David Bobb on Washington Journal traces the Bill of Rights’ 234-year legacy, born from Virginia’s 1791 ratification and FDR’s 1941 recognition, after delegates like George Mason forced its inclusion amid 200 proposed amendments. The 14th Amendment’s due process clause later enabled selective state incorporation, though controversially. Public awareness lags—only 12% know the right to petition—while debates over rights like the Second Amendment (Heller vs. militia origins) and unenumerated protections (Ninth/Tenth Amendments) reveal deep civic engagement gaps. Bobb ties its principles to marginalized struggles, from slavery’s Declaration condemnation to women’s suffrage at Seneca Falls in 1848, framing it as a tool for solving modern challenges like homelessness. The episode underscores how constitutional literacy transforms passive subjects into active citizens, even as Congress debates healthcare and gender-affirming bans. [Automatically generated summary]
You see, I didn't even know that it was something that you could do.
And live with your life.
I thought that, and I was writing poetry from the age of 10, I guess, but it was always a secret thing.
It was a thing that I wrote and thought, okay, this is my secret.
It was my thing that I enjoyed.
I didn't realize that a little black girl could become a poet.
unidentified
Watch America's Book Club with Rita Dove.
Sunday at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern and Pacific, only on C-SPAN.
With Affordable Care Act subsidies set to expire at the end of the month, the House Rules Committee meets Tuesday to consider health care legislation aimed at lowering costs through employer-funded health reimbursement plans and cost-sharing reduction payments.
The committee will also look at two other bills related to gender transition procedures.
One barring the use of Medicaid for transition surgeries, and the other making it a felony to perform gender-affirming treatment or prescribe associated medication to anyone under the age of 18.
Watch the Rules Committee live at 2 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN 3.
C-SPAN now, our free mobile video app, and online at c-SPAN.org.
It seems kind of obvious that it should be there in the Constitution.
unidentified
Isn't that so true?
So much of our history, you know, here we are on the cusp of celebrating 250 years for the Declaration of Independence and the birthday of the country.
So much of it seems like it must have been that way, right?
The wins and the victories and the documents, they all must have just been foreordained.
But in fact, everything kind of hung in the balance.
When you had the Declaration of Independence, if you fast forward then 11 years, there's a debate over, well, what kind of form of government should we have?
We won the Revolutionary War.
The colonies won the war.
They became the United States of America.
And they said, we need a constitution.
So in that constitutional convention, over four months, long, hot days of deliberation in Philadelphia, the delegates said, let's try to put together this framework to govern us.
And there were a few of them that throughout were very skeptical of whether they were going to do the right thing when it came to actually listing the rights that the people would have.
And sure enough, when it came down to the final days, there were three delegates, including George Mason, who dissented and said, you know what, if this document does not have a list of those rights, we're out.
George Mason said that he would sooner have his right hand cut off than sign the Constitution.
And so what that happened, the Constitution did pass that body, but it was going to be sent out to the people then, to the states for ratification.
And so the wing, they came to be known as the anti-federalists that wanted a Bill of Rights, fought very hard.
They had 200 suggestions that poured in from all the different states.
They whittled it down to a number, and the people who were against the Bill of Rights, people like James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, came around to being for it because they heard the voice of the people.
And so in the first Congress, James Madison now is there as a member of the House of Representatives.
That list of 200 had been whittled down to about 19, and then it came down to 12.
And 12 actually were sent out to the states for ratification.
Only 10 came back, and that became the Bill of Rights.
And that would have meant that today, if that had been put into effect, there would be thousands and thousands of members of the U.S. House of Representatives.
So that one didn't go anywhere.
The second, what was then the Second Amendment, was really fascinating, though.
And there's a really quick story that I can relate about it, because I think for young people around the country who wonder if their schoolwork actually matters to the fate of the nation, here's a great example.
So the second one was about you need an election in between a pay raise coming to members of the Congress.
So in other words, make sure that before the members of the Senate and House vote themselves a pay increase, that it would be subjected to the will of the people.
