the time of the framing were violating individual liberties, including property rights, through the tyranny of popular majorities 29 Footnote See Gordon S. Wood , The Creation of the American Republic 1776–1787 , at 409–13 (1969) (noting that the Framer’s experience of government under the Articles of Confederation, including the famous debtors’ uprising called Shay’s Rebellion, led to fear that, unless checks were imposed on majority rule, the debtor-majority might infringe the rights of the creditor-minority). —was a central theme of the Federalist Papers . For instance, in the Federalist No. 51 James Madison described justice as “the end of government . . . [and] civil society” that “has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.” 30 Footnote See The Federalist No. 51 (James Madison) . Similarly, the Constitution’s goals of “ensur[ing] domestic tranquility” and “provid[ing] for the common defence” were noted in the Federalist Papers later attributed to John Jay and Alexander Hamilton, who described both the foreign threats and interstate conflicts that faced a disunited America as an argument for ratification. 31 Footnote See The Federalist Nos. 2–5 (John Jay) (describing foreign dangers posed to America); see id. Nos. 6–8 , at 21–39 (Alexander Hamilton) (describing concerns over domestic factions and insurrection in America). Finally, the Preamble’s references to the “common defence” and the “general welfare,” which mirrored the language of the Articles of Confederation, 32 Footnote See Articles of Confederation of 1781 , art. III , reprinted in Sources & Documents , supra note 5, at 335 ( “The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defence, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever.” ); id. art. VIII , reprinted in Sources & Documents , supra note 5, at 338 ( “All charges of war, and all other expenses that shall be incurred for the common defense or general welfare, and allowed by the United States in Congress assembled, shall be defrayed out of a common treasury, which shall be supplied by the several States in proportion to the value of all land within each State, granted or surveyed for any person, as such land and the buildings and improvements thereon shall be estimated according to such mode as the United States in Congress assembled, shall from time to time direct and appoint.” ). were understood by Framers like James Madison to underscore that the new federal government under the Constitution would generally provide for the national good better than the government it was replacing. 33 Footnote See Letter from James Madison to Andrew Stevenson (Nov. 17, 1830) , reprinted in 2 The Founders’ Constitution 453, 456 (Philip B. Kurland & Ralph Lerner eds., 1987) (contending that the terms “common defence” and “general welfare,” “copied from the Articles of Confederation, were regarded in the new as in the old instrument, . . . as general terms, explained and limited by the subjoined specifications” ). For example, calling the Confederation’s efforts to provide for the “common defense and general welfare” an “ill-founded and illusory” experiment, Alexander Hamilton in the Federalist No. 23 argued for a central government with the “full power to levy troops; to build and equip fleets; . . . to raise revenues” for an army and navy; and to otherwise manage the “national interest.” 34 Footnote See The Federalist No. 23 (Alexander Hamilton) .

Nonetheless, there is no historical evidence suggesting the Constitution’s Framers conceived of a Preamble with any substantive legal effect, such as granting power to the new government or conferring rights to those subject to the federal government. 35 Footnote See I Joseph Story , Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States § 462 (1833) . Instead, the founding generation appeared to view the Constitution’s prefatory text as generally providing the foundation for the text that followed. 36 Footnote See id. (concluding the Preamble’s “true office is to expound the nature, and extent, and application of the powers actually conferred by the constitution” ); see also 1 Annals of Cong. 717 –19 (1789) (noting several Members of the First Congress described the Preamble as comprising “no part of the Constitution” ); Letter from James Madison to Robert S. Garnett (Feb. 11, 1824) , in 9 The Writings of James Madison 176–77 (Gaillard Hunt ed., 1910) ( “The general terms or phrases used in the introductory propositions . . . were never meant to be inserted in their loose form in the text of the Constitution. Like resolutions preliminary to legal enactments it was understood by all, that they were to be reduced by proper limitations and specifications . . . .” ). In so doing, the Preamble ultimately reflects three critical understandings that the Framers had about the Constitution. First, the Preamble specified the source of the federal government’s sovereignty as being “the People.” 37 Footnote See Story , supra note 35, § 463 ( “We have the strongest assurances, that this preamble was not adopted as a mere formulary; but as a solemn promulgation of a fundamental fact, vital to the character and operations of the government. The obvious object was to substitute a government of the people, for a confederacy of states; a constitution for a compact.” ). Second, the Constitution’s introduction articulated six broad purposes, all grounded in the historical experiences of being governed under the Articles of Confederation. 38 Footnote Farrand’s Records , supra note 10, at 137 ( “[T]he object of our preamble ought to be to briefly declare, that the present federal government is insufficient to the general happiness [and] that the conviction of this fact gave birth to this convention.” ). Finally, and perhaps most critically, the Preamble, with its conclusion that “this Constitution” was established for “ourselves and our Posterity,” underscored that, unlike the constitutions in Great Britain and elsewhere at the time of the founding, the American Constitution was a written and permanent document that would serve as a stable guide for the new nation. 39 Footnote See Erwin Chemerinsky & Michael Stokes Paulsen , Common Interpretation: The Preamble, Interactive Constitution , Const. Ctr. (last visited Nov. 1, 2018), https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/interpretation/preamble-ic/interps/37 ( “[T]he Preamble declares that what the people have ordained and established is ‘this Constitution'—referring, obviously enough, to the written document that the Preamble introduces. . . . The U.S. Constitution contrasts with the arrangement of nations like Great Britain, whose ‘constitution’ is a looser collection of written and unwritten traditions constituting the established practice over time. America has a written constitution, not an unwritten one.” ); see also Michael Stokes Paulsen , Does the Constitution Prescribe Rules for Its Own Interpretation? , 103 Nw. U. L. Rev. 857 , 869 (2009) ( “'[T]his Constitution’ means, each time it is invoked, the written document.” ).

• Lesson Plans
• Teacher's Guides
• Media Resources

The Preamble to the Constitution: A Close Reading Lesson

The first page of the United States Constitution, opening with the Preamble.

National Archives

"[T]he preamble of a statute is a key to open the mind of the makers, as to the mischiefs, which are to be remedied, and the objects, which are to be accomplished by the provisions of the statute." — Justice Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution

The Preamble is the introduction to the United States Constitution, and it serves two central purposes. First, it states the source from which the Constitution derives its authority: the sovereign people of the United States. Second, it sets forth the ends that the Constitution and the government that it establishes are meant to serve.

Gouverneur Morris, the man the Constitutional Convention entrusted with drafting the final version of the document, put into memorable language the principles of government negotiated and formulated at the Convention.

As Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story points out in the passage quoted above, the Preamble captures some of the hopes and fears of the framers for the American republic. By reading their words closely and comparing them with those of the Articles of Confederation, students can in turn access “the mind of the makers” as to “mischiefs” to be “remedied” and “objects” to be accomplished.

In this lesson, students will practice close reading of the Preamble and of related historic documents, illuminating the ideas that the framers of the Constitution set forth about the foundation and the aims of government.

Guiding Questions

How does the language of the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution reflect historical circumstances and ideas about government?

To what extent is the U.S. Constitution a finished document?

Learning Objectives

Compare the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution with the statement of purposes included in the Articles of Confederation.

Explain the source of authority and the goals of the U.S. Constitution as identified in the Preamble.

Evaluate the fundamental values and principles expressed in the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution.

Lesson Plan Details

The Articles of Confederation was established in 1781 as the nation’s “first constitution.” Each state governed itself through elected representatives, and the state representatives in turn elected a central government. But the national government was so feeble and its powers so limited that this system proved unworkable. Congress could not impose taxes to cover national expenses, which meant the Confederation was ineffectual. And because all 13 colonies had to ratify amendments, one state’s refusal prevented any reform. By 1786 many far-sighted American leaders saw the need for a more powerful central authority; a convention was called to meet in Philadelphia in May 1787.

The Constitutional Convention met for four months. Among the chief points at issue were how much power to allow the central government and then, how to balance and check that power to prevent government abuse.

As debate at the Philadelphia Convention drew to a close, Gouverneur Morris was assigned to the Committee of Style and given the task of wording the Constitution by the committee’s members. Through thoughtful word choice, Morris attempted to put the fundamental principles agreed on by the framers into memorable language.

By looking carefully at the words of the Preamble, comparing it with the similar passages in the opening of the Articles of Confederation, and relating them to historical circumstances as well as widely shared political principles such as those found in the Declaration of Independence, students can see how the Preamble reflects the hope and fears of the Framers.

For background information about the history and interpretation of the Constitution, see the following resources:

• A basic and conveniently organized introduction to the historical context is “ To Form a More Perfect Union ,” available in Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, 1774–1789 from the Library of Congress .
• Another historical summary is " Constitution of the United States—A History ," available in America's Founding Documents from the National Archives .
• The Interactive Constitution , a digital resource that incorporates commentary from constitutional scholars, is available from the National Constitution Center .
• The American Constitution: A Documentary Record , available via  The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School , offers an extensive archive of documents critical to the development of the Constitution.

This lesson is one of a series of complementary EDSITEment lesson plans for intermediate-level students about the foundations of our government. Consider adapting them for your class in the following order:

• The Argument of the Declaration of Independence
• (Present lesson plan)
• Balancing Three Branches at Once: Our System of Checks and Balances:
• The First Amendment: What's Fair in a Free Country

NCSS. D2.Civ.3.9-12. Analyze the impact of constitutions, laws, treaties, and international agreements on the maintenance of national and international order.

NCSS.D2.Civ.4.9-12. Explain how the U.S. Constitution establishes a system of government that has powers, responsibilities, and limits that have changed over time and that are still contested.

NCSS. D2.His.3.9-12. Use questions generated about individuals and groups to assess how the significance of their actions changes over time and is shaped by the historical context.

NCSS. D2.His.4.9-12. Analyze complex and interacting factors that influenced the perspectives of people during different historical eras.

NCSS. D2.His.5.9-12. Analyze how historical contexts shaped and continue to shape people’s perspectives.

NCSS. D2.His.6.9-12. Analyze the ways in which the perspectives of those writing history shaped the history that they produced.

NCSS. D2.His.14.9-12. Analyze multiple and complex causes and effects of events in the past.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.1. Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.2. Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary of the source distinct from prior knowledge or opinions.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.6. Identify aspects of a text that reveal an author’s point of view or purpose (e.g., loaded language, inclusion or avoidance of particular facts).

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.10. By the end of grade 8, read and comprehend history/social studies texts in the grades 6-8 text complexity band independently and proficiently.

The following resources are included with this lesson plan to be used in conjunction with the student activities and for teacher preparation.

• Activity 1. Student Worksheet
• Activity 2. Teachers Guide to the Preamble
• Activity 2. Graphic Organizer

Review the Graphic Organizer for Activity 2, which contains the Preamble to the Constitution along with the opening passages of the Articles of Confederation and the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence (both from OurDocuments.gov ), and make copies for the class.

Activity 1. Why Government?

To help students understand the enormous task facing the Americans, pose a hypothetical situation to the class:

Imagine that on a field trip to a wilderness area or sailing trip to a small, remote island, you all became stranded without any communication with parents, the school, or other adults and had little hope of being rescued in the foreseeable future. The area where you’re marooned can provide the basic necessities of food, shelter, and water, but you will have to work together to survive.

Encourage students to think about the next steps they need to take with a general discussion about such matters as:

• Are you better working together or alone? (Be open to their ideas, but point out reasons why they have a better chance at survival if they work together.)
• How will you work together?
• How will you create rules?
• Who will be responsible for leading the group to help all survive?
• How will they be chosen?
• How will you deal with people in the group who may not be following the rules?

Distribute the Student Worksheet handout , which contains the seven questions below. [ Note: These questions are related to the seven phrases from the Preamble but this relationship in not given on the handout. ]

Divide students into small groups and have each group brainstorm a list of things they would have to consider in developing its own government. [ Note: You can have all groups answer all seven questions or assign one question for each group.] Ask students to be detailed in their answers and be able to support their recommendations.

• How will you make sure everyone sticks together and works towards the common goal of getting rescued? (form a more perfect union)
• How will you make sure that anyone who feels unfairly treated will have a place to air complaints? (establishing justice) 
• How will you make sure that people can have peace and quiet? (ensuring domestic tranquility) 
• How will you make sure that group members will help if outsiders arrive who threaten your group? (providing for the common defense)
• How will you make sure that the improvements you make on the island (such as shelters, fireplaces and the like) will be used fairly? (promoting the general welfare) 
• How will you make sure that group members will be free to do what they want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else? (securing the blessing of liberty to ourselves) 
• How will you make sure that the rules and organizations you develop protect future generations? (securing the blessing of liberty to our posterity) 

While students are working in their groups, write or project the following seven headers on the front board in this order:

• Secure the Blessings of Liberty for our Posterity,
• Promote the General Welfare,
• Establish Justice,
• Form a more perfect Union,
• Insure Domestic Tranquility,
• Secure the Blessings of Liberty to Ourselves, and
• Provide for the Common Defense

After the groups have finished discussing their questions, have them meet as a class. First ask them to identify which question (by number) from their handout goes with which section of the Preamble of the U.S. Constitution you’ve listed on the front board. Next, have students share their recommendations to the questions and allow other groups to comment, add, or disagree with the recommendations made.

Exit Ticket:

Encourage class discussion of the following questions:

• Having just released themselves from Britain's monarchy, what would the colonists fear most?
• Judging from some of the complaints the colonists had against Britain, what might be some of their concerns for any future government?

As in the hypothetical situation described above, what decisions would the colonists have to make about forming a new government out of 13 colonies which, until 1776, had basically been running themselves independently?

Activity 2. What the Preamble Says

Review the Teachers' Guide to the Preamble , which parses each of the phrases of the Preamble and contrasts them with the equivalent passages in the Articles and the Declaration. Teachers can use this guide as a source for a short lecture before the activity and as a kind of answer sheet for the activity.

In this activity, students investigate the Preamble to the Constitution by comparing and contrasting it with the opening language of the Articles of Confederation. They will:

• understand how the Preamble of the Constitution (in outlining the goals of the new government under the Constitution) was written with the deficiencies of the Articles of Confederation in mind, aiming to create “a more perfect union,” and
• understand how the Preamble drew its justification from the principles outlined in the Declaration of Independence.

The aim of this activity is to show students, through a close reading of the Preamble, how its style and content reflect some of the aspirations of the framers for the future of republican government in America. 

[ Note: teachers should define “diction,” “connotation,” and “denotation” to the students before beginning to ask students to differentiate between language in the two documents. ]

Distribute copies of the Graphic Organizer and questions to all students and have them complete it in their small groups (or individually as a homework assignment).

Have one or two students or groups of students summarize their conclusions concerning the critical differences between the Articles and the Preamble, citing the sources of these documents as referents.

Have students answer the following in a brief, well-constructed essay:

Using the ideas and information presented in this lesson, explain how the wording and structure of the Preamble demonstrate that the Constitution is different from the Articles of Confederation.

Note: For an excellent example of what can be inferred from the language and structure of the Preamble, teachers should review and model this passage by Professor Garret Epps from “ The Poetry of the Preamble ” on the Oxford University Press blog (2013):

“Form, establish, insure, provide, promote, secure”: these are strong verbs that signify governmental power, not restraint. “We the people” are to be bound—into a stronger union. We will be protected against internal disorder—that is, against ourselves—and against foreign enemies. The “defence” to be provided is “common,” general, spread across the country. The Constitution will establish justice; it will promote the “general” welfare; it will secure our liberties. The new government, it would appear, is not the enemy of liberty but its chief agent and protector.

Students could be asked whether they agree or disagree with the above interpretation. They should be expected to provide evidence-based arguments for their position.

The aspirational rhetoric of the Preamble has inspired various social movements throughout our nation’s history. In particular, two 19th-century developments come to mind: the struggles for abolitionism and women's suffrage. Examples of oratory from each movement are provided below. In response to one of these excerpts, students can write a short essay about how the words of the Preamble affected the relevant movement.

• Students should ascertain what the Preamble meant to the movement and how it was used to make an appeal to the nation. The essay might address the question of how and why those such as Frederick Douglass and Susan B. Anthony, who at their time were excluded from the full range of rights and liberties ensured by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, responded to the principles expressed in the Preamble.
• Students should then argue either for or against the interpretation of the Preamble advanced in the excerpt, drawing from the knowledge gained in this lesson.

Be sure that the essay has a strong thesis (a non-obvious, debatable proposition about the Preamble) that students support with evidence from the texts used in this lesson.

Example 1. Frederick Douglass, “ What to the Slave is the Fourth of July ?” (1852)

Fellow-citizens! there is no matter in respect to which, the people of the North have allowed themselves to be so ruinously imposed upon, as that of the pro-slavery character of the Constitution. In that instrument I hold there is neither warrant, license, nor sanction of the hateful thing; but, interpreted as it ought to be interpreted, the Constitution is a GLORIOUS LIBERTY DOCUMENT. Read its preamble, consider its purposes. Is slavery among them? Is it at the gateway? or is it in the temple? It is neither.

Example 2. Susan B. Anthony, “ Is It a Crime for a U.S. Citizen to Vote? ” ( 1873)

It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union. And we formed it, not to give the blessings of liberty, but to secure them; not to the half of ourselves and the half of our posterity, but to the whole people—women as well as men. And it is a downright mockery to talk to women of their enjoyment of the blessings of liberty while they are denied the use of the only means of securing them provided by this democratic-republican government—the ballot.

Materials & Media

Preamble close reading: activity 1 student worksheet, preamble close reading: activity 2 graphic organizer, preamble close reading: activity 2 teachers guide, related on edsitement, a day for the constitution, commemorating constitution day, the constitutional convention of 1787.

• Search Menu
• Advance articles
• Author Guidelines
• Submission Site
• Open Access
• About International Journal of Constitutional Law
• Editorial Board
• Advertising and Corporate Services
• Journals Career Network
• Self-Archiving Policy
• Dispatch Dates
• Journals on Oxford Academic
• Books on Oxford Academic

Article Contents

1. introduction, 2. how to talk about preambles, 3. the american preamble, 4. the legal status of preambles, 5. integrative and disintegrative power of preambles, 6. conclusion.

• < Previous

The preamble in constitutional interpretation

• Article contents
• Figures & tables
• Supplementary Data

Liav Orgad, The preamble in constitutional interpretation, International Journal of Constitutional Law , Volume 8, Issue 4, October 2010, Pages 714–738, https://doi.org/10.1093/icon/mor010

• Permissions Icon Permissions

From Plato's Laws through common law and until modern legal systems, preambles to constitutions have played an important role in law and policy making. Through a qualitative analysis of the legal status of preambles in different common law and civil law countries, the article highlights a recent trend in comparative constitutional law: the growing use of preambles in constitutional adjudication and constitutional design. The article also explores the theory of preambles and their functions. It examines the legal status of the U.S. preamble and shows how the U.S. preamble remains the most neglected section in American constitutional theory. The article then presents a typology for determining the legal status of preambles: a symbolic preamble, an interpretive preamble, and a substantive preamble. While focusing on Macedonia, Israel, Australia, and the Treaty of Lisbon, the article discusses the sociological function of preambles in top-down and bottom-up constitutional designs.

The preamble to the United States Constitution has become a legend. The phrase “We the people of the United States” and the remaining forty-five words of the preamble are the most well-known part of the Constitution, and the section that has had the greatest effect on the constitutions of other countries. And yet, the preamble remains a neglected subject in the study of American constitutional theory and receives scant attention in the literature. Questions such as: what is a preamble to a constitution?; what role does it play in constitutional adjudication and constitutional design?; and why do states add a preamble to the constitution? have been seldom asked or answered.

This article highlights the legal and social functions of preambles. First, it discusses the growing use of preambles in constitutional interpretation. In many countries, the preamble has been used, increasingly, to constitutionalize unenumerated rights. A global survey of the function of preambles shows a growing trend toward its having greater binding force—either independently, as a substantive source of rights, or combined with other constitutional provisions, or as a guide for constitutional interpretation. The courts rely, more and more, on preambles as sources of law. While in some countries this development is not new and dates back several decades, in others it is a recent development. From a global perspective, the U.S. preamble, which generally does not enjoy binding legal status, remains the exception rather than the rule.

Second, the article discusses one of the interesting merits of a preamble: its integrative power. A preamble is the part of the constitution that best reflects the constitutional understandings of the framers, what Carl Schmitt calls the “fundamental political decisions.” Its terms, thus, have far-reaching social effects. Consequently, preambles recently have been added or amended in some countries either due to a popular demand (a bottom-up change) or because of a government-led constitutional design (a top-down change). The article illustrates the potential of a consensual preamble to unite, or a disputable preamble to divide, a people. It emphasizes the sociological reason why it is necessary to carefully consider what is written in the text of the preamble, in particular, in those cases in which the preamble is granted binding legal force.

Section 1 explains the concept of preamble based on qualitative research of the preambles in fifty common law and civil law countries. Section 2 traces the origins of the U.S. preamble and its legal status. Section 3 presents a typology of three legal functions of preambles: the ceremonial-symbolic, in which the preamble serves to consolidate national identity but lacks binding legal force; the interpretive, in which the preamble is granted a guiding role in statutory and constitutional interpretation; and the substantive, in which the preamble serves as an independent source for constitutional rights. Section 4 demonstrates the importance of consensual preambles, sketches the risks inherent in nonconsensual preambles, and describes the benefits and disadvantages in the process of designing a preamble. Focusing on Macedonia, Israel, Australia, and the Treaty of Lisbon, the article examines the social function of preambles in top-down and bottom-up designs and suggests some lessons for a future design of a preamble.

