In 1787, America’s Founding Fathers created a four-page document known as the U.S. Constitution to establish our nation’s government, the laws, and to give citizens basic human rights. On September 17, 1787, delegates to the Constitutional Convention signed it in Philadelphia. Let’s take a look at some interesting Constitution facts!

Infographic Courtesy of RocketLawyer.com
- Quality over quantity: The U.S. Constitution is the oldest and shortest written Constitution of any major government in the world. It contains only 4,400 words!
- History starts here: The U.S. Constitution was written and signed at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- Last minute change: The iconic opening “We the people of the United States” was actually penned at the last minute. In earlier drafts, it read “We the people of the states of…” (and then the individual states were listed from north to south).
- Missing Founders: Two of our Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, were unable to attend the Constitutional Convention, so their signatures do not appear on the actual document.
- The “First American” gets teary-eyed: Benjamin Franklin, known as the “First American,” was the oldest American to sign the Constitution at the age of 81. It’s been said that he needed help signing, and as he did, there were tears running down his face.
- Not a Democracy: The word “democracy” is not in the Constitution at all. Not even once. That’s because The United States is actually a Republic!
- Pennsylvania is spelled incorrectly (sort of): On the part of the Constitution where the signers affixed their names, one of them spelled Pennsylvania as “Pensylvania,” with only one “n.” It’s spelled with two n’s in other parts of the document. This isn’t really an error, however. Although colonial Americans did not spell consistently, we should not assume they were careless writers. That’s because those were the days before standardized spelling rules. Noah Webster’s speller, which he first published in 1783, and his American Dictionary of the English Language (1828), would soon help to facilitate standardization.
- Hard to change: Of the 11,000+ amendments proposed over the centuries, the Constitution has only been amended 17 times with 27 amendments being made. The first 10 were added all at once, as the Bill of Rights, in 1791.
- Not part of the original document: Many do not know that the Bill of Rights weren’t in the original document. They are the first 10 amendments presented by James Madison on September 25, 1789, and ratified on December 15, 1791, to protect the rights of citizens and limit the powers of government.
- Preserving History: The original Constitution is in a display case at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. The case contains argon gas and is kept at 67 degrees Fahrenheit with a relative humidity of 40% to preserve the parchment.
How did you like these facts about the about the governing document of the United States? Did any of them surprise you?