The United States Constitution stands as a foundational document not only for the nation but also for the legal profession, guiding the interpretation and application of law in courts across the country. In Philadelphia, the U.S. Constitution is not just a piece of legal text but a living symbol of justice and democratic ideals. For legal professionals practicing in and around Philadelphia, the Constitution represents a powerful connection to the origins of American law. Our members share their thoughts, experiences, and perspectives on this document that is constantly being analyzed and interpreted.
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I like to believe the framers of the Constitution were or aspired to be good parents. A good parent sets good examples. Parents who grew up in the 80s never want to hear their kid say, in response to something they did wrong, “I learned it from watching you.” In this regard, it is important to remember that the Constitution created a self-governing form of government. Citizens elect representatives to make and enforce laws that apply equally to all. How can we, as citizens, be expected to follow the law when those we elect to make and enforce the law do not? Our constitutional form of government was created to hold everyone equally accountable, government officials and its citizens alike. Likewise, a good parent does not punish their child for copying their parents’ behavior.
A good parent helps their child set goals. Recognizing it is not always easy or even achievable to meet those goals. The preamble to the Constitution recognizes an ever reaching goal, “...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…” The preamble does not state citizens must form a more perfect union. Rather, it simply states, “in order to…” this is what you can do. Similarly, a good parent guides their child to help them be the best version of themselves.
A good parent admits mistakes and learns from them. A good parent ensures their child knows they are not perfect, and that there is always room for improvement. Although a good parent maybe cannot help but see their own child as perfect, they know better, and teach their child to see beyond themselves, to be flexible, to see faults in themselves, and to be willing to change course if and when necessary. Article V to the Constitution recognizes that it is not a perfect document. Whenever two thirds of both the Senate and House of Representatives shall deem it necessary, they shall propose amendments to the Constitution. Following the ratification of the Constitution, changes, i.e., amendments were needed to, among other things, abolish slavery and to ensure all citizens, regardless of race or gender, have the right to vote.
A good parent puts their child’s needs in front of their own and recognizes what works for them may not be the best way for their child. Along these lines, the First Amendment ensures our government “shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” The well-known motivation for this clause was the desire of our founders to exercise their chosen religion, not have it imposed upon them. A good parent helps their child see all the different options in front of them and lets the child figure out what is best for themselves.
And a good parent recognizes their power and influence over their child yet exercises restraint. Articles I, II, and III of the Constitution were designed to dilute power. To ensure no one person or group of people becomes too powerful and prevent its citizens from carrying on in a free world. A good parent succeeds when their child recognizes and rejects repression, and is able to, in the pursuit of happiness, carry on in a free world.
Howard A. Rosen
President/Owner
H. Rosen Law, P.C.
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The Constitution is a document that I struggle with almost every day – often not by choice, given that I am a law student. As I review for my Constitutional Law final and revisit cases such as Dred Scott v. Sandford and Plessy v. Ferguson, where the courts’ racist readings and applications of the Constitution prevailed, I am reminded not only of the power of the Constitution but also of its failures. Oh, how wonderful it is that it has survived all this time - 250 years! Wars! Political crises! Social upheaval! But survival alone is not a virtue. The more difficult question is: at what cost has it endured?
At times, I wonder whether the United States needs a new Constitution altogether, as many nations have adopted in more recent history. That question feels especially urgent when confronting the Constitution’s origins and the ways it has been interpreted to preserve hierarchy rather than justice. From its inception, the document protected enslavers’ rights to human ‘property’ while denying the humanity of Black people. Has the Second Founding taken that place? In Dred Scott, one of the Court’s central arguments was that there was no textual basis for recognizing Black people as citizens. Yet the Constitution did contain textual compromises that treated enslaved people as less than fully human. Case closed. The document gave the justices enough constitutional grounding to deny citizenship and personhood to those who were enslaved or could be enslaved.
Similarly, in Plessy, the Court framed itself as merely an interpreter of the Constitution, detached from moral responsibility. The justices suggested that the Constitution could neither create nor eradicate social prejudice; it could only reflect the law as written, and the law being challenged as reflective of people’s viewpoints. However, Constitutional interpretation is never neutral. When the Court upheld segregation under the doctrine of “separate but equal,” it did more than interpret a document - it legitimized racism through law. The Court repeatedly deferred to the so-called “will of the people”, yet a collective desire to segregate and subordinate others should never be mistaken for a legitimate constitutional principle (or should it?).