What is a preamble to a constitution and how can it be classified? In formal terms , a preamble constitutes the introduction to the constitution and usually bears the formal heading “Preamble” or some alternative, equivalent title, 1 while in other cases it appears without a heading. The formal classification provides a simple and technical identification of a preamble. Alongside a formal classification, it is possible to identify a preamble through its content. In substantive terms , a preamble does not require a specific location in the constitution but, rather, specific content. 2 It presents the history behind the constitution's enactment, as well as the nation's core principles and values. 3

Analysis of a nonrepresentative sample of fifty democratic countries revealed that most have included a formal preamble in their constitutions: 4 thirty-seven countries have a preamble (74 percent) 5 while thirteen countries do not (26 percent). 6 Countries that do not have a formal preamble often include introductory articles that may be regarded, in substantive terms, as a preamble. 7 A preamble is, thus, a common constitutional feature. Moreover, most of the countries that have adopted a constitution in recent years, particularly in Eastern and Central Europe, have included a preamble.

The content of preambles can be classified into five categories.

The Sovereign. Most preambles specify the source of sovereignty. In some cases, sovereign power rests with the people (“we the people of …”). 8 This is a relatively neutral term with which most of the population can usually identify. Another phrase relates to the source of sovereignty as stemming from a particular nation (the “Lithuanian Nation,” the “Spanish Nation,” and the like). This terminology emphasizes a specific national group and is less neutral. 9 Some preambles combine a reference to the people with a reference to representative bodies; others refer only to representative bodies; while others make no reference to a sovereign authority. In federations and unions, the preamble often identifies the constituent states—and their peoples—as the source of sovereignty. 10

Historical Narratives . Preambles include, typically, historical narratives of a state, a nation, or a people, telling specific stories that are rooted in language, heritage, and tradition. These stories shape the common identity (“we”). The reference is often to past events that influenced the establishment of the state. The South African preamble, for example, declares that the people of South Africa “recognise the injustices of our past,” and “honour those who suffered for justice and freedom in our land.” The preamble to the Chinese Constitution notes that “China is one of the countries with the longest histories in the world” and details, at great length, Chinese history and the nation's achievements. The Turkish preamble mentions that the Turkish Constitution is established “in line with the concept of nationalism outlined and the reforms and principles” introduced by the republic's founder Atatürk. In Eastern and Central Europe—in countries such as Croatia, Estonia, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Ukraine—the preambles celebrate the nations’ struggles for independence and self-determination.

Supreme Goals. Preambles often outline a society's fundamental goals. These may be universal objectives, such as the advancement of justice, fraternity, and human rights; economic goals, such as nurturing a socialist agenda or advancing a free market economy; or others, such as maintaining the union. 11 These goals tend to be abstract ideas, such as happiness or well-being. The preamble to the Constitution of Japan, for instance, is peace-loving (“never again shall we be visited with the horrors of war … desire peace for all time”), while the preambles to the Constitutions of the Philippines and of Turkey stress love.

National Identity . Preambles usually contain statements about the national creed. Understanding the constitutional faith of each country, and its constitutional philosophy, cannot be complete without reading its preamble. Frequently, preambles include an additional element about future aspirations and may include a commitment to resolve disputes by peaceful means, to abide by the principles of the UN Charter, or to further national aspirations as stated in a declaration of independence. 12 These statements often refer to inalienable rights, such as liberty or human dignity.

God or Religion. A preamble may include references to God. Some preambles emphasize God's supremacy, such as the preambles to the Canadian Charter (“the supremacy of God”) or the Swiss Constitution (“in the Name of Almighty God”). 13 Other preambles refer to a religion: the Greek preamble refers to the Holy Trinity; 14 in the Irish preamble, the Holy Trinity is mentioned as “our final end” and a source of authority toward which all actions of “men and states must be referred.” 15 Conversely, the preamble may emphasize the separation of state and religion or the state's secular character. 16

While common characteristics can be identified, each preamble has its own distinguishing features. Preambles come in various lengths, 17 harmonize with or contradict the body of the constitution, and may be enacted together with the body of the constitution as well as in a later constitutional moment.

One of the greatest contributions of the United States to the world is the U.S. Constitution, and, perhaps, the most influential section of the U.S. Constitution is its preamble. It is, therefore, particularly interesting to trace its origins and legal status. The current preamble is different from the original introduced in 1787 at the Philadelphia Convention. The original preamble did not include the famous phrase “We the people of the United States” but, rather, designated the states as the source of authority; also, it did not specify the Constitution's objectives. The original preamble stated, simply, that: “We the people of the States of New-Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New-York, New-Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North-Carolina, South-Carolina, and Georgia, do ordain, declare, and establish the following Constitution for the Government of Ourselves and our Posterity.” 18 The text was changed by the Committee of Style, whose members were William Samuel Johnson, Alexander Hamilton, Gouverneur Morris, James Madison, and Rufus King. 19 However, there is no historical record of the drafting process of the preamble, or the reasons for the changes made by the Committee of Style.

The framers of the American Constitution were well aware of other forms of preambles. The Petition of Rights of 1628, the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679, the Bill of Rights of 1689, the Act of Settlement of 1701, the Articles of Confederation of 1777, and some state constitutions—all preceded the U.S. Constitution and set the pattern for the U.S. preamble. The question remains: Why was the preamble needed in the first place? During the Philadelphia Convention, Edmund Randolph argued for the inclusion of a preamble: “a Preamble seems proper,” he said, but “not for the purpose of designating the ends of government and human polities.” 20 This form of preamble, which Randolph referred to as a “display of theory,” was not necessary in his view. A preamble “ is unfit here; since we are not working on the natural rights of men not yet gathered into society, but upon those rights, modified by society, and interwoven with what we call the rights of states.” 21 For Randolph, a preamble was essential as a statement of the reasons for accepting the Constitution: “the object of our preamble ought to be briefly to declare, that the present foederal government is insufficient to the general happiness [and] that the conviction of this fact gave birth to this convention.” 22

Although that Preamble indicates the general purposes for which the people ordained and established the Constitution, it has never been regarded as the source of any substantive power conferred on the Government of the United States, or on any of its Departments. Such powers embrace only those expressly granted in the body of the Constitution, and as such as may be implied from those so granted. 25

Justice Harlan stripped the preamble of any legal force without providing any historical evidence or textual explanations. While he noted that individuals have no constitutional rights derived directly from the preamble, he neither stated, expressly, that the preamble has less significance than other constitutional provisions nor did he assert that it does not form a binding part of the Constitution. Yet, evidence suggests that the framers anticipated the role the preamble would play in constitutional interpretation. 26 Alexander Hamilton even stated that the Bill of Rights was not necessary since the preamble was able to function as one. 27 Joseph Story argued that the preamble “is a key to open[ing] the mind of the makers, as to the mischiefs, which are to be remedied, and the objects, which are to be accomplished.” 28 James Monroe , similarly, stated that the preamble is “the Key of the Constitution. Whenever federal power is exercised, contrary to the spirit breathed by this introduction, it will be unconstitutionally exercised and ought to be resisted.” 29 These views, however, were not shared by everyone, and a dispute arose over the preamble's role. James Madison, for one, expressed his reservations about the preamble's power. “The general terms or phrases used in the introductory propositions,” he said, “were never meant to be inserted in their loose form in the text of the Constitution.” 30 A debate started over whether and in what manner the Constitution's preamble should be used by the Court. 31

Nevertheless, U.S. courts have invoked the preamble in constitutional interpretation. Although the references are inconsistent, rhetorical, and far from conferring independent constitutional rights, they still provide the preamble with some constitutional weight. Courts have used the term “We the people” to define the boundaries of the Constitution's applicability, 32 hold the powers of the federal government, 33 indicate that the people—and not the states—are the source of the federal government's power, 34 challenge sovereign immunity, 35 and define who is a citizen. 36 Similarly, the phrase to “establish Justice” has been invoked to expand federal jurisdiction 37 and to support invalidation of legal tender legislation. 38 The phrase to “provide for the common defense” has likewise been used to broaden congressional power 39 and uphold exclusion from citizenship. 40 In addition to its interpretive role, the preamble exerts a meaningful, although indirect, influence of congressional decision making. 41

In spite of these references, the U.S. preamble is not, by and large, a decisive factor in constitutional interpretation. Its relatively meager use in constitutional adjudication has been criticized. “It is regrettable that law professors rarely teach and that courts rarely cite the Preamble,” Sanford Levinson notes, as it is “ the single most important part of the Constitution.” 42 For Levinson, the preamble is “the equivalent of our creedal summary of America's civil religion.” 43 For Mark Tushnet, the “thin” Constitution of the United States is anchored in the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the preamble. 44 Milton Handler, Brian Leiter, and Carole Handler charge the courts with ignoring the preamble: “we can discern no reason why [its] rules of construction should not obtain in the constitutional context.” 45 They mention that disregard of the preamble conflicts with the status of recital clauses of contracts, legislative declarations of purpose in statutes, and preambles to international treaties 46 — all of which do guide the court in judicial decision making. 47 For them, the preamble ought to play a more significant role in constitutional decisions. 48 Other scholars have argued that courts should accord the preamble legal force for the sake of future generations. In referring to Roe v. Wade , Raymond Marcin has claimed that the question of yet-to-be-born descendants requires a solution that finds its foundation in the preamble—the blessings of liberty for the people but also for posterity—which includes fetuses, as well. 49

While the preamble is written in a manner that appeals to many, it remains difficult to persuade jurists of its superior legal status. 50 Although Justice Harlan stripped the preamble of its legal force, its occasional use in constitutional adjudication indicates that while it is not an independent source of rights neither is it constitutionally irrelevant. 51

The preamble has several functions. To begin with, it has an educational purpose: it is one of the most significant sections of the constitution that is mentioned in educational and public arenas. Unlike the constitution—usually a very long document including complex provisions—the preamble is relatively short and is written in a more accessible language. Next, the preamble has an explanatory purpose: it serves to specify the reasons for the constitution's enactment, its raison d’être and eternal ideals. In addition, the preamble has a formative purpose: it constitutes a political resource for the consolidation of national identity and serves as a national “calling card.” The preamble has a legal purpose as well. This section sketches a three-part typology of preambles: a ceremonial preamble, an interpretive preamble, and a substantive preamble. 52

4.1. Ceremonial-symbolic preamble

[j]ust as a “free” doctor explains the patient's illness to him, and tries to make him understand the reasons for the measures to be prescribed, in order to gain his co-operation, so the legislator must explain and justify his laws. Hence every law must be headed by a preamble justifying its provisions; further, the preamble must be rhetorical in character: it must not only instruct, but persuade. Only if a man ignores the preambles, must the sanction of actual law be applied.

Plato's notion of a preamble is meant to justify the law. A good preamble would persuade the people to obey the law, not because of civil or criminal sanctions but because it is a good law. The purpose of the preamble is to mitigate the harshness of the law; a law without a persuasive preamble is a “dictatorial prescription.” Plato's preambles use abstract terms and invoke poetic ideals. 54 However, they are not regarded as integral part of the law and do not create rights or have binding interpretative power.

The preamble of the U.S. Constitution is an example of Plato's concept of a preamble because it is persuasive, symbolic, and, generally, has no legal force. An opposite example of a non–legally binding preamble, which has no persuasive power, is the preamble to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The preamble declares that Canada “is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law.” Courts have not granted the Canadian preamble legal force, 55 and some scholars have opposed granting it any legal weight, 56 inter alia because of the alleged contradiction between the supremacy of God and the rule of law and because the preamble contradicts some clauses of the Charter. 57 Courts refer to the preamble as a dead letter; 58 others, describe it as perfunctory, restricting the liberties embodied in the Charter and not intended for use even as an interpretative tool. 59 Canada, thus, is an example of a state in which the judiciary dissociates itself from the preamble. 60 One reason might be that the preamble is short and lacks significant usable details. Another reason might be that, unlike Plato's preamble the preamble to the Canadian Charter has no persuasive value. In particular, it does not offer a persuasive explanation for the unusual reference to the “supremacy of God.” 61 Interestingly, when the legal status of the preamble to the Constitution Act of 1867 was discussed, the Canadian Supreme Court reached a different conclusion. In order to determine whether the secession of Quebec was constitutionally valid, the Court analyzed that preamble's content to determine the fundamental values underlying the Canadian Constitution. 62

4.2. Interpretive preamble

The interpretive role of preambles is rooted in the common law tradition. Edward Coke asserted that preambles to an act of parliament are a “good mean to find out the meaning of the statute” and “the key to open understanding thereof”; 63 they are “the key to the statute and the key to the makers.” 64 William Blackstone referred to preambles as intended “to help the construction of an act of parliament.” 65 Blackstone noted that whenever the statute is dubious, “the proem, or preamble, is often called in to help the construction of an act of parliament.” 66 However, in a case of conflict between the preamble and the body of the act, the body of the act prevails. 67 This is still considered good law in common law states. 68 Some have a specific clause indicating the significant role of preambles in statutory interpretation. 69

This common law rule remains effective on the constitutional level in states in which the constitution's preamble embodies a guiding framework for constitutional interpretation. When several interpretations exist, courts prefer the option consonant with the preamble. For example, section 39 to the South African Constitution declares that, when interpreting the Bill of Rights, the courts “must promote the values that underlie an open and democratic society based on human dignity, equality and freedom”—words that appear in the preamble. 70 South Africa's Constitutional Court has confirmed the preamble's status as a guide when interpreting the Bill of Rights. While the preamble is not an independent source of rights, it is an inspiration for those rights. 71 In Ireland, similarly, the courts have been invoking the preamble to interpret the Irish Constitution, and as a tool to guide in understanding its spirit. 72 A proposal to amend the preamble by adopting a nonjusticiable preamble, offered by a Constitution Review Group, was rejected. 73

The use of preambles as a tool in constitutional interpretation is common in civil law systems, as well. In Estonia, the preamble, in which the Estonian people undertake to “guarantee the preservation of the Estonian nation and its culture throughout the ages,” has been used by the Supreme Court to confirm the constitutionality of an act requiring adequate command of the Estonian language as a prerequisite for election to a local government council. The Court ruled that mastering Estonian—the state's official language—is a legitimate requirement in light of the preamble. 74 However, in another case, the Supreme Court declared that an act forbidding Estonians to change their Estonian last name to a non-Estonian last name is unconstitutional, despite the provision in the preamble regarding the protection of Estonian national identity. 75 In Macedonia, the Supreme Court of the Republic upheld restrictions on the freedom of political association because certain activities were perceived as contrary to the preamble. It held that a political association that overtly denies the right of Macedonian self-determination is legally forbidden. 76 In the Ukraine, the Supreme Court invoked the preamble in order to declare the constitutionality of the use of Ukrainian as the state language, an act requiring its use by central and local government agencies, and, consequently, greatly restricting the use of other languages, such as Russian. 77

A recent example of the interpretive role of preambles comes from Germany. On June 30, 2009, the German Constitutional Court decided that, in principle, no incompatibility exists between the German Grundgesetz and the Treaty of Lisbon and thus laid the groundwork for completion of the ratification process. 78 The treaty grants the European Union (EU) powers in matters of foreign and security policy and obliges member states to participate in European integration. The question was whether the treaty overrides the German constitutional order in a way that requires a constitutional amendment. The Court held that the treaty does not violate German sovereignty, although its confirmation does require some legislation processes. It referred to article 23(1) of the Basic Law, as well as to the preamble, taking note of the latter's intent “to serve world peace as an equal part in a unified Europe.” In light of these stipulations, the Court was able to conclude that it is the will of the German people to be part of the EU. It noted that the preamble emphasizes “not only the moral basis of responsible self-determination but also the willingness to serve world peace as an equal partner of a united Europe.” 79 The Court observed that Germany breaks with “political Machiavellianism and with rigid concept of sovereignty” and seeks to realize “a united Europe, which follows from Article 23.1 of the Basic Law and the Preamble.” 80 Therefore, the Constitutional Court held, achieving “European integration and an international peaceful order” is the will of the preamble. 81

The German preamble, generally, does not enjoy legal force in German constitutional law. However, the Treaty of Lisbon decision was not the first to invoke the preamble. Another example was the decision regarding the treaty signed between the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic. The 1949 preamble lists unification as the highest priority, stating that “the entire German people is called upon to accomplish, by free self-determination, the unity and freedom of Germany.” 82 Although the preamble speaks in the name of the German people as a whole—acting “on behalf of those Germans to whom participation was denied”—it only applied in West Germany. On December 1972, after the treaty on the relationship between the Federal Republic and the German Democratic Republic was signed, a petition challenging the treaty was placed before the Constitutional Court claiming that the treaty, which seemed to support the idea that West and East Germany were two separate and independent states, violated the unification clause of the preamble. In determining whether the treaty was compatible with the Basic Law, the Court addressed the preamble. 83 It first decided that the preamble was a decisive source for determining the case, and then held that “the preamble to the Basic Law has not only political importance but also legal content.” 84 Hence, “reunification is a constitutional command .” 85 The Court noted that the treaty was a starting point for the future relationship between West and East Germany and gave the political branches wide discretion in deciding further political actions needed to bring about German unification. 86

4.3. Substantive preamble

Preambles can also be legally binding constitutional clauses and serve as independent sources for rights and obligations. In Constitutional Theory , Carl Schmitt distinguishes between “constitutional laws” and the “constitution.” The former are constitutional provisions that govern behavior and set norms; the latter contains what Schmitt calls “fundamental political decisions.” 87 These decisions are not constitutional laws but the “fundamental prerequisite[s] of all subsequent norms”; 88 as such, they define the genuine objectives of a society. While fundamental political decisions may appear in the text of the constitution, or not be in the text of the constitution at all, they most often appear in the preamble. Indeed, “it is a typical error of prewar-era state theory to misconstrue” preambles as “mere statements,” declares Schmitt. Preambles, to a large extent, represent the society's “constitution,” while “constitutional law,” as specified in the body of the constitution, is only “secondary to the fundamental political decisions.” 89

An example of a substantive preamble that governs constitutional interpretation and represents Schmitt's notion of “fundamental political decisions” is to be found in France. The preamble to the Constitution of the Fifth Republic (1958) states that the French people “proclaim their attachment to the Rights of Man and the principles of national sovereignty as defined by the Declaration of 1789, confirmed and complemented by the preamble to the 1946 Constitution.” The founding fathers of the Fifth Republic did not include a bill of rights in the Constitution. 90 Instead, they drafted a preamble referring to two previous documents: the Declaration on the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789, and to the preamble to the Constitution of the Fourth Republic of 1946. The preamble to the 1958 Constitution did not originally enjoy binding legal force nor was it even considered an integral part of the Constitution.

On July 16, 1971, the Conseil Constitutionnel recognized the preamble's binding force as an independent legal source of human rights. For the first time, the Conseil found an act passed by the French Parliament to be unconstitutional because it contradicted freedom of association, one of the “fundamental principles recognized by the laws of the Republic.” 91 These fundamental principles were not mentioned in the 1958 Constitution but in the preamble to the 1946 constitution. 92 In later decisions, the Council held that the preamble to the 1946 constitution enjoys legal force and constitutes an independent source of rights. Interestingly, at the time it was drafted, the 1946 preamble did not enjoy any legal status. Thus, the Conseil Constitutionnel, through a reference to the 1946 preamble in the 1958 preamble, effectively granted the 1946 preamble a higher status than it had previously enjoyed. Although not explicitly enumerated in the 1958 Constitution, the rights to strike, freedom of association, privacy, education, freedom of conscience, freedom of movement, and due process were all thereby recognized as constitutionally protected rights. 93 Some of these rights, such as freedom of association, were not even listed in the 1946 preamble but were incorporated by affirming the doctrine of the “fundamental principles recognized by the laws of the Republic,” anchored in the 1946 preamble. 94 The 1971 decision was France's Marbury v. Madison . It applied an interesting method of judicial interpretation according to which the 1946 preamble, the 1789 declaration, and the fundamental principles of the Republic were all granted constitutional legal status ex post facto. 95

India is another example that illustrates the growing use of preambles in constitutional interpretation. The Indian preamble includes three sections: declarative, in which the people of India establish the Constitution through the constituent assembly; principled, in which the people of India establish a socialist, secular, democratic republic; and operative, in which the people of India sanctify four supreme aims: “Justice, Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.” The original preamble was adopted on October 17, 1949, and was subsequently amended in 1977 with the addition of the terms “secular” and “socialist.” These changes brought about a constitutional revolution and have been interpreted since to formally provide India with a social character. 96

In a nearly thousand-page benchmark decision, 97 the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the preamble is part of the Constitution and enjoys legal force. The justices inquired into the theory of preambles and their uses. Some even cited American case law and Joseph Story's Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States to conclude that the preamble is the key to understanding the Constitution and interpreting its clauses. The preamble, together with the Fundamental Rights and the Directive Principles of State Policy—the most important parts of the Indian Constitution—constitute the core of the constitution. Unlike France, India declared that the preamble cannot, in and of itself, impose additional rights to those explicitly stipulated in the Constitution. Nevertheless, the courts regularly resort to using the preamble when the text of the Constitution is vague. For example, the Supreme Court relied on the preamble in establishing that the constitutional authorities draw their strength directly from the people of India, clarifying the character of India as a socialist republic, recognizing the possibility of the nationalization of private industries in order to secure equality and justice, and granting the expression “social justice” the status of a constitutional right. 98 These references are interpretive, yet their quantity and length indicate a more substantive role of the Indian preamble in constitutional interpretation. 99

A unique example of a substantive preamble appears in Nepal. Article 116(1) of the Nepalese Constitution proclaims that “a bill to amend or repeal any Article of this Constitution, without prejudicing the spirit of the Preamble of this Constitution, may be introduced in either House of Parliament.” This clause invalidates even a constitutional amendment that violates that spirit of the preamble. Nepal is unique not only for the specific provision indicating the legal status of the preamble but also for taking additional measures to protect the preamble's spirit . 100 The concept of a constitutional amendment that is unconstitutional vis-à-vis the spirit of the constitution is found in Schmitt's theory. For Schmitt, constitutional laws may be amended, and even eliminated, by adhering to the amendment procedure of the constitution. Fundamental political decisions, however, cannot be amended or eliminated in the same way. “The German Reich cannot be transformed into an absolute monarchy or into a Soviet republic through a two-thirds majority decision of the Reichstag,” Schmitt declared, just as “a majority decision of the English Parliament would not suffice to make England into a Soviet state.” 101 Legislators are not omnipotent; only the people, acting directly or through a constitutional assembly, can change fundamental decisions. In Nepal, this concept has been influenced by the Indian concept of “basic structure.” 102 A number of dissenting justices in India ruled that the preamble is not a regular constitutional clause and, therefore, its “basic structure” cannot be amended; representing eternal law, it cannot be set aside by an amendment, not even by the amendment procedure of article 368 to the Indian Constitution. 103 The fundamental values of the Constitution, as they appear in the preamble, cannot be altered. 104 In Schmitt's terms, the amendment procedure of the constitution can amend constitutional laws but not the Constitution; a new constitution would have to be created and accepted. 105 The preamble “walks before the Constitution.” 106 Hence, it is not only a source of rights and powers but also of entrenchment.

