Why does the constitution need to be definite, brief and broad?

Question

who can help me out? I have one last question on my Political Science homework, and I'm all out of words :)

Why does the constitution need to be definite, brief and broad?

Answer 1

I saw your Q on Yahoo answers Philippines, so i'll answer you using the words of this Philippine author of a book on the Philippine Constitution.

Requisites of a good written constitution.

As to form, a good written constitution should be:

(a) Brief.- because if a constitution is too detailed, it would lose the advantage of a fundamental law which in a few provisions outlines the structure of the government of the whole state and the rights of the citizens. It would probably never be understood by the public. Furthermore, it would then be necessary to amend it every once in a while to cover many contingencies;

(b) Broad.- because a statement of the powers and functions of government, and of the relations of the governing body and the governed, requires that it be as comprehensive as possible ( the scope must be wide enough to make the constitution flexible and easily adaptable to changing social, economic, and political conditions, and thus enable it, without amendment, to meet every exigency, for a constitution is designed to be a permanent document to serve a country for many generations-indeed, if possible "to endure for ages t come"); and

(c) Definite.- because otherwise the appplication of its provisions to concrete situations may prove unduly difficult if not impossible. Any vagueness which may lead to opposing interpretations of essential features may cause incalculable harm. Civil war and disruption of the state may conceivably follow from ambiguous expressions in a constitution.

Answer 2

The Constitution needs to be definite, brief, and broad in order to be versatile and able to be used years down the road. A constitution in any organization is supposed to be that organization's core values. Some states made long constitutions and then they had to re-write their constitutions over and over again. For instance, back in the 1700's it would have made sense to make laws regarding horse-drawn carriages. A law regarding something like that would be out-dated today because no one hardly uses horse draw carriages. A constitution is the highest level of rule for a particular organization whether it be a state, country, school organization, etc. So it's not something you want to be changing regularly. If you add too much and make it too long, you risk certain aspects becoming outdated just like if some state had added a horse-drawn carriage law to their constitution. Less important stuff like that should not be included in a constitution but should be included in the regular state, federal, and city laws. Since a constitution is the highest law for that organization, changes to it affect all of the laws below it. So less important items should be passed as regular laws and not as part of the constitution so they can be updated and changed more easily.

A constitution is kind of similar to the way a computer works. You have base computer programming that runs the main functions of the computer. That programming you want to keep concise and short and design it very well because tons of other programs are going to use it to be able to perform their operations. The more complex you get that base code the more potential you have for errors. The programs that run on the base code aren't nearly as hard to fix because if something is wrong with them you only have one program to fix. On the other hand, if you have to fix the base code that the computer runs on it could potentially create problems for all of the programs or software that runs on that base code. Then a ton of reprogramming would have to be done when that base code is changed because probably all of the software that runs on that base code would have to be changed also. The same goes for a constitution. If you don't get it right, then when you have to make a change to it you have to make a change to all of the laws that were based on that portion of the constitution.

There is one other thing I would like to mention regarding the US Constitution. The US Constitution was written by our forefathers to ensure freedom and justice for all in the US. Only one amendment to the US Constitution was ever passed that limited the freedom of its citizens. That was the amendment to ban the drinking of alcohol. That ban as you well know was lifted several years later. No other part of the Constitution ever limited freedom of US citizens. If you look, the rest are regarding guaranteeing rights, not limiting them.

Over the last several years, President Bush has pushed for a Constitutional ban on same sex marriage. I believe that ideology is wrong. Remember, all of the current US Constitution is written guaranteeing freedoms and rights. An amendment on banning same sex marriage would be limiting rights. Limiting rights if it is ever done should be kept to regular laws and should not be raised to the level of a constitutional amendment. The ideology of a country can change. If for instance, the Congress had decided back in pre-Civil War times that an amendment should be added to the Constitution banning the right of African Americans and women to vote. It could have been a very likely possibility that even today neither women nor African Americans would still be able to vote. But luckily our ancestors were smart enough not to add such amendments to the Constitution that limit people's freedoms.

The same possibility could exhist if a Constitutional ban on same sex marriage was ever ratified. Years down the road a large majority of US citizens might support same sex marriage then if there was a constitutional ban on it, overriding that constitutional ban might be almost near to impossible to do. So the likelihood could exhist that it could still be banned 50-100 years after the American public might one day overwhelmingly agree that same sex marriage is OK.

If it is just a regular law, it may only take a few years to over-turn the law. An ideology of a country can change, and the Constitution has to be written so that it can adapt and apply to those changes. That is why it should guarantee freedoms, not limit them.

Answer 3

So that it can effectively addresses all arguments, grievances it could and does cover. If it's definite, it cannot adapt readily. if it's broad it is ambiguous. If it's brief, it's inadequate. Then you turn those answers over: If it's definite, it cannot be misinterpreted. If it's broad, it can adapt. If it's brief, it can be understood (used in conjunction with the similar value for briefness).

Answer 4

THE CONSTITUTION HAS REALLY GONE MAD
THEY TAKE ANY DICITION AT ANY TIME