The U.S. Constitution in Five Minutes - Joseph L. Smith
4. Racism in the Constitution
The U.S. Constitution in Five Minutes - Joseph L. Smith
Leslie F. Goldstein [+]
University of Delaware
Leslie F. Goldstein is the Judge Hugh M. Morris Professor Emerita of political science at the University of Delaware. Her primary research interests are in the fields of constitutional law and political philosophy, especially the intersection of these fields and the rights of women and racial minorities.
Description
The Constitution speaks with two voices on slavery and racial discrimination: the due process, bill of attainder, ex post facto, trial by jury, and titles of nobility clauses protect liberty and equality; the euphemistic clauses on slave trade, fugitive slave, and three-fifths representation protected race-based slavery. This ambiguity resulted in a Civil War and then 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to end both slavery and racial discrimination by government. Native American tribes in the Constitution are treated as semi-sovereign nations with whom Congress can make treaties and regulate commerce, but eventually Congress gave U.S. citizenship to all individual American Indians.