On January 4th, Prof. Viator from Loyola University New Orleans was invited by XMU Law School to give a lecture on “Constitutional Reverence and the Failure of the American Constitution”, hosted by Deputy Prof. Zhou Chen. First-year postgraduates of Constitutional and Administrative Law and students from other majors, as well as Zhu Xiaoqin, Vice Dean of XMU Law School, attended this lecture.
Starting with U.S. Constitution, Prof. Viator fully narrated the history of its birth and growth, as well as how Federalists strove to protect and develop American Constitution. The very first constitutional flaw Prof. Viator pointed out is that there used to be two long gaps during the amendment of U.S. Constitution, which led to tremendous pressure on current governmental stability: If all people were patriots and respected their government, the entire society could stay in a stable status. However, the fact is the other way around. James Madison, “Father of the Constitution”, became aware of this issue and illustrated his idea in his book The Federalist Papers . His idea was to shape people through the power of Constitution and nation. Prof Viator showed his divergence from James’s ideas, and believed that despite Jame’s remarkable contribution to constitutionalism, he was wrong on this issue because it was the power of community that could shape people, other than the power of nation. Communities constitute the nation of U.S., and make it a great country. Decline of communities can be a catastrophe for the U.S..
Prof. Viator shared with audience a lot of interesting facts and remarkable insights into U.S. Constitution, and jokes he made in the lecture delighted the audience. After the interaction with students and teachers, Viator impressed everyone with his musical talent by playing the guitar and singing along. Success of the lecture developed the friendship between LUNO and XMU Law School and meant that everything got off to a good start at the beginning of new year.
Translated by Zhao Chengming
