On its 229th birthday, Sacramento students learn sacred importance of Bill of Rights

The Bill of Rights — the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution — celebrates the ripe old age of 229 today. For students in some Sacramento area classrooms reading the amendments for the first time, their words are as vital as ever.

With their teachers undeterred by the coronavirus pandemic, these students are videoconferencing to discern the meaning of the document that marked our country’s earliest step toward a more perfect union. When originally ratified, the Constitution created the new federal government’s framework by assigning responsibilities to three coordinate branches of government.

But it did not give protections to citizens against this new federal government’s powers. It was only with the adoption of the Bill of Rights that the founding document first incorporated specific guarantees of our quintessentially American individual liberties as a check on the new government’s authority.

Two local classrooms demonstrate the active, virtual learning that’s taking place now. At Natomas Charter Academy, 8th-grade social studies teacher Jeanne Quinn recently reviewed the Constitution with her students. She covered the founders’ promise to later add a bill of rights as essential to securing enough signatures on the Constitution for its ratification in the first place. Some members of the Continental Congress refused to sign because there was no bill of rights included!

Quinn talked through each provision in the bill adopted by the first US Congress four years later, after a healthy debate on a longer list of possible protections. Her students were wide-eyed as they read what we ended up with: “Awesome!” they exclaimed. At the same time, “they pretty quickly focused on how certain amendments relate to what is going on in the world around them, including with Black Lives Matter.”

What caught their attention especially was the 4th, 5th and 6th Amendments, and the protections against illegal search and seizure and self-incrimination. These and other provisions first restrained the federal government’s powers, but have since been made applicable to state and local governments as well through the Due Process clause of the 14th Amendment.

“Their first reaction was that they wanted these laws to be applied equally,” Quinn said. “And they are concerned that they’re not.”

Through lively discussions fueled by the students’ passions, Quinn had the opportunity to drive home her message “that it’s important to be informed” and that “understanding the Bill of Rights means understanding that everyone needs to adhere to the law, including state and county and local governments, and the police.”

Mario Fox, who runs the Criminal Justice Academy at Grant Union High School, wholeheartedly agrees. Fox, a former federal probation officer, is currently taking his junior class through the Bill of Rights.

“I’ve placed significant emphasis on the Bill of Rights in our curriculum because I believe that the students should not only know and understand what is stated within the amendments, but also to foster a greater appreciation for the rights and freedoms they have in our constitutional democracy,” Fox said.

Fox is reviewing with his students “scenario-based questions and determining the rights being violated and correctly connecting it to the appropriate amendment.” He’s also asking them to put themselves in the shoes of the original drafters to rewrite the Bill of Rights “in student-friendly language, in their own words.” If time permits, they’ll even be writing a Classroom Bill of Rights.

As Quinn tells her students, “Knowing your protections is one way to safeguard yourself.” Knowing those protections is also the starting point for her eighth graders and for Fox’s high school juniors to understand they have a role in further perfecting our resilient union.

The Bill of Rights is alive in everyday interactions between governments and the people, and an invaluable tool for further improving our lot.