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Show Constitution Day While Constitution Day, September 17, is not a legal holiday it is observed with appropriate exercises in many schools and various patriotic societies employ the occasion to renew acquaintance acquain-tance with the provisions of our nations organic law. The Constitution of the United States was adopted on September 17, 1787, by the convention appointed in pursuance of a resolution of Congress. Washington Washing-ton presided over the convention, which was composed of 55 delegates, representing represen-ting each of the orginal 13 states except ex-cept Rhode Island, and that body was in session nearly four months. The final draft of the Constitution was made by Gouverneur Moms, a delegate dele-gate from Pennsylvania. Delaware was the first state to ratify the Constitution which it did on December Dec-ember 7, 1787, and Rhoda Island was the last, its date of raitfication being May 29, 1790. The first ten amendments, popularly known as the Bill of Rights, were proposed pro-posed together, and adopted by the required number of states by December 15, 1791. Only two other amendments were adopted prior to the Civil War, and between 1865 and 1870 three more were added. Since then four additional addition-al amendments have been adopted, providing pro-viding for the income tax, direct elec-ction elec-ction of United States senators, prohibition pro-hibition and women's suffrage. The Constitution is one of the world's greatest documents, and every citizen should make himself familiar with its provisions, even though some of them have been sadly disregarded in recent ' years. |