6
The Constitution’s Deep Roots
and adopted after the Second World War. The oldest and most respected
constitution is the Constitution of England. It dates back to the beginning
of the thirteenth century.
Much of the written Constitution of the United States is derived from
the ‘‘unwritten’’ English Constitution—or, to be more precise, from the
English Constitution as it stood during the latter half of the eighteenth
century. For England’s constitution developed and changed over the centuries. By 1774, when the American struggle for independence began, the
fundamental laws of England were very different from what they had
been in 1215, the year when King John accepted the constitutional document known as the Magna Charta. All good constitutions change over
the years because the circumstances of a nation change. As the great
parliamentary leader Edmund Burke put this in the eighteenth century,
‘‘Change is the means of our preservation.’’ But good constitutions also
contain many provisions that are permanent. These are principles and
rules of law that help prevent rash or hasty changes which might work
mischief. Unlike the English Constitution, which can be changed by a
mere statute of Parliament, the American Constitution can be formally
changed only when a large majority of the people, through their States,
approve an ‘‘amendment.’’
The American Constitution is like the English Constitution in another
way. Both \