Constitution Day at UGA

The American Founding Group and the School of Public and International Affairs will host a celebration of Constitution Day. The centerpiece of these festivities is a lecture by Carol Berkin, Presidential Professor of History Emerita at Baruch College & the Graduate Center, City University of New York. The lecture and moderated question and answer session will be followed by a dessert reception in Candler Hall. In addition, historical documents and materials related to the American founding and U.S. Constitution will be on display at the Chapel from the Hargrett Rare Book & Manuscript Library.

A dessert reception will immediately follow the lecture in Candler Hall.

Constitution Day is the annual celebration of the day that representatives to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia completed and signed the U.S. Constitution in 1787. The observance of this day began as “I am an American Day” in 1940 and later as Citizenship Day in 1952 when the celebration was moved to September 17 to commemorate the signing of the original document. Constitution Day as we observe it today was recognized as a federal holiday in 2004, when Senator Robert Byrd passed a bill designating September 17 as the day for citizens to commemorate the signing of the U.S. Constitution and to thoughtfully engage with the nation’s founding document.