How Does the Declaration of Independence Influence the Constitution?

Listen to today’s episode

Subscribe to the podcast

Join The American Idea’s Listener Email list – get news about upcoming episodes and a chance to offer questions for them, too!

Understanding America’s Founding Ideas

When Americans think about the founding documents that established their nation, two texts stand paramount: the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution. Most people know these documents exist and have some general sense of their importance, but far fewer understand the profound relationship between them. This connection is not merely academic trivia. It has shaped the course of American history, influenced major Supreme Court decisions, and continues to animate debates about rights, liberty, and the proper role of government today.

What Does the Constitution Say About the Declaration?

The Constitution itself provides clues about its relationship to the Declaration. Article VII, which addresses ratification, notes that the Constitution was completed “in the year of our Lord 1787 and of the independence of the United States the twelfth.” This seemingly minor detail establishes something significant: America as a political community began in 1776 with the Declaration of Independence, not in 1787 with the Constitution.

Beyond this explicit reference, the Constitution embodies several key principles articulated in the Declaration. The Preamble’s promise to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity” reflects the Declaration’s commitment to liberty as a fundamental right. The Constitution’s prohibitions against titles of nobility and religious tests embody the Declaration’s principle of equality. The opening words “We the People” demonstrate that government derives its authority from the consent of the governed, another cornerstone of the Declaration’s philosophy.

The Articles of Confederation: A First, Failed Attempt

To fully understand the Declaration-Constitution relationship, we must look at what came between them: the Articles of Confederation. From 1781 until the Constitution’s ratification, the Articles served as America’s first national government. They failed spectacularly, not primarily because of specific structural defects like the lack of a chief executive or national judiciary, but because they failed to fulfill the Declaration’s fundamental promises.

The Declaration had proclaimed that governments exist to secure people’s natural rights on the basis of popular consent. The Articles accomplished neither goal effectively. Congress lacked the power to tax or raise troops, depending entirely on state governments to implement its decisions. This weakness meant the national government could not adequately protect citizens’ rights or truly represent their collective will. The Constitution emerged as a necessary replacement, designed specifically to create a framework that would actually realize the Declaration’s vision.

State Constitutions as a Bridge

After declaring independence from Britain, each of the thirteen states wrote its own constitution. These documents provide fascinating insight into how Americans understood the Declaration’s principles. Many state constitutions used language strikingly similar to the Declaration, asserting that all human beings possess certain inalienable, inherent, or natural rights. These rights come not from government but from God and nature itself.

The state constitutions also helped flesh out principles that the Declaration mentioned only briefly. For instance, the Declaration never explicitly names property as a natural right, though it implies the existence of rights beyond “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” State constitutions filled this gap, emphasizing the right to acquire, possess, keep, and use property as fundamental to human dignity. Similarly, while the Declaration does not elaborate on religious liberty, state constitutions recognized this as another essential natural right.

Lincoln’s “Apple of Gold”

No American statesman thought more deeply about the Declaration-Constitution relationship than Abraham Lincoln. He argued repeatedly that the two documents must be read together, that they complement rather than contradict each other. The Constitution, in Lincoln’s view, provided the specific institutions and framework needed to realize the aims spelled out in the Declaration, particularly the principle of “liberty to all.”

Lincoln expressed this vision memorably in a brief fragment on the Constitution and Union. Drawing on Proverbs 25:11, which mentions “apples of gold in pictures of silver,” Lincoln described the Declaration’s principle of liberty to all as the apple of gold, with the Constitution and Union serving as the silver frame. “The picture was made to conceal or destroy the apple, but to adorn and preserve it,” Lincoln wrote. “The picture was made for the apple, not the apple for the picture.”

This metaphor mattered because some Americans were arguing the opposite: that the Constitution should be understood independently of the Declaration, or even that the Declaration had no legal standing and therefore no relevance to constitutional interpretation. Lincoln insisted this was backwards. Without understanding the Declaration’s principles, one could not properly understand the Constitution’s meaning or purpose.

Practical Applications

Lincoln did not merely theorize about this relationship. He applied it to the most pressing issues of his era. When debating whether Congress had authority to prohibit slavery in western territories, Lincoln pointed to the Northwest Ordinance, which had banned slavery in the Northwest Territory. Significantly, this ordinance was passed twice by the First Congress under the new Constitution, with many of the same men who had written and ratified the Constitution voting for it. This historical evidence suggested that the Constitution’s authors believed Congress possessed such authority.

Lincoln also recognized, however, that the Constitution did not perfectly embody the Declaration’s principles. Slavery’s existence in the states represented a tragic compromise with the Declaration’s assertion that all men are created equal. As president, Lincoln worked to amend the Constitution through the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment, bringing the nation’s fundamental law into closer alignment with its founding principles.

Contrasting Visions Over Time

Not all American leaders have shared Lincoln’s interpretation. Calvin Coolidge, speaking on the Declaration’s 150th anniversary, embraced Lincoln’s view. Coolidge argued that the Declaration’s principles represent final truths that cannot be improved upon. “To assert that all men are created equal, that is final,” Coolidge declared. “To claim that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final.” Progress could be made in how well Americans lived up to these principles, but not in the principles themselves.

Coolidge’s predecessor, Woodrow Wilson, took the opposite view. Wilson argued that Americans should ignore the Declaration when interpreting the Constitution. In Wilson’s progressive vision, being tied to past principles prevented necessary adaptation to modern circumstances. This fundamental disagreement between Wilson and Coolidge reflects a debate that continues today.

Contemporary Implications

The question of how the Declaration relates to the Constitution remains alive in contemporary jurisprudence. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas maintains that the Constitution must be interpreted through the lens provided by the Declaration. Justice Antonin Scalia, while often aligned with Thomas on constitutional questions, disagreed on this point. Scalia focused on constitutional text and tradition, arguing that the Declaration lacks the legal standing of the Constitution and therefore should not guide its interpretation.

These competing approaches matter because they lead to different conclusions about constitutional meaning. When the Constitution’s text is ambiguous or silent on an issue, should judges look to the Declaration’s principles for guidance? Or should they restrict themselves to the Constitution’s specific words and the legal traditions surrounding them?

Why it Still Matters

As America approaches its 250th anniversary, understanding the relationship between the Declaration and Constitution remains essential. The controversies of the 1850s, the early 20th century, and today often revolve around the same fundamental questions: Do the Declaration’s principles apply to all human beings universally? Do our rights come from God or from government? Is the purpose of government to secure pre-existing natural rights, or does government determine what rights we possess?

The answers to these questions shape how we approach contemporary constitutional debates, from questions of individual liberty to the proper scope of government power. By returning to the Declaration and understanding its connection to the Constitution, Americans can better navigate these perennial challenges and work toward a political life more fully aligned with their founding principles.