These decisions are not relics of some distant and disconnected past. They continue to shape our institutions, our legal doctrines, and national education. We rarely confront the extent to which constitutional interpretation has perpetuated injustice well into modern history. We speak reverently about the Constitution while too often ignoring the suffering that has been justified in its name.
Clearly, the Constitution is not meaningless. Its imperfections force us to reckon honestly with the history and present of this country. The Constitution reveals who this nation was at its founding: a democracy built alongside exclusion, racial hierarchy, and supremacy. This should not be romanticized, but perhaps the Constitution’s greatest value is that it exposes the unfinished nature of the American project.
The Constitution's contested nature proves its value. Its vagueness can be dangerous, allowing prejudice to masquerade as a constitutional principle, but it also creates space for transformation. It must. Every generation inherits the responsibility to decide whether the Constitution will remain a tool of exclusion or become the instrument of justice.
That, I believe, is the obligation of legal professionals and law students today: not blind appreciation for the Constitution, but a willingness to challenge it, reinterpret it, and demand that it serves all people rather than the powerful. Roots do not determine destiny. The Constitution should not preserve the nation as it was; it should help us imagine what it still has the potential to become.
Laís Ramirez Santoro
J.D. Candidate
Temple University, Beasley School of Law
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Take the oath for admission to the United States Supreme Court Bar. Enjoy special seating access to the Courtroom to hear oral arguments and rulings and to the Supreme Court library. And you can argue a case before the Court. Hearing the Justices read their opinions brings the law to life. David Rubenstein interviewed Justice Thomas in the Courtroom. I spoke with Justice Ginsburg about judicial independence after the Admissions Ceremony in the West Conference Room of the Courthouse.
Waiting for Chief Justice Roberts to say, “You are now admitted,” I carried my current pocket copy of the Constitution, given to me as a member of the Constitution Center. Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. inspired me to carry one the first time I saw him, when I was still in law school. He was to give a speech at the ABA’s Section of Individual Rights and Responsibilities Program at New York University School of Law. Having lost his voice, Mrs. Brennan gave the presentation. The focus was the due process clause of the 14th Amendment making the Bill of Rights applicable to States. He expounded that while the 13th and 14th Amendments prohibit States’ abuses of power, the due process clause made the first 8 Amendments applicable to restraints on the power of State governments. President Reagan’s Attorney General, Ed Meese, argued elsewhere that the Framers intended the Bill of Rights only to apply to the national government. The different reasonings are fascinating.
I never refused an opportunity to spend a moment with Justice Brennan after a talk or at an event. He never refused a request. He believed that interpreting the Constitution relies on the underlying fundamental principles of human dignity and equality. He explained that his pocket copy of the Constitution, dog eared and worn from use, accompanied him everywhere. I never saw him without it.
Akhil Reed Amar, one of my favorite constitutional scholars, carries several pocket copies of the Constitution to share and read along with others, pulling them out of every pocket. The Constitution is a guiding force in my personal as well as my professional life as I reflect on how thorough consideration and reasoned insight can guide us from the past to present day participation in a constitutional democracy. There are Rules of Law and the Rule of Law. The Constitution consists of the ultimate Rules of Law. The Rules inform the manner in which we establish a governing body, protect rights, and restrain government authority. The Rule of Law ensures that no one is above the law. I carry several copies. Now, my pocket Constitution is dog eared and worn.
Leslie Goldberg
Attorney
Law Offices of Leslie Ilene Goldberg
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What does the Constitution mean to me? When I hear this question, I immediately think about Frederick Douglass’ speech given on July 5, 1852, “The Meaning of July Fourth to the Negro.” That speech was a scalding indictment of the hypocrisy of white Americans who celebrated freedom while denying it to three million enslaved Black men, women and children:
The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn.
Thirteen years after Douglass’ soul wrenching speech, the fetters of chattel slavery were broken in 1865 by ratification of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. A period of reconstruction followed which saw Congressional adoption of civil rights laws intended to afford the newly freed Black Americans with the same rights as white Americans.
