To some, Sept. 17 was just another Wednesday. But to many civically minded Americans, it was Constitution Day.
Constitution Day is a federal observance commemorating both the day that the Constitution was signed and all citizens in the U.S. To celebrate Constitution Day, PCAL’s Political Science department invited Professor Ronald Keith Gaddie to lead a lecture in Gary Randsell Hall Auditorium.
Gaddie, born and raised in Louisville, is a political science professor and the Hoffman Chair of the American Ideal at Texas Christian University. He holds a master’s and a doctorate in political science from the University of Georgia. Previous to his employment at TCU, he spent 27 years on faculty at the University of Oklahoma and is 15 years into his 20-year tenure as the editor of the Social Science Quarterly journal.
Throughout his career, Gaddie has participated in nine Constitution Day lectures in universities across the country. He said that he chooses to speak about the Constitution in terms of challenges rather than through a historical perspective.
“We can’t just sit here and speak in flowery terms about the Constitution,” Gaddie said. “We have to confront the reason why we crafted it, why we keep changing it, and what our challenges are because they are not inconsequential.”
Gaddie’s lecture covered the Voting Rights Act , a piece of legislation signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson that prohibited racially discriminatory voting practices used to deter racial minorities from voting. This year, the Act is celebrating 60 years of being enacted.
Gaddie first became interested in the topic while he worked as a litigation consultant dealing with redistricting and voting rights cases. Since then, he has published 30 books discussing politics and voting within the U.S., with two about the Voting Rights Act.
“The Voting Rights Act in the 1960s is a manifestation of the effort to activate the guarantees to participation for black people that is implied in the 14th and 15th Amendments,” Gaddie said.
During the hour-long lecture, Gaddie discussed the historical context surrounding the Voting Rights Act, how it ties into the Constitution, and its impact in today’s political climate.
“I hadn’t really known the full history (of the Voting Rights Act). I obviously learned about the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the Civil Rights Act, but he really tied it together in kind of a linear way that made sense,” said senior Charlie Lowey, a philosophy major who attended the lecture.
Gaddie hit on how voting has evolved through the history of the United States, comparing the Constitution to a technology that has changed in impact and influence.
To continue the celebrations of Constitution Day after Gaddie’s lecture, WKU’s Student Government Association organized free food and pocket Constitutions in Centennial Mall.
While the intention of many Constitution Day events is to celebrate, to Gaddie, it is an act of service to uphold his mission statement.
“We are charged with attempting to progress constitutional democracy,” Gaddie said. “That’s why we’re here.”
