Today is Constitution Day. On September 17, 1787, thirty-nine delegates signed the Constitution in Philadelphia.
The Framers knew they had not written a perfect document, so they built in a way to change it: Article V. They also made it deliberately difficult, so changes would require a broad national consensus rather than a passing majority.
Two Steps: Proposal and Ratification
Proposal can happen in one of two ways:
- Two-thirds of both the House and the Senate vote to propose an amendment, or
- Two-thirds of state legislatures (34 states) apply for a convention to propose amendments. This method has never been used
Ratification also has two possible routes, chosen by Congress:
- Three-fourths of state legislatures (38 states) approve, or
- Three-fourths of states approve through state ratifying conventions. This has been used once, for the Twenty-first Amendment, which repealed Prohibition in 1933
The President has no formal role. An amendment does not require a signature and cannot be vetoed.
The Record
- 27 amendments have been ratified out of thousands proposed in Congress
- The first ten, the Bill of Rights, were ratified together in 1791
- The Reconstruction Amendments, the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth, abolished slavery, defined citizenship and protected voting rights regardless of race
- The Eighteenth Amendment established Prohibition, and the Twenty-first repealed it, the only amendment ever repealed
- The Twenty-seventh, which delays congressional pay raises until after the next election, was proposed in 1789 and ratified in 1992, more than 202 years later
Why Amendments Are So Rare
Requiring supermajorities in Congress and the states means an amendment must win support across regions and parties. The Equal Rights Amendment, proposed by Congress in 1972, illustrates the difficulty: disputes over ratification deadlines and states that later voted to rescind their approval have kept its status contested for decades.
Because formal amendment is so difficult, much constitutional change has come through court interpretation instead, which is why judicial appointments draw such intense attention.
A Living Responsibility
The Constitution belongs to the people. Article V puts the final word in the hands of the people’s representatives in Congress and the states. On Constitution Day, the best way to honor the document is to read it. It takes less than an hour.
Keep Digging With Truth Agent
This article is a starting point. Truth Agent puts the public record at your fingertips, including the Constitution, federal law, regulations, court opinions and oversight reports, so you can read every amendment, including those that failed, and the debates behind them without relying on anyone’s summary, including ours.
Read Next on Truth Trench
- The Bill of Rights, Amendment by Amendment
- The Fourteenth Amendment: Citizenship, Due Process and Equal Protection
- The Constitution: America’s Framework for Government