Yet in 2026 I find myself as a Black woman, struggling with the same feelings expressed more eloquently by Frederick Douglass. The recent year has seen civil rights laws stripped of their original intent and utilized as a cudgel against fairness and equal access to justice. Born in 1956, I am a first-generation beneficiary of the 1964 Civil Rights and 1965 Voting Rights Acts. Leading up to that landmark legislation, I never had to experience the burn of a cigarette butt on my arm, the force of a fire hose, the bite of a snapping police dog, or the indignity of a literacy test. Even so I have experienced racial discrimination firsthand in this country including in my beloved city of Philadelphia. Despite these experiences, I continued to hold fast to a belief that our Constitution and laws are worthy of the oath I pledged to defend.
As many will celebrate America 250 with glee, I reserve space for sober reflection of where we’ve been and where we’re going as a nation. I seek solace in Douglass’ wise admonition that nations of the world endure for thousands of years, and America is just a mere infant:
The eye of the reformer is met with angry flashes, portending disastrous times; but his heart may well beat lighter at the thought that America is young, and that she is still in the impressible stage of her existence. May he not hope that high lessons of wisdom, of justice and of truth, will yet give direction to his destiny? Were the nation older, the patriot's heart might be sadder, and the reformer's brow heavier. Its future might be shrouded in gloom, and the hope of its prophets go out in sorrow. There is consolation in the thought that America is young.
My hope for my country is guarded by the recognition that America was founded on principles of freedom and equality even when those liberties were denied to my ancestors. A river of blood has been shed for me to enjoy these freedoms, and I cannot allow despair to betray those ancestral sacrifices. I will continue to hope that the “high lessons of justice and truth” will inspire future leadership of our country and serve as a beacon to generations yet to come.
Michelle Flamer
Retired Senior Attorney
City of Philadelphia Law Department
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When I was in middle school in Huntsville, Alabama back in the late 80s, I was in a history class where we prepared entries for the American Legion Oratorical Contest. I worked hard on my short speech, and even though I did not progress very far in the competition, I was hooked on the debate and drama and the incredible foresight that went into the writing of the Constitution. It was the first time I had been exposed to “primary sources” such as the Federalist Papers and Anti-Federalist Papers. And the secondary source that helped me understand it? “Miracle at Philadelphia: The Story of the Constitutional Convention” by Catherine Drinker Bowen. I had no idea at the time that one day I too would one day be a Philadelphian.
What struck me then is that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are straightforward. The Constitution was democratic—ready to be understood and debated by an educated citizenry, not just experts like lawyers and judges.
I eventually became a political science student at the University of Pittsburgh where the Constitution and its interpretation loomed over most American government courses, but also in the comparative studies classes: the U.S. Constitution was so revolutionary and the political culture it created so unusually stable that many drafters of other constitutions would draw upon it for ideas. After undergrad, I was admitted to Temple University Beasley School of Law and got to study the Constitution again, but now with a focus on how the Constitution applies to a lawyer’s work. My con law class was with Professor Kairys, and I loved getting to see how the structure of the Constitution continued to operate in our modern world.
The Revolution of 1776 threw off British rule, but it did not establish an effective national political framework. Making the Articles of Confederation work depended too much on people of exceptional ability choosing to sacrifice together. The Constitution birthed a national government and political culture capable of uniting the country together which was tested and did not fail even under the strain of the Civil War.
I suspect the single biggest structural reason for its success was setting up an extremely democratically responsive chamber, the House of Representatives, with short two-year terms, forcing the national government to stay closely linked to the popular mood. But its second most important innovation was formally splitting the Executive branch from the Judicial and placing both as coequal branches with the Congress. The President of the United States, unlike a monarch, is legally just like every other citizen and subject to the law. And the Supreme Court was a significant step in the professionalization of judges, since the position came with lifetime tenure and income.
I expect that Constitutional questions will continue to inform political debates for the rest of my working career as an attorney, and likely for as long as I am able to follow politics. As hobbies go, I think I made a fortunate pick.
Long may the miracle at Philadelphia continue—showing the world the beauty of self-government.
Adam H. Davis
Document Review Attorney
Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP
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Days after the Constitution was signed, the document was typeset for a newspaper called The Pennsylvania Packet. For the vast majority of Philadelphians who were not members of the Constitutional Convention held at Independence Hall, this was a first glimpse at the document organizing their federal government. The content of the document ensured that the newspaper was not merely making an academic presentation but rather currying an invitation, beckoning the public’s participation in the young nation’s legal systems.