As any provision of an Entity's Constitution [RS] must be consistent with the Constitution of BiH, including its Preamble, the provisions of the Preamble are thus a legal basis for reviewing all normative acts lower in rank in relation to the Constitution of BiH for as long as the aforesaid Preamble contains constitutional principles … the provisions of the preamble are therefore not merely descriptive, but are also invested with a powerful normative force, thereby serving as a sound standard of judicial review for the Constitutional Court. Hence, the Constitutional Court must establish in substance what specific rights or obligations follow from the constitutional principles of the Preambles of both the Constitution of BiH and the Constitution of RS. 109

This survey demonstrates the growing use of preambles in constitutional adjudication. Nevertheless, it is difficult to generalize under what circumstances it is likely that a preamble may play a functional role, whether interpretive or substantive. In some cases, preambles are more substantive when there is no explicit bill of rights in the constitution, as in France. In other cases, as in India, preambles are more likely to be substantive when they set up concrete norms rather than abstract ideas, such as happiness or love. On the other hand, when a gap between the content of the preamble and the text of the constitution exists, as in Canada, the preamble is less likely to play a role in constitutional interpretation. Nonetheless, going back to Hans Kelsen, the legal status of the preamble is still to be considered functional. In principle, a preamble “usually does not stipulate any definite norms for human behavior and thus lacks legally relevant contents. It has an ideological rather than a juristic character.” 110 However, the legal status of the preamble depends on various criteria; among them is its content. A preamble may have a normative character whenever “its meaning is to establish … an obligation. A statement whose meaning is to establish an obligation is a norm.” 111

One question that arises is why would a preamble not be regarded as binding in the first place? Why is it required of those who want the preamble to have a legal meaning to make a case for its functionality? In many instances, it is clear that justices in various states have paid particular attention to the legal status of the U.S. preamble when determining the case before them. It does appear peculiar that one of the most comprehensive studies on the legal status of the U.S. preamble was not conducted by American scholars but by Indian justices in Delhi. 112 One thing, however, is clear: in many countries, it is no longer possible to treat the preamble as a prefatory rather than as a dispositive piece of the constitution. Preambles are playing an increasing role in constitutional interpretation. 113 At least two lessons can be drawn: ( a ) parties to litigation should be aware of the growing role of preambles in constitutional adjudication, which means that they can invoke the preamble as a source of law; ( b ) future constitutional design must consider the legal status of the preamble. Constitutional framers either can determine the legal status of the preamble in the constitution themselves or let the courts decide the issue.

The preamble's strength lies not only in the legal sphere but also in its social function and effect. 114 The United States probably has the best example of an integrative preamble. However, just as preambles can foster integration by forging a common identity, so also they can be disintegrative, driving people apart and contributing to social tension. This occurs when a preamble reflects only the story of a dominant group. If the preamble states the fundamental principles underlying the constitution and enjoys legal status—that is, these principles are no longer political morality or nonbinding historical statements—it is necessary to consider what is written therein. Four cases are briefly discussed here: Macedonia, Israel, Australia, and the EU.

5.1. The Macedonian experience

The citizens of the Republic of Macedonia, the Macedonian people, as well as the citizens living within its borders, which are part of the Albanian nation, the Turkish nation, the Vlah nation, the Serbian nation, the Roma nation, the Bosnian nation and others … have decided to establish the Republic of Macedonia as an independent, sovereign state.

By including only a limited national narrative and expressing future aspirations of a specific national group, the original Macedonian preamble had excluded the Albanian minority from the mainstream of Macedonian life; it thereby weakened the Constitution's political legitimacy. 117 The Albanians demand was for a more consensual, less partisan preamble with which all citizens could identify. Yet, one can be skeptical regarding the efficacy of such a preamble in those nation-states that, by definition, are not equally accepting of all national groups. More importantly, the amendment to the preamble has not resolved the social conflict. On the contrary, the deletion of Macedonia as a nation-state caused resentment among ethnic Macedonians, who felt that this change had been forced upon them by violence and international pressure. Similarly, ethnic Albanians continue to challenge their linkage to other minorities and their inferior status, which is derived, in their view, from the term “as well as” that appears in the preamble. They object to any preamble that falls short of referring to a fully binational Macedonia. This case thus emphasizes the power of preambles either to unify or to divide political resources; it also sheds light on the limits of constitutional design to ameliorate ethnic conflicts or foster a common national identity.

5.2. The Israeli experience

I. Fundamental human rights in Israel are founded upon recognition of the value of the human being, the sanctity of human life, and the principle that all persons are free; these rights shall be upheld in the spirit of the principles set forth in the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel. IA. The purpose of this Basic Law is to protect human dignity and liberty, in order to establish in a Basic Law the values of the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.

This amendment is consonant with most of the substantive requirements of a preamble; it recognizes the fundamental values of the state of Israel and its national character. While it is not a formal preamble—bearing the title “preamble” or a similar title (“foreword,” “preface,” and the like)—it may constitute, in effect, a substantive preamble. It was also the first time in Israel's legislative history that the Declaration of Independence was incorporated into law. The legal status of the Declaration of Independence has changed over the years. Soon after the state's foundation, the Supreme Court refused to grant it legal status; 122 however, this attitude changed with the Supreme Court's progressive reliance on the human rights guaranteed in the declaration for constitutional interpretation. The Court has repeatedly ruled that the declaration serves as a political act with legal implications that should be respected by all authorities, although it could not disqualify acts of parliament. The Court adopted a Blackstonian reading of preambles under which a law, interpretable in different ways, would be interpreted in the manner compatible with the preamble's spirit or, in this case, the declaration’s. 123 Following the 1994 amendments, a few judges ruled that the legal status of the Declaration of Independence had been altered, significantly, and held that the Court may declare rights recognized by the declaration as constitutional rights. 124 In one case, a dissenting judge even ruled that the Disengagement Plan regarding the unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip was unconstitutional, because it conflicted with “the right” of the Jewish people to settle in all the territories of the Land of Israel/Palestine, protected, in his view, by the Declaration of Independence. 125

The Jewish and democratic character of Israel is its basic constitutional structure. This structure, as former president of the Supreme Court Aharon Barak argues, is eternal and, therefore, an amendment that denies it would be an unconstitutional constitutional amendment. 126 In fact, Israel has been a Jewish state from its foundation but, until 1994, it was an unwritten convention rather than a constitutional imperative. Legalization of the term “Jewish state” has granted the courts the power to decide the meaning of this character and has triggered social tension between secular and ultraorthodox Jews and between Jewish and Arab citizens. Arab citizens feel that the Basic Laws have excluded them from Israel's social arrangement and have ignored their identity, culture, and heritage. By adopting a constitutional definition of Israel as a Jewish State, the Basic Laws exclude them from the Israeli mainstream and treat them as “second-class citizens.” 127 The Israeli experience demonstrates how the preamble's design can raise ideological barriers to social integration as well as produce feelings of not belonging. 128 The “Purpose Clause,” considered Israel's substantive preamble, 129 is not ideologically neutral; it does not state “we, the people of Israel,” and its meaning is the focus of ongoing disputes and social divisions. 130

5.3. The Australian experience

Australia was established in 1900 through the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act that was passed by the British Parliament and established Australia as an indissoluble federal commonwealth; the act's preamble has been regarded as equivalent to a constitution's preamble. The preamble outlines the structure and powers of the government. It is very short and lacks any substantive content. Toward the end of the twentieth century, the preamble was criticized for no longer reflecting Australia's values. On November 6, 1999, a referendum was held on the question of adopting a new preamble. 131

As in the Macedonian case, a legal change was triggered by a new reality. One of the reasons motivating the referendum was the need to reconsider the legal status of Australian Aborigines. In February 1998, a constitutional convention adopted a new preamble that would enable minority groups to identify with Australia. 132 The convention decided that a separate referendum would be held on the question of replacing the existing preamble along with the question whether Australia would become a Republic. Prime Minister John Howard announced his intention to abide by the decision regarding a separate referendum on the new preamble. His draft, published in February 1999, was met with criticism mainly from minority leaders, who requested that the Australian Aborigines not be mentioned as a “native minority” but as “the custodian[s] of our land.” Howard, thereafter, drafted a second version of the preamble; however, it was rejected in the referendum—60.7 percent voted against it. 133

The Australian experiences differ from those of Macedonia and Israel. First, it is very difficult to gain broad public support for a new preamble at a later constitutional moment, especially in multicultural societies. Second, the plan to adopt a nation-building preamble—that is, to use the preamble as a symbol for promoting national identity, similar to a flag or an anthem—requires public involvement. In the Australian case, expressions such as “recognising the nation-building contribution of generations of immigrants,” or “honouring Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, the nation's first people[s], for their deep kinship with their lands” 134 were inadequate to compensate for the isolation in which the prime minister drafted the document. If the goal is to secure reconciliation between the state and its minorities, representatives of the minorities have to be involved in the drafting process. Third, the intention was not to replace the old preamble but to adopt a new preamble, devoid of legal power, to accompany the old one that enjoyed interpretative force. Yet, if the preamble is intended from the outset to be purely symbolic, and absent legal force, 135 the publics’ interest in the preamble is likely to decrease. In addition, the insistence on a nonjusticiable preamble revealed deep concern regarding the role of the preamble in judicial empowerment. 136

5.4. The EU experience

On December 1, 2009, the Treaty of Lisbon entered into force. The changes inserted in the Treaty of Lisbon's preamble express the differences in the conceptual framework of the rejected draft Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe. A process that began with high expectations and romantic visions concluded, essentially, in a watered-down product. It is interesting to compare the long, detailed version of the preamble of the draft constitutional treaty with the short, almost valueless preamble of the Lisbon treaty, whose almost sole purpose is to allow the EU more efficient functioning. 137

At the end of 2004, representatives of the EU signed the draft Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe. The discussions during the drafting of the preamble revived old disputes forcing member states to address historical narratives, common motives, shared values, and future destinies. 138 In a document of approximately three-hundred pages, the preamble is particularly interesting. It includes the values and objectives of the EU's citizens, features that were fiercely debated within the framework of historical narratives, a reference to God or Christianity, and issues of identity.

It was first necessary to determine who speaks for EU citizens: the states themselves, the parliaments, or the citizenry. It was decided to refer to the heads of the state—his Majesty the King of the Belgians, the president of the Czech Republic, her Majesty the Queen of Denmark, and so on—as the entities ratifying the treaty. In the preamble to the Lisbon treaty, the people of Europe do not speak directly as one political body; no united “people of Europe” exists. By way of comparison, in the United States, one suggestion considered at the Philadelphia Convention had been to name the Union the “United People and States of America.” 139 The framers eventually adopted the phrase “We the people of the United States” because they were uncertain how many states would join the Union, and this term was more flexible. 140 Yet, in Europe, it seems that adding a new member state would require amending the preamble in order to insert another head of state.

Another interesting discussion took place regarding the question of whether to refer to Christianity. Poland and Italy advocated adding a reference to God whereas secular France and Belgium strongly opposed such a reference. At the end, it was decided to mention neither God nor Europe's Christian heritage. A similar debate arose surrounding Europe's common history. The question was whether the horrors of the two world wars should be mentioned as a motivation for the creation of the EU. The member states first decided to adopt a terse reference to Europe as “reunited after bitter experiences” and to declare that “the peoples of Europe are determined to transcend their former divisions.” However, this formulation was dropped in the Treaty of Lisbon, to be replaced by a thin statement according to which member states “draw […] inspiration from the cultural, religious, and humanist inheritance of Europe, from which have developed the universal values of the inviolable and inalienable rights of the human person, freedom, democracy, equality and the rule of law.”

A major challenge was how to frame common European goals. The preamble to the draft Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe was very detailed. It described common aspirations—such as “forging a common destiny” or “striv[ing] for peace, justice and solidarity throughout the world”—while declaring that the peoples of Europe are “united ever more closely” in the lofty goals of “continu[ing] along the path of civilization, progress and prosperity” and of accepting responsibilities toward “future generations.” It celebrated the member states as “united in diversity.” This formula, which is the official motto of the EU, indicates that Europe chooses unification in the realization of common goals while sustaining its diverse national identities; thus the peoples of Europe “remain […] proud of their own national identities and history.” In the Treaty of Lisbon, however, all these goals have been completely omitted. The preamble is much shorter. It merely declares a modest goal of “enhancing the efficiency and democratic legitimacy of the Union and to improving the coherence of its action.”

With no united people of Europe, little common history, and fewer shared goals, the question of having a European identity became more significant. Should the preamble define a collective European identity or be neutral on the subject? In the first draft adopted in July 2003, the preamble began with a quote from the writing of Thucydides, in ancient Greek. 141 Its purpose was to refer to one of the historical sources of democracy as an enduring unifying symbol. With no overt desire to develop a collective idea of Europeanness, the Treaty of Lisbon's preamble avoids directly addressing Europe's collective identity.

The debate concerning the EU's preamble demonstrates the difficulties of forging a consensus around common values against a background of diverse national histories. It remains unclear as to whether the preamble will have any normative influence or foster a unified European identity. For now, the preamble's main merit is that it shows the importance of the drafting process, which, in turn, will demonstrate the purposes of the preamble. From a legal perspective, there is little difference between the draft Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe and the Treaty of Lisbon. The significant difference, after years of ongoing debates, is to be found in the content of the preamble.

Do preambles have a point? They surely do. For Plato, preambles are the soul of the laws, a device through which the legislator convinces the people to obey the law. For Schmitt, preambles express the society's fundamental political decisions. For Blackstone, preambles are the key to opening up to us the minds of the lawmakers. For individuals, preambles are the national consciousness; they define the constitutional identity and, as such, they define who the “we” is.

For a long time, preambles have been disregarded as symbolic statements. Students at American law schools do not learn that they can win a case by invoking the Preamble. This article shows that, in a global perspective, this premise is no longer valid. A growing number of countries have legalized the language of the preamble. The preamble's rights and principles have become more and more legally enforceable, rights that lawyers can bring to court (whether this is a desirable practice is a separate question). And yet, preambles are not simply legal provisions, like the other provisions of the constitution. The motives for writing preambles, their design process, and their sociological functions are different. The preamble's purpose is not only—perhaps not mainly—to guarantee rights or provide legal arguments but to set down the basic structure of the society and its constitutional faith. In no other place than the preamble is the constitutional understanding of the founding fathers and the national creed so clearly reflected.

Preambles have an important nonlegal purpose, as well. They reflect and affect social and political norms. They encourage cohesion or exacerbate divisions, express the constitutional identity, and are called upon to serve as a device of national consolidation or to reconcile past wrongs. Their impact depends on their wording but also on the political environment that once gave them life. Preambles may acquire a unique force, generally at a constitutional moment. The classic case is the U.S. Constitution. This was also the case with the preamble to the German Grundgesetz in which a defeated and shattered Germany, recuperating from the Nazi nightmare, was able to proclaim its attachment to a new Europe. In those moments, preambles enjoy popular consent. When those moments pass, popular consent is more difficult to achieve.

The preamble to the constitutions of Albania and Bahrain is called “Foreword.” The preamble to the Constitution of Japan is called “Preface.”

The Charter of the United Nations, for example, has a formal preamble and a substantive preamble; the latter appears in chapter I of the Charter. See Hans Kelsen, The Preamble of the Charter—a Critical Analysis , 8(2) J. P OL . 134 (1946).

Another form of a preamble may be a declaration of independence, which, although not formally part of a constitution, may have some of the substantive elements of a preamble. Unless otherwise mentioned, the article does not discuss the declaration of independence as a form of a substantive preamble.

Constitution defined here as a group of binding fundamental principles characterizing a state or society on a permanent basis. Therefore, a constitution could be either a formal document or substantive legal norms a society refers to as a binding constitution. See , e.g. , A.V. D ICEY , I NTRODUCTION TO THE S TUDY OF THE L AW OF THE C ONSTITUTION 22 (8th ed., 1915).

States that have a preamble to their constitution are Andorra, Albania, Argentina, Australia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Ireland, Japan, Lithuania, Macedonia, Montenegro, New Zealand, Paraguay, Poland, Portugal, Philippines, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, and the United States. All the preambles’ phrasings were taken from the International Constitutional Law Project Information, available at http://www.servat.unibe.ch/icl/ .

States that do not have a formal preamble to their constitutions are Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Singapore, and Sweden.

This is the case of Denmark (arts. 1–4), Italy (arts. 1–3), Norway (art. 1), Romania (art. I), and Sweden (arts. 1–2). Therefore, it emerges that only eight of the surveyed states (16 percent) do not have a preamble to their constitution, either in a formal or a substantive sense.

This is the case in Albania, Estonia, France, Japan, India, Ireland, the Philippines, South Africa, the United States, and the Czech Republic (in the latter, the reference is to the “citizens” — “We, the citizens of the Czech Republic”). In Russia, the reference is to “We, the multinational people of the Russian federation.”

It is not surprising that some preambles refer to the citizens of all national origins. See , e.g. , the preamble to the Constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina (“Bosnians, Croats and Serbs, as constituent peoples [along with others], and citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina”), Poland (“We, the Polish Nation—all citizens of the Republic”), Slovakia (“the Slovak nation … that is, we, citizens of all Slovak republic”), and Ukraine (“The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, on behalf of the Ukrainian people—citizens of Ukraine of all nationalities”).

See the preamble to the Constitution of Australia (“The people of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, and Tasmania … have agreed to unite in one indissoluble Federal Commonwealth”), and Switzerland (“We, the Swiss People and the Cantons ”; emphasis is in original).

Preambles that explicitly set a socialist agenda appear in Bulgaria, China, Cuba, India, Laos, Ukraine, and Vietnam. An example of a preamble declaring a quasi-capitalistic character appears in the Constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

See , respectively, the preambles to the constitutions of Brazil, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Armenia.

See also the preamble to the Constitution of South Africa (“May god protect our people … God bless South Africa”), Germany (“Conscious of their responsibility before God and men”), and Argentina (“Invoking the protection of God, source of all reason and justice”). An interesting wording style appears in the Polish Constitution (“Both those who believe in God as the source of truth, justice, good and beauty, as well as those not sharing such faith but respecting those universal values as arising from other sources”).

The Greek preamble states: “In the name of the Holy and Consubstantial and Indivisible Trinity, the Fifth Constitutional Assembly of Greece votes.”

The Irish preamble also notes: “We, the people of Ireland, humbly acknowledging all our obligations to our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ, Who sustained our fathers through centuries of trial.”

See the preamble to the Constitution of Turkey and India. Interestingly, all states’ constitutions in the United States include, or included in the past, an explicit reference to God. See 50 out of 50 States Recognize God's Role, available at http://dubyanell.blogspot.com/2004/04/this-just-in-50-out-of-50-states.html .

Examples of long preambles include the constitutions of China, Croatia, Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, Serbia, Syria, Thailand, Turkey, and Vietnam. Examples of terse preambles include the constitutions of Canada, France, Greece, India, Switzerland, and the United States.

See T HE R ECORDS OF THE F EDERAL C ONVENTION OF 1787 177 (Max Farrand ed., vol. II, 1937).

Id ., at 590, 651; Robert J. Peaslee, Our National Constitution: The Preamble , 9 B.U. L. R EV . 2 (1929).

See S UPPLEMENT TO M AX F ARRAND ’ S R ECORDS OF THE F EDERAL C ONVENTION OF 1787 183 (James H. Hutson ed., 1987) (hereinafter S UPPLEMENT TO M AX F ARRAND ).

Id. (emphasis is in original).

For an historical review, see Morris D. Forkosch, Who Are the “People” in the Preamble to the Constitution? , 19 C ASE . W. R ES . L. R EV . 644 (1967–1968).

See Milton Handler, Brian Leiter & Carole E. Handler, A Reconsideration of the Relevance and Materiality of the Preamble in Constitutional Interpretation , 12 C ARDOZO L. R EV . 117, 120–121, fn 14 (1990–1991).

See Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11, 13–14 (1905).

