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Book excerpt: “The Year of Living Constitutionally” by A.J. Jacobs
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New York Times bestselling author and humorist A.J. Jacobs previously wrote about his experiment in living life as interpreted by the Old and New Testaments in “The Year of Living Biblically.” Now, in an effort to fully understand our nation’s founding document, Jacobs embarked on a year-long quest to be the original originalist, in “The Year of Living Constitutionally” (to be published by Crown May 7). Yes, muskets were involved.
Read the book’s “preamble” below, and don’t miss John Dickerson’s interview with A.J. Jacobs on “CBS News Sunday Morning” May 5!
“The Year of Living Constitutionally” by A.J. Jacobs
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The Preamble
I recently discovered that if you walk around New York City while carrying an eighteenth-century musket, you get a lot of questions.
“You gonna shoot some redcoats?”
“Can you please leave?”
“What the hell, man?”
Questions aside, a musket can come in handy. When I arrived at my local coffee shop at the same time as another customer, he told me, “You go first. I’m not arguing with someone holding that thing.”
Why was I carrying around a ten-pound firearm from the 1790s? Well, it’s because I’m deep into my year of living constitutionally. For reasons I’ll explain shortly, I’ve pledged to try to express my constitutional rights using the tools and mindset of when they were written in 1787. My plan is to be the original originalist.
I will bear arms, but only those arms available when the Second Amendment was written. Hence the musket and its accompanying bayonet.
I will exercise my First Amendment right to free speech—but I’ll do it the old-fashioned way: by scratching out pamphlets with a quill pen and handing them out on the street.
My right to assemble? I will assemble at coffeehouses and taverns, not over Zoom or Discord.
If I’m to be punished, I will insist my punishment not be cruel and unusual, at least not cruel and unusual by eighteenth-century standards (when, unfortunately, Americans considered it acceptable to have your head stuck in a pillory and get pelted by mud and rotten vegetables).
Thanks to the Third Amendment, I may choose to quarter soldiers in my apartment—but I will kick them onto the street if they misbehave.
My goal is to understand the Constitution by expressing my rights as they were interpreted back in the era of Washington and Madison (or, in the case of the later amendments, how those amendments were interpreted when they were ratified). I want, as much as possible, to get inside the minds of the Founding Fathers. And by doing so, I want to figure out how we should live today. What do we need to update? What should we ignore? Is there wisdom from the eighteenth century that is worth reviving? And how should we view this most influential and perplexing of American texts?
I undertook this quest because reading the news over this past year led me to three important revelations.
The first revelation was just how much our lives are affected by this 4,543-word document inscribed on calfskin during that long-ago Philadelphia summer. The Supreme Court’s recent controversial decisions on a multitude of issues—including women’s rights, gun rights, environmental regulations, and religion—all claim to stem from the Constitution.
The second revelation was just how shockingly little I knew about the Constitution. I’d never even read it—not the whole thing, anyway. Thanks to Schoolhouse Rock!, I was familiar with the “We the People” preamble. And I could recall a handful of other famous passages, most notably the First Amendment, which is beloved by me and my fellow writers (as well as by my kids, who cite it whenever I ask them not to curse at me). But as for the entire document, from start to finish? Never read it.
And third, I realized just how much the Constitution is a national Rorschach test. Everyone, including me, sees what they want. Does the Constitution support laissez-faire gun rights, or does it support strict gun regulation? Does it prohibit school prayer or not? Depends on whom you ask.
And it’s not just the issues we’re divided on—it’s the Constitution itself. Is the Constitution a document of liberation, as I was taught in high school? Or is it, as some critics argue, a document of oppression? Should we venerate this brilliant road map that has arguably guided American prosperity and expanded freedom for 230-plus years? Or should we be skeptical of this set of rules written by wealthy racists who thought tobacco-smoke enemas were cutting-edge medicine?*
[* Tobacco-smoke enemas were a mainstream medical treatment for all sorts of ills. They involved hoses, smoke, and hand-powered bellows. It is quite possibly the origin of the phrase “blowing smoke up your ass.”]
It reminds me of a William Blake quote I once read about the Bible:
[We] both read the Bible day and night
But thou read’st black where I read white.
And, as with the Bible, whether you see black or white in the Constitution depends largely on one crucial question: What is your method for interpreting this text?
Should we try to discover the original meaning from when the text was written? Or does the meaning of the text evolve with the times?