The supreme law of the land, as any text creating multiple rights, has been regularly self-reconciled in the courts of the United States. Attorneys, like elementary civics students, have been perpetually made aware that one actor’s rights end where another’s begin.
A single clause, such as the Takings Clause, can illustrate this premise. Say you have watched your children grow in your front yard. Now the state attempts bona fide negotiations with you, offering what its appraisers deem just compensation, for the reasonably necessary acquisition of a portion of that front yard for a public use. On the other hand, perhaps you are an individual whose interests are protected by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). You cannot make use of the antiquated sidewalk that abuts the front yards of several houses on your way to work. Your state legislature has delegated authority to the state’s department of transportation to expand the sidewalk by reducing the front yards of those houses in order to achieve compliance with the ADA. Faced with these facts, a trial court shall decide whether individual property rights must yield to the public’s interest in the use of the land.
As we reach a quarter of a millennium since American independence, we are beckoned to participate in our nation’s legal systems by substantially the same Constitution, with fewer than thirty amendments. The low rate of revision to the Constitution is not strictly an indication of its having been fortunately drafted for good aging in a fast-developing world. It is also an indication of the fact that American courts have preserved the document against attacks of inconsistency by reconciling the various rights it simultaneously affords.
Benjamin Salvatore
Incoming Associate Attorney
Wade Clark Mulcahy LLP
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As we approach the semi-quincentennial of our nation, I find myself returning not to abstract ideals, but to the very real, very personal promise I made when I took my oath as a lawyer. The Constitution has never been, for me, a distant historical document. It is a living framework that has shaped how I think and how I show up as an attorney and as a citizen.
When I stood before then-President Judge Alex Bonavitacola and swore to “support, obey and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this Commonwealth,” I understood those words as a professional obligation. I have come to see them as something deeper: a call to stewardship.
The Constitution is not self-executing. It relies on each generation, and particularly on those of us in the legal profession, to give it meaning, to test its limits, and to protect its integrity. This is something I was taught by my father, Richard F. Furia, Esq., and his father, the Honorable Edward W. Furia, Sr., both of whom viewed the Constitution as an enduring covenant, one that requires each generation to defend and carry it forward.
In my work advising lawyers and law firms on business strategy, public relations and reputation management, I often emphasize the importance of answering the “why” before the client asks. The Constitution demands the same discipline of us. Why does due process matter? Why must we safeguard free expression, even when it is uncomfortable? Why does the rule of law require consistency, even when outcomes may be unpopular?
Without those guardrails, we lose more than just legal structure. We lose trust.
The Constitution is both durable and fragile. Durable in its design, its ability to adapt, and its endurance over 250 years. Fragile in that it depends entirely on our willingness to uphold it, especially when doing so may feel inconvenient or be contested. I have seen firsthand how quickly misinformation, polarization, and attacks on institutions can erode public confidence. In those moments, our role as lawyers becomes even more critical.
The Constitution has guided me to lead with clarity and conviction. It has reminded me that silence can be complicity, and that our professional responsibility extends beyond client service to the preservation of the system itself. Whether advising on risk, navigating crisis, or shaping narrative, I am constantly aware that the principles embedded in the Constitution, such as fairness, accountability and transparency, are not theoretical. They are operational.
As members of the Philadelphia Bar Association, we are uniquely connected to the birthplace of this document. That proximity is not just geographic; it is symbolic. It should compel every one of us to engage more actively, to speak more deliberately, and to act more courageously. This responsibility is not theoretical. It is reflected in the work of lawyers in our own community who show up every day to give meaning to constitutional protections.
A woman who embodied the U.S. Constitution is Deborah Willig, the first woman Chancellor of our Bar Association and the managing partner of Willig, Williams & Davidson. She exemplifies this through her advocacy for workers and her commitment to ensuring that the promises of due process and equal protection are accessible to all, not just those with the loudest voices or deepest pockets. During her chancellorship, she focused on access to justice, advocating for legal services for underserved and working-class communities. She encouraged and supported public interest lawyering, elevating the importance of representing individuals, not just institutions. And she exemplified civic engagement by lawyers, reinforcing the idea that attorneys have a responsibility beyond their clients to the legal system and society. This is the living embodiment of our Constitution.
This anniversary is not simply a moment of celebration. It is a moment of reflection and recommitment. The Constitution has influenced me by setting a standard, one that requires vigilance, integrity, and action. It has guided me to ask not only what the law allows, but what it demands of us as its stewards.