See W ILLIAM W. C ROSSKEY , P OLITICS AND THE C ONSTITUTION IN THE H ISTORY OF THE U NITED STATES 365–366, 374–379 (1953); Eric M. Axler, The Power of the Preamble and the Ninth Amendment: the Restoration of the People's Unenumerated Rights , 24 S ETON . H ALL L EGIS . J. 431, 435–437 (1999–2000); Raymond Marcin, ‘Posterity’ in the Preamble and a Positivist Pro-Position , 38 Am. J. J URIS 273, 281–288 (1993).

See T HE F EDERALIST N O . 84.

See J OSEPH S TORY , C OMMENTARIES ON THE C ONSTITUTION OF THE U NITED S TATES 218–219 (1833). In Story's view, “there does not seem any reason why, in a fundamental law or constitution of government, an equal attention should be not given to the intention of the framers, as stated in the preamble.” Id . Story asserted, however, that “the preamble never can be resorted to, to enlarge the powers confided to the general government, or any of its departments. It cannot confer any power per se … its true office is to expound the nature, and extent, and application of the powers actually conferred by the Constitution, and not substantively to create them.” Id .

See J AMES M ONROE , T HE W RITINGS OF J AMES M ONROE 356 (vol. III, 1969).

S UPPLEMENT TO M AX F ARRAND , supra note 20, at 313.

Id ., at 132–145.

See United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 494 U.S. 259, 265 (1990).

See Chisholm v. Georgia, 2 U.S. 419, 465, 471 (1793).

See Downes v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 244, 377–378 (1901).

See Employees v. Missouri Public Health Department, 411 U.S. 279, 322–323 (1973).

See Dred Scott v. Sanford, 60 U.S. 393, 404, 410–411 (1857).

See Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, 37 U.S. 657, 730 (1838).

See Hepburn v. Griswold, 75 U.S. 603, 622–623 (1870).

See Selective Service System v. Minnesota Public Interest Research Group, 468 U.S. 841, 860–862 (1984).

See Kennedy v. Mendoza-Matinez, 372 U.S. 144, 212–213 (1963).

See Peter W. Rodino, Jr., Living With The Preamble , 42 R UTGERS L. R EV . 685 (1989–1990); Craig M. Lawson, The Literary Force of the Preamble , 39 M ERCER L. R EV . 879 (1987–1988).

See S ANFORD L EVINSON , O UR U NDEMOCRATIC C ONSTITUTION 13 (2006) (emphasis is in original).

See M ARK T USHNET , T AKING THE C ONSTITUTION A WAY FROM THE C OURTS 181–182, 188–193 (1999).

Handler, Leiter & Handler, supra note 24, at 123.

For the role of preambles in the interpretation of international treaties, see art. 31(2) of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, 1155 U.N.T.S. 331 (1969).

Handler, Leiter & Handler, supra note 24, at 123–127.

Id ., at 131–148.

Marcin, supra note 26, at 277–278.

The appropriate interpretation of preambles forms a point of disagreement in Heller. See District of Columbia v. Heller, 128 S. Ct. 2783, 2789 n.3, 2826 (2008).

See Dan Himmelfarb, The Preamble in Constitutional Interpretation , 2 S ETON H ALL C ONST . L.J. 127, 160–166, 193–201 (1991–1992).

The classification is not clear-cut, and some preambles fall into more than one category. In addition, preambles differ in the meaning given to them by courts, not only in and of themselves.

See P LATO , T HE L AWS 137–145, 424–429 (Trevor J. Saunders ed., 2005).

See Kent Roach, The Uses and Audiences of Preambles in Legislation , 47 M C G ILL L. J. 129, 138–140 (2001).

See R. v. Morgentaler, 1 S.C.R. 30, 178 (1988); Zylberberg v. Sudbury Board of Education, 65 O.R. (2d) 641, 657 (C.A.) (1988); R. v. Sharpe, B.C.J. No. 1555 (1999).

See D ALE G IBSON , T HE L AW OF THE C HARTER : G ENERAL P RINCIPLES 65 (1986); P ETER W. H OGG , C ANADA A CT 1982 A NNOTATED 9 (1982).

It was argued that the term “supremacy of God” contradicts Canada's being a “free and democratic society” (art. I of the Charter), the right to freedom of religion (art. 2[a]), and the rule of law (the preamble).

Sharpe, B.C.J. No. 1555, at 78–80.

G IBSON , supra note 56, at 65–66.

See Lorne Sossin, The ‘Supremacy of God’, Human Dignity and the Charter of Rights and Freedoms , 52 U.N.B. L.J. 227 (2003).

Some scholars made a case for a more binding preamble by arguing that the term “supremacy of God” does not mean religion but indicates a more fundamental principle according to which some rights are inalienable and derive from a source beyond state's power. See David M. Brown, Freedom From or Freedom For? Religion as a Case Study in Defining the Content of Charter Rights , U.B.C. L. R EV . Soc. 551, 560–563, 615 (2000); Jonathon Penney & Robert J. Danay, The Embarrassing Preamble? Understanding the Supremacy of God and the Charter , 39(2) U.B.C. L. R EV . 287 (2006).

See Reference re Secession of Quebec [1998] 2.S.C.R. 217, at para 51–54 (“The principles [of the Preamble] dictate major elements of the architecture of the Constitution itself and are as such its lifeblood. The principles assist in the interpretation of the text and the delineation of spheres of jurisdiction, the scope of rights and obligations, and the role of our political institutions … the principles are not merely descriptive, but are also invested with a powerful normative force, and are binding upon both courts and governments”). See also Reference re Remuneration of Judges of the Provincial Court, [1998] 1 S.C.R, at para 95.

See E DWARD C OKE , I NSTITUTES OF THE L AWS OF E NGLAND 79 (1628).

Cited in Anne Winckel, The Contextual Role of a Preamble in Statutory Interpretation , 23 M ELBOURNE L. R EV . 184 (1999).

See W ILLIAM B LACKSTONE , C OMMENTARIES ON THE L AWS OF E NGLAND 59–60 (1765) (1979).

For the common law rule, see Winckel, supra note 64. For civil law rule, see Csaba Varga, The Preamble: A Question of Jurisprudence , in L AW AND P HILOSOPHY —S ELECTED P APERS IN L EGAL T HEORY 141, 150–161 (1994).

See C HARLES P EARCE & R. S. G EDDES , S TATUTORY I NTERPRETATION IN A USTRALIA 4.33 (3rd ed., 1988); Winckel, supra note 64.

See , e.g. , s. 5(e) to the New Zealand's Acts Interpretation Act of 1924, 1924 R.S. No. 11; s. 13 to the Canada's Interpretation Act, R.S.C. 1985; s. 8 to Canada's Interpretation Act, R.S.N.L. 1990.; s. 15A(a) to the Australian Acts Interpretation Act 1901.

Article 39, however, does not explicitly refer to the preamble. Therefore, the requirement to promote these values would remain even if the preamble is repealed.

See , e.g. , Lourens M. D. Plessis, The Evolution of Constitutionalism and the Emergence of a Constitutional Jurisprudence in South Africa: An Evaluation of the South African Constitutional Court's Approach to Constitutional Interpretation , 62 S ASK . L. R EV . 299, 314–315, 321–322 (1999).

See J OHN M. K ELLY , T HE I RISH C ONSTITUTION 49–64 (by Gerald Hogan & Gerry Whyte, 4th ed., 2003).

See Report of the Constitution Review Group, 1–4, 1996, available at http://www.constitution.ie/reports/crg.pdf .

See EST-1998-3-007 (Official Gazette) 1998, CODICES, available at http://codices.coe.int .

This case involved a married Estonian citizen who wished to add her maiden name to her new surname. The minister of the interior refused to permit this. The Court ruled that the preservation of Estonian identity, as ordered by the preamble, could not prevent the addition of a maiden family name. See EST-2001-2-004 (Official Gazette) 2001, CODICES database.

See MKD-2001-1-004 (Official Gazette) 27/2001, CODICES database. The decision was made before the amendment of the preamble of the Macedonian Constitution in 2001.

See UKR-2000-1-002 (Official Gazette), CODICES database.

See BVerfG, 2 BvE 2/08 vom 30.6.2009, Absatz-Nr. (1—421), available at http://www.bverfg.de/entscheidungen/es20090630_2bve000208en.html .

See at http://www.ena.lu/basic-law-frg-23-1949-020003177.html .

See BVerfGE 36, 1 2 BvF 1/73 Grundlagenvertrag-decision East-West Basic Treaty, available at http://www.utexas.edu/law/academics/centers/transnational/work_new/german/case.php?id=589

Id. Emphasis added.

See C ARL S CHMITT , C ONSTITUTIONAL T HEORY 77–79 (Jeffrey Seitzer trans. and ed., 2008).

See Michel Troper, Judicial Review and International Law , 4 S AN D IEGO I NT ’ L L.J. 39, 50–53 (2003).

See Decision of the Constitutional Council No. 44–71 (1971), available at http://www.conseil-constitutionnel.fr/decision/1971/7144dc.htm .

The preamble of the Fourth Republic (1946) stated that the people of France “solemnly reaffirm the rights and freedoms of man and the citizen enshrined in the Declaration of Rights of 1789 and the fundamental principles acknowledged in the laws of the Republic.”

Troper, supra note 90, at 52.

See , e.g. , The Press Law (1881), the Trade Unions Law (1884), The Unions and Freedom of Association Law (1901), and The Separation of Religion and State Law (1905). These laws have political significance, sometimes even more importance than the Constitution.

See A LEC S TONE , T HE B IRTH OF J UDICIAL P OLITICS IN F RANCE : T HE C ONSTITUTIONAL C OUNCIL IN C OMPARATIVE P ERSPECTIVE 40–45, 66–78 (1992). Stone mentions that seven out of sixteen annulments made by the Council between 1971 and 1981 were based on the Council's interpretation of the 1958 preamble.

See R AMESH C. L AHOTI , P REAMBLE : T HE S PIRIT AND B ACKBONE OF THE C ONSTITUTION OF I NDIA (2004).

See Kesavanada Baharati v. State of Kerala (1973) 4 S.C.C. 225.

L AHOTI , supra note 96, at 38–41, 54–55, 63–86.

India's preamble should be treated as lying between the interpretative and the substantive models. For the growing reliance on the preamble in constitutional interpretation in India, see A PARAJITA B ARUAH , P REAMBLE OF THE C ONSTITUTION OF I NDIA : A N I NSIGHT AND C OMPARISON WITH OTHER C ONSTITUTIONS 176–224 (2007); K. C. M ARKANDAN , T HE P REAMBLE : K EY TO THE M IND OF THE M AKERS OF THE I NDIAN C ONSTITUTION 76–97 (1984). The preamble in India has at least three interpretive values: ( a ) assisting in interpretation of the Constitution; ( b ) assisting in interpretation of statutes; ( c ) assisting in judicial thinking process.

Article 116(1) to the Constitution also says that “this Article shall not be subject to amendment.” Similar articles exist in article 176(1) to the Turkish Constitution (“The Preamble, which states the basic views and principles underlying the Constitution, shall form an integral part of the Constitution”), and art. 81 to the constitution of the French Fourth Republic (1946).

S CHMITT , supra note 87, at 79–80.

See Richard Stith, Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments: The Extraordinary Power of Nepal's Supreme Court , A M . U. J. I NT ’ L L. & P OL ’ Y 47, 57 (1996).

See Kesavananda Bharati v. State of Kerala, 4 SCC 225 (Shelat and Grover JJ., dissenting); L AHOTI , supra note 96, at 41–46, 49.

The concept of the unamendable “basic structure” of the Constitution appears in other constitutions. Article 89(5) of the French Constitution forbids a constitutional amendment that violates the republican form of France; article 79(3) of the German Basic Law forbids a constitutional amendment that violates human dignity or the nature of Germany as a republic, democracy, and social federal state; and article 4 of the Turkish Constitution forbids a constitutional amendment relating to the republic, democratic, secular, and social nature of Turkey. While the basic structure of the constitution in these cases does not appear in a formal preamble, one may treat this basic structure as a substantive form of preamble.

S CHMITT , supra note 87, at 79.

Kesavananda Bharati 4 SCC 225 (Khanna J). In Khanna's opinion, only the provisions in the preamble that pertain to the basic structure of the Constitution are unalterable; other parts of the preamble are amendable as are other parts of the Constitution.

See BIH-2000-3-003 (Official Gazette), CODICES database. Since Srpska's preamble infringed upon the Constitution of BiH, the Court left open the question of whether it also infringed the preamble to the Constitution of BiH. Id. , at para 12.

The Court ruled that the reference to the “Serb people” is troubling since the Dayton Accords and the Constitution of BiH establish that all three peoples—Bosniaks, Croatians, and Serbs—share equal rights throughout the territory of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Id ., at para 10.

See H ANS K ELSEN , G ENERAL T HEORY OF L AW AND S TATE , 260–261 (2007).

Id. , at 142.

Kesavanada Baharati, 4 SCC 225.

See Kim L. Scheppele, Declarations of Independence: Judicial Reactions to Political Pressure , in J UDICIAL I NDEPENDENCE AT THE C ROSSROADS : AN I NTERDISCIPLINARY A PPROACH 227, 248–251 (Stephen B. Burbank & Barry Friedman eds., 2002).

See Dieter Grimm, Integration by Constitution , 3(2) I NT ’ L J. C ON . L. 193, 199 (2005).

For the Macedonian case, see Biljana Belamaric, Attempting to Resolve and Ethnic Conflict: The Language of the 2001 Macedonian Constitution , 4(1) S. E . E UR . P OL . 25 (2003); Zhidas Daskalovski, Language and Identity: The Ohrid Framework Agreement and Liberal Notions of Citizenship and Nationality in Macedonia , JEMIE 1/2002; Jenny Engstrom, Multi-ethnicity or Bi-nationalism? The Framework Agreement and the Future of the Macedonian State , JEMIE 1/2002.

See the preamble as well as articles 7 and 48 of the 2001 Macedonian Constitution.

In Slovakia, similarly, the preamble to the Constitution declared that the Slovak Republic embodies national Slovak statehood. The Hungarian minority opposed the preamble and demanded that it be amended from “We, the Slovak nation” to “We, the citizens of the Slovak Republic.” See Farimah Daftary & Kinga Gal, The 1999 Slovak Minority Language Law: Internal or External Politics? , in N ATION -B UILDING , E THNICITY AND L ANGUAGE P OLITICS IN T RANSITION C OUNTRIES 39, 43–45 (2003). For a similar clash in Poland, see Geneviève Zubrzycki, ‘ We, the Polish Nation’: Ethnic and Civic Visions of Nationhood in Post-Communist Constitutional Debates , 30 T HEORY & S OCIETY 629 (2001).

See Session 41/I9 of the Provisional Government, Feb. 2, 1949 (in Hebrew); Session 16/I10 of the Government, Dec. 13, 1949 (in Hebrew); Knesset Protocols, 5710, at p. 10, 726, 728, 731, 784, 801–804, 1711–1722, 1262–1263.

See Dafna Barak-Erez, From an Unwritten to a Written Constitution: The Israeli Challenge in American Perspective , 26 C OLUM . H UM . R TS . L. R EV . 309 (1995).

See C.A. 6821/93, Bank Hamizrachi Hameuhad Ltd. v. Migdal Cooperative Village, 49(4) P.D. 221 (in Hebrew).

In article 2 of Basic Law: Freedom of Occupation the text is almost identical.

See HCJ Zeev v. District Commissioner of the Urban Area of Tel Aviv, 1 P.D. 85, 89 (Hebrew).

See HCJ 73/53 Kol Ha’am v. the Minister of the Interior (1953) 7(2) P.D. 871, 884; C.A. 450/70 Rogozinksy v. State of Israel, 26(1) P.D. 129, 135; EA 1/65 Yardor v. Central Elections Committee, 19(3) P.D. 365; HCJ 953/87 Poraz v. Mayor of Tel-Aviv-Jaffa, 42(2) P.D. 309, 332; HCJ 262/62 Perez v. Kfar Shemariahu, 16 P.D. 2101, 2113 (in Hebrew).

See HCJ 726/94 Klal Insurance Company v. The Minister of Finance, 48(5) P.D. 441, 461; HCJ 1554/95 Gilat Ass. v. The Minter of Education, 50(3) P.D. 2, 24–25 (in Hebrew).

See HCJ 1661/05 The Regional Council of Gaza v. The Knesset , 59(2) P.D. 481 (in Hebrew). The Supreme Court, however, has not yet decided the legal status of the Declaration.

See Aharon Barak, Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendment , I SR . L. R EV . (forthcoming, 2011) (holding that Israel has a basic structure of fundamental principles that cannot be amended by a constitutional assembly; this basic structure includes the character of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state).

See Jousef T. Jabareen, Constitution Building and Equality in Deeply-Divided Societies, The Case of the Palestinian-Arab Minority in Israel , 26(2) W IS . I NT ’ L L. R EV . 345 (2008).

This is not to say there are no other reasons for current tensions between Jewish and Arab citizens; ongoing discrimination against Arab-Palestinian citizens is, no doubt, a central reason.

See Amnon Rubinstein & Liav Orgad, The Legal Status of the Constitutional Preamble: The Israeli Case , 20 H AMISHPAT L. R EV 38 (2005) (in Hebrew).

See Amnon Rubinstein, The Curious Case of Jewish Democracy , A ZURE 33 (2010).

See Bruce Stone, A Preamble to the Australian Constitution: A Criticism of the Recent Debate , 35 A USTRALIAN J. OF P OL . S CIENCE 291 (2000); Mark McKenna, First Words: A Brief History of Public Debate on a New Preamble to the Australian Constitution 1991–1999 (2000), available at http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/RP/1999-2000/2000rp16.htm .

See Report of the Constitutional Convention (Old Parliament House, 1998).

The referendum was held on November 6, 1999. For the reasons for its failure, see Anne Winckel, A 21st Century Constitutional Preamble—An Opportunity for Unity rather than Partisan Politics , 24(3) U.N.S.W. L. J. 636, 638–48 (2001); Mark McKenna, Amelia Simpson & George Williams, With Hope in God, the Prime Minister and the Poet: Lessons from the 1999 Referendum on the Preamble , 24 U.N.S.W. L.J. 401, 415–16 (2001).

See Alex Reilly, Preparing a Preamble: The Timorous Approach of the Convention to the Inclusion of Civic Values , 21 U.S.N.W. L.J. 903 (1998).

The new preamble asserted that “the preamble to this Constitution has no legal force and shall not be considered in interpreting this Constitution or the law in force in the Commonwealth or any part of the Commonwealth.” See McKenna, Simpson & Williams, supra note 133, at 411.

Winckel, supra note 64, at 644–648.

For the text of the Treaty Establishing a Constitution for Europe, see http://en.constitution.com/ . For the text of the Treaty of Lisbon, see http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/full_text/index_en.htm .

On the discussions relating to the EU preamble, see Armin V. Bogdandy, The Preamble , in T EN R EFLECTIONS ON THE C ONSTITUTIONAL T REATY FOR E UROPE 3 (Bruno D. Witte ed., 2003); Ingolf Pernice, Integrating the Charter of Fundamental Rights into the Constitution of the European Union: Practical and Theoretical Propositions , 10 C OLUM . J. E UR . L. 5, 18–22, 45 (2003); Armin V. Bogdandy, The European Constitution and European Identity: Text and Subtext establishing a Constitution for Europe , 3(2) I NT ’ L J. C ONST . L. 295, 300–305 (2005).

S UPPLEMENT TO M AX F ARRAND , supra note 20, at 152.

See Sanford Levinson, Do Constitutions Have a Point? Reflections on ‘Parchment Barriers’ and Preambles , 28 S OC . P HIL . & P OL . 150 (2011).

See Armin V. Bogdandy, The European Constitution and European Identity: A Critical Analysis of the Convention's Draft Preamble , in A LTNEULAND : T HE EU C ONSTITUTION IN A C ONTEXTUAL P ERSPECTIVE (Joseph H.H. Weiler & Christopher L. Eisgruber, eds., 2004), available at http://centers.law.nyu.edu/jeanmonnet/papers/04/040501-07a.pdf .

Email alerts

Citing articles via.

• I·CONnect
• Recommend to your Library

Affiliations

• Online ISSN 1474-2659
• Print ISSN 1474-2640
• Copyright © 2024 New York University School of Law and Oxford University Press
• About Oxford Academic
• Publish journals with us
• University press partners
• What we publish
• New features  
• Open access
• Institutional account management
• Rights and permissions
• Get help with access
• Accessibility
• Advertising
• Media enquiries
• Oxford University Press
• Oxford Languages
• University of Oxford

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide

• Copyright © 2024 Oxford University Press
• Cookie settings
• Cookie policy
• Privacy policy
• Legal notice

This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

Skip to main navigation

• Email Updates
• Federal Court Finder

The U.S. Constitution: Preamble

The preamble sets the stage for the  Constitution  (Archives.gov). It clearly communicates the intentions of the framers and the purpose of the document. The preamble is an introduction to the highest law of the land; it is not the law. It does not define government powers or individual rights.

Establish Justice is the first of five objectives outlined in the 52-word paragraph that the Framers drafted in six weeks during the hot Philadelphia summer of 1787. They found a way to agree on the following basic principles:

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

In this video, designed to guide group recitations of the preamble to the U.S. Constitution, the words are supported by visuals and background music that give it emotional impact as it sets out the aspirations that “We the People” have for our government and for our way of life as a nation.

Promises of the Preamble

High school journalists share what the promises of the preamble to the Constitution mean to them. This video can be used as an inspirational element in a courtroom, classroom, or community program. It also can serve as an effective discussion starter to stimulate conversation about the Constitution.

DISCLAIMER: These resources are created by the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts for educational purposes only. They may not reflect the current state of the law, and are not intended to provide legal advice, guidance on litigation, or commentary on any pending case or legislation.

