{"id":2298,"date":"2026-06-19T22:10:34","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T22:10:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanmovershub.com\/?p=2298"},"modified":"2026-06-19T22:10:34","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T22:10:34","slug":"opinion-an-argument-for-the-divinity-of-the-u-s-constitution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanmovershub.com\/?p=2298","title":{"rendered":"Opinion: An argument for the divinity of the U.S. Constitution"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

What is so inspired about the U.S. Constitution? The doctrine of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints provides one set of answers. The Founders provide another. Together, the two sets of answers provide a compelling argument for the divinity of the U.S. Constitution and world constitutionalism. <\/p>\n

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In Doctrine & Covenants 101: 77-80, the Lord admonishes Joseph Smith to pursue legal remedies for the oppressed early Saints \u201caccording to the laws and constitution of the people, which I have suffered to be established.\u201d <\/p>\n

The Lord also indicates the purpose of the Constitution: to maintain the \u201crights and protection of all flesh.\u201d Then, in the following verses, the Lord specifies that such rights and protections are necessary for man (and woman) to enjoy agency, or the ability to choose. <\/p>\n

Interestingly, these constitutional blessings were not just for Americans but for \u201call flesh.\u201d <\/p>\n

Although freedom for all is an important goal, it is also central to the Lord\u2019s mission. To accomplish it and the Church\u2019s official recognition, freedom is a precondition. More, the restored gospel must be preached to \u201cevery nation, kindred, tongue and people.\u201d Unless this prophecy is fulfilled otherwise online, it means there must be freedom and Church recognition in every country. <\/p>\n

Thus, global constitutionalism becomes mission critical.<\/p>\n

In \u201cDefending our Divinely Inspired Constitution,\u201d church President Dallin H. Oaks identifies five ways the U.S. Constitution was inspired. It establishes popular sovereignty, or that power originates in the people. It also institutes the horizontal and vertical division of power. It protects a \u201ccluster\u201d of important rights and establishes the rule of law. <\/p>\n

All of these factors deal with constitutional content. Interestingly, most of these elements \u2014 excepting federalism and, for some aspects of parliamentarianism, separation of powers \u2014 are recognized in comparative constitution writing scholarship as normative, or desirable elements of any constitution.<\/p>\n

In contrast, the Founders thought how the Constitution was written (or its process) and who wrote it were divine. Writing to John Adams in London from Paris, Thomas Jefferson exclaimed that the Convention meeting in Philadelphia was \u201can assembly of demigods.\u201d <\/p>\n

For others, what was divine or inspired was that those demigods \u2014 whom they viewed as exceptionally different and flawed \u2014 could come to consensus. Here, it is important to note the more than skin-deep differences which existed between framers. As I have written elsewhere:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 55 Convention participants had vastly different political orientations based on nativity, religion, state loyalties and economies, military service, and slavery. \u2026 First, they spoke with a myriad of different accents, and delegates would have strained to understand one another. \u2026 In all, eight of 55 delegates were foreign born. Then there were differences of class, profession, education and experience. <\/p>\n

\u201cPerhaps the starkest contrast was between the slave haves and the have-nots. Here, the Convention was also nearly equally split. <\/p>\n

\u201cDelegates from Massachusetts and New Hampshire boasted no slaves, it being illegal (Massachusetts) or out of fashion (New Hampshire). Others from the North owned none out of principle. This included Roger Sherman, who called the institution of slavery \u2018iniquitous.\u2019 <\/p>\n

\u201cFranklin, who owned a few slaves throughout his life (but freed them before death), was later president of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society. <\/p>\n

\u201cWilliam Patterson of New Jersey owned one slave on the eve of the Convention, but quickly liberated him and wrote New Jersey\u2019s emancipation legislation in 1798. <\/p>\n

\u201cOthers, such as Gouverneur Morris, came from a slave-owning family but elected out of principle not to own them, and called slavery \u2018a nefarious institution.\u2019 <\/p>\n

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\u201cOthers from the upper South, like George Mason, condemned slavery as \u2018evil\u2019 but owned over 100 slaves, personifying perpetual cognitive dissonance. Edmund Randolph, another large slave owner, was likewise conflicted. Yet others of the Deep South \u2014 John Rutledge, Pierce Butler, Charles Pinckney \u2014 defended and justified holding property in slaves. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe difference between North and South brought the Convention more than once to its knees, with delegates threatening to abandon the Convention and even the Union, prophesying that slavery would bring about the \u2018curse of heaven\u2019 upon the nation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Given these differences, Benjamin Franklin\u2019s speech on the last day of the Convention takes on more significance:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you assemble a number of men to have the advantage of their joint wisdom, you inevitably assemble with those men, all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests, and their selfish views. From such an Assembly can a perfect production be expected? It therefore astonishes me, Sir, to find this system approaching so near to perfection as it does \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

So what about the U.S. Constitution was divine? Its content, or its creation? <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

For Franklin, the exceptional, perhaps supernatural aspect of the Constitution was the perfection of the Constitution despite the delegates\u2019 selfish interests (including slave interests). <\/p>\n

By the fall of 1787, Madison wrote to Jefferson in Paris, \u201cIt is impossible to consider the degree of concord [or agreement] which ultimately prevailed as less than a miracle.\u201d <\/p>\n

Under the pen name of \u201cCaesar\u201d in a New York newspaper, Alexander Hamilton wrote, \u201cFor my own part, I sincerely esteem it a system, which, without the finger of God, never could have been suggested and agreed upon by such a diversity of interests.\u201d <\/p>\n

Hamilton also saw the divine at play in helping the Convention achieve consensus.<\/p>\n

They were right to be astounded. From a comparative standpoint, the Convention in Philadelphia reached an extraordinarily high level of consensus, at 89%. Eventually, 49 of 55 delegates bought in. <\/p>\n

And it wasn\u2019t just a horse-traded, grit-your-teeth-and-bare-it consensus. They went home and proselytized for the Constitution. Most served under it. This level of wholehearted constitutional buy-in has never happened since, anywhere, ever. <\/p>\n

Political inclusiveness (wherein all who have a political or violence veto have a say) and consensus have become the gold standard in constitution-writing. Constitutions written via consensus are thought to have a better chance of durability. <\/p>\n

So what about the U.S. Constitution was divine? Its content, or its creation? <\/p>\n

My answer: Both. They are not unrelated. Good process is likely to produce good results. It\u2019s hard to imagine a process that includes all minorities and comes to consensus which does not yield a healthy set of rights, structural protections and pluralism, both political and religious. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s the substance plus process which \u201cbelongs to all people.\u201d Its separation of horizontal and vertical powers, the rule of law, popular sovereignty, and the protection of fundamental rights along with inclusivity and consensus-building in its creation will protect and preserve freedom for \u201call flesh.\u201d <\/p>\n

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