If we take that responsibility seriously, then the Constitution will continue to endure as a lived commitment carried forward by those sworn to defend it.
Gina Rubel
CEO & General Counsel
Furia Rubel Communications, Inc.
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I was about eight years old when my dad sent me across the street to watch my mom vote. To witness "democracy in action" as he put it.
He had read me a story about the women's suffrage movement the night before. When my mom and I returned home from the polling place, my dad asked me what I thought. I told him it was boring because no one was turned away like the suffragists in the story were.
By the time I turned 18 and cast my own ballot for the first time, I had a deep appreciation for the tremendous sacrifices made for me to exercise this most basic of rights. I had watched movies, read books, written papers, and even made my own video project for school on the suffrage movement. I had visited Seneca Falls, New York. On my eighteenth birthday, I wore a shirt I bought there with the words "I Would Have Been a Suffragist" printed on it. I wear it every Fourth of July, too.
But the biggest impact the 19th Amendment to our Constitution has on me isn't the suffrage it affords me. I exercise that right twice a year. But I wake up in Philadelphia almost every day.
I'm from small-town Indiana, but I wanted to live in Philadelphia from the time I first visited at fifteen years old until I moved here at twenty-two. My dad was a U.S. history teacher; my family didn't take vacations. We went on field trips. And after our 157th battlefield (give or take), we visited the birthplace of democracy in the United States. And I thought - as it turns out, correctly - that Philadelphia must be the greatest city in the world.
But even more than I wanted to live in this city that is more wonderful and grittier yet kinder than I could have possibly guessed all those years ago, I wanted to be just like Alice Paul, my absolute favorite of the suffragists. And so, I applied to Penn Law (and yes, I know Alice Paul went to American University for law school and studied sociology at Penn, but let's not get caught up on the details). And I was so fortunate to be admitted, but I was even more fortunate to be engaged to a woman who, despite the 650 miles we would have to move to get here, told me that nothing short of living my dream was acceptable.
We've lived in Philadelphia for six years now. Your math is correct: We moved during the peak of the pandemic. But we fell in love with this city from the jump anyway. This place where you can just, on any day of the week you are so inclined, go sit outside Independence Hall. In the summer, you can even have a drink in your hand and enjoy the view from Independence Beer Garden. Philly is also just two hours by train from New York City and Washington, D.C., so you can visit those two inferior, but still incredible, cities on any given weekend. And perhaps best of all for a kid from Indiana who grew up a competitive swimmer, the Shore is just an hour away.
So, I can safely say that the 19th Amendment has given me much more than your average woman: I don't just owe my public, political life to those who fought so hard for our suffrage. I owe my personal, everyday life to them (and to my wife) as well.
Haley Ferise
Associate Attorney
Levy Konigsberg LLP
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In 2025, I had the privilege of serving as the Chancellor of the Philadelphia Bar Association. This role provided me with tremendous opportunities to champion the rule of law and be in a position to stand for our democracy and equal access to justice. It also provided me the opportunity to reflect on our great country and the Republic that was created 250 years ago when the U.S. Constitution officially became the foundational legal document of the United States of America, having been signed here in Philadelphia just blocks from the home of the Philadelphia Bar Association.
When I hear the first three words of the preamble of the U.S. Constitution, “We the People,” I think about how these words describe all of us – those who were born here, those who have chosen this country as their home, and all of those who commit to the ideals of the U.S. Constitution and strive to the make this country the best it can be for the people, by the people. As the daughter of two naturalized U.S. citizens, I know firsthand what the protections of our Constitution mean to people who give up everything to become a part of this country.
For me, the U.S. Constitution acts as the bedrock of the rule of law in the United States. While it is not a perfect document, it has carried us through some of the hardest times in our history when applied with empathy, dignity, and grace for humanity. To me, the U.S. Constitution has been a promise of equal access to justice for all. At times, when I feel that our Republic is slipping away, I am reminded that as lawyers, judges, legal professionals and Philadelphians, we can safeguard the ideals and fundamental values of the U.S. Constitution, including the separation of powers in the federal government to ensure that no one person or ideology controls our democracy. It reminds me that we must continue to fight, especially at this time when our democracy is under attack, seemingly almost daily.