In fact, the Bible-Constitution parallels helped give birth to this book. I decided to steal an idea from myself. Several years ago, I wrote a book called The Year of Living Biblically, in which I explored the ways we interpret the Bible. I did this by following the rules in the Good Book as literally as possible. I followed the Ten Commandments, but I also followed the hundreds of more obscure rules. I grew some alarmingly sprawling facial hair (Leviticus says you should not shave the corners of your beard) and tossed out my poly-cotton sweaters (Leviticus says you cannot wear clothes made of two kinds of fabric). I became the ultimate fundamentalist.
The project was absurd at times but also enlightening and inspiring. I found that some aspects of living biblically changed my life for the better (the emphasis on gratitude, for instance). I also learned the dangers of taking the Bible too literally (I don’t recommend stoning an adulterer in Central Park, even if those stones are pebble-sized, as mine were). And I learned how challenging it is to figure out what we should replace literalism with.
I’m not the first to notice that we treat the Constitution and the Bible in similar ways. Scholars have long described the Constitution as the sacred text of our civic religion. Jefferson called the delegates “demigods.” And as with the Bible, there is an ongoing debate between those who say we should hew to the original meaning and those who say the meaning evolves. It’s the originalists versus the living constitutionalists. The two camps have been around for decades, but in the past five years, the originalists have gained surprising power. Five of the six conservative justices on the Supreme Court are originalists of some sort (John Roberts is the exception), a position that has affected their rulings on abortion, gun rights, and many other topics. I felt it was time. I began prepping for a year of living constitutionally.
Excerpted from “The Year of Living Constitutionally: One Man’s Humble Quest to Follow the Constitution’s Original Meaning” by A.J. Jacobs. Published by Crown, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. Copyright © 2024 by A.J. Jacobs.
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Rep. Mike Turner says all “candidates need to deescalate” after Trump assassination attempts
Rep. Mike Turner, an Ohio Republican who chairs the House Intelligence Committee, responded Sunday to Eric Trump’s implication that his father’s Democratic opponents were responsible for the attempts on former President Trump’s life, saying the innuendo was “of course” inaccurate but political candidates on both sides of the aisle “need to deescalate” their rhetoric.
“No, of course not,” Turner said in his latest appearance on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan,” after being asked whether he believes there was truth to claims made by the former president, his son Eric, and his vice presidential running mate, Sen. JD Vance, at a rally where each either implied or suggested Democrats tried to kill him.
Trump returned Saturday to Butler, Pennsylvania, to speak to supporters gathered at the Butler Farm Show fairgrounds, the site of the July 13 assassination attempt against him. A gunman facing Trump on the podium at that rally opened fire into the crowd, grazing Trump’s ear, killing one attendee and injuring two others, according to authorities. The gunman was killed by a Secret Service sniper, officials said.
Another apparent assassination attempt happened in September when a suspect pointed a gun in Trump’s direction on the Florida course where he was playing golf. The FBI has opened probes into both incidents.
CBS News
Trump, his son and Vance all acknowledged the assassination attempt in Butler at Saturday’s campaign event.
“Over the past eight years, those who want to stop us from achieving this future have slandered me impeached me indicted me tried to throw me off the ballot and, who knows, maybe even tried to kill me,” said the former president, while Eric Trump claimed his father’s political opponents “tried to kill him, and it’s because the Democratic party, they can’t do anything right.”
Vance, in his remarks, addressed Trump’s Democratic challenger in the presidential race, Vice President Kamala Harris, and suggested that the Republican nominee “took a bullet for democracy.”
Brennan asked Turner: “You don’t mean to imply here anything that would suggest Eric Trump’s allegations that Democrats are trying to kill him?”
“No, of course not,” Turner responded. “But I do think that Vice President Harris needs to actively state and acknowledge that her administration is saying a foreign power, which would be an act of war, is actively trying to kill her opponent.”
The attempts on Trump’s life came after a citizen of Pakistan with ties to Iran was arrested and charged with allegedly planning a murder-for-hire scheme targeting Trump, among others. Although the timing of the charges coincided with the first attempt, there was no indication that the two incidents were related.
Turner criticized Harris for what he viewed as a failure to openly condemn the alleged plot.
“I think there’s certainly a role for her to play and for the president to play in this, in both identifying that there are threats against Donald Trump that need to be acknowledged and responded to, to deter,” he said. “I think all the candidates need to de-escalate, certainly in their language.”