Find anything you save across the site in your account

Stephen Breyer to the Supreme Court Majority: You’re Doing It Wrong

By Louis Menand

One day in 1993, Stephen Breyer , then the chief judge of the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, which sits in Boston, was riding his bicycle in Harvard Square when he was hit by a car. He was taken to Mount Auburn Hospital with broken ribs and a punctured lung. While he was recovering, he was visited by three White House officials. They had flown up to interview him for a possible nomination to the United States Supreme Court.

The vetting went well enough, and Breyer was invited to Washington to meet the President, Bill Clinton . Breyer’s doctors advised against flying, so he took the train, in some discomfort. The meeting with Clinton did not go well. According to Jeffrey Toobin’s “ The Nine ,” a book about the Supreme Court, Clinton found Breyer “heartless.” “I don’t see enough humanity,” he complained. “I want a judge with soul.” Breyer was told to go home. They would call.

He knew that things had gone poorly. “There’s only two people who aren’t convinced I’m going to be on the Supreme Court,” he told a fellow-judge. “One is me and the other is Clinton.” He was right. The phone never rang. The seat went to Ruth Bader Ginsburg .

Discover notable new fiction and nonfiction.

Ginsburg was a cool customer, too, but she knew which buttons to push. In her interview with Clinton, she talked about the death of her mother and about helping her husband get through law school after he was stricken with testicular cancer. Clinton loved catch-in-the-throat stories like that. Ginsburg was confirmed by the Senate 96–3.

A year went by, there was another Supreme Court vacancy, and Breyer was again in the mix. His candidacy was pushed by Ted Kennedy, with whom he had worked as the chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary Committee when Kennedy was its chair. Clinton really wanted to nominate his Secretary of the Interior, Bruce Babbitt, but Babbitt faced opposition from senators in Western states, and Breyer seemed politically hypoallergenic.

So Breyer was chosen. Still, the White House did not do him any favors. Clinton’s indecisiveness was an ongoing story in the press—it had taken him eighty-six days to pick Ginsburg—and the news coverage made it plain that Breyer was not his first or even his second choice. The White House counsel, Lloyd Cutler, told reporters that, of the candidates being considered, Breyer was “the one with the fewest problems.”

Clinton announced the selection without even waiting for Breyer to come down from Boston. When Breyer did show up, a few days later, he said, “I’m glad I didn’t bring my bicycle down.” Famous last words. In 2011, he broke his collarbone in another biking accident near his home in Cambridge, and in 2013 he fractured his right shoulder and underwent shoulder-replacement surgery after crashing his bicycle near the Korean War Veterans Memorial, on the National Mall. He was seventy-four. You have to give him credit. He gets right back on the horse.

Since his appointment to the Court, Breyer has published several books on his jurisprudential views. His latest is “ Reading the Constitution: Why I Chose Pragmatism, Not Textualism ” (Simon & Schuster). It sums up his frustration with the court that he just stepped down from.

Clinton was not the only person who read Breyer as a technocrat. People felt he lacked a quality that Clinton could apparently summon at will—empathy. “He’s always been smarter than most of those around him,” the Yale constitutional-law professor Akhil Amar explained to a reporter, “so he’s had to learn how to get along with other people.”

That was his reputation at Harvard Law School, too, where he taught administrative law for many years before becoming a judge. “Breyer’s basic social instincts are conservative,” a Harvard colleague, Morton Horwitz, told the Times . “His legal culture is more liberal, and his very flexible pragmatism will enable him to give things a gentle spin in a liberal direction. But he’s a person without deep roots of any kind. He won’t develop a vision. . . . The words ‘social justice’ would somewhat embarrass him.”

It’s true that Breyer has a professorial presentation. He is cosmopolitan and erudite. He travels to other countries and is interested in their legal systems; reporters like to drop the fact that he has read “À la Recherche du Temps Perdu,” in French, twice. He is also, for a judge, relatively wealthy. His wife, Joanna Hare, a clinical psychologist at Dana-Farber, is the daughter of an English viscount.

Before joining the Court, Breyer showed few signs of being a social-justice warrior. He has, like the President who appointed him, neoliberal inclinations. He was instrumental in creating sentencing guidelines for federal judges that he later conceded were too rigid. He wrote a book on regulatory reform. And one of his proudest legislative achievements was working with Kennedy to deregulate the airline industry.

But he has an admirable temperament. Toobin called him “the sunniest individual to serve on the Supreme Court in a great many years.” Seated on a bench next to a lot of intellectual loners— Antonin Scalia , Clarence Thomas , David Souter , Ginsburg herself—Breyer became a consensus seeker, if not always a consensus builder. He believed in reasoned discourse.

He had also learned, from watching Kennedy do business in the Senate, that compromise is how you get things done in government, and he understood that on an ideologically divided court the power is in the middle. Being a split-the-difference centrist, like his predecessor Lewis Powell, and like the Justice he was closest to, Sandra Day O’Connor , suited his personality, too.

Breyer loved the job and was reluctant to announce his retirement, throwing liberals who feared another R.B.G. fiasco into a panic. He stepped down at the end of the 2021-22 term, in time for President Joe Biden to put one of Breyer’s former clerks, Ketanji Brown Jackson , on the Court. Breyer is now back where he started, as a professor of administrative law at Harvard. Happily for the law school, there are now many dedicated bike lanes in Cambridge.

Horwitz was not entirely right about what George H. W. Bush called “the vision thing.” Beneath Breyer’s pragmatic, let-us-reason-together persona is the soul of a Warren Court liberal. The Warren Court is where Breyer’s judicial career began. After graduating from Harvard Law School, in 1964, he clerked for Justice Arthur Goldberg. It was, he said, “a court with a mission.” The mission was to realize the promise of Brown v. Board of Education.

Brown is Breyer’s touchstone. He calls the decision “an affirmation of justice itself.” Brown was decided in 1954, and it governs only segregation in public schools. This is because the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of “the equal protection of the laws,” the right under which Brown was decided, is a right that can be exercised only against states and their agencies. But Breyer understands Brown in a broader sense. He believes that the reasoning in Brown leads to the condemnation of any and all discrimination that is within the reach of government to eliminate.

Extending the spirit of Brown is what the 1964 Civil Rights Act was designed to do. The act was signed into law in July, just as Breyer was beginning his clerkship, and it did something that Congress had tried once before, in 1875: make it unlawful for public accommodations like hotels, theatres, and restaurants to discriminate on the basis of race. In 1883, in a blockbuster decision, the Supreme Court had thrown out that earlier act as unconstitutional. It ruled that the government cannot tell private parties whom they must serve.

Title II of the Civil Rights Act once again prohibited discrimination in public accommodations on the basis of race, color, religion, or national origin. But how are privately owned businesses like restaurants within the reach of the state? In October, 1964, three months after the act was signed into law, that question came before the Court in two challenges to the constitutionality of Title II: Heart of Atlanta Motel v. U.S., concerning a motel in Georgia that refused to serve Black travellers, and Katzenbach v. McClung, concerning a restaurant in Birmingham, Ollie’s Barbecue, that refused to seat Black customers. (They could use a takeout window.)

The Court ruled that Congress gets its power to ban discrimination in public accommodations from the commerce clause in Article I of the Constitution. (“Congress shall have power . . . to regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.”) This holding required the Court to find that the Heart of Atlanta Motel and Ollie’s Barbecue were, in fact, part of interstate commerce. And the Court so found.

Since the motel was patronized by people travelling from one state to another, and since the ingredients for some of the food served at Ollie’s came from outside Alabama, the Court held that the motel and the restaurant were part of commerce “among the several states” and therefore within the power of Congress to regulate. The Court declared the 1883 ruling “inapposite and without precedential value,” and the decision in both cases was unanimous. Breyer thinks that they were the most important rulings of his clerkship.

There was another case with far-reaching effects that was decided during Breyer’s clerkship: Griswold v. Connecticut. The plaintiffs, Estelle Griswold and C. Lee Buxton, opened a Planned Parenthood clinic in New Haven and were arrested for counselling married couples about birth-control devices, which were illegal under the state’s anti-contraception law. Griswold and Buxton argued that, since the law was unconstitutional, they could not be prosecuted for advising women to break it. In a 7–2 decision, the Court agreed. What constitutional provision did the Connecticut law violate? The right to privacy.

Justice William O. Douglas wrote the opinion of the Court, and it is a classic of judicial inventiveness. Nowhere does the Constitution mention a right to privacy, but Douglas proposed that “specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance.” By this jurisprudential alchemy, the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth Amendments could be interpreted as defining a “zone of privacy” whose penumbra would extend to the marital bedroom.

Douglas concluded his opinion with an encomium to marriage. He got quite worked up about it. “Marriage is a coming together for better or for worse, hopefully enduring, and intimate to the degree of being sacred,” he wrote. “It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects. Yet it is an association for as noble a purpose as any involved in our prior decisions.” Douglas was sixty-six. A year after Griswold, he divorced his twenty-six-year-old third wife, Joan Martin, to marry Cathleen Heffernan, who was twenty-two.

Griswold became a key precedent in two landmark cases: Roe v. Wade, decided in 1973, and Obergefell v. Hodges, the same-sex-marriage case, decided in 2015. “The right of privacy,” Harry Blackmun wrote for the Court in Roe, “is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy.” In Obergefell, Anthony Kennedy, also writing for the Court, quoted Douglas’s reflections on marriage in their entirety and added some emanations of his own. In addition to a privacy right, he declared, constitutional liberties extend “to certain personal choices central to individual dignity and autonomy, including intimate choices that define personal identity and beliefs.” (In a dissent, Scalia said that he would “hide my head in a bag” before putting his name to some of Kennedy’s prose.)

The shape of Breyer’s Supreme Court career therefore has an emblematic significance, because it was bookended by two decisions that undid much of what the Warren Court achieved in Heart of Atlanta and Griswold. Breyer’s first major dissent came in 1995, in U.S. v. Lopez, a commerce-clause case; his last was in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Organization, the decision that overturned Roe v. Wade .

Lopez turned on the constitutionality of the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990, which made it a federal crime to possess a firearm in a school zone. In a 5–4 decision, the Court rejected the government’s argument that the act was a legitimate exercise of Congress’s power under the commerce clause. It was the first time since 1936 that the Court had struck down a federal law for exceeding the commerce-clause power.

Much of the New Deal was made possible by the commerce clause. In his dissent, Breyer noted that more than a hundred federal laws include the phrase “affecting commerce.” How many was the Court bent on invalidating? Some, anyway. Five years later, in U.S. v. Morrison, the Court threw out provisions of the Violence Against Women Act on the ground of commerce-clause overreach.

Breyer’s dissent in Dobbs, in 2022, was joined by Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor . The privacy right in Roe “does not stand alone,” they wrote. “The Court has linked it for decades to other settled freedoms involving bodily integrity, familial relationships, and procreation. Most obviously, the right to terminate a pregnancy arose straight out of the right to purchase and use contraception. . . . They are all part of the same constitutional fabric.” They wondered, again, how much the Court was prepared to unravel. In his concurrence, Thomas suggested that the Court might want to reconsider Griswold and Obergefell.

Link copied

What happened? Breyer has an explanation, and he lays it out in the new book. He thinks it’s all a matter of interpretation.

As Breyer points out, a majority of the Court now subscribes to the interpretive methods known as textualism and originalism. Textualism and originalism tend to be run together as types of what used to be called “strict construction” (a term that seems to have fallen out of use). But there is a difference. Textualism is primarily a way of interpreting statutes, and originalism is a way of interpreting the Constitution.

Textualists ask what the words of a statute literally mean. Information like legislative history or social-science data is largely irrelevant. Textualists don’t ask, “What would Congress have us do?” They just say, “What is the rule here?” and try to follow it.

Originalists, on the other hand, ask what the Framers would have them do. Originalists can consult the records of the Constitutional Convention (which are hardly comprehensive) and documents like the Federalist Papers (which is a collection of op-eds). But they claim to stick to the “original public understanding” of constitutional language—that is, what the words meant to the average voter in the eighteenth century. They do not invent rights that the Framers would not have recognized, as originalists think Douglas did in Griswold.

More recently, originalists have looked to something called “history and tradition,” highly malleable terms—whose history? which tradition?—by which they tend to mean things as they were prior to circa 1964. Writing for the Court in Dobbs, Samuel Alito explained that the decision turned on “whether the right at issue in this case is rooted in our Nation’s history and tradition.” The constitutional right to abortion was then fifty years old. For women likely to rely on it, the right had existed for their entire lifetimes. But what mattered to the originalists was whether women could rely on it in the nineteenth century.

The use of race as a plus factor in college and university admissions is even older. The practice dates from the late nineteen-sixties, and has been ruled constitutional by the Supreme Court three times: in 1978, in 2003, and in 2016. But the majority had little trouble wiping it out last term, in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard . It is a bit brazen to be shouldering aside precedents under the banner of “tradition.”

Breyer sums up textualism and originalism as attempts to make judicial reasoning a science and to make law a list of rules. In our system of government, the Constitution is the big trump card. But it doesn’t come with a user manual. The document is basically a list of clauses—the commerce clause (sixteen words), the equal-protection clause (fourteen words), and so on. And the Constitution gives the reason for a clause only twice: in the patent-and-copyright clause in Article I and in the right-to-bear-arms clause in the Second Amendment. (We could add the preamble, the “We the People” clause, which gives the rationale for having a written constitution in the first place, a novel idea in 1787.)

Some constitutional clauses, like the requirement that the President be native-born, are rules, but many, like the equal-protection clause (the only reference to equality in the entire document), are principles. They do not mark out bright lines separating the constitutionally permitted from the constitutionally forbidden.

Courts, however, are obliged to draw those lines. Judges cannot conclude that the law is a gray area. Textualists and originalists believe that their approach draws the line at the right place. Breyer thinks that the idea that there is a single right place, good for all time, is a delusion, and that his approach, which he calls “pragmatism,” is the one best suited to the design of the American legal system. Pragmatism makes the system “workable” (a word Breyer uses many times) because it does not box us into rigid doctrines and anachronistic meanings.

Pragmatist judges therefore look to the law’s purposes, consequences, and values. They ask, “Why did the lawmakers write this? What are the real-world consequences for the way the Court interprets it? And what are the values that subtend the system of government that courts are a part of?” These are questions that literal readings can’t answer.

An originalist like Scalia, for example, thinks that the “cruel and unusual punishment” clause in the Eighth Amendment makes unconstitutional only punishments that would have been considered cruel and unusual in 1791, the year the amendment was ratified. In 1791, people were sentenced to death for theft. If we said that seems cruel and unusual today, Scalia would say, “Fine. Pass a law against it. But the Constitution does not forbid it.” When he was asked what punishment the Framers would have considered cruel and unusual, Scalia said, “Thumbscrews.”

To this, a pragmatist judge would say, “Then what is the point of having a constitution?” The words “cruel and unusual” were chosen by the Framers (in this case, James Madison, who drafted the Bill of Rights) because their meanings are not fixed. And that goes to the purpose of the clause. The Constitution does not prohibit cruel and unusual punishment because cruelty is bad and we’re against it. It prohibits punishment that most people would find excessive in order to preserve the public’s faith in the criminal-justice system. If we started executing people for stealing a loaf of bread today, the system would lose its legitimacy. Surely an originalist would agree that the Framers were big on legitimacy.

The same is true of many other clauses—for example, the free-speech clause in the First Amendment. Free speech is protected not because it’s a God-given right. It’s protected because, in a democracy, if you do not allow the losers to have their say, you cannot expect them to submit to the will of the winners. Free speech legitimizes majoritarian rule.

Breyer’s book is organized as a series of analyses of some twenty Supreme Court cases, most of which Breyer took part in during his time on the Court. Some are major cases, like District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the originalists found a right to possess a gun for self-defense in the Second Amendment, which says nothing about self-defense. (“Some have made the argument, bordering on the frivolous, that only those arms in existence in the eighteenth century are protected by the Second Amendment,” Scalia wrote in the Court’s opinion. Hmm. What happened to the Thumbscrews Doctrine?)

Other cases are perhaps less than major, like Return Mail, Inc. v. United States Postal Service, which answered the question of whether the federal government is a “person” capable of petitioning the Patent Trial and Appeal Board under the Leahy-Smith America Invents Act. (It is not.) Breyer explains how originalists and textualists decided each case and how he, as a pragmatist, decided them. His book is accessible, rather repetitive, and neither theoretical nor technical. It is addressed to non-lawyers.

It also seems weirdly naïve. Or maybe purposefully naïve. In most of the cases Breyer discusses, where there was disagreement on the Court it resulted not from differences in interpretive methods but from differences in politics. In almost every case, the originalists and textualists came down on the conservative side, restricting the powers of the federal government and expanding the powers of the states, and the pragmatists and “living constitutionalists” (another term that’s now largely avoided) came down on the liberal side.

What is naïve is to believe that the conservative Justices—which means, on the current Court, the six Justices appointed by Republican Presidents, though they are not always on the same page—would decide cases differently if they switched to another method of interpretation. Judicial reasoning doesn’t work that way. Judges pretty much know where they want to come out, and then they figure out a juridically respectable way of getting there.

Why would Breyer want to ignore, or seriously understate, the part that political ideology plays in Supreme Court decisions? The answer lies in an earlier book, “ The Authority of the Court and the Peril of Politics ,” based on a lecture he delivered at Harvard in 2021. It’s all about legitimacy.

Legitimacy is why the Warren Court was on a mission in 1964. The Supreme Court’s reputation—you could say its mystique—is all that it has. It cannot tax or spend. Only Congress can do those things, and only the President can send in the Army. When Southern school districts ignored Brown and refused to integrate, the Court was in danger of being exposed as a paper tiger. It was crucial, therefore, that everyone believe that the Justices were not making law, only finding it. The Constitution made them do it. That was the Court’s claim to legitimacy.

Breyer thinks that the Court still operates this way. All Justices, he says in “The Authority of the Court,” “studiously try to avoid deciding a case on the basis of ideology rather than law.” The reason that “different political groups so strongly support some persons for appointment to the Court and so strongly oppose others” is that people “confuse perceived personal ideology (inferred from party affiliation or that of the nominating executive) and professed judicial philosophy.”

But Presidents and Senate majorities certainly think they are appointing Justices who share their political beliefs, even when they profess to be simply looking for the most qualified jurist. Sometimes Presidents are wrong. Earl Warren, appointed by Dwight D. Eisenhower, no enthusiast of race-mixing, is a famous example. But that is not because Warren was apolitical. Warren was a Republican politician. He had been elected governor of California three times and had run for Vice-President on the ticket with Thomas E. Dewey, in 1948. For Warren, the political constituency that mattered when he became Chief Justice was not the President or Congress. It was the public.

He could see that, in the postwar era, public opinion was likely to favor expanded liberties—the United States was presenting itself, after all, as the leader of the free world—and although his court may sometimes have got a few paces ahead of public opinion, it was largely in step with the times. It was a liberal era. We are not living in a liberal era anymore, and the Court reflects this.

Politics is the art of governance. The Supreme Court is a branch of government, and is therefore a political body. Its decisions affect public life. If by “political” we mean “partisan,” we are still talking about governance, because partisanship is loyalty to a political ideology, normally instantiated in a political party. Politics, therefore, cannot not be partisan. Partisanship is how politics works. Even when politicians say, “This is no time for politics,” they are saying it for partisan reasons. They are saying it because it is good for their side to say it.

What makes the Court different from other political actors is stare decisis, the tradition of respecting its earlier decisions, something Congress does not have to worry about. There is no rule against overturning a precedent, though. So why has the Court been traditionally reluctant to do so? Why does Thomas’s suggestion that it might be time to overrule Griswold and Obergefell seem so radical? It’s because the Court’s legitimacy is intimately tied to the perception that, in making its rulings, it looks only to what the Constitution says and what the Court has previously decided. When the Court overturns a case, it has to make it appear as though the decision was wrong as a matter of law.

This is why Breyer insists that it’s all a matter of legal forensics, of what interpretive lenses the Justices use. He wants to preserve the authority of the Court. He wants to prevent the Justices from being seen as the puppets of politicians.

His toughest moment on the Court, for this reason, must have been Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District, decided in 2007. In that case, the Court struck down a Seattle policy of using race as a factor in assigning students to high schools with the aim of attaining rough racial balance.

It was the kind of policy that the Court had approved a number of times since Brown. Now, in an opinion by John Roberts, the Court declared that it had had enough. Roberts ended with a memorable line, no doubt saved up for the right occasion: “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”

After Roberts announced the Court’s opinion, on the last day of the term, Breyer delivered a speech from the bench. “Bristling with barely concealed anger,” according to an account by the legal scholar Lani Guinier, he accused the Court’s Republican appointees of voting their policy preferences. “It is not often in the law that so few have so quickly changed so much,” he said.

In 2019, Breyer’s speech from the bench was published as a pamphlet by Brookings. The title he gave it was “Breaking the Promise of Brown.” ♦

New Yorker Favorites

Why facts don’t change our minds .

The tricks rich people use to avoid taxes .

The man who spent forty-two years at the Beverly Hills Hotel pool .

How did polyamory get so popular ?

The ghostwriter who regrets working for Donald Trump .

Snoozers are, in fact, losers .

Fiction by Jamaica Kincaid: “Girl”

Sign up for our daily newsletter to receive the best stories from The New Yorker .