Awe, the concept of being amazed outside of yourself, is what I think of when I think of the U.S. Constitution and what has been created by its words and what is imperative to preserve. While there may be times that it seems like we are poised to lose some of our hard-fought and hard-won rights as a society, the U.S. Constitution and those who preserve its true meaning gives me hope. My hope comes from all of us who are using our voice and our positions to preserve and keep safe the rights that have been bestowed upon us by our founders in creating the U.S. Constitution and the United States of America.
Katayun Jaffari
Chair, Corporate Governance
Co-Chair, Capital Markets and Securities
Chair, Environmental, Social, and Governance
Cozen O'Connor
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I am a fan of the Constitution. There it is, a controversial position bravely put in print for all to see. What can I say, I’ve grown tired of playing it safe and saving my edgiest views for private company.
I’m joking, of course. Publicly appreciating the Constitution is about as risky as admitting you like Tom Petty. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a heel to argue the counterpoint.
For nearly 250 years, giants of thought and pen have eloquently tackled the Constitution’s brilliance. There’s not much I can add to the impressive canon addressing its substance.
As a mediator, I spend my days in rooms where agreement can feel impossible —where each side is often convinced that compromise means surrender. Perhaps that is why I think we lose sight of the process that brought about the Constitution.
As a country, we tend to treat the Constitution as if it were delivered from God’s lips to the parchment upon which it was written. But it was not so providentially delivered.
It was the product of 97 days of vigorous negotiation between 55 delegates, many of whom loathed one another. Although the stakes were higher, the dynamics were not so different from the disputes I see every day in mediation rooms: entrenched positions, mutual distrust, and the constant risk of impasse.
And the issues debated and resolved were neither small nor inconsequential. And many of those compromises came at a profound moral cost.
Northern delegates agreed to allow the transatlantic slave trade to continue at least until 1808 and to include the Fugitive Slave Clause in the Constitution. The Three-Fifths Compromise inflated representation for slaveholding states while denying enslaved people any voice at all. Equal representation in the Senate further entrenched regional power imbalances. The structure included a strong executive, to the dismay of Anti-Federalists. Even the Bill of Rights began as a concession by Federalists who feared it would weaken the new government.
To me, the Constitution is not just a founding document—it is the most consequential mediated agreement in history.
As lawyers, we needn’t pore over James Madison’s notes from the Convention to understand how close the delegates came to failure. The signs are clear: brinkmanship, deadlock, and landmines around every corner. It’s remarkable they walked out of Independence Hall with a deal intact.
Yet, we now regard the final product with near reverence.
There is something curious about that. The Constitution—often treated as flawless—to this day contains heinous provisions like the Fugitive Slave Clause. As I sometimes pointedly ask my originalist friends: have you ever in a hotly contested dispute reached a settlement full of painful concessions, and then thought that every word should be frozen in time for centuries?
But that is precisely the point.
The Constitution was the best deal that could be had. And it created a framework that could evolve. Through amendment, conflict, litigation and continued struggle—from the Civil War to the Civil Rights Movement—it has been reshaped in pursuit of a more just society. And that work is not over.
As a mediator, I see a profound lesson here.
The next time you are in a bare-knuckled negotiation headed toward impasse, think about the Constitution. Remind yourself—and your client—that you are not drafting an agreement to endure centuries and withstand the scrutiny of scholars. You are trying to solve a problem that feels unsolvable today. That perspective—seeing agreement as progress, not perfection—can create the conditions that allow for resolution.
The framers did not resolve every issue. They did not achieve justice in every provision. But they avoided collapse.
They created a framework that allowed a fractured collection of states to function together, and to improve over time.
No one leaves a difficult negotiation fully satisfied. But the alternative to an imperfect agreement is often no agreement at all.
The Constitution is not a sacred artifact frozen in time. It is a living example of what is possible when we choose progress over purity. It is a reminder that even flawed compromises can create a better reality than continued conflict, and that the arc of justice does not have to end when the deal is signed.
Kevin Dulaney
Mediator & Arbitrator
Kevin Dulaney ADR
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Constitution oh constitution, wherefore art thou, oh constitution? Why hast thou forsaken me?
Ok…I know I’m mixing Shakespeare and the Bible…but you get my drift.
These are challenging times.
