constitution

Dictionary: con·sti·tu·tion   (kŏn'stĭ-tū'shən, -tyū'-)

1. The act or process of composing, setting up, or establishing.
2. 1. The composition or structure of something; makeup.
   2. The physical makeup of a person: Having a strong constitution, she had no trouble climbing the mountain.
3. 1. The system of fundamental laws and principles that prescribes the nature, functions, and limits of a government or another institution.
   2. The document in which such a system is recorded.
   3. Constitution The fundamental law of the United States, framed in 1787, ratified in 1789, and variously amended since then.

Fundamental principles of law by which a government is created and a country is administered. In Western democratic theory, a mandate from the people in their sovereign capacity, concerning how they shall be governed. Distinguished from a Statute, which is a rule decided by legislative representatives and is subject to limitations of the constitution.

noun

1. The act of founding or establishing: creation, establishment, foundation, institution, organization, origination, start-up. See start/end.
2. The physical or constitutional characteristics of a person: build, habit, habitus, physique. See body/spirit.

The set of fundamental rules governing the politics of a nation or subnational body. The word was first used in this sense after the ‘Glorious Revolution’ of 1688 in Britain, when the deposed king, James II, was accused of having violated the ‘fundamental constitution of the kingdom’. But though the word in this sense is a British invention, it is much harder to determine what the British constitution actually is than that of almost anywhere else.

A typical constitution is written, short, general, and entrenched. The oldest and (except from 1861 to 1865) most successful constitution in the world, that of the United States, illustrates all these points. It was written at a Constitutional Convention in 1787 and ratified by all the existing states except Rhode Island. The US Constitution and all its subsequent amendments run to only around 8,000 words. It contains no rules about what must be done, except procedural rules governing the election of Presidents and Congress and the nomination of Supreme Court justices and other senior officials. It contains many rules about what Congress, the executive, and (since the Civil War) the states may not do. And it contains the rules for its own amendment: proposals must emanate from either two-thirds of each house of Congress, or a convention called at the request of two-thirds of the state legislatures, and to succeed they must be ratified by three-quarters of the states.

Most other written constitutions are longer than that of the United States, and they often contain particular rules (a popular example being clauses like ‘The national anthem is the Marseillaise’ from the constitution of the French Fifth Republic, Title 1, Article 2). But they all entrench themselves by making themselves more difficult to amend than ordinary laws. Many go beyond the procedural rights guaranteed in the US Constitution to guarantee substantive rights as well: for instance, ‘Every individual has the duty to work and the right to employment’ (France); ‘Citizens of the USSR have the right to rest and leisure’ (USSR constitution of 1977). They are typically less forthcoming about how the citizen who feels deprived of these rights may seek redress.

Given the tradition of parliamentary sovereignty, how can it be said that a British constitution exists? As it is a fundamental idea of parliamentary sovereignty that Parliament can do anything except bind its successor, it follows that anything which purports to be a constitutional guarantee enshrined in a British Act of Parliament could simply be amended by a later parliament. Thus for instance the five-year maximum term of a parliament is set by the Parliament Act 1911, but if a parliament which was near the end of its term decided that it would rather not face a general election, there would be no legal impediment to its simply repealing the 1911 Act. When commentators state that the British constitution is unwritten, they are expressing the nature of entrenchment in Britain in a very misleading way by saying that there is an unwritten understanding that no parliament would actually do that. But unwritten understandings are not always understood until somebody writes them down (and not necessarily then). Those who argue that Britain ought to have a written constitution claim that some of the supposed unwritten understandings have ceased to be understood, pointing in particular to the decline of collective responsibility and claiming that the British executive treats the legislature increasingly arrogantly and unaccountably. Those opposed to a written constitution argue that decisions on constitutional matters ought not to be transferred from elected politicians to unelected lawyers.

For more information on constitution, visit Britannica.com.

