Akhil Reed Amar, Yale Law professor, argues that the Constitution's Preamble was less a slogan than a historical act that made self-government real. He opens with how rare self-rule was in 1786, then moves through the ratification year that began September 19, 1787, when the Pennsylvania Packet printed the full text with the Preamble in oversized type. Amar traces the thirteen state ratifying conventions, notes that eight of the thirteen states lowered or dropped property qualifications so more people could vote on the Constitution than had voted on anything before, and shows how the Bill of Rights emerged from arguments raised in those conventions. The lecture closes with James Wilson, the immigrant lawyer who drafted the Preamble's language, addressing ten thousand Philadelphians on July 4, 1788. Chapter markers break the talk into the Preamble's text, the franchise debates, and the Bill of Rights' origins.