Constitution Day is the one day a year when we take time to celebrate the signing of our Constitution — the supreme law of the United States — created by our Founding Fathers on September 17, 1787.
This monumental document bestows our rights and freedoms and provides the framework for our government — both federal and state — and the relationship between the two.  It incorporates pivotal concepts of separation of power and checks and balances to ensure that no one branch of government becomes too powerful over another.  It has been amended twenty-seven times since 1789 and continues to be interpreted and challenged 225 years later.  That’s something to celebrate!
Originally recognized as “I Am an American Day”, in 1953 Dwight D. Eisenhower signed a resolution to observe “Citizenship Day” on the actual day the Constitution was signed – September 17^th.  Constitution Day became an official holiday alongside Citizenship Day in 2004 when legislation introduced by Senator Robert Byrd passed through Congress.  Since 2005, all schools receiving federal funds are mandated to teach about the Constitution on September 17^th.
I can’t recall baking cupcakes for my children’s school’s Constitution Day party nor have I ever been invited to a Constitution Day barbeque.  So, how does one celebrate a holiday that doesn’t lend itself to balloons, streamers, and decorations?  We can make it a priority to teach and learn something new about this document and talk about it with our children, other family members, co-workers and friends.
Last year, ACLU of Colorado volunteers went into middle school, high school, and college classes to teach about the Constitution.  We will be doing the same this year but in addition, we would like to share with you resources on our website that you can use to learn and teach about the Constitution. You can take the ACLU of Colorado’s Constitution Word Search – a fun way to test your knowledge and learn some basic Constitutional facts.  Please also take a moment to sign our petition to President Obama to make Constitution Day an official federal holiday.
So, if you are a teacher, a parent, or a civic-minded citizen, please take a moment today to recognize and celebrate the Constitution and the rights and freedoms that it bestows.  We’ll keep fighting every day to ensure those rights are protected and extended to all people in Colorado.

Read this excellent Letter to the Editor, recently published in the Vail Daily, on the exoneration of a man who spent more than 30 years in prison facing the death penalty for a crime he did not commit.  George Mizner of Vail does an excellent job of laying out the many reasons that Colorado’s broken death penalty is part of an unjust system that does not deter crime and routinely executes innocent people:
http://www.vaildaily.com/opinion/12900699-113/death-penalty-murder-percent?utm_source=swift_rss&utm_section=Opinion

To read more about the recent exonerations of  Henry Lee McCollum and Leon Brown, read Getting it Wrong on the Death Penalty for 30 Years from the National ACLU Blog of Rights:
https://www.aclu.org/blog/capital-punishment-racial-justice/getting-it-dead-wrong-30-years

Our Executive Director's editorial about Amendment 67 appeared this weekend in the Durango Herald. In it, he writes that "Neither the government nor religious crusaders should be allowed to intervene and take control of difficult, personal decisions best left to a woman and her doctor. Amendment 67 goes far beyond what it appears to be at first glance, threatening basic rights and opening a legal Pandora’s box that would be very hard to close because it would be written into the Colorado Constitution."
Read more here.