We must also make constitutional engagement a valued public ritual, model civil discourse, invest in civic educators inside and outside the classroom, and protect and celebrate civic spaces like museums, libraries, and historical sites.

. They threw out the Articles, drafted a new constitution, and sent it to the states for ratification. In 1789, less than twelve months after the Constitution was ratified, Congress passed the Bill of Rights, adding ten amendments to the original document. The states approved several additional amendments over the coming decades to close loopholes in the original text or clarify ambiguous language.