Well, it got a few states in the early days, but then it died off and kind of laid fallow until a student back in the late 20th century, actually, was pulling together a report.
He wrote a report for his government class at the University of Texas, and he got a C.
He wrote about this thing.
Then he realized, you know what?
There's no time stamp on that particular amendment.
And so he started methodically going through.
He said, it's a pretty good idea, right?
I bet people will like this idea.
And he went and he found enough states until finally he had the requisite number and it passed and it became the 27th Amendment to the United States Constitution.
If you want to join our conversation with David Bob, if you've got a comment or a question about the Bill of Rights on this Bill of Rights Day, you can go ahead and start calling in now.
The lines are regional.
So if you're in Mountain, sorry, if you're in Eastern or Central time zones, it's 202-748-8000.
If you're in Mountain or Pacific, it's 202-748-8001.
You can go ahead and start calling in now.
I want to go through some numbers with you.
This is this year's survey of the Annenberg Constitution Day Civics Survey.
And here's what it says.
We'll put that on the screen.
That 79% of people were able to name the freedom of speech as part of the first part of the Bill of Rights.
48% name freedom of religion.
36% name the right to assembly.
And 34% name freedom of the press.
Only 12% know that there's a right to petition the government.
What do you make of those numbers?
Do you think they're high?
Do you think they're low?
Or do they not surprise you?
unidentified
They're up just a little bit.
You know, what's interesting is Annenberg does that survey every year.
And so that high number, 79% knowing about freedom of speech being in the First Amendment, is up five percentage points.
We've seen that same slight increase on some other questions too.
I think people are starting to feel the importance of civics, the importance of history, the importance of understanding these because we wonder can we talk to each other as friends, as classmates?
You know, a Knight Foundation survey revealed that two out of five kids who are in high school right now do not feel comfortable talking and disagreeing with their peers in class or with their teacher now.
And so there's a kind of concern that is registering across this country.
How do we have the requisite kind of civic knowledge to really be engaged in the way that we want to in order to make a difference?
You know, I think one of the great things that you might do is seek out that friend of yours, that person that you know that maybe you have a disagreement with around some of these big issues, some of the things that C-SPAN callers call in every day about, and ask their opinion and really listen.
That would be a great way to mark it because I think the way that we see things at the Bill of Rights Institute, we work with a network and support a network of 90,000 educators that every day that do this great work in history and civics.
And talking to people with whom you disagree sharpens each person.
It makes us a better people.
And I think that's the spirit that's at work here in Bill of Rights Day.
We'll start with Ellen in Broadview Heights, Ohio.
Good morning, Ellen.
unidentified
Hello, good morning.
Thank you.
I had a question about the incorporation of the Bill of Rights to the various states through the Supreme Court.
Once the 14th Amendment was passed after the Civil War, this was something that the Supreme Court was able to do through the due process clause.
And although it's a good thing, I think that some negatives have resulted as well.
And I was just wondering if you could speak about this.
I also think for young people, it's one of the most difficult concepts to convey to them.
Thank you, and I'll listen.
Yeah, I thank the caller for this question.
It's about the doctrine, the constitutional doctrine of incorporation.
So when the United States was formed as a country, the national government was not nearly as strong as it is today.
Most of the rules and regulations that a person would feel in their daily life came from the local governments or from the states.
And originally, as the caller is correct in saying, the Bill of Rights did not apply against activities in the states.
Over time, starting in the 20th century, the Supreme Court of the United States used the 14th Amendment to selectively incorporate these rights so that a person would have the same rights claimed against the state governments as they would against the national government.
This has been, throughout our history, controversial.
Today it is noted as settled law, and I think for very good reasons, because we recognize that you can have a tyrannical majority, whether it's in your local community, your local, the state in which you reside, or from Washington, D.C.
And the important thing to remember about the Bill of Rights is that what it is saying is you should be secure in your own life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.
You should be secure in your own life, liberty, and property.
And that's an important thing to remember as we mark this day.
This is exactly the kind of thing that young people and all Americans need to wrestle with.
Take the plain language, right?