For fifty years, I have considered myself a civil rights lawyer for children. I read Simple Justice in law school and wanted to follow in the footsteps of Thurgood Marshall and his colleagues at the NAACP LDF who secured one of the most important civil rights victories in American legal history in Brown v. Board of Education. I came of age through the 1960s and 70s and wanted to pick up where the civil rights and women’s rights leaders of those tumultuous years left off. With three Temple Law School classmates, I co-founded Juvenile Law Center, with the idealistic vision to use the law to build a better and fairer justice and child welfare system for children. I can still remember my first visit to the U.S. Supreme Court to hear arguments in Pennhurst v Haldeman, a case involving the civil rights of mentally ill people. I was awestruck by the physical majesty of the Court as well as the towering intellect of the Justices.
That was then. This is now. As the Phyllis Beck Chair at Temple Law School for Spring 2026, I have just completed teaching constitutional law to 78 first year law students. Reading 250 years of U.S. Supreme Court cases, it turns out, is the antidote to idealism. While I along with many colleagues have had enormous recent success winning victories for children before the Court under the federal Constitution, I now see the last 15 years as an exception, along with the years of the Warren Court, to what is otherwise a fairly steady stream of conservative rulings that largely preserve the status quo and differ only with respect to who is drafting them. While the Court’s ideology appears to zigzag depending upon who is in the majority, truly progressive opinions from the Court that aimed to rectify profound injustices are exceedingly rare.
And while we have tried to portray Dred Scott v. Sandford and Plessy v. Ferguson as just some embarrassing detours in our constitutional history that have long since been corrected, the Court’s most recent decision in Louisiana v. Callais has turned a shameful duo into a modern-day doctrinal triplet reinforcing and resurfacing the racist foundations of our constitutional democracy.
I carry a copy of the Constitution in my handbag. But now I do it not to celebrate it, but to remind myself how limited it is in its ability to protect us. As a document that was adopted by an electorate that excluded women and Black people, recent decisions issued by the new conservative majority on the Court have construed that document to once again turn women and people of color into second class citizens, stripping women of their right to reproductive autonomy in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and stripping non-white voters of their right of equal access to be represented and to be heard in our political system in Callais.
It turns out the wear and tear of my pocket Constitution mirrors the current frail and frayed spirit of the original document. While the Founders and early Justices understood the document as intentionally vague to allow for future generations to adapt its provisions to their own, different times, that spirit has been hijacked by originalists who refuse to wrest the Constitution’s words from their 18th and 19th century straitjackets. The Constitution’s focus on prescribing what government cannot do, rather than prescribing guarantees for individual rights, equality and opportunity, provides insufficient protection against the current conservative headwinds. The document’s inherent limitations are compounded by a Court majority willing to twist facts and law to achieve their anti-democratic and anti-egalitarian goals.
So, I am not feeling particularly celebratory as we approach the 250th birthday of America. But even as I despair the current moment, I refuse to give in. I am disappointed, but not without hope. I understand the built-in constraints of our Constitution, but I believe it can still be an instrument of justice, in the right hands. I will continue to carry it around, to be ready for the day it stands for good.
Marsha Levick
Co-founder, Deputy Director and Chief Counsel
Juvenile Law Center
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The U.S. Constitution is bound with my identity. I grew up at a time when school kids had to learn the Constitution, and then we were tested on it in exams that if memory serves me right, were extremely rigorous for grade schoolers! I am glad I grew up with this foundation in my education. It influenced my decision to be a journalist — a member of the Fourth Estate — and it influenced my decision to go to law school. I may have well been a different person if I had grown up somewhere else, without the rights and ideals of the Constitution.
U.S. Constitutional rights gives one confidence; it enshrines sovereignty and independence for each American as an individual and in our role as part of our collective society. The Constitution is blind; it really does not care what you look like, how much money you have, what you do for a living, your family bloodline, class, or power, or even what you think.
It is important though that a person does think, and our Constitution supports thinking. This is also why it is a confidence booster. It helps us spread our mental wings; to be the creative beings who we are meant to be. It recognizes that each being brings, or could bring, something unique to life, just by being themselves, with their own unique mind.
Even on days when it seems like humanity is not well-behaved or too highly evolved, at the very least the Constitution stands there as an ideal for me. It’s important for a person and for a society to have ideals — something higher to strive towards, to reach for, and to contemplate besides what one is going to watch on Netflix or order from GrubHub.
