Celebrating 200 Years of Bill of Rights’ Freedoms

On a searing morning last August, my wife and I came to the nation’s capital to see the Bill of Rights at the National Archives, where it is on permanent display. Staring at the single sheet of aged parchment, I felt my throat tighten with emotion and I couldn’t speak. Sharing my strong, “old-fashioned” feelings about America and freedom, my wife fell silent, too.

So did the other visitors beside us--men, women and children from across the country and many different nations. We think of the Bill of Rights as ours. In truth, this bold and basic declaration of human dignity belongs to the whole world.

Next Sunday, Dec. 15, the Bill of Rights--those precious first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution guaranteeing such basic freedoms as speech, worship and assembly--will officially turn 200 years old.

Fact is, we almost didn’t have a Bill of Rights. In 1787, when delegates from the 13 ex-colonies were drafting the Constitution, representatives from 11 of the 13 believed that their local laws already dealt adequately with basic rights.

That didn’t satisfy James Madison, the principled Virginian who was to become our fourth President. As a member of the new republic’s House of Representatives in 1789, he launched and led the 2 1/2-year crusade that finally resulted in the Bill of Rights being added to the Constitution on Dec. 15, 1791.

Every year, more than a million people journey to the National Archives, that extraordinary treasure house in the northwest section of Washington, to look at the so-called “Charters of Freedom”--the Bill of Rights, Constitution and Declaration of Independence.

Officially, the National Archives contain the “permanently valuable records” of the U.S. government dating to 1774--the tangible testament of the nation’s civil, military and diplomatic activities. The diversity and depth of these collections is fascinating and awesome.

The vast National Archives building extends from 7th to 9th Street, and fronts on both Pennsylvania and Constitution avenues. Framed in 72 lofty Corinthian columns outside, the interior of this four-square-block edifice contains incomparable collections of documents and memorabilia.

The Archives’ bronze doors, like the priceless objects they protect, are unique and imposing. Each is 38 feet and 7 inches tall, nearly 10 feet wide. They’re 11 inches thick, and weigh 6 1/2 tons apiece.

Recessed during the day, the doors are visible only when the building is closed. The guards and security systems aren’t very noticeable, either. What catches your eye when you enter is the 75-foot-high domed Exhibition Hall, and a six-foot-wide bronze medallion with winged figures symbolizing legislation, justice, history, and war and defense.

The National Archives actually has branches and regional units spread as far as Alaska. In all, the Archives’ collections include more than 4 billion documents, more than 6 million still photos, 111,827 motion pictures and 187,243 sound and video recordings.

And 1,908,447 maps and charts.

And 2,079,380 architectural and engineering plans.

And 8,939,269 aerial photos.

And. . . .

There are passenger manifests from thousands of slave ships and later vessels that brought millions of voluntary immigrants; Indian treaties (often broken soon after the signing), and the Emancipation Proclamation. Plus journals of polar expeditions . . . photos of 20th-Century Dust Bowl farmers . . . records of wars, and materials from many federal agencies, including those handling secret intelligence operations.

But the main attraction of the National Archives are the contents of a group of specially designed glass cases that face visitors as they enter the spacious domed rotunda. These are the greatest treasures of all--four sheets of parchment that changed history: the Declaration of Independence, the first and last pages of the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights, whose 200th anniversary next weekend is being honored in the rotunda with an exhibit of various historic documents and petitions illustrating how the long battle to add these essential guarantees to the Constitution was waged and won. Compelling and human, it is an excellent presentation not to be missed.

The exhibit has some interesting surprises, too--including the identities of the prominent Americans who opposed the Bill of Rights on the grounds that it was unnecessary, and the fact that the 1789 Congress actually approved a dozen amendments, not just the 10 now in effect. One of the two that failed to get enough votes from the states during ratification concerned the formula for determining representatives to the House, which could have led to a modern-day House of Representatives numbering about 5,000, and the other barred Congress from voting itself wage increases.

The exhibit is fascinating, but it is those extraordinary four pages of parchment at the rear of the rotunda that dominate the entire chamber and can turn visitors speechless.

In fact, the treasured papers aren’t big. The Declaration of Independence measures 29 3/4 inches by 24 1/2 inches; the Constitution is 28 3/4 by 23 5/8 inches, and the Bill of Rights is 28 5/8 inches by 28 1/4 inches. But make no mistake about it--the paper looks a lot bigger to awed visitors contemplating their profound truths and promises.

It isn’t easy to read the fading and spidery handwriting that was inscribed with quill pens. Time has taken its toll, and the pages--especially the Declaration of Independence--were not always handled carefully during the past two centuries.