A constitution is a body of rules, formal or informal, which regulates the government of a state. The distribution of power between the various organs of government, the limits of governmental authority, and the methods of appointing or electing those who govern form the staple of a constitution.

The existence of a constitution implies that there are some restraints upon those who govern. If decisions, for instance, depend upon the whim of an absolute monarch, or the fancy of a dictator, it is hard to speak of a constitution. Most states, and many private associations, have written constitutions—a code of written rules binding those who govern, together with any amendments which have been made in accordance with the procedures laid down in the constitution. Thus the US constitution is the document accepted in 1787, together with the 27 amendments which have been passed subsequently.

A contrast is sometimes made between written and unwritten constitutions. Britain, it is said, has an unwritten constitution. But the distinction is overdrawn. Britain is unusual in that there is no single document which can be called the formal constitution. The constitution in Britain is scattered through hundreds of Acts of Parliament and judicial rulings. But the description of Britain as having an unwritten constitution usually focuses on another attribute—the importance of conventions. Some of Britain's most important constitutional rules are constitutional conventions. There is a convention that the monarch acts on the advice of his or her ministers: there is no direct legal compulsion on the monarch to do this, but he or she invariably does. By convention, a government clearly defeated on a vote of confidence in the House of Commons either resigns or holds a general election.

The absence of a written constitution has prompted some people to suggest that a bill of rights is needed to protect British citizens, particularly since the 1689 Bill of Rights is concerned mainly with governmental structures. There is already European legislation on human rights. A British bill of rights would certainly lead to increased legislation, and some citizens would devote time to devising more rights. Consequently others have counter-proposed that any bill of rights should be accompanied by a formal statement of duties.

In political theory, the written or unwritten laws or conventions that govern the powers and limits of political authority in the state.

The fundamental law, written or unwritten, that establishes the character of a government by defining the basic principles to which society must conform; by describing the organization of the government and regulation, distribution, and limitations on the functions of different government departments; and by prescribing the extent and manner of the exercise of its sovereign powers.

A legislative charter by which a government or group derives its authority to act.

The concept of a constitution dates to the city-states of ancient Greece. The philosopher Aristotle (384-322 b.c.), in his work Politics, analyzed over 150 Greek constitutions. In that work, he described a constitution as creating the frame upon which the government and laws of a society are built:

A constitution may be defined as an organization of offices in a state, by which the method of their distribution is fixed, the sovereign authority is determined, and the nature of the end to be pursued by the association and all its members is prescribed. Laws, as distinct from the frame of the constitution, are the rules by which the magistrates should exercise their powers, and should watch and check transgressors.

In modern Europe, written constitutions came into greater use during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Constitutions such as that of the United States, created in 1787, were influenced by the ancient Greek models. During the twentieth century, an increasing number of countries around the world have concluded that constitutions are a necessary part of democratic or republican government and have adopted their own constitutions.

Many different forms and levels of government may have constitutions. All fifty states of the United States have constitutions, as do many countries including Japan, India, Canada, and Germany. It is also common for nongovernmental organizations and civic groups to have constitutions.

In its ideal form, a constitution emanates from the consent and will of the people that it governs. Besides establishing the institutions of government and the manner in which they function toward each other and toward the people, a constitution may also set forth the rights of the individual and government's responsibility to honor those rights.

Constitutions, whether written or unwritten, typically function as an evolving body of legal custom and opinion. Their evolution generally involves changes in judicial interpretation or in themselves, the latter usually through a process called amendment. Amendment of a constitution is usually designed to be a difficult process in order to give the constitution greater stability. On the other hand, if a constitution is extremely difficult to amend, it may be too inflexible to survive over time.

The ongoing evolutionary nature of constitutions explains why Great Britain may be described as having a constitution even though it does not have a single written document designated as such. England's constitution instead inheres in a body of legal custom and tradition that regulates the relationship between the monarchy, the legislature (Parliament), the judicial system, and common law. Though Great Britain's constitution is in a sense unwritten because it does not originate in a single document, many written laws have been instrumental in its creation, and England in fact has one of the oldest traditions of constitutionalism.