When the Declaration of Independence wrote about the “pursuit of happiness,” it was not setting up the government to be some kind of guarantor of personal happiness. The Constitution is not license to hedonistic freedom or an indulgence in pleasures either. Human behavior is also not solely motivated by the carrot-and-stick as if humans were simply sensory, instinctive animals. That might be the Lockean, Hobbesian, and utilitarian philosophy that has influenced modern law, but that is not what the Constitution is about.
Instead, for me, the Constitution is a recognition that each person has a mind and as such each person must be given room and respect to chase his or her bliss. This is the pursuit of happiness; a mind free and independent to chase and pursue its pet projects, interests, subjects, topics, and “stuff” when it wants, how it wants, and why it wants without restraint, reprimand, or retribution from the state. The First Amendment paves the way for the chase; an American mind free to take in what is needed and desired and then free to express it back out if it wants, how it wants, without pressure to conform to state orthodoxies and ideologies. Again, the Constitution doesn’t care what you think.
On the 250th anniversary of our independence, in this great city of Philadelphia, the Constitution for me is not about a way to maximize money, wealth, or ideologies — a person’s “utilitarian and productive capacities” for the state — but about maximizing human creativity in each of us and in society overall.
Stephanie Chodl
J.D. Candidate
Temple University Beasley School of Law
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When I think of the U.S. Constitution, I am reminded of a myriad of life experiences and narratives that have shaped me into who I am today. Growing up in a divided Korea, older generations often preached that the Korean War and the American military intervention were inevitable to protect democracy. To them, the Korean democracy was founded on the ideas of the U.S. Constitution. Oddly enough, keeping market capitalism intact outside the influences of other diverse, free stands of thought such as socialism and communism could not be tolerated if the society were to protect democracy. The logic survived multiple dictatorships and economic crashes. For many years, I remained unsuspecting of the idea until I had to live through it.
Fast forward ten years, I am living in a small, quaint college town in Florida. I am skipping town in the middle of the night to dodge right-wing extremist violence happening in town. The entire town was flooding with white nationalists who had traveled in time for a prominent right-wing figure’s speech. The county government had just declared an emergency in light of the speech. For the first time in my life, I heard gun shootings within earshot when a mob of extremists took over a part of the town’s busiest corner. Within minutes, I picked up my haphazardly packed bag and left the town to take refuge in another state until it was safe enough. As a non-white, non-citizen immigrant and student, my visible traits made me an easy target.
With no destination in sight, I drove on until I reached Baton Rouge. The familiar dense humidity and magnolia trees in full bloom lured me into the city. I found myself cruising without navigation in a serene neighborhood where I spent a youthful year. I finally pulled over onto the parking lot of the elementary school I attended. I sat on the bench where I used to chatter away with my Black classmates. As I set my gaze on the empty playground, I remembered being mocked at by white students who were bussed from another school every week to attend the extended program at my school.
At the school, I was the only Asian kid amongst Black-majority students and white-majority teachers. Coming from a colorblind (more accurately put, unicolor) Korean society, I never fully grasped my place within the school. Teachers lumped me with the white students whenever I excelled at tests or behaved well; otherwise, I was placed in the Black peers’ group. It was a mystery that I had to be one or the other. Even in the eyes of a foreign third grader, the color line was subtle but clearly visible.
Fast forward another five years, I just pulled a seat in the front row of the audience. The freshly coated walls of the immaculate white government building in West Philadelphia reminded me of the clean slate I was about to receive after the naturalization ceremony. On paper, I would be a new person with a new name and a new passport. However, none of these new “identities” of mine would make me completely “American.” After all, my racial, ethnic, and cultural background would continue to define me precariously along the color lines. If another political violence were to hit my town, I would still have to leave town without a destination in search of safety.
I stepped up to the podium to receive my naturalization certificate when I saw a giant frame of the original Constitution hanging over my head. It was the constitution that some older Koreans treated and touted as the foundation of democracy. It was also the same constitution under which I had to encounter a most horrifying political violence and run for my life and force myself to be in one racial group over the other.
Now that I am in law school, the Constitution has entered my life professionally. It is not only an academic subject I need to learn as a law student but a professional compass I will have to practice by in the future. Even so, the Constitution will continue to live on and shape who I am in society however I intend it to be. As a future lawyer, I remind myself every day of the goal of making the best use of my personal experiences and making others’ experiences with the Constitution safer and less traumatizing.
Seyeon Park
University of Pennsylvania