For more than a century and a half, they sat in the files of various federal agencies, getting no special care. It wasn’t until 1934 that the National Archives was established. The building that houses the records was finished in 1937.

By the time the three documents arrived at the Archives (the Bill of Rights in 1938, the Constitution and Declaration of Independence in 1952), exposure to sunlight over the years had already affected their condition. To protect them from further deterioration, each page was placed in a separate case of special glass provided by the Monsanto Corp. The glass contains filters to screen out harmful light rays. Almost all of the air inside each case has been replaced by helium, with a carefully selected amount of humidity left to protect against drying and cracking. The cases are sealed with lead solder.

At night, when the rotunda closes, all four cases are lowered into a massive vault below the Exhibition Hall. Measuring 7 1/2 feet long, 5 feet wide and 6 feet high, this reinforced concrete-and-steel strong room weighs 55 tons. The floor of the vault is 22 feet below the rotunda. Once the papers are lowered down, thick metal doors close overhead. The vault also contains the two other pages of the four-page Constitution, in a pair of identical helium-filled cases. All four pages are on display in the rotunda once a year--on Sept. 17, Constitution Day.

In addition to the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights and pages of the U.S. Constitution, there is another major “Charter of Liberty” about 15 yards away--one of the four remaining copies of Britain’s famed Magna Carta. Written in Latin on a 14 1/2-by-17 3/4-inch sheet of parchment, it is one of the copies of the edition that King Edward I signed in 1297. It is not the earlier version of the Great Charter approved by King John in 1215, but it is still enormously important. The only privately owned Magna Carta and the only copy permanently residing in the United States, it was purchased by Dallas tycoon and philanthropist H. Ross Perot in 1984 and delivered to the Archives on an indefinite loan.

Leaving the rotunda, visitors usually turn left to the Archives’ small but fascinating gift shop. The quality facsimiles of historic documents on sale include the Bill of Rights ($1 for a smaller version, folded, $3.50 for a bigger rolled edition); similarly priced reproductions of the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution; George Washington’s inaugural address on April 30, 1789; the Magna Carta (75 cents); Emancipation Proclamation (75 cents), and Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address ($1.25), plus paper money of the 13 colonies and Revolutionary War currency ($1.50 per package).

Handsome white ceramic mugs bearing the signatures of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan and George Bush are $4.50 each. A T-shirt printed emblazoned with the words “We the People” is a bestseller at $8.50. Other T-shirts are adorned with the Bill of Rights, and there is a colorful U.S. Army World War I recruiting poster. Popular history books, documentary videos, a Harry Truman “If You Can’t Stand the Heat, Stay Out of the Kitchen” apron, postcards and impressive steel plates mounted on walnut and engraved with the Declaration, Constitution and Bill of Rights ($165 each) are also available.

There is another gallery worth visiting on the opposite side of the rotunda. The current exhibit--a living example of the Bill of Rights’ freedom of the press--is a lively collection of political cartoons from recent decades. These fierce but funny swipes at the high and mighty have both amused and stung their targets, and a number of the famous satirized in these drawings were sufficiently tickled to request copies.

The Archives has also sent out a special exhibit that will tour the country for four years before returning to Washington. Commemorating the 50th anniversary of U.S. participation in World War II, the exhibit began a three-month stay at the San Antonio Museum of Art last weekend, before visiting the Presidential libraries administered by the National Archives in nine states. It’s scheduled to stop at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley in 1995.

Exhibits represent only one aspect of the National Archives and Records Administration, the official title of the agency that employs about 1,000 people in Washington and at least that many at the various Presidential libraries, 13 regional Archives branches and 14 records centers throughout the country.

Thousands of people come to the National Archives every year to do research on a wide variety of subjects, the most popular being family genealogy. Equipped with 21 levels of steel-and-concrete stack areas, the windowless and temperature-controlled building has incredible resources and a highly skilled and helpful professional staff.

“We have the most-used archives in the world,” says Don W. Wilson, who took over as director of the National Archives in 1987, after running the Gerald Ford Presidential Library and Museum in Grand Rapids and Ann Arbor, Mich. Wilson directs a range of programs at the Archives--from lectures and film screenings to book signings by authors of new nonfiction works.

For a free copy of the National Archives’ monthly Calendar of Events, write to NSE-1, National Archives, Washington, D.C. 20408. Visiting hours for the Archives’ research rooms, whose entrance is on Pennsylvania Avenue near 7th Street N.W., are from 8:45 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday.

Visiting hours at the Exhibition Hall and rotunda (entrance on Constitution near 7th Street) are 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily (except Christmas), April 1 through Labor Day. From Labor Day through March 31, hours are 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.