The Declaration is not just chronologically prior to the Constitution, it is logically prior. As Timothy Sandefur writes, the Declaration “sets the framework for reading” the Constitution, so it is the Constitution’s “conscience”: By the terms with which the Declaration articulates the Constitution’s purpose – the purpose is to “secure” unalienable rights – the Declaration intimates the standards by which one can distinguish the proper from the improper exercises of majority rule. “Freedom is the starting point of politics; government’s powers are secondary and derivative, and therefore limited…. Liberty is the goal at which democracy aims, not the other way around.”
The progressive project, now in its second century, has been to reverse this, giving majority rule priority over liberty when they conflict, as they do, inevitably and frequently.
-George Will (commentator, author The Conservative Sensibility)
(H/T: Cafe Hayek)
UPDATE: Wasn’t sure this could be a standalone but it amplifies the above:
The evidence suggests, in other words, that behind the growth of government there’s something deeper, and more recent, than mere wars. The missing cause is ideas, as [Robert] Higgs in fact came to believe – in particular a triad of anti-liberal ideas devised in Europe during the 19th century and implemented whole-hog during the 20th: nationalism, unlimited majority rule and socialism.
-Deirdre McCloskey (Coronavirus must not rob us of our liberties forever)
(H/T: Cafe Hayek)
