Celebrate Constitution Day with this FREE US Constitution PDF!
It includes the full text of the Constitution of the United States and its amendments.
About Constitution Day
Do you live in Iowa? If so, your state was the first to start celebrating Constitution Day—back in 1911! By 1949 each of the 48 states had adopted Constitution Day through formal proclamations.
Americans celebrate Constitution Day on September 17. This marks the important date in 1787 when 39 delegates of the Constitutional Convention signed the US Constitution. Benjamin Franklin, the oldest person to sign the document, struggled with his signature because of his age, and legend says that tears streamed down his face as he wrote.
Constitution Day finally became an official national holiday in 2004. Many people felt it was important to recognize and teach young people about our country’s unique founding document. To this day, all schools receiving federal funding are required to teach about the Constitution on that day.
Jacob Shallus, assistant clerk to the Pennsylvania General Assembly, transcribed the original parchment inscription of the US Constitution. He copied the entire document for a wage of $30—a large sum in those days! It is on display in the Rotunda at the National Archives Museum where more than a million people visit each year.
Read more about Constitution Day and Constitution Week on the National Archives website and blog.
Learn More
Finally, don’t miss the groundbreaking US Constitution and Government Course, only from The Good and the Beautiful!
This open-and-go course explains the text and context of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and all 27 amendments. Within the 32 engaging and interactive lessons, principles of freedom and the history leading to the creation of the Constitution come alive!
Don’t forget to download and print your FREE PDF!
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Comments
I’m concerned that the world history timeline doesn’t even include the Americas before Europeans set foot? Where are the ancient civilizations and Indigenous people who were the first Americans?
Thank you for your interest and for reaching out!
The focus of this course is the Constitution and the founding of the United States Government. We note that indigenous peoples were not granted full citizenship until 1924 and were denied the right to vote in every state until 1962. We also discuss the struggles of the suffragettes in winning women the right to vote.
We do not shy away from discussing these important issues; however, we discuss them in the context of the Constitution itself. We believe that people of all ethnicities and races have contributed to the greatness of this country—a greatness that lies in our ability to recognize wrongs and to correct them. We are thankful for the freedoms the founders enshrined in the Constitution that allow us to freely yet constructively criticize wrongs and advocate for the correction of them. The United States of America is a beautiful and ongoing experiment in self-government.
Thank you for the resources! I’ve been using the Constitution course this year with a group of kids and it’s going so well. I shared this blog post with them. Thanks!