The Constitution, How Did We Get It?

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How did we get it? What was going on in the 17 eighties that prompt those men to create it? And what's it for really? How do the answers inform urgent matters here and now, including not only the right wing attack on american democracy. But also the question of why or racy itself is so frustratingly hobbled.

In the summer of 1787, fifty-five men got together in Philadelphia to write a new Constitution for the United States, replacing the new nation’s original blueprint, the Articles of Confederation. But why, exactly? What problems were the framers trying to solve? Was the Constitution designed to advance democracy, or to rein it in? And how can the answers to those questions inform our crises of democracy today?

By producer/host John Biewen with series collaborator Chenjerai Kumanyika. Interviews with Woody Holton, Dan Bullen, and Price Thomas. The series editor is Loretta Williams.