The Constitution of the United States was the result of a "Great Compromise" in which leaders of the early days of the American Republic negotiated the relative powers that would be given to the three branches of the federal government and the division of powers between the national and the state governments (Janda, Berry, and Goldman, 81). The genius contained within the Constitution is reflected in the fact that it creates a people, explains its reason for being, articulates goals, and fashions a government (Janda, et al, 83). Levinson (30) stated that there is a special nature within the American Constitution in which its "writtenness supplies a tangibility, an ability quite literally to take the Constitution into one's own hands and read it with one's own eyes."
It is a written instrument full and complete in itself which enjoys the force of law. Levinson (31) contends that "the mere text, and only the text, and not any commentaries or creeds written by those who wished to give the text a meaning apart from its plain reading was adopted as the Constitution of the United States." Because this is the case, Calvi and Coleman (132) state that judges in this country are compelled to use only this document in determining whether or not laws are valid. This is part of the genius of the Constitution and one of the most significant ways in which it continues to meet the needs of the Republic.
The Constitution is organized in a manner that is designed to delineate the powers of each branch of the government and to establish checks and balances through the separation of powers (Janda, et al, 86). It begins with a Preamble, which establishes the basic principles that would govern the nation and then unfolds into seven articles. The first three articles establish the internal operation and delineate powers given to the separate branches of the legislature, the executive, and the judiciary. The remaining four articles "struc...