THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA WITH ANNOTATIONS
The Preamble
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
Purpose and Effect of the Preamble
Although the preamble is not a source of power for any department of the Federal Government,[1] the Supreme Court has often referred to it as evidence of the origin, scope, and purpose of the Constitution. "Its true office" wrote Joseph Story in his Commentaries, "is to expound the nature and extent and application of the powers actually conferred by the Constitution, and not substantively to create them. For example, the preamble declares one object to be, 'to provide for the common defense.' No one can doubt that this does not enlarge the powers of Congress to pass any measures which they deem useful for the common defence. But suppose the terms of a given power admit of two constructions, the one more restrictive, the other more liberal, and each of them is consistent with the words, but is, and ought to be, governed by the intent of the power; if one could promote and the other defeat the common defence, ought not the former, upon the soundest principles of interpretation, to be adopted?"[2] Moreover, the preamble bears witness to the fact that the Constitution emanated from the people, and was not the act of sovereign and independent States,[3] and that it was made for, and is binding only in, the United States of America.[4] In the Dred Scott case,[5] Chief Justice Taney declared that: "The words 'people of the United States' and 'citizens' are synonymous terms, and mean the same thing. They both describe the political body who, according to our republican institutions, form the sovereignty, and who hold the power and conduct the Government through their representatives. They are what we familiarly call the 'sovereign people,' and every citizen is one of this people, and a constituent member of this sovereignty."[6]
Notes
[1] Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11, 22 (1905).
[2] 1 Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, § 462.
[3] McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 403 (1819); Chisholm v. Georgia, 2 Dall. 419, 470 (1793); Martin v. Hunter, Wheat. 304, 324 (1816).
[4] Downes v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 244, 251 (1901); In re Ross, 140 U.S. 453, 464 (1891).