But the congressman did acknowledge that a Biden-Harris Justice Department official, Matthew Olsen, the head of the national security division, said the U.S. government has been “intensely tracking Iranian lethal plotting efforts targeting former and current U.S. government officials — and that includes the former president.”
“I would say that we are very concerned — gravely concerned — about Iranian plotting,” Olsen told CBS News in a recent interview.
Hurricane Milton rapidly intensified into a Category 1 storm on Sunday, and it has set its path on Florida’s Gulf Coast.
Forecasters predict Milton will make landfall around the Tampa Bay area on Wednesday, bringing with it upwards of 120 mph winds and drenching an area still reeling from Hurricane Helene.
As of 2 p.m. ET on Sunday, Milton was centered about 290 miles west-northwest of Progreso, Mexico, and about 815 miles west-southwest of Tampa. It had maximum sustained winds of nearly 80 mph and was inching north-northeast at 6 mph.
Path of Hurricane Milton
A map from the National Hurricane Center shows Milton continuing to strengthen into a major hurricane as it approaches Florida’s western coast.
“Milton is forecast to rapidly intensify during the next couple of days and become a major hurricane on Monday,” forecasters said.
NOAA/National Hurricane Center
The storm is expected to remain north of Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula, with heavy rainfall expected as Milton makes its way northeast toward Florida. Tropical storm watches are currently in effect from Celestun to Cancún, Mexico.
NOAA/National Hurricane Center
The hurricane center said hurricane and storm surge watches could be issued for parts of Florida later Sunday.
Florida officials prepare for more impact
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Sunday that while it remains to be seen just where Milton will strike, it’s clear that Florida is going to be hit hard. “I don’t think there’s any scenario where we don’t have major impacts at this point,” he said.
“You have time to prepare — all day today, all day Monday, probably all day Tuesday to be sure your hurricane preparedness plan is in place,” the governor said. “If you’re on that west coast of Florida, barrier islands, just assume you’ll be asked to leave.”
NOAA via AP
DeSantis expanded his state of emergency declaration Sunday to 51 counties and said Floridians should prepare for more power outages and disruptions, making sure they have a week’s worth of food and water and are ready to hit the road.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency, meanwhile, coordinated with the governor and briefed President Biden Sunday on how it has staged lifesaving resources.
“I highly encourage you to evacuate” if you’re in an evacuation zone, said Kevin Guthrie, executive director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management. “We are preparing … for the largest evacuation that we have seen, most likely since 2017, Hurricane Irma. “
As many as 4,000 National Guard troops are helping state crews to remove debris, DeSantis said.
“All available state assets … are being marshaled to help remove debris,” DeSantis said. “We’re going 24-7 … it’s all hands on deck.”
An American climber was rescued after she and another alpinist from the U.K. were stranded for two days at more than 20,000 feet in the Himalayan mountains.
Michelle Dvorak, 31, and Fay Manners, 37, went missing on Thursday after their equipment and food tumbled down a ravine while trekking up India’s Chaukhamba mountain, CBS News partner BBC reported.
The pair sent an emergency message but search and rescue teams were unable to find them.
INDIAN AIR FORCE/Handout via REUTERS
Manners told the BBC they were “terrified” as they tried to make part of the descent down the treacherous mountains without supplies.
“I watched the bag tumble down the mountain and I immediately knew the consequence of what was to come,” she said. “We had none of our safety equipment left. No tent. No stove to melt snow for water. No warm clothes for the evening.”
The terrifying ordeal intensified when it started to snow. They took cover on a ledge while waiting for rescuers.
“I felt hypothermic, constantly shaking and with the lack of food my body was running out of energy to keep warm,” Manners said.
The rescue was made difficult because of the conditions, including bad weather, fog and high altitude.
“The helicopter flew passed again, couldn’t see us. We were destroyed,” Manners told the BBC.
INDIAN AIR FORCE/Handout via REUTERS
On the second day, the pair began to cautiously abseil down the mountain. They spotted a team of French climbers coming toward them. Manners said they shared their equipment and food and contacted the helicopter company with an exact location.
“I cried with relief knowing we might survive,” she said.
The Indian Air Force said in a post on the X social media platform that their helicopter airlifted the climbers from 17,400 feet after “battling two days of bad weather.”
Chaukhamba is a mountain massif in the Garhwal Himalaya in northern India.