A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
Put that down, give some documentary evidence, ask young people, this is what we do in support of our teachers all across the country, not to just take a position, but to really weigh the evidence.
What is a militia?
The caller raises this very important question.
Trace that all the way through.
Then look at the two major Supreme Court cases, Heller and McDonald, that weighed in on this and said it indeed was an individual right.
And like I was saying earlier, steel man the position that you might not agree with.
Make sure that you're stating it in the way that your opponents, say, in this debate, would recognize as a fair statement of their own.
That's the important thing about this.
And for us, we're not taking a position at the Bill of Rights Institute on policy.
We're an educational institution, so I want to be very clear about that.
What we do do is ask young people, by supporting our teachers all across this country in all 50 states in the District of Columbia, to grapple with the very questions that the caller is raising.
And to do that, you have to be able to weigh the evidence, think and work with a kind of historical perspective, and then apply that knowledge.
You know, young people are very concerned about this issue, naturally.
They are worried about this issue in many cases.
And they also, we think, have some really good ideas about what we can do to improve our country based on the principles on which it was founded.
Yeah, I've often wondered about the meanings and implications of the Ninth Amendment.
It's kind of open-ended.
It's, you know, this Constitution does not disparage any of the rights of people.
And I often wondered, I know like some, like I believe Judge Bork felt that or expressed the opinion that he didn't think the Ninth Amendment was worth the ink it was written on.
But, you know, what are the, what is the meaning?
And it's the Ninth Amendment because before the Tenth Amendment, people have individual rights that should not be disparaged because the Constitution does not specifically mention them.
Now, I'm just kind of curious, has the Ninth Amendment been important in any kind of Supreme Court decision or any kind of identification of what its meaning is and the implications of what was?
I know it's related to maybe the founders' notion of natural rights and that sort of thing.
Again, I think the takeaway is that you have to go back to the debates.
You know, we talked a little bit about how the Bill of Rights came to be.
One of the reasons that Madison and Hamilton and the Federalists were opposed to the Bill of Rights was because they worried, what if you start writing them down but you don't list them all?
Won't people wonder then about the logic of that?
Won't they think, well, if they're not written down on parchment, on paper, does that mean that I do not have those rights?
I'll just give you a quick example.
This morning I drove in from the Commonwealth of Virginia into the District of Columbia.
Nowhere does that say in the Constitution of the United States or the Bill of Rights or any even local document, I have the right to do that.
And so the concern of Madison and the concern of Hamilton was a kind of logical question here.
There came to be more than 200 suggestions, remember, of different things that should be included in the Bill of Rights.
And so the Ninth Amendment was something that Madison really wanted to include.
These kind of fundamental rights.
Remember, again, they're just very close to the Declaration of Independence.
They're very close to the Constitution having been adopted.
That sense, the caller is right, of life, liberty, and property.
Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is fundamental.
And nothing can be done on paper to erase the fact that you and all of us have those rights.
The caller, Steve, also mentioned the 10th Amendment.
So I'll just put it on the screen and have you explain it that powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the states are reserved to the states respectively or to the people.
Explain that.
And where did that come from?
unidentified
Yeah, this is another one of those kind of things when you think about it logically.
Those who oppose the Bill of Rights initially were saying, well, why would you need to codify the right to free speech and say that Congress shall have no say in that?
Wouldn't you just think logically, well, of course Congress shall have no say.
There's no authorization of Congress to do that.
So what it's saying is that the people have the rights.
We, the people, retain the rights.
And this is a really important thing because if you think of it, the Bill of Rights itself, what we're celebrating today, is a bulwark, a kind of guard against government encroachment.
The main engine of American progress throughout our history, think of taking the principles of the Declaration of Independence and applying them.
Think of what the abolitionists did in eliminating and fighting the scourge of slavery.
What suffragists did in securing the right to vote for women?
What the civil rights movement did.
We talked about the 14th Amendment.
Taking those principles and making sure that they applied to everyone.
The Bill of Rights was proof that the Constitution was amendable.
Yes?