Books & Fiction

By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

By Amy Davidson Sorkin

By David D. Kirkpatrick

By Stephania Taladrid

The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: a Foundation of American Ideals

This essay about the Preamble to the Declaration of Independence explores its profound significance as a foundational document in American history. It discusses how the Preamble articulates the principles of human equality, unalienable rights, and democratic governance, setting the stage for the colonies’ break from British rule and shaping the nation’s identity. Additionally, it highlights the enduring impact of the Preamble’s ideals on American democracy and its influence on global movements for freedom and equality. The essay also acknowledges the ongoing challenges in realizing these ideals fully and emphasizes the Preamble’s role as a guiding beacon for the nation’s continued pursuit of liberty and justice for all. PapersOwl showcases more free essays that are examples of Declaration Of Independence.

How it works

The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence is not merely an introduction to a historic document; it is a profound declaration of the philosophical foundation of the United States. Crafted by Thomas Jefferson in 1776, the Preamble sets forth the principles that not only justified the American colonies’ break from British rule but also laid the groundwork for the nation’s values and governance. This essay explores the significance of the Preamble, its philosophical underpinnings, and its enduring impact on American democracy.

At its core, the Preamble to the Declaration of Independence articulates the inherent rights that justify a people’s quest for independence. It famously begins with a powerful assertion of human equality and the unalienable rights of “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” This was a radical departure from the prevailing notions of governance in the 18th century, which often centered around the divine right of kings and the hierarchical structures of society. Jefferson, drawing on the Enlightenment ideals of thinkers like John Locke, posited that government’s legitimacy comes from the consent of the governed, not from hereditary rule or force.

The Preamble’s articulation of these ideals served several purposes. Firstly, it provided a moral and legal justification for the colonies’ separation from Britain, arguing that the British Crown had violated the colonists’ rights, thus forfeiting its authority over them. Secondly, it communicated to the world the American colonies’ intentions, laying out a vision for a society based on individual rights and democratic governance. This was a bold statement on the global stage, signaling the emergence of a new political entity predicated on the principles of freedom and equality.

The impact of the Preamble extends far beyond its historical moment. It has become a touchstone for American identity, encapsulating the ideals that the United States strives to embody. Its words have been invoked in subsequent struggles for rights and justice, including the abolitionist movement, women’s suffrage, and the civil rights movement. The Preamble’s principles have also influenced the development of democratic governance worldwide, serving as a model for other nations seeking to articulate their own ideals of liberty and justice.

However, the journey to fully realize the Preamble’s ideals has been, and continues to be, fraught with challenges. The tension between these founding principles and the realities of American history, including slavery, segregation, and ongoing debates over civil rights, underscores the complexity of living up to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence. This ongoing struggle highlights the Preamble’s role not just as a historical artifact but as a living document that calls Americans to reflect on and strive towards the fulfillment of its promises.

In conclusion, the Preamble to the Declaration of Independence stands as a testament to the power of ideas in shaping the destiny of a nation. It articulates a vision of human rights and governance that has inspired not only the formation of the United States but also the broader quest for freedom and equality around the world. As we continue to grapple with the challenges of making these ideals a reality for all citizens, the Preamble serves as both a beacon of hope and a call to action, reminding us of the principles upon which the nation was founded and the work that remains to be done.

Cite this page

The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: A Foundation of American Ideals. (2024, Feb 20). Retrieved from https://papersowl.com/examples/the-preamble-to-the-declaration-of-independence-a-foundation-of-american-ideals/

"The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: A Foundation of American Ideals." PapersOwl.com , 20 Feb 2024, https://papersowl.com/examples/the-preamble-to-the-declaration-of-independence-a-foundation-of-american-ideals/

PapersOwl.com. (2024). The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: A Foundation of American Ideals . [Online]. Available at: https://papersowl.com/examples/the-preamble-to-the-declaration-of-independence-a-foundation-of-american-ideals/ [Accessed: 11 Apr. 2024]

"The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: A Foundation of American Ideals." PapersOwl.com, Feb 20, 2024. Accessed April 11, 2024. https://papersowl.com/examples/the-preamble-to-the-declaration-of-independence-a-foundation-of-american-ideals/

"The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: A Foundation of American Ideals," PapersOwl.com , 20-Feb-2024. [Online]. Available: https://papersowl.com/examples/the-preamble-to-the-declaration-of-independence-a-foundation-of-american-ideals/. [Accessed: 11-Apr-2024]

PapersOwl.com. (2024). The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: A Foundation of American Ideals . [Online]. Available at: https://papersowl.com/examples/the-preamble-to-the-declaration-of-independence-a-foundation-of-american-ideals/ [Accessed: 11-Apr-2024]

Don't let plagiarism ruin your grade

Hire a writer to get a unique paper crafted to your needs.

Our writers will help you fix any mistakes and get an A+!

Please check your inbox.

You can order an original essay written according to your instructions.

Trusted by over 1 million students worldwide

1. Tell Us Your Requirements

Essay on Preamble Of Indian Constitution

Students are often asked to write an essay on Preamble Of Indian Constitution in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Preamble Of Indian Constitution

Introduction to the preamble.

The Preamble is like the introduction to the Indian Constitution. It tells us about the values and principles of the country. It is like a promise to its people to give them justice, liberty, equality, and to promote brotherhood.

Goals of the Preamble

The Preamble sets goals for India. It wants to make sure everyone is treated fairly and has the same rights. It also wants to keep the country united and maintain peace among all its people.

Words in the Preamble

The Preamble starts with “We, the people of India,” showing that the power of the government comes from the citizens. It talks about making India a sovereign, socialist, secular, and democratic republic.

Importance of the Preamble

The Preamble is important because it guides the people who make laws in India. It helps them remember the core values of the Constitution when they make decisions or create new laws.

Also check:

• Speech on Preamble Of Indian Constitution

250 Words Essay on Preamble Of Indian Constitution

The Preamble of the Indian Constitution is like an introduction to a book. It tells us about the values, principles, and goals of our country. It is the opening statement of the Constitution and gives us a brief idea of what the rest of the document is about.

What the Preamble Says

The Preamble declares India as a “Sovereign Socialist Secular Democratic Republic.” This means that India is free to make its own decisions, supports social equality, respects all religions equally, believes in fair and equal voting rights, and is run by the people for the people. It also aims to secure justice, liberty, equality, and to promote fraternity among all citizens.

The Goals of the Preamble

The Preamble sets the direction for the country. It aims to make sure that every person gets fair treatment, has the freedom to speak, think, and worship as they like, and is treated equally before the law. It also wants to make sure that people from different backgrounds feel like they belong to the same big family.

Significance of the Preamble

The Preamble is very important because it guides the people who make laws and the courts that explain these laws. It also helps the citizens understand the essence of the Constitution and the rights and duties it gives them.

The Preamble of the Indian Constitution is like a guiding light. It sets the path for the nation to follow and helps everyone understand the core values that India stands for. It is not just an introduction but the soul of the Constitution, reflecting the dreams and aspirations of its people.

500 Words Essay on Preamble Of Indian Constitution

The Preamble of the Indian Constitution is like an introduction to a book. It tells us what the book is about. In the same way, the Preamble gives us a glimpse of what the Constitution contains. It shares the ideals and goals of the country. The Constitution is the most important set of rules for India, and the Preamble is like its guiding light.

Words and Their Meaning

The Preamble starts with the words “We, the people of India.” This means all the rules in the Constitution come from the citizens of India. It says that India will be a “Sovereign, Socialist, Secular, Democratic Republic.” Sovereign means no other country can tell India what to do. Socialist means the wealth of the country should be shared fairly among its people. Secular means the government will treat all religions equally. Democratic means the people have the power to choose their leaders. Republic means the head of the country is not a king or queen but someone elected by the people.

The Preamble sets four main goals: Justice, Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. Justice means everyone should be treated fairly by the law. Liberty means everyone has the freedom to speak, believe, and think what they want. Equality means everyone should have the same chance to succeed in life, no matter where they come from. Fraternity means we should all treat each other like brothers and sisters, and make sure everyone feels like they belong to India.

The Preamble is important because it tells the government how to use its power. It reminds the government that it should work to make life better for all its people. It also tells the people that they have rights and should live together peacefully.

Changes to the Preamble

The Preamble was changed once. In 1976, three new words were added: Socialist, Secular, and Integrity. Integrity means that the country should be united and strong, with no parts wanting to break away.

The Preamble of the Indian Constitution is a short but powerful text. It shows the dreams and promises of India as a country. It tells us that India belongs to its people, and it is up to everyone to make sure the country is fair, free, equal, and friendly. The Preamble is not just an introduction to the Constitution; it is a promise of what India strives to be.

That’s it! I hope the essay helped you.

If you’re looking for more, here are essays on other interesting topics:

• Essay on Pratapgad Fort
• Essay on Is College Worth It
• Essay on Powerful Weapon To Change The World

Apart from these, you can look at all the essays by clicking here .

Happy studying!

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

• School guide
• Social Science Notes
• History Notes
• Geography Notes
• Political Science Notes
• Economics Notes
• Science and Technology Notes
• Social Science Solutions
• English Grammar
• Science Solution
• Biology Solutions
• Mathematics Solutions
• R.D.Sharma Solutions
• Difference between Political and Permanent Executive
• Evolutionary Theory of Origin of State
• Functions of the Parliament
• Independent Judiciary
• Why do we need Parliament?
• Constitutional Safeguards for Minorities
• Judicial Activism: Definition and Types
• Political Parties : Functions, Importance and Party System
• Article 368 of the Constitution of India
• Fundamental Rights and Protection of Freedom
• Constitution of India
• Challenges faced by the Healthcare Facilities of India
• Difference between Horizontal and Vertical Power Sharing in Modern Democracies
• Advantages and Disadvantages of Democracy
• Political Cartoons
• Secularism in India
• Improving the Quality of Health Care in India
• Powers and Functions of Supreme Court
• Outcomes of Democracy

Importance of Preamble of Indian Constitution

A constitution’s preamble is the first portion of the introduction of the document. It usually includes the country’s history, fundamental ideas and goals, and a declaration of the country’s intentions. The preamble to a constitution is significant because it establishes the tone for the entire document. It also explains why the document was made in the first place. 

The American Constitution is the first to include the concept of a preface in its constitution. It has been suggested that the Preamble is not merely a preface to the Constitution, but also a declaration of self-evident fundamental truths.

Table of Content

Meaning of Preamble

Significance of the preamble, facts of the preamble, amendments to the preamble, important words of the preamble.

Preamble in the Constitution

The Preamble refers to an preamble of the legislation or the constitution and is a declaration issued by the legislature before the introduction of a law and also helps in comprehension of some provisions. The main motive behind the Preamble is the explanation of definitions of important words and include particular words which must be defined.

The Indian Constitution is a document that describes what India stands for and how it will be governed, making it one of the most important documents in the country. The preamble is an introduction to the Constitution that explains what it stands for and how it will be applied. It’s almost like the Indian constitution’s mission statement. It attempts to summarize what India represents as a country and a society in a single paragraph. Furthermore, it is based on Pandit Nehru’s ‘Objectives Resolution. 

According to the preamble, India is declared a sovereign nation and a democratic republic. It follows socialism and is secular in terms of religion. The Preamble outlines the Constitution’s purposes, which include ensuring justice, protecting people’s liberty, achieving social equality, and instilling a sense of fraternity among citizens. The day the constitution was adopted, November 26, 1949, is referenced in the Preamble.

A debate on whether the preamble is a part of the Constitution existed previously, as there is no mention of it in the Constitution. The clarity on that came after a few judgments given by the supreme court, which stand out as landmark judgments. 

According to the Supreme Court in the Berubari Union case, the Preamble explains the overarching purpose of the various provisions of the Constitution and so acts as a key to the framers’ views. Even though the court recognizes the importance of the preamble, it believes it is not a component of the Constitution.

The Supreme Court rejected the earlier decision in the Kesavananda Bharati case and concluded that the Preamble is a component of the Constitution. Reflected this statement in the LIC of India case. It is important to remember that, while the preamble can be concluded as a part of the constitution, it is not enforceable by law as the rest of the parts.

Important facts on the Preamble include the following:

• The Preamble of Indian constitution is lengthy.
• The main function of Preamble is to define the constitution and its goals and objectives.
• The Preamble is responsible for the direction and purpose of the Constitution of India.
• The constitution was established in 1949 but came into effect on 26 January 1950 according to the Preamble.

Only when the preamble is part of the constitution is it feasible to change it. Following the clarification that the preamble is a component of the Constitution, the topic of amenability arose. It was decided that the preamble can be amended, but only if the core elements and features remained unchanged.

The 42nd Amendment Act of 1976 amended the constitution’s preamble, adding the words “socialist,” “secular,” and “integrity” to the preamble.

Some important words in the Preamble include-

• Sovereign : India is a sovereign country, by this conception. It denotes that it is not ruled by or under the jurisdiction of any external authority or country.
• Socialist : The 42nd Amendment Act adds the phrase “socialist” to the preamble. Rather than traditional communalist socialism, Indian socialism is democratic. It operates in a mixed economy, with public and private ownership coexisting.
• Secular : The 42nd Amendment established the term “secular.” It establishes that the state has no official religion and is not prejudiced against any faith. It distinguishes between states and religion.
• Democratic republic: It asserts that India will pursue a republican, or people’s representative, democratic system of governance. To display the democratic republic character, the constitution covers various themes such as universal adult franchise, an independent judiciary, eradication of discrimination, and so on.
• Justice : The preamble indicates that the justice here is social, economic, and political justice. Social justice refers to the equitable treatment of all citizens of the country, regardless of sex, caste, religion, gender, or other factors.
• Liberty : Liberty is defined as freedom from restriction, force, or control. Liberty refers to our power to make decisions about our own lives in this context. Fundamental rights provide freedom of thought, faith, speech, belief, and worship, and when they are violated, they can be enforced in a court of law. Liberty is not limitless, and no one can do whatever they want while jeopardizing others’ fundamental rights or the Constitution itself.
• Equality : The phrase “equality” refers to the lack of preferential treatment for any group in society, as well as the provision of suitable opportunities for all people, without regard for their race or gender. Fraternity: Fraternity is defined as a sense of brotherhood among people. According to the Preamble, the fraternity must provide two things: human dignity and national unity and integrity.

Related Links

• Indian Constitution
• Salient Features of the Indian Constitution
• Significance of the phrase ” We the people of India” in the Preamble

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the importance of the preamble.

Preamble is a document which explains the document’s purpose and underlying philosophy.

What are the main objectives of the Preamble?

The main objectives of Preamble is ensuring the citizens of India as a soverign, socialist, democratic republic and also as a secular country.

What is Preamble of India and its importance?

Preamble of India and its importance is that it presents the principles of Constitution and also indicates the sources for authority and authenticity.

What is the importance of the Constitution of India?

The Constitution of India lays down the framework for defining the fundamental political principles and also establishes its structure and procedures.

Please Login to comment...

Similar reads.

• School Learning
• School Polity
• Social Science
• Google Releases ‘Prompting Guide’ With Tips For Gemini In Workspace
• Google Cloud Next 24 | Gmail Voice Input, Gemini for Google Chat, Meet ‘Translate for me,’ & More
• 10 Best Viber Alternatives for Better Communication
• 12 Best Database Management Software in 2024
• 30 OOPs Interview Questions and Answers (2024)

Improve your Coding Skills with Practice

What kind of Experience do you want to share?

Crying Myself to Sleep on the Biggest Cruise Ship Ever

Seven agonizing nights aboard the Icon of the Seas

Listen to this article

Listen to more stories on curio

Updated at 2:44 p.m. ET on April 6, 2024.

This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter. Sign up for it here .

MY FIRST GLIMPSE of Royal Caribbean’s Icon of the Seas, from the window of an approaching Miami cab, brings on a feeling of vertigo, nausea, amazement, and distress. I shut my eyes in defense, as my brain tells my optic nerve to try again.

The ship makes no sense, vertically or horizontally. It makes no sense on sea, or on land, or in outer space. It looks like a hodgepodge of domes and minarets, tubes and canopies, like Istanbul had it been designed by idiots. Vibrant, oversignifying colors are stacked upon other such colors, decks perched over still more decks; the only comfort is a row of lifeboats ringing its perimeter. There is no imposed order, no cogent thought, and, for those who do not harbor a totalitarian sense of gigantomania, no visual mercy. This is the biggest cruise ship ever built, and I have been tasked with witnessing its inaugural voyage.

Explore the May 2024 Issue

Check out more from this issue and find your next story to read.

“Author embarks on their first cruise-ship voyage” has been a staple of American essay writing for almost three decades, beginning with David Foster Wallace’s “A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again,” which was first published in 1996 under the title “Shipping Out.” Since then, many admirable writers have widened and diversified the genre. Usually the essayist commissioned to take to the sea is in their first or second flush of youth and is ready to sharpen their wit against the hull of the offending vessel. I am 51, old and tired, having seen much of the world as a former travel journalist, and mostly what I do in both life and prose is shrug while muttering to my imaginary dachshund, “This too shall pass.” But the Icon of the Seas will not countenance a shrug. The Icon of the Seas is the Linda Loman of cruise ships, exclaiming that attention must be paid. And here I am in late January with my one piece of luggage and useless gray winter jacket and passport, zipping through the Port of Miami en route to the gangway that will separate me from the bulk of North America for more than seven days, ready to pay it in full.

The aforementioned gangway opens up directly onto a thriving mall (I will soon learn it is imperiously called the “Royal Promenade”), presently filled with yapping passengers beneath a ceiling studded with balloons ready to drop. Crew members from every part of the global South, as well as a few Balkans, are shepherding us along while pressing flutes of champagne into our hands. By a humming Starbucks, I drink as many of these as I can and prepare to find my cabin. I show my blue Suite Sky SeaPass Card (more on this later, much more) to a smiling woman from the Philippines, and she tells me to go “aft.” Which is where, now? As someone who has rarely sailed on a vessel grander than the Staten Island Ferry, I am confused. It turns out that the aft is the stern of the ship, or, for those of us who don’t know what a stern or an aft are, its ass. The nose of the ship, responsible for separating the waves before it, is also called a bow, and is marked for passengers as the FWD , or forward. The part of the contemporary sailing vessel where the malls are clustered is called the midship. I trust that you have enjoyed this nautical lesson.

I ascend via elevator to my suite on Deck 11. This is where I encounter my first terrible surprise. My suite windows and balcony do not face the ocean. Instead, they look out onto another shopping mall. This mall is the one that’s called Central Park, perhaps in homage to the Olmsted-designed bit of greenery in the middle of my hometown. Although on land I would be delighted to own a suite with Central Park views, here I am deeply depressed. To sail on a ship and not wake up to a vast blue carpet of ocean? Unthinkable.

Allow me a brief preamble here. The story you are reading was commissioned at a moment when most staterooms on the Icon were sold out. In fact, so enthralled by the prospect of this voyage were hard-core mariners that the ship’s entire inventory of guest rooms (the Icon can accommodate up to 7,600 passengers, but its inaugural journey was reduced to 5,000 or so for a less crowded experience) was almost immediately sold out. Hence, this publication was faced with the shocking prospect of paying nearly $19,000 to procure for this solitary passenger an entire suite—not including drinking expenses—all for the privilege of bringing you this article. But the suite in question doesn’t even have a view of the ocean! I sit down hard on my soft bed. Nineteen thousand dollars for this .

The viewless suite does have its pluses. In addition to all the Malin+Goetz products in my dual bathrooms, I am granted use of a dedicated Suite Deck lounge; access to Coastal Kitchen, a superior restaurant for Suites passengers; complimentary VOOM SM Surf & Stream (“the fastest Internet at Sea”) “for one device per person for the whole cruise duration”; a pair of bathrobes (one of which comes prestained with what looks like a large expectoration by the greenest lizard on Earth); and use of the Grove Suite Sun, an area on Decks 18 and 19 with food and deck chairs reserved exclusively for Suite passengers. I also get reserved seating for a performance of The Wizard of Oz , an ice-skating tribute to the periodic table, and similar provocations. The very color of my Suite Sky SeaPass Card, an oceanic blue as opposed to the cloying royal purple of the standard non-Suite passenger, will soon provoke envy and admiration. But as high as my status may be, there are those on board who have much higher status still, and I will soon learn to bow before them.

In preparation for sailing, I have “priced in,” as they say on Wall Street, the possibility that I may come from a somewhat different monde than many of the other cruisers. Without falling into stereotypes or preconceptions, I prepare myself for a friendly outspokenness on the part of my fellow seafarers that may not comply with modern DEI standards. I believe in meeting people halfway, and so the day before flying down to Miami, I visited what remains of Little Italy to purchase a popular T-shirt that reads DADDY’S LITTLE MEATBALL across the breast in the colors of the Italian flag. My wife recommended that I bring one of my many T-shirts featuring Snoopy and the Peanuts gang, as all Americans love the beagle and his friends. But I naively thought that my meatball T-shirt would be more suitable for conversation-starting. “Oh, and who is your ‘daddy’?” some might ask upon seeing it. “And how long have you been his ‘little meatball’?” And so on.

I put on my meatball T-shirt and head for one of the dining rooms to get a late lunch. In the elevator, I stick out my chest for all to read the funny legend upon it, but soon I realize that despite its burnished tricolor letters, no one takes note. More to the point, no one takes note of me. Despite my attempts at bridge building, the very sight of me (small, ethnic, without a cap bearing the name of a football team) elicits no reaction from other passengers. Most often, they will small-talk over me as if I don’t exist. This brings to mind the travails of David Foster Wallace , who felt so ostracized by his fellow passengers that he retreated to his cabin for much of his voyage. And Wallace was raised primarily in the Midwest and was a much larger, more American-looking meatball than I am. If he couldn’t talk to these people, how will I? What if I leave this ship without making any friends at all, despite my T-shirt? I am a social creature, and the prospect of seven days alone and apart is saddening. Wallace’s stateroom, at least, had a view of the ocean, a kind of cheap eternity.

