Can you name...?

What I am about to share is not totally original. Only I don’t know where I got it from or who wrote it but just suffice it to say it was not me. Sometimes I tuck things away but regretfully do not make a note on where or when I got it.

But here is something I read sometime over the holidays to use as a starter at a holiday meal or party. The idea was to ask your friends and family to name the five freedoms guaranteed in the First Amendment. I never did that but I think it is a good opener for a blog post for this new year and a good way to self-administer a test on one’s civic knowledge.

We hear a lot about the Constitution these days, though hearing ABOUT it is not the same as really knowing what is in it. It is certainly not the same as a commitment to follow what the Constitution says. Political pundits expound on the importance. One candidate against another tries to out-constitution the other. People wave their teeny tiny pocket size editions as if keeping a copy in your pocket is any guarantee of your commitment to honoring what the Constitution says.

During the pandemic I memorized the Preamble as one of the ways to keep my mind a little more agile:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The Constitution was written in 1787 by a group of men (yes, all men; yes, all white men), including James Madison and Alexander Hamilton. There were some that opposed ratifying the Constitution because they felt it gave the federal government too much power over the states. They said that their concern was for the individual rights of people.

Some insisted that there be a Bill of Rights to accompany the new U.S. Constitution. Even in the early days of our country, compromises were made to try to bring people together, and in this case, to get the new Constitution unanimously ratified. James Madison created the Bill of Rights during the first U.S. Congress which met from 1789 to 1791. George Washington was President when the Bill of Rights was adopted. It has long served as one of the major guardrails for our country.

Go a step farther. Ask your friends and family—and yourself—to name the five rights protected by the First Amendment to our Constitution. If I am honest, I will tell you that I could not do this initially. I think I got three out of the five. But it is worth paying attention to the five freedoms that were considered essential from the earliest days of our country.

The First Amendment protects the following rights:

Freedom of speech and expression. The First Amendment states that Congress cannot make laws limiting freedom of speech.

Freedom of the press. The First Amendment says Congress cannot make laws that censor the freedom of the press.

Freedom of assembly. The First Amendments states that the people have the right to assemble peacefully.

Right to petition the government. The First Amendment states that the people have the right to petition the government to remedy grievances.

Freedom of religion. The First Amendment states that Congress cannot make laws that establish a religion or prohibit the free exercise of religion.

Think about it. These are pretty awesome freedoms. These five freedoms have kept our Democracy in good order—though with some debate, both in the courts and outside of the courts— for over 200 years. Yes, there have definitely been some ups and downs, often in regards to whom we think deserve these freedoms. We have not always been generous in granting these five freedoms to all the people. But we seem to keep trying, to keep working to do better. Or maybe I just hope that is what we are doing.

If we keep anything in our pocket maybe it ought to just be a checklist of these five freedoms, these five rights we believe are the foundation of the United States of America. Maybe we ought to pull out this list and review it with what we are seeing happen in Congress, in our country, in our. neighborhoods, in our own mindsets.

Paying attention to these five freedoms can help us keep a watchful eye on how our Constitution and the Bill of Rights are doing in 2025. We can take nothing for granted.