Talk about the process of amending the Constitution.
unidentified
Sure, it's a pretty complicated thing in a way because when you think of it, we have had 27 of them, but we've also had more than 10,000 amendments proposed over time.
So the process is about really the people coming forward and having a say.
You know, you can first have two-thirds of Congress has to initiate and vote for an amendment, and then it's sent out to the states, and three-quarters of the states have to vote in favor of that particular amendment.
There's also another way where you can authorize a convention of the states that has never been done.
So all of them have had to go through that process.
But I do think it was a particular act of humility when you think of here there's this long debate in Congress, in the Constitutional Convention, and in the first Congress they're saying, we recognized right away that we needed to make 10 pretty significant changes and those have to go out to the people, those have to go out to the states.
That's what we're marking today, when Virginia became the 11th of 14 states to ratify those first 10 amendments to the Constitution.
You mentioned that your organization works with students and teachers.
What about adults?
If adults want to find out more about this, or they feel like they want more civic education, where would they go?
unidentified
We'd love to.
We, while we mainly serve those who are in the educational sphere, adults are welcome to use all of the resources because they're free of charge.
At Mybri.org, one of the things that we've been pleased to be involved in that I'll mention here too, is the National Civics B.
This is a project of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation.
And one thing we've seen that's just great is as thousands of kids across the country who are sixth, seventh, and eighth graders participate in the B, their parents, their guardians are becoming more interested.
And they're quizzing the kids and they're starting to say, you know what, I wonder if I knew or if I know enough.
So a lot of the things that we have available on YouTube are perfect for adults, they're perfect for kids.
They're really for everyone.
And one of the things that I hope we start to see more of in this country is those kind of intergenerational conversations that should be happening.
Maybe not as much as in the past around, say, the dinner table, but if you're in the car, if you're taking a walk with your kids, ask them about what's happening in the world and point them back to these big, important documents that have enshrined our freedoms.
I was just wondering if you could give us more information about the number of House of Representatives.
Like in the Constitution, you know, it's one for every 30,000.
But I know they passed a law, I believe it was in 1929, limiting the number.
So why wasn't it amended kind of thing?
Yeah, that amendment was proposed.
It actually was the first amendment in the list of 12.
It didn't make the cut, as I mentioned, because among other things, let's say that we had actually put that into effect at the rate of 30,000 people per representative.
I think I calculated it once, and it would have been something like 10,000 members of the U.S. House of Representatives now, right?
We've grown 100 times since that time.
So it was an unwieldy number.
Now I think it's more like 800,000 citizens in a congressional district.
So it's been debated over the years, but that number can be set by the Congress itself.
You know, I want to ask you about a book you wrote.
It's called Humility, an Unlikely Biography of America's Greatest Virtue.
This was back in 2013.
But, you know, humility is not in vogue in American politics.
unidentified
Yeah.
The question is, has it ever been?
You know, the reason that I wrote the book is I was fascinated at how many times an elected official will say upon being elected, I am humbled by your vote.
And then they go on and they do whatever they're going to do, right?
And you don't hear anything more about humility.
And more importantly, what do you see?
And so the question that I posed in the book is, can you be humble and can you be great at the same time?
And some of the people I wrote about are part of the unlikely story.
You know, somebody like Abigail Adams, who was a remarkable thinker and a doer, somebody that really embodied that spirit of humility.
A person like Frederick Douglass, a slave for the first 20 years of his life, who came to an appreciation of this country and its principles.
He in fact changed his opinion.
So he had some intellectual and moral dimensions to his humility.
I'd like to ask the gentleman if there's a constitutional convention required to make changes or can the president cherry-pick amendments to destroy the country one by one?
Well, the Constitutional Convention is a possibility and it has never been called and it's one of the things that I think has made people a little bit concerned about it is would the whole of the Constitution be up for grabs at that point?
Would you be able to change a lot more than just and put together more than one amendment?
The nature of our Constitutional Convention was controversial itself because it was charged with changing the Constitution, right?
The Constitution it was changing was the Articles of Convention, Articles of Confederation.
