Reading the Constitution

...the Massachusetts Constitution, that is.

It turns out the School Committee swears to uphold the US and MA Constitutions in the oath of office. I'm certainly familiar with the US version ("We the People of the United States...") but I must admit to a lack of familiarity with the state version.

As you might expect from John Adams (who wrote it), there is some great stuff in there! Besides the quotation from Chapter V that you will find at the bottom of the page, in which Adams makes Massachusetts the only state to include education in the original constitution, there is this:

The body politic is formed by a voluntary association of individuals: it is a social compact, by which the whole people covenants with each citizen, and each citizen with the whole people, that all shall be governed by certain laws for the common good. It is the duty of the people, therefore, in framing a constitution of government, to provide for an equitable mode of making laws, as well as for an impartial interpretation, and a faithful execution of them; that every man may, at all times, find his security in them.

A bit of a different way than most of us think of government, most of the time, I think.