Primary Sources are America’s Geneaology | Julie Silverbrook | BRI’s Constitutional Conversations
Why study primary sources on Constitution Day, and every day? Listen to Julie Silverbrook, Executive Director of the Constitutional Sources Project discuss the importance of these resources.
0:00 so so much of what we have to look at from this period comes from the documents that are still preserved what would you say is the importance of reading these documents or the importance of of working with primary sources both on constitution day and throughout the year yeah so these are the first-hand accounts of what are what happened during that period so go read
0:22 the colonial charters so you understand the way that colonies were originally set up it’s the absolute best way to understand that read the Diaries and letters and first-hand accounts of the people who were living there go look at those early state constitutions look at how they were developed you’re gonna see similarities and differences between
0:43 those state constitutions and our federal constitution you’re gonna see difference between those early state constitutions and your modern state constitution I this these are the building blocks of who we are these are the pieces of DNA who make that make up the American body and I think it’s so
1:03 fundamentally important to go and actually look at them ancestry.com and like 23andme and on all that this impulse for to do genealogical research to understand who you are as an individual I think it’s the same thing to say I want to go back and do the genealogy of my country and understand
1:24 who we are warts and all as Americans