So conventions make people, the Constitutional Convention makes people nervous.
People have lots of different views about what administrations are doing to the Constitution.
But that's kind of the beauty to me of this day, that we have the ability in this country to debate these things and the freedom to have a petition for the redress of our grievances with any administration.
Can Mr. Bob speak about what has become of the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights under Trump 2.0?
It seems to be a mere shadow of its former self.
unidentified
Well, I'll be happy to speak to this from the perspective that we do our work at the Bill of Rights Institute as an educational institution.
We're nonpartisan.
We're non-ideological.
One of the key things that I think is important for young people to do, and this we see every day, is debate questions like the one that you've posed.
To take up the documents like the Bill of Rights, the Constitution itself, and the Declaration of Independence, and look at the actions of our elected officials.
Weigh them in the balance.
We have a program, for example, called Think the Vote that young people can engage in.
And they'll take up a question related to a policy matter, but they have to adduce evidence from the foundational documents so that it doesn't turn into just kind of a verbal food fight, but it really elevates the conversation.
The important thing, I think, is that we're, as a people, trying to figure these things out every day.
And this requires, as I mentioned before, a consideration of opinions that are different than your own.
Young people too often, just like adults as a whole, are in their own bubbles.
And so what's important is to find that friend, talk to that person about the views that might be opposite yours, and really be open to the fact that they might change your own opinion.
I'd like to know more about the Electoral College, the formation of it, and why we still have it in our form of government.
So the Electoral College was part of the original debate over the Constitution.
And it came about as a bunch of different compromises.
You know, the nature of politics, the nature of politics both today and in the past is one of compromise.
So it's a pretty long story.
I won't be able to get into it all, but it really has to do with how much should each state's vote be counted and how much should each state's representation matter.
So one of the key things that we've debated in this country is the institution of slavery.
And that's one of the big things that's at work in the framing of the Electoral College.
And following that, we've got Jeff on X who says, 13 states were in the Union at that time.
We, the people, were white male landowners.
unidentified
The rest didn't have these Bill of Rights.
The challenge of our American founding is, as the caller says, one in which the founders themselves, think of it, in the Declaration of Independence, two-thirds of the signers of that document themselves owned, quote unquote, other human beings.
Here's the thing.
I think whether it was Thomas Jefferson or any of those men, and they all were men who signed the Declaration, they recognized to a person that slavery was a grievous wrong.
They didn't take the steps necessary in their own lives to change the plight of those people who were enslaved under them, for most of them.
But what they did do was set up a standard.
And that standard said that human beings have the rights to life, liberty, and property.
Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
And they set up a standard that could be used by later generations.
So right away when the Declaration was announced, right away when the Constitution was announced, right away when the Bill of Rights was put forward, the people heard that loud and clear.
People who were enslaved heard it loud and clear, and they started claiming their rights.
And they said, you've put it down in your own documents.
So you think the Bill of Rights advanced the cause of freedom?
unidentified
It absolutely did.
And what happened is it took way too long.
And that is something that we can all lament.
And use as a goad to recognize and think about how do we act with a sense of urgency on behalf of people's liberties and rights.
But what we see, I'm working on a book right now on the Declaration of Independence, is immediately in the enslaved community, in people across this country, they started saying, we have rights and you should not deny them, right?
Abby Adams writes John and says, remember the ladies.
It took, you know, even when they finally got to Seneca Falls in 1848, right, it was another 70 years beyond that.
To get the vote.
To even get the vote for women.
So I think the American story of progress is one that is crooked.
Our inconstancy is something to be lamented.
But the point that I think is really, really important to remember is that we were the only country in the world that said we're going to make our cornerstone, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all people.
I'm so interested in what he's talking about, the Bill of Rights.
I think civics should be taught in the schools now.
Because when I went to school, it was so important.
I enjoyed it so much and learned a lot.
And I think what's wrong now with everything, nobody, quite a few people understand the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, but especially the Bill of Rights, what he's talking about.
I think that I feel that a lot of the older people in Congress don't even really understand what it is.
