Archive: 09/19/23

Do We Need a Constitution? Find Out on September 19.

David Goldfield, Ph.D. presents the UNC Charlotte 2022 Constitution Day Observance

A bitterly divided nation, an insurrection at the Capitol, growing disparities between rich and poor, Black and white, legislative gridlock, and a Supreme Court meant to resolve disputes now widening America’s deep fissures. Is the Constitution to blame? The short answer is no: these issues reflect the shortcomings of both our leaders and ourselves. But, in the oft-heard declaration that “We are a nation of laws,” the Constitution, as the supreme law of the land,

has not provided a framework to help us out of this mess. To the contrary; the Constitution may be making things worse. Can we fix it, or will American governance become at best a muddle and at worst a threat to our republic?

David Goldfield, Ph.D. will present “Constitution Day 2022: Do We Need A Constitution?”  at 10 a.m. on Monday, Sept. 19 in the College of Education (COED) Room 065. There is no charge and the event is open to the public. 

Constitution Day is sponsored by The University of North Carolina at Charlotte College of Liberal Arts & Sciences and the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology.

Goldfield is the Robert Lee Bailey Professor of History at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. A native of Memphis, he grew up in Brooklyn and attended the University of Maryland. He is the author or editor of sixteen books including two prize-winning titles, Cotton Fields and Skyscrapers (1982) and Black, White, and Southern (1991). His most recently published books are America Aflame: How the Civil War Created a Nation (2011), The Gifted Generation: When Government Was Good (2017), and The American Journey (2023). Goldfield is also the Editor of the Journal of Urban History, and serves as Distinguished Lecturer for the Organization of American Historians, and as an academic specialist for the U.S. State Department. He is Past President of the Southern Historical Association (2012-2013). Goldfield also serves on the Executive Board of the human rights organization, The International Coalition of Sites of Conscience, and on the Board of the North Carolina Civil War and Reconstruction History Center. His hobbies include reading southern novels, watching baseball, and listening to the music of Gustav Mahler and Buddy Holly.