Worse awaits me in the dining room. This is a large, multichandeliered room where I attended my safety training (I was shown how to put on a flotation vest; it is a very simple procedure). But the maître d’ politely refuses me entry in an English that seems to verge on another language. “I’m sorry, this is only for pendejos ,” he seems to be saying. I push back politely and he repeats himself. Pendejos ? Piranhas? There’s some kind of P-word to which I am not attuned. Meanwhile elderly passengers stream right past, powered by their limbs, walkers, and electric wheelchairs. “It is only pendejo dining today, sir.” “But I have a suite!” I say, already starting to catch on to the ship’s class system. He examines my card again. “But you are not a pendejo ,” he confirms. I am wearing a DADDY’S LITTLE MEATBALL T-shirt, I want to say to him. I am the essence of pendejo .

Eventually, I give up and head to the plebeian buffet on Deck 15, which has an aquatic-styled name I have now forgotten. Before gaining entry to this endless cornucopia of reheated food, one passes a washing station of many sinks and soap dispensers, and perhaps the most intriguing character on the entire ship. He is Mr. Washy Washy—or, according to his name tag, Nielbert of the Philippines—and he is dressed as a taco (on other occasions, I’ll see him dressed as a burger). Mr. Washy Washy performs an eponymous song in spirited, indeed flamboyant English: “Washy, washy, wash your hands, WASHY WASHY!” The dangers of norovirus and COVID on a cruise ship this size (a giant fellow ship was stricken with the former right after my voyage) makes Mr. Washy Washy an essential member of the crew. The problem lies with the food at the end of Washy’s rainbow. The buffet is groaning with what sounds like sophisticated dishes—marinated octopus, boiled egg with anchovy, chorizo, lobster claws—but every animal tastes tragically the same, as if there was only one creature available at the market, a “cruisipus” bred specifically for Royal Caribbean dining. The “vegetables” are no better. I pick up a tomato slice and look right through it. It tastes like cellophane. I sit alone, apart from the couples and parents with gaggles of children, as “We Are Family” echoes across the buffet space.

I may have failed to mention that all this time, the Icon of the Seas has not left port. As the fiery mango of the subtropical setting sun makes Miami’s condo skyline even more apocalyptic, the ship shoves off beneath a perfunctory display of fireworks. After the sun sets, in the far, dark distance, another circus-lit cruise ship ruptures the waves before us. We glance at it with pity, because it is by definition a smaller ship than our own. I am on Deck 15, outside the buffet and overlooking a bunch of pools (the Icon has seven of them), drinking a frilly drink that I got from one of the bars (the Icon has 15 of them), still too shy to speak to anyone, despite Sister Sledge’s assertion that all on the ship are somehow related.

Kim Brooks: On failing the family vacation

The ship’s passage away from Ron DeSantis’s Florida provides no frisson, no sense of developing “sea legs,” as the ship is too large to register the presence of waves unless a mighty wind adds significant chop. It is time for me to register the presence of the 5,000 passengers around me, even if they refuse to register mine. My fellow travelers have prepared for this trip with personally decorated T-shirts celebrating the importance of this voyage. The simplest ones say ICON INAUGURAL ’24 on the back and the family name on the front. Others attest to an over-the-top love of cruise ships: WARNING! MAY START TALKING ABOUT CRUISING . Still others are artisanally designed and celebrate lifetimes spent married while cruising (on ships, of course). A couple possibly in their 90s are wearing shirts whose backs feature a drawing of a cruise liner, two flamingos with ostensibly male and female characteristics, and the legend “ HUSBAND AND WIFE Cruising Partners FOR LIFE WE MAY NOT HAVE IT All Together BUT TOGETHER WE HAVE IT ALL .” (The words not in all caps have been written in cursive.) A real journalist or a more intrepid conversationalist would have gone up to the couple and asked them to explain the longevity of their marriage vis-à-vis their love of cruising. But instead I head to my mall suite, take off my meatball T-shirt, and allow the first tears of the cruise to roll down my cheeks slowly enough that I briefly fall asleep amid the moisture and salt.

I WAKE UP with a hangover. Oh God. Right. I cannot believe all of that happened last night. A name floats into my cobwebbed, nauseated brain: “Ayn Rand.” Jesus Christ.

I breakfast alone at the Coastal Kitchen. The coffee tastes fine and the eggs came out of a bird. The ship rolls slightly this morning; I can feel it in my thighs and my schlong, the parts of me that are most receptive to danger.

I had a dangerous conversation last night. After the sun set and we were at least 50 miles from shore (most modern cruise ships sail at about 23 miles an hour), I lay in bed softly hiccupping, my arms stretched out exactly like Jesus on the cross, the sound of the distant waves missing from my mall-facing suite, replaced by the hum of air-conditioning and children shouting in Spanish through the vents of my two bathrooms. I decided this passivity was unacceptable. As an immigrant, I feel duty-bound to complete the tasks I am paid for, which means reaching out and trying to understand my fellow cruisers. So I put on a normal James Perse T-shirt and headed for one of the bars on the Royal Promenade—the Schooner Bar, it was called, if memory serves correctly.

I sat at the bar for a martini and two Negronis. An old man with thick, hairy forearms drank next to me, very silent and Hemingwaylike, while a dreadlocked piano player tinkled out a series of excellent Elton John covers. To my right, a young white couple—he in floral shorts, she in a light, summery miniskirt with a fearsome diamond ring, neither of them in football regalia—chatted with an elderly couple. Do it , I commanded myself. Open your mouth. Speak! Speak without being spoken to. Initiate. A sentence fragment caught my ear from the young woman, “Cherry Hill.” This is a suburb of Philadelphia in New Jersey, and I had once been there for a reading at a synagogue. “Excuse me,” I said gently to her. “Did you just mention Cherry Hill? It’s a lovely place.”

As it turned out, the couple now lived in Fort Lauderdale (the number of Floridians on the cruise surprised me, given that Southern Florida is itself a kind of cruise ship, albeit one slowly sinking), but soon they were talking with me exclusively—the man potbellied, with a chin like a hard-boiled egg; the woman as svelte as if she were one of the many Ukrainian members of the crew—the elderly couple next to them forgotten. This felt as groundbreaking as the first time I dared to address an American in his native tongue, as a child on a bus in Queens (“On my foot you are standing, Mister”).

“I don’t want to talk politics,” the man said. “But they’re going to eighty-six Biden and put Michelle in.”

I considered the contradictions of his opening conversational gambit, but decided to play along. “People like Michelle,” I said, testing the waters. The husband sneered, but the wife charitably put forward that the former first lady was “more personable” than Joe Biden. “They’re gonna eighty-six Biden,” the husband repeated. “He can’t put a sentence together.”

After I mentioned that I was a writer—though I presented myself as a writer of teleplays instead of novels and articles such as this one—the husband told me his favorite writer was Ayn Rand. “Ayn Rand, she came here with nothing,” the husband said. “I work with a lot of Cubans, so …” I wondered if I should mention what I usually do to ingratiate myself with Republicans or libertarians: the fact that my finances improved after pass-through corporations were taxed differently under Donald Trump. Instead, I ordered another drink and the couple did the same, and I told him that Rand and I were born in the same city, St. Petersburg/Leningrad, and that my family also came here with nothing. Now the bonding and drinking began in earnest, and several more rounds appeared. Until it all fell apart.

Read: Gary Shteyngart on watching Russian television for five days straight

My new friend, whom I will refer to as Ayn, called out to a buddy of his across the bar, and suddenly a young couple, both covered in tattoos, appeared next to us. “He fucking punked me,” Ayn’s frat-boy-like friend called out as he put his arm around Ayn, while his sizable partner sizzled up to Mrs. Rand. Both of them had a look I have never seen on land—their eyes projecting absence and enmity in equal measure. In the ’90s, I drank with Russian soldiers fresh from Chechnya and wandered the streets of wartime Zagreb, but I have never seen such undisguised hostility toward both me and perhaps the universe at large. I was briefly introduced to this psychopathic pair, but neither of them wanted to have anything to do with me, and the tattooed woman would not even reveal her Christian name to me (she pretended to have the same first name as Mrs. Rand). To impress his tattooed friends, Ayn made fun of the fact that as a television writer, I’d worked on the series Succession (which, it would turn out, practically nobody on the ship had watched), instead of the far more palatable, in his eyes, zombie drama of last year. And then my new friends drifted away from me into an angry private conversation—“He punked me!”—as I ordered another drink for myself, scared of the dead-eyed arrivals whose gaze never registered in the dim wattage of the Schooner Bar, whose terrifying voices and hollow laughs grated like unoiled gears against the crooning of “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.”

But today is a new day for me and my hangover. After breakfast, I explore the ship’s so-called neighborhoods . There’s the AquaDome, where one can find a food hall and an acrobatic sound-and-light aquatic show. Central Park has a premium steak house, a sushi joint, and a used Rolex that can be bought for $8,000 on land here proudly offered at $17,000. There’s the aforementioned Royal Promenade, where I had drunk with the Rands, and where a pair of dueling pianos duel well into the night. There’s Surfside, a kids’ neighborhood full of sugary garbage, which looks out onto the frothy trail that the behemoth leaves behind itself. Thrill Island refers to the collection of tubes that clutter the ass of the ship and offer passengers six waterslides and a surfing simulation. There’s the Hideaway, an adult zone that plays music from a vomit-slathered, Brit-filled Alicante nightclub circa 1996 and proves a big favorite with groups of young Latin American customers. And, most hurtfully, there’s the Suite Neighborhood.

I say hurtfully because as a Suite passenger I should be here, though my particular suite is far from the others. Whereas I am stuck amid the riffraff of Deck 11, this section is on the highborn Decks 16 and 17, and in passing, I peek into the spacious, tall-ceilinged staterooms from the hallway, dazzled by the glint of the waves and sun. For $75,000, one multifloor suite even comes with its own slide between floors, so that a family may enjoy this particular terror in private. There is a quiet splendor to the Suite Neighborhood. I see fewer stickers and signs and drawings than in my own neighborhood—for example, MIKE AND DIANA PROUDLY SERVED U.S. MARINE CORPS RETIRED . No one here needs to announce their branch of service or rank; they are simply Suites, and this is where they belong. Once again, despite my hard work and perseverance, I have been disallowed from the true American elite. Once again, I am “Not our class, dear.” I am reminded of watching The Love Boat on my grandmother’s Zenith, which either was given to her or we found in the trash (I get our many malfunctioning Zeniths confused) and whose tube got so hot, I would put little chunks of government cheese on a thin tissue atop it to give our welfare treat a pleasant, Reagan-era gooeyness. I could not understand English well enough then to catch the nuances of that seafaring program, but I knew that there were differences in the status of the passengers, and that sometimes those differences made them sad. Still, this ship, this plenty—every few steps, there are complimentary nachos or milkshakes or gyros on offer—was the fatty fuel of my childhood dreams. If only I had remained a child.

I walk around the outdoor decks looking for company. There is a middle-aged African American couple who always seem to be asleep in each other’s arms, probably exhausted from the late capitalism they regularly encounter on land. There is far more diversity on this ship than I expected. Many couples are a testament to Loving v. Virginia , and there is a large group of folks whose T-shirts read MELANIN AT SEA / IT’S THE MELANIN FOR ME . I smile when I see them, but then some young kids from the group makes Mr. Washy Washy do a cruel, caricatured “Burger Dance” (today he is in his burger getup), and I think, Well, so much for intersectionality .

At the infinity pool on Deck 17, I spot some elderly women who could be ethnic and from my part of the world, and so I jump in. I am proved correct! Many of them seem to be originally from Queens (“Corona was still great when it was all Italian”), though they are now spread across the tristate area. We bond over the way “Ron-kon-koma” sounds when announced in Penn Station.

“Everyone is here for a different reason,” one of them tells me. She and her ex-husband last sailed together four years ago to prove to themselves that their marriage was truly over. Her 15-year-old son lost his virginity to “an Irish young lady” while their ship was moored in Ravenna, Italy. The gaggle of old-timers competes to tell me their favorite cruising stories and tips. “A guy proposed in Central Park a couple of years ago”—many Royal Caribbean ships apparently have this ridiculous communal area—“and she ran away screaming!” “If you’re diamond-class, you get four drinks for free.” “A different kind of passenger sails out of Bayonne.” (This, perhaps, is racially coded.) “Sometimes, if you tip the bartender $5, your next drink will be free.”

“Everyone’s here for a different reason,” the woman whose marriage ended on a cruise tells me again. “Some people are here for bad reasons—the drinkers and the gamblers. Some people are here for medical reasons.” I have seen more than a few oxygen tanks and at least one woman clearly undergoing very serious chemo. Some T-shirts celebrate good news about a cancer diagnosis. This might be someone’s last cruise or week on Earth. For these women, who have spent months, if not years, at sea, cruising is a ritual as well as a life cycle: first love, last love, marriage, divorce, death.

Read: The last place on Earth any tourist should go

I have talked with these women for so long, tonight I promise myself that after a sad solitary dinner I will not try to seek out company at the bars in the mall or the adult-themed Hideaway. I have enough material to fulfill my duties to this publication. As I approach my orphaned suite, I run into the aggro young people who stole Mr. and Mrs. Rand away from me the night before. The tattooed apparitions pass me without a glance. She is singing something violent about “Stuttering Stanley” (a character in a popular horror movie, as I discover with my complimentary VOOM SM Surf & Stream Internet at Sea) and he’s loudly shouting about “all the money I’ve lost,” presumably at the casino in the bowels of the ship.

So these bent psychos out of a Cormac McCarthy novel are angrily inhabiting my deck. As I mewl myself to sleep, I envision a limited series for HBO or some other streamer, a kind of low-rent White Lotus , where several aggressive couples conspire to throw a shy intellectual interloper overboard. I type the scenario into my phone. As I fall asleep, I think of what the woman who recently divorced her husband and whose son became a man through the good offices of the Irish Republic told me while I was hoisting myself out of the infinity pool. “I’m here because I’m an explorer. I’m here because I’m trying something new.” What if I allowed myself to believe in her fantasy?

“YOU REALLY STARTED AT THE TOP,” they tell me. I’m at the Coastal Kitchen for my eggs and corned-beef hash, and the maître d’ has slotted me in between two couples. Fueled by coffee or perhaps intrigued by my relative youth, they strike up a conversation with me. As always, people are shocked that this is my first cruise. They contrast the Icon favorably with all the preceding liners in the Royal Caribbean fleet, usually commenting on the efficiency of the elevators that hurl us from deck to deck (as in many large corporate buildings, the elevators ask you to choose a floor and then direct you to one of many lifts). The couple to my right, from Palo Alto—he refers to his “porn mustache” and calls his wife “my cougar” because she is two years older—tell me they are “Pandemic Pinnacles.”

This is the day that my eyes will be opened. Pinnacles , it is explained to me over translucent cantaloupe, have sailed with Royal Caribbean for 700 ungodly nights. Pandemic Pinnacles took advantage of the two-for-one accrual rate of Pinnacle points during the pandemic, when sailing on a cruise ship was even more ill-advised, to catapult themselves into Pinnacle status.

Because of the importance of the inaugural voyage of the world’s largest cruise liner, more than 200 Pinnacles are on this ship, a startling number, it seems. Mrs. Palo Alto takes out a golden badge that I have seen affixed over many a breast, which reads CROWN AND ANCHOR SOCIETY along with her name. This is the coveted badge of the Pinnacle. “You should hear all the whining in Guest Services,” her husband tells me. Apparently, the Pinnacles who are not also Suites like us are all trying to use their status to get into Coastal Kitchen, our elite restaurant. Even a Pinnacle needs to be a Suite to access this level of corned-beef hash.

“We’re just baby Pinnacles,” Mrs. Palo Alto tells me, describing a kind of internal class struggle among the Pinnacle elite for ever higher status.

And now I understand what the maître d’ was saying to me on the first day of my cruise. He wasn’t saying “ pendejo .” He was saying “Pinnacle.” The dining room was for Pinnacles only, all those older people rolling in like the tide on their motorized scooters.

And now I understand something else: This whole thing is a cult. And like most cults, it can’t help but mirror the endless American fight for status. Like Keith Raniere’s NXIVM, where different-colored sashes were given out to connote rank among Raniere’s branded acolytes, this is an endless competition among Pinnacles, Suites, Diamond-Plusers, and facing-the-mall, no-balcony purple SeaPass Card peasants, not to mention the many distinctions within each category. The more you cruise, the higher your status. No wonder a section of the Royal Promenade is devoted to getting passengers to book their next cruise during the one they should be enjoying now. No wonder desperate Royal Caribbean offers (“FINAL HOURS”) crowded my email account weeks before I set sail. No wonder the ship’s jewelry store, the Royal Bling, is selling a $100,000 golden chalice that will entitle its owner to drink free on Royal Caribbean cruises for life. (One passenger was already gaming out whether her 28-year-old son was young enough to “just about earn out” on the chalice or if that ship had sailed.) No wonder this ship was sold out months before departure , and we had to pay $19,000 for a horrid suite away from the Suite Neighborhood. No wonder the most mythical hero of Royal Caribbean lore is someone named Super Mario, who has cruised so often, he now has his own working desk on many ships. This whole experience is part cult, part nautical pyramid scheme.

From the June 2014 issue: Ship of wonks

“The toilets are amazing,” the Palo Altos are telling me. “One flush and you’re done.” “They don’t understand how energy-efficient these ships are,” the husband of the other couple is telling me. “They got the LNG”—liquefied natural gas, which is supposed to make the Icon a boon to the environment (a concept widely disputed and sometimes ridiculed by environmentalists).

But I’m thinking along a different line of attack as I spear my last pallid slice of melon. For my streaming limited series, a Pinnacle would have to get killed by either an outright peasant or a Suite without an ocean view. I tell my breakfast companions my idea.

“Oh, for sure a Pinnacle would have to be killed,” Mr. Palo Alto, the Pandemic Pinnacle, says, touching his porn mustache thoughtfully as his wife nods.

“THAT’S RIGHT, IT’S your time, buddy!” Hubert, my fun-loving Panamanian cabin attendant, shouts as I step out of my suite in a robe. “Take it easy, buddy!”

I have come up with a new dressing strategy. Instead of trying to impress with my choice of T-shirts, I have decided to start wearing a robe, as one does at a resort property on land, with a proper spa and hammam. The response among my fellow cruisers has been ecstatic. “Look at you in the robe!” Mr. Rand cries out as we pass each other by the Thrill Island aqua park. “You’re living the cruise life! You know, you really drank me under the table that night.” I laugh as we part ways, but my soul cries out, Please spend more time with me, Mr. and Mrs. Rand; I so need the company .

In my white robe, I am a stately presence, a refugee from a better limited series, a one-man crossover episode. (Only Suites are granted these robes to begin with.) Today, I will try many of the activities these ships have on offer to provide their clientele with a sense of never-ceasing motion. Because I am already at Thrill Island, I decide to climb the staircase to what looks like a mast on an old-fashioned ship (terrified, because I am afraid of heights) to try a ride called “Storm Chasers,” which is part of the “Category 6” water park, named in honor of one of the storms that may someday do away with the Port of Miami entirely. Storm Chasers consists of falling from the “mast” down a long, twisting neon tube filled with water, like being the camera inside your own colonoscopy, as you hold on to the handles of a mat, hoping not to die. The tube then flops you down headfirst into a trough of water, a Royal Caribbean baptism. It both knocks my breath out and makes me sad.

In keeping with the aquatic theme, I attend a show at the AquaDome. To the sound of “Live and Let Die,” a man in a harness gyrates to and fro in the sultry air. I saw something very similar in the back rooms of the famed Berghain club in early-aughts Berlin. Soon another harnessed man is gyrating next to the first. Ja , I think to myself, I know how this ends. Now will come the fisting , natürlich . But the show soon devolves into the usual Marvel-film-grade nonsense, with too much light and sound signifying nichts . If any fisting is happening, it is probably in the Suite Neighborhood, inside a cabin marked with an upside-down pineapple, which I understand means a couple are ready to swing, and I will see none of it.

I go to the ice show, which is a kind of homage—if that’s possible—to the periodic table, done with the style and pomp and masterful precision that would please the likes of Kim Jong Un, if only he could afford Royal Caribbean talent. At one point, the dancers skate to the theme song of Succession . “See that!” I want to say to my fellow Suites—at “cultural” events, we have a special section reserved for us away from the commoners—“ Succession ! It’s even better than the zombie show! Open your minds!”

Finally, I visit a comedy revue in an enormous and too brightly lit version of an “intimate,” per Royal Caribbean literature, “Manhattan comedy club.” Many of the jokes are about the cruising life. “I’ve lived on ships for 20 years,” one of the middle-aged comedians says. “I can only see so many Filipino homosexuals dressed as a taco.” He pauses while the audience laughs. “I am so fired tonight,” he says. He segues into a Trump impression and then Biden falling asleep at the microphone, which gets the most laughs. “Anyone here from Fort Leonard Wood?” another comedian asks. Half the crowd seems to cheer. As I fall asleep that night, I realize another connection I have failed to make, and one that may explain some of the diversity on this vessel—many of its passengers have served in the military.

As a coddled passenger with a suite, I feel like I am starting to understand what it means to have a rank and be constantly reminded of it. There are many espresso makers , I think as I look across the expanse of my officer-grade quarters before closing my eyes, but this one is mine .