And that's why I feel that it's important that younger, the more, the younger people, young citizens, I mean, people come into Congress so that they can be aware of the rights of the American people, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.
I feel the Bill of Rights is so important.
I would just like to hear him speak on that.
Is there a way that the schools can get back into civics for the country?
I thank the caller for your sentiments.
It's vital.
You know, the average school teacher in the elementary grades is lucky if they have 20 minutes per week to do history and civics.
That's not enough time.
The promise of the American founding is something that civics is really anchored on.
Just like the last caller's question, you know, how do we understand these contradictions, right?
The promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for everyone, but yet it took so long.
These are questions that every person needs to wrestle with from an early age.
And what we see is that young Americans are capable.
You know, I was talking to a child psychologist recently, and she told me that 86% of the adjectives that we use for teenagers are negative.
Let's flip that script.
Let's say you're capable, because what we see at the Bill of Rights Institute every year is millions of young people who love the materials that their teachers are using that we publish.
They're excited to get up to learn these things and then to, you know what, go out in their communities and solve problems.
They're identifying things like homelessness.
They're grappling with questions like how do we prepare people for natural disasters.
They're taking skills that they're learning based on these ideas.
One more call for you, April in Long Island, New York.
Go ahead, April.
unidentified
Yes, good morning.
Yes, I have a question for David.
David, we were making reference to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in the Declaration of Independence.
And it was my understanding that there was a paragraph in there pertaining to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all people, which would include enslaved people.
But that paragraph was removed and it was not put back in there.
It was removed because there were some concessions that had to be made with other, I don't know who they were, but that was the only way that it would be signed.
So that life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness paragraph for enslaved people was removed.
What you may be thinking of, Caller, is a passage that Jefferson, as the draftsman of the Declaration included, that condemned King George III for violating human nature by perpetuating the slave trade.
You're right that that did not make the final cut.
It was removed because they needed consensus, and Georgia and South Carolina objected to that inclusion of the condemnation of the slave trade.
But what was important is this was not just Jefferson, it was everybody coming together to say that we're going to have a standard, and that standard is that all human beings are created equal.
We have to live up to it, and it's going to take a fight.
All right, that's David Bob, president of the Bill of Rights Institute.
Their website is billofrightsinstitute.org.
Thanks so much for joining us.
unidentified
Thank you so much for having me.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, our live forum inviting you to discuss the latest issues in government, politics, and public policy from Washington and across the country.
Coming up Tuesday morning, we'll discuss this week's votes on the future of health care subsidies, Ukraine, and other news of the day with Texas Republican Congressman Keith Self, chair of the Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Europe and a member of the Freedom Caucus.
Then the Hudson Institute's Brigham McCown on attempts by the House to vote on a bill to accelerate permitting for energy projects.
Also, Harvard Institute of Politics John DeLaVolpe talks about the Institute's new poll on young Americans and their concerns about the future.
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, joining the conversation live at 7 Eastern Tuesday morning.
On C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile app, or online at c-SPAN.org.
On Tuesday, the head of the Federal Aviation Administration, Brian Bedford, will testify before Congress for the first time since his confirmation in July.
He's expected to answer questions regarding FAA regulations, aviation safety, and issues facing the nation's air traffic control system.
Watch live at 10 a.m. Eastern on C-SPAN 3.
C-SPAN Now, our free mobile video app, and online at cspan.org.
America marks 250 years, and C-SPAN is there to commemorate every moment.
From the signing of the Declaration of Independence to the voices shaping our nation's future, we bring you unprecedented all-platform coverage, exploring the stories, sights, and spirit that make up America.
Join us for remarkable coast-to-coast coverage, celebrating our nation's journey like no other network can.
America 250, over a year of historic moments.
C-SPAN, official media partner of America 250.
President Trump signed an executive order classifying fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction.
During his Oval Office remarks, the president also weighs in on the weekend shootings at Brown University, his lawsuit against the BBC, and the death of actor and director Rob Reiner.
This came during a ceremony to recognize service members deployed to the U.S. border with Mexico.