“We made certain promises in the Declaration of Independence, in the preamble to the Constitution, in the Gettysburg Address, in the Constitution and its amendments, and over time we’ve struggled to fulfill those promises. We haven’t fulfilled them yet, by any means. And in the process of coming closer, of redeeming some of the commitments that the Constitution makes, we sometimes reformulate those commitments — it is a living process.”
Laurence H. Tribe is the Carl M. Loeb University Professor at Harvard University and a leader in constitutional law. He has studied how constitutions serve public officials and the public in establishing the parameters of government and has worked with several nations to help develop their constitutions.