A shocking sight greets me beyond the pools of Deck 17 as I saunter over to the Coastal Kitchen for my morning intake of slightly sour Americanos. A tiny city beneath a series of perfectly pressed green mountains. Land! We have docked for a brief respite in Basseterre, the capital of St. Kitts and Nevis. I wolf down my egg scramble to be one of the first passengers off the ship. Once past the gangway, I barely refrain from kissing the ground. I rush into the sights and sounds of this scruffy island city, sampling incredible conch curry and buckets of non-Starbucks coffee. How wonderful it is to be where God intended humans to be: on land. After all, I am neither a fish nor a mall rat. This is my natural environment. Basseterre may not be Havana, but there are signs of human ingenuity and desire everywhere you look. The Black Table Grill Has been Relocated to Soho Village, Market Street, Directly Behind of, Gary’s Fruits and Flower Shop. Signed. THE PORK MAN reads a sign stuck to a wall. Now, that is how you write a sign. A real sign, not the come-ons for overpriced Rolexes that blink across the screens of the Royal Promenade.

“Hey, tie your shoestring!” a pair of laughing ladies shout to me across the street.

“Thank you!” I shout back. Shoestring! “Thank you very much.”

A man in Independence Square Park comes by and asks if I want to play with his monkey. I haven’t heard that pickup line since the Penn Station of the 1980s. But then he pulls a real monkey out of a bag. The monkey is wearing a diaper and looks insane. Wonderful , I think, just wonderful! There is so much life here. I email my editor asking if I can remain on St. Kitts and allow the Icon to sail off into the horizon without me. I have even priced a flight home at less than $300, and I have enough material from the first four days on the cruise to write the entire story. “It would be funny …” my editor replies. “Now get on the boat.”

As I slink back to the ship after my brief jailbreak, the locals stand under umbrellas to gaze at and photograph the boat that towers over their small capital city. The limousines of the prime minister and his lackeys are parked beside the gangway. St. Kitts, I’ve been told, is one of the few islands that would allow a ship of this size to dock.

“We hear about all the waterslides,” a sweet young server in one of the cafés told me. “We wish we could go on the ship, but we have to work.”

“I want to stay on your island,” I replied. “I love it here.”

But she didn’t understand how I could possibly mean that.

“WASHY, WASHY, so you don’t get stinky, stinky!” kids are singing outside the AquaDome, while their adult minders look on in disapproval, perhaps worried that Mr. Washy Washy is grooming them into a life of gayness. I heard a southern couple skip the buffet entirely out of fear of Mr. Washy Washy.

Meanwhile, I have found a new watering hole for myself, the Swim & Tonic, the biggest swim-up bar on any cruise ship in the world. Drinking next to full-size, nearly naked Americans takes away one’s own self-consciousness. The men have curvaceous mom bodies. The women are equally un-shy about their sprawling physiques.

Today I’ve befriended a bald man with many children who tells me that all of the little trinkets that Royal Caribbean has left us in our staterooms and suites are worth a fortune on eBay. “Eighty dollars for the water bottle, 60 for the lanyard,” the man says. “This is a cult.”

“Tell me about it,” I say. There is, however, a clientele for whom this cruise makes perfect sense. For a large middle-class family (he works in “supply chains”), seven days in a lower-tier cabin—which starts at $1,800 a person—allow the parents to drop off their children in Surfside, where I imagine many young Filipina crew members will take care of them, while the parents are free to get drunk at a swim-up bar and maybe even get intimate in their cabin. Cruise ships have become, for a certain kind of hardworking family, a form of subsidized child care.

There is another man I would like to befriend at the Swim & Tonic, a tall, bald fellow who is perpetually inebriated and who wears a necklace studded with little rubber duckies in sunglasses, which, I am told, is a sort of secret handshake for cruise aficionados. Tomorrow, I will spend more time with him, but first the ship docks at St. Thomas, in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Charlotte Amalie, the capital, is more charming in name than in presence, but I still all but jump off the ship to score a juicy oxtail and plantains at the well-known Petite Pump Room, overlooking the harbor. From one of the highest points in the small city, the Icon of the Seas appears bigger than the surrounding hills.

I usually tan very evenly, but something about the discombobulation of life at sea makes me forget the regular application of sunscreen. As I walk down the streets of Charlotte Amalie in my fluorescent Icon of the Seas cap, an old Rastafarian stares me down. “Redneck,” he hisses.

“No,” I want to tell him, as I bring a hand up to my red neck, “that’s not who I am at all. On my island, Mannahatta, as Whitman would have it, I am an interesting person living within an engaging artistic milieu. I do not wish to use the Caribbean as a dumping ground for the cruise-ship industry. I love the work of Derek Walcott. You don’t understand. I am not a redneck. And if I am, they did this to me.” They meaning Royal Caribbean? Its passengers? The Rands?

“They did this to me!”

Back on the Icon, some older matrons are muttering about a run-in with passengers from the Celebrity cruise ship docked next to us, the Celebrity Apex. Although Celebrity Cruises is also owned by Royal Caribbean, I am made to understand that there is a deep fratricidal beef between passengers of the two lines. “We met a woman from the Apex,” one matron says, “and she says it was a small ship and there was nothing to do. Her face was as tight as a 19-year-old’s, she had so much surgery.” With those words, and beneath a cloudy sky, humidity shrouding our weathered faces and red necks, we set sail once again, hopefully in the direction of home.

THERE ARE BARELY 48 HOURS LEFT to the cruise, and the Icon of the Seas’ passengers are salty. They know how to work the elevators. They know the Washy Washy song by heart. They understand that the chicken gyro at “Feta Mediterranean,” in the AquaDome Market, is the least problematic form of chicken on the ship.

The passengers have shed their INAUGURAL CRUISE T-shirts and are now starting to evince political opinions. There are caps pledging to make America great again and T-shirts that celebrate words sometimes attributed to Patrick Henry: “The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people; it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government.” With their preponderance of FAMILY FLAG FAITH FRIENDS FIREARMS T-shirts, the tables by the crepe station sometimes resemble the Capitol Rotunda on January 6. The Real Anthony Fauci , by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., appears to be a popular form of literature, especially among young men with very complicated versions of the American flag on their T-shirts. Other opinions blend the personal and the political. “Someone needs to kill Washy guy, right?” a well-dressed man in the elevator tells me, his gray eyes radiating nothing. “Just beat him to death. Am I right?” I overhear the male member of a young couple whisper, “There goes that freak” as I saunter by in my white spa robe, and I decide to retire it for the rest of the cruise.

I visit the Royal Bling to see up close the $100,000 golden chalice that entitles you to free drinks on Royal Caribbean forever. The pleasant Serbian saleslady explains that the chalice is actually gold-plated and covered in white zirconia instead of diamonds, as it would otherwise cost $1 million. “If you already have everything,” she explains, “this is one more thing you can get.”

I believe that anyone who works for Royal Caribbean should be entitled to immediate American citizenship. They already speak English better than most of the passengers and, per the Serbian lady’s sales pitch above, better understand what America is as well. Crew members like my Panamanian cabin attendant seem to work 24 hours a day. A waiter from New Delhi tells me that his contract is six months and three weeks long. After a cruise ends, he says, “in a few hours, we start again for the next cruise.” At the end of the half a year at sea, he is allowed a two-to-three-month stay at home with his family. As of 2019, the median income for crew members was somewhere in the vicinity of $20,000, according to a major business publication. Royal Caribbean would not share the current median salary for its crew members, but I am certain that it amounts to a fraction of the cost of a Royal Bling gold-plated, zirconia-studded chalice.

And because most of the Icon’s hyper-sanitized spaces are just a frittata away from being a Delta lounge, one forgets that there are actual sailors on this ship, charged with the herculean task of docking it in port. “Having driven 100,000-ton aircraft carriers throughout my career,” retired Admiral James G. Stavridis, the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe, writes to me, “I’m not sure I would even know where to begin with trying to control a sea monster like this one nearly three times the size.” (I first met Stavridis while touring Army bases in Germany more than a decade ago.)

Today, I decide to head to the hot tub near Swim & Tonic, where some of the ship’s drunkest reprobates seem to gather (the other tubs are filled with families and couples). The talk here, like everywhere else on the ship, concerns football, a sport about which I know nothing. It is apparent that four teams have recently competed in some kind of finals for the year, and that two of them will now face off in the championship. Often when people on the Icon speak, I will try to repeat the last thing they said with a laugh or a nod of disbelief. “Yes, 20-yard line! Ha!” “Oh my God, of course, scrimmage.”

Soon we are joined in the hot tub by the late-middle-age drunk guy with the duck necklace. He is wearing a bucket hat with the legend HAWKEYES , which, I soon gather, is yet another football team. “All right, who turned me in?” Duck Necklace says as he plops into the tub beside us. “I get a call in the morning,” he says. “It’s security. Can you come down to the dining room by 10 a.m.? You need to stay away from the members of this religious family.” Apparently, the gregarious Duck Necklace had photobombed the wrong people. There are several families who present as evangelical Christians or practicing Muslims on the ship. One man, evidently, was not happy that Duck Necklace had made contact with his relatives. “It’s because of religious stuff; he was offended. I put my arm around 20 people a day.”

Everyone laughs. “They asked me three times if I needed medication,” he says of the security people who apparently interrogated him in full view of others having breakfast.

Another hot-tub denizen suggests that he should have asked for fentanyl. After a few more drinks, Duck Necklace begins to muse about what it would be like to fall off the ship. “I’m 62 and I’m ready to go,” he says. “I just don’t want a shark to eat me. I’m a huge God guy. I’m a Bible guy. There’s some Mayan theory squaring science stuff with religion. There is so much more to life on Earth.” We all nod into our Red Stripes.

“I never get off the ship when we dock,” he says. He tells us he lost $6,000 in the casino the other day. Later, I look him up, and it appears that on land, he’s a financial adviser in a crisp gray suit, probably a pillar of his North Chicago community.

THE OCEAN IS TEEMING with fascinating life, but on the surface it has little to teach us. The waves come and go. The horizon remains ever far away.

I am constantly told by my fellow passengers that “everybody here has a story.” Yes, I want to reply, but everybody everywhere has a story. You, the reader of this essay, have a story, and yet you’re not inclined to jump on a cruise ship and, like Duck Necklace, tell your story to others at great pitch and volume. Maybe what they’re saying is that everybody on this ship wants to have a bigger, more coherent, more interesting story than the one they’ve been given. Maybe that’s why there’s so much signage on the doors around me attesting to marriages spent on the sea. Maybe that’s why the Royal Caribbean newsletter slipped under my door tells me that “this isn’t a vacation day spent—it’s bragging rights earned.” Maybe that’s why I’m so lonely.

Today is a big day for Icon passengers. Today the ship docks at Royal Caribbean’s own Bahamian island, the Perfect Day at CocoCay. (This appears to be the actual name of the island.) A comedian at the nightclub opined on what his perfect day at CocoCay would look like—receiving oral sex while learning that his ex-wife had been killed in a car crash (big laughter). But the reality of the island is far less humorous than that.

One of the ethnic tristate ladies in the infinity pool told me that she loved CocoCay because it had exactly the same things that could be found on the ship itself. This proves to be correct. It is like the Icon, but with sand. The same tired burgers, the same colorful tubes conveying children and water from Point A to B. The same swim-up bar at its Hideaway ($140 for admittance, no children allowed; Royal Caribbean must be printing money off its clientele). “There was almost a fight at The Wizard of Oz ,” I overhear an elderly woman tell her companion on a chaise lounge. Apparently one of the passengers began recording Royal Caribbean’s intellectual property and “three guys came after him.”

I walk down a pathway to the center of the island, where a sign reads DO NOT ENTER: YOU HAVE REACHED THE BOUNDARY OF ADVENTURE . I hear an animal scampering in the bushes. A Royal Caribbean worker in an enormous golf cart soon chases me down and takes me back to the Hideaway, where I run into Mrs. Rand in a bikini. She becomes livid telling me about an altercation she had the other day with a woman over a towel and a deck chair. We Suites have special towel privileges; we do not have to hand over our SeaPass Card to score a towel. But the Rands are not Suites. “People are so entitled here,” Mrs. Rand says. “It’s like the airport with all its classes.” “You see,” I want to say, “this is where your husband’s love of Ayn Rand runs into the cruelties and arbitrary indignities of unbridled capitalism.” Instead we make plans to meet for a final drink in the Schooner Bar tonight (the Rands will stand me up).

Back on the ship, I try to do laps, but the pool (the largest on any cruise ship, naturally) is fully trashed with the detritus of American life: candy wrappers, a slowly dissolving tortilla chip, napkins. I take an extra-long shower in my suite, then walk around the perimeter of the ship on a kind of exercise track, past all the alluring lifeboats in their yellow-and-white livery. Maybe there is a dystopian angle to the HBO series that I will surely end up pitching, one with shades of WALL-E or Snowpiercer . In a collapsed world, a Royal Caribbean–like cruise liner sails from port to port, collecting new shipmates and supplies in exchange for the precious energy it has on board. (The actual Icon features a new technology that converts passengers’ poop into enough energy to power the waterslides . In the series, this shitty technology would be greatly expanded.) A very young woman (18? 19?), smart and lonely, who has only known life on the ship, walks along the same track as I do now, contemplating jumping off into the surf left by its wake. I picture reusing Duck Necklace’s words in the opening shot of the pilot. The girl is walking around the track, her eyes on the horizon; maybe she’s highborn—a Suite—and we hear the voice-over: “I’m 19 and I’m ready to go. I just don’t want a shark to eat me.”

Before the cruise is finished, I talk to Mr. Washy Washy, or Nielbert of the Philippines. He is a sweet, gentle man, and I thank him for the earworm of a song he has given me and for keeping us safe from the dreaded norovirus. “This is very important to me, getting people to wash their hands,” he tells me in his burger getup. He has dreams, as an artist and a performer, but they are limited in scope. One day he wants to dress up as a piece of bacon for the morning shift.

THE MAIDEN VOYAGE OF THE TITANIC (the Icon of the Seas is five times as large as that doomed vessel) at least offered its passengers an exciting ending to their cruise, but when I wake up on the eighth day, all I see are the gray ghosts that populate Miami’s condo skyline. Throughout my voyage, my writer friends wrote in to commiserate with me. Sloane Crosley, who once covered a three-day spa mini-cruise for Vogue , tells me she felt “so very alone … I found it very untethering.” Gideon Lewis-Kraus writes in an Instagram comment: “When Gary is done I think it’s time this genre was taken out back and shot.” And he is right. To badly paraphrase Adorno: After this, no more cruise stories. It is unfair to put a thinking person on a cruise ship. Writers typically have difficult childhoods, and it is cruel to remind them of the inherent loneliness that drove them to writing in the first place. It is also unseemly to write about the kind of people who go on cruises. Our country does not provide the education and upbringing that allow its citizens an interior life. For the creative class to point fingers at the large, breasty gentlemen adrift in tortilla-chip-laden pools of water is to gather a sour harvest of low-hanging fruit.

A day or two before I got off the ship, I decided to make use of my balcony, which I had avoided because I thought the view would only depress me further. What I found shocked me. My suite did not look out on Central Park after all. This entire time, I had been living in the ship’s Disneyland, Surfside, the neighborhood full of screaming toddlers consuming milkshakes and candy. And as I leaned out over my balcony, I beheld a slight vista of the sea and surf that I thought I had been missing. It had been there all along. The sea was frothy and infinite and blue-green beneath the span of a seagull’s wing. And though it had been trod hard by the world’s largest cruise ship, it remained.

This article appears in the May 2024 print edition with the headline “A Meatball at Sea.” When you buy a book using a link on this page, we receive a commission. Thank you for supporting The Atlantic.

• Share full article

Advertisement

Supported by

Sensible Ways to Fight Terrorism

More from our inbox:, the quake, as felt in manhattan, r.f.k. jr.’s claim of ‘censorship’, obstacles to liberalism, prioritizing and valuing care jobs.

To the Editor:

Re “ The West Still Hasn’t Figured Out How to Beat ISIS ,” by Christopher P. Costa and Colin P. Clarke (Opinion guest essay, April 1):

Two clear lessons have emerged in the decade since ISIS exploded on the world scene. First, as the authors note, pulling all U.S. troops and intelligence assets from fragile conflict zones is a boon to globalized terror movements. Despite political promises, the full U.S. withdrawal from Iraq in 2011 and Afghanistan in 2021 did not “end” those wars; it transformed them into more complex and potentially more deadly challenges.

Second, we must reckon with the underlying grievances that make violent anti-Western ideologies, including militant jihadism, attractive to so many in the first place. These include the ill effects of globalization, and a “rules-based” world order increasingly insensitive to the needs of developing countries and regions.

Simply maintaining a military or intelligence presence in terror hot spots does nothing to reduce the sticky recruiting power of militant movements. Unless the United States and its allies and partners begin offering tangible policies that counter jihadi ideology and propaganda, we will just continue attacking the symptoms, not the causes.

Stuart Gottlieb New York The writer teaches American foreign policy and international security at Columbia University.

The Islamic State’s territorial caliphate in Iraq and Syria may have been eliminated years ago, but as Christopher P. Costa and Colin P. Clarke write, the terrorist group itself is very much in business. ISIS-K, its branch in Afghanistan, has conducted two large-scale external attacks over the last two months — one in Iran that killed more than 80 people and another near Moscow that took the lives of more than 130.

If the United States and its allies haven’t found a way to defeat ISIS-K in its entirety, it’s because terrorism itself is an enemy that can’t be defeated in the traditional sense of the term. This is why the war on terror framework, initiated under the George W. Bush administration immediately after the 9/11 attacks, was such poor terminology. Terrorism is going to be with us for as long as humanity exists.

Viewed this way, terrorism is a conflict management problem, not one that can be solved. While this may sound defeatist to many, it’s also the coldhearted truth. Assuming otherwise risks enacting policies, like invading whole countries (Iraq and Afghanistan), that are likely to create even more anti-U.S. terrorism than we started with.

Of course, all countries should remain vigilant. Terrorism will continue to be a part of the threat environment. The U.S. intelligence community must ensure that its counterterrorism infrastructure is well resourced and continues to focus on areas, like Afghanistan, where the U.S. no longer has a troop presence. But for the U.S., a big part of the solution is keeping our ambitions realistic and prioritizing among terrorist threats lest the system gets overloaded or pulled in too many directions at once.

While all terrorism is tragic, not all terrorist groups are created equal. Local and even regional groups with local objectives aren’t as important to the U.S. as groups that have transnational aims and the capabilities to strike U.S. targets. This, combined with keeping a cool head instead of trafficking in threat inflation, is key to a successful response.

Daniel R. DePetris New Rochelle, N.Y. The writer is a fellow at Defense Priorities, a foreign policy think tank in Washington.

Re “ Earthquake Rattles Northeast, but Little Damage Is Reported ” (live updates, nytimes.com, April 5):

I’m lying in bed Friday morning, on 14th Street in Manhattan. Suddenly I feel and see the bed start to shake!

My first thought — OMG, I’m in “The Exorcist.” Then an alert on my phone tells me that it’s an earthquake in New York City.

Frankly, I’m not sure which one scared me more.

Steven Doloff New York

Re “ Kennedy Calls Biden Bigger Threat to Democracy Than Trump ” (news article, April 3):

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s concern about the Biden administration’s “censorship” of misinformation might be viewed as legitimate if the American public demonstrated more responsibility about fact-checking what they see and hear on social media and other information platforms masquerading as legitimate sources of news.

Sadly, many in this country, and indeed the world, have abdicated responsibility for being factually informed about current events. As long as bad actors have unfettered access to social media platforms, it will be necessary to “censor” the misinformation they claim as fact. The world has become the proverbial crowded theater where one cannot yell “fire.”

Helen Ogden Pacific Grove, Calif.

Re “ The Great Struggle for Liberalism ,” by David Brooks (column, March 29):

In face of growing populism at home and abroad, Mr. Brooks issues a cri de coeur on behalf of liberal democracy and democratic capitalism, which provide the means to a “richer, fuller and more dynamic life.”

His impassioned plea for “we the people” of these United States to experience a sense of common purpose, to build a society in which culture is celebrated and families thrive, is made despite existential challenges to American liberalism:

1) We do not share an overarching belief in who we are as a people, as a nation.

2) Trust in our three branches of government, in checks and balances, is broken amid warring partisanship.

3) There is, for many, as Mr. Brooks notes, an “absence of meaning, belonging and recognition” that drives a tilt to authoritarianism in search of the restoration of “cultural, moral and civic stability” by any means necessary.

The ballot box in a free and open society allows for choice, and there are those who, in exercising their right to vote, would choose to cancel the aspirational hopes of the preamble to our Constitution.

David Brooks sees the full measure of the choices facing America and the world in 2024. Do we?

Michael Katz Washington

Re “ New Ways to Bring Wealth to Nations ,” by Patricia Cohen (news analysis, Business, April 4):

Ms. Cohen is right to argue that the service sector will be the key to economic growth in the future. However, it’s essential to consider what service jobs are — and who will be doing them.

Of course, the service industry includes office workers in tech hubs like Bengaluru, as highlighted by Ms. Cohen. Currently, these jobs are held predominantly by men, so to spur inclusive growth, employers and governments must make sure women have equal access.

But the service sector also includes hundreds of millions of people — mostly women — who are teachers and who care for children, older people and those with disabilities and illnesses. To seize the opportunity ahead, governments must position care jobs as careers of the future for women and men, alongside tech jobs. This requires making sure these positions provide good pay and working conditions.

If the goal is sustainable growth, the best approach leverages the critical care sector to generate income in the short run and prepare healthy, well-educated young people, which maintains progress in the long run.

Anita Zaidi Seattle The writer is president of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Gender Equality Division.