Afro-American courier. (Yazoo City, Miss.) 1926-19??, 1938-05-01
Faith Of Our Fathers
BY CHARLES H. WILSON, Social Science Department,
Acorn & NJ College

Just few months ago celebrated the birth
day of our first president George Washington and on
April 30 we observed the Inauguration of this great
personality who took the initiative to launch out our
newly equipped Ship of State. We also in the midst
Of celebrating the 50h anniversary of the formation of
our National Constitution. Thus Indebtedness is not
only to President Washington who acted chairman
of this Constitutional Convention to draw up this
immortal document, but to those fiftyfour stalwarts
who assisted him.
Their problem was to write a Constitution under
which it would be impossible for the government IN
a constitutional manner ever to deprive the people Of
their liberties People should be free to surrender them
if they wished to do That, too provided for,
but by should their liberties ever be TAX
away without their consent, and they discovered
that government in that case, must be founded on
two principles, namely: first it must be limited gov
ernment secondly it must be representative govern
ment. Wanting these principles, you may have con-
stitutonal government without liberty you know it.
You may have constitutional monarchy or consti-
tutional tyranny.
First, then, what is the meaning of limited govern
ment?
A limited government is that is permitted to
exercise only the powers that have been delegated to
it by the people, and not absolute power The original
right of the people to establish for their future gov
eminent such principles as, in their opinion, shall
most contribute to their happiness. This original
and supreme will organizes the government and assigns
to different departments their respective powers The
powers Of legislature (the congress) defined and
limited and that these limits may not be mistaken
forgotten, the Constitution is written
Such is the philosophical principle of limited con-
stitutiona government But then there must be a
mechanism. The government has got to work. The
mechanism is system of checks and balances, or
by another phase, division of powers No power
is supreme Each is complete in itself, and yet
of them represents the complete power of govern
ment There is the legislative power of Congress- COM
pete in ITSELF there is the executive power of the Pres
dent complete in itself. There is the judicial power
of the Supreme Court complete in ITSELF and yet each
of these is balanced against the other two and all
three limit ANOTHER. Nor does the complete pow
of government exist in all three of them together,
even if they should coalesce into Above them,
limiting them, is the written Constitution
Who writes the Constitution? The people do that
The people themselves constitute the only sovereign
power. They make the law, therefore, they above
the law, limited only by their wisdom, their exper-
fence and their of self-restraint
SO to the second great principle i'm
planted in the Constitution the principle of
representative This principle presents prob
lem that be solved only by people in very high
state of political developments be solved
for all and forgotten. 1t has to be met and solved