In a truly constitutional form of government, government officials are subject to constitutional rules and provisions and may not violate them without punishment. Such constitutional governments are also called limited governments because the constitution restricts the scope of their power over the people. However, many governments with constitutions do not practice true constitutionalism. The former Soviet Union, for example, created the Stalin constitution in 1936, but that document did not establish a truly constitutional form of government. Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union from 1924 to 1953, could not be formally penalized or called to account for his actions, no matter how heinous, before any other government official, any court, or the people themselves. The Soviet Constitution also claimed to guarantee freedom of speech, press, and assembly, but in practice the Soviet government continually repressed those who sought to express those freedoms. Constitutions such as that of the former Soviet Union are called nominal constitutions, whereas those that function more truly as prescriptive documents, such as the Constitution of the United States, are called normative constitutions.

In the United States, individual state constitutions must conform to the basic principles of the U.S. Constitution. In other words, they may not violate rights or standards established by the federal, or national, Constitution. However, states are free to grant rights not defined in the U.S. Constitution, so long as doing so does not interfere with other rights drawn from the federal Constitution. For this reason, groups or individuals seeking to file constitutional claims in court are increasingly examining state constitutions for settlement of their grievances. In the issue of school desegregation, for example, groups such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People began in the 1990s to shift their focus to the state level with the hope of finding greater protection of rights under state constitutions.

United States.

1. the makeup or functional habit of the body.
2. the order in which the atoms of a molecule are joined together.

A nation or state's fundamental set of laws. Most nations with constitutions have them in written form, such as the United States Constitution. The constitution of Britain, by contrast, is an informal set of traditions, based on several different laws.

Quotes:

"A Constitution should be short and obscure." - Napoleon Bonaparte

"There is a hearty Puritanism in the view of human nature which pervades the instrument of 1787 It is the work of men who believed in original sin, and were resolved to leave open for transgressors no door which they could possibly shut." - James Bryce

"Our constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws, not of men." - Gerald R. Ford

"The words of the Constitution are so unrestricted by their intrinsic meaning or by their history or by tradition or by prior decisions that they leave the individual Justice free, if indeed they do not compel him, to gather meaning not from reading the Constitution but from reading life." - Felix Frankfurter

"Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes." - Benjamin Franklin

"Constitutions should consist only of general provisions; the reason is that they must necessarily be permanent, and that they cannot calculate for the possible change of things." - Alexander Hamilton

See more famous quotes about Constitutions

Common misspelling(s) of constitution

• consitution
• constituion
• constituion
• costitution

Dansk (Danish)
n. - sammensætning, grundlov, forfatning, vedtægter, konstitution

Nederlands (Dutch)
samenstelling, grondwet, gestel, decreet, geestelijke gesteldheid, bouw

Français (French)
n. - (Pol) Constitution, constitution (d'une personne), composition

Deutsch (German)
n. - Konstitution, Verfassung, Satzung

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - ίδρυση, σύνταγμα, καταστατικός χάρτης, σύσταση, σύνθεση, δομή, κατασκευή, κράση, ιδιοσυστασία, ιδιοσυγκρασία

Italiano (Italian)
costituzione, struttura

Português (Portuguese)
n. - constituição (f), Constituição (f) (Dir.), temperamento (m)

Русский (Russian)
структура, телосложение, конституция

Español (Spanish)
n. - constitución, composición, estatutos, estructura, configuración, conformación

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - statsförfattning, kroppskonstitution, sinnesförfattning, sammansättning, konstituerande, utseende, förordning, lag

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
宪法, 体质, 构造

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 憲法, 體質, 構造

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 구조, 체격, 설립 , 헌법

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 憲法, 構成, 体質, 制定, 設立, 政体

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) دستور, تركيب, تشكيل, تكوين, بنيه, خلقه‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮חוקה, הרכב, מבנה, מערוכת, מצב גופני‬

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