For several decades, right-wing ideologues and legal scholars have argued that the US Constitution should be interpreted only in accordance with what they call the “original intention” of its authors—or what the US Founding Fathers intended.
But assuming that were really the case, how do we know what their intentions were at the time? Of course we don’t know. Only in a few cases do we have clues. Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) wrote a monograph entitled Notes on the State of Virginia during his lifetime, but it was his only one. However, Mr. Jefferson was a diligent letter writer and freely expressed his opinions in his letters. For example, on June 24, 1813 to a John WS: »The earth belongs to the living, not to the dead.«
Thomas Paine (1737–1809) was a gifted writer whose pamphlets and books lured the nation into war once morest the King of…
