> Projects
Photograph of the Illinois State Constitution, 1970. This image is used with permission from the Illinois Constitution Collection in the Illinois Digital Archives, part of the Illinois State Library a division of the Illinois Secretary of State and State Librarian.
ILLINOIS State Constitution 1970
To complement the work we are undertaking on eighteenth and nineteenth century constitutional conventions, we selected the 1970 Illinois Constitutional Convention as the next major project on state-level constitution-writing. This addresses our larger research questions relating to the changes that can be observed across time and place between the 235 successful state constitutional conventions that have met in America since 1776 to write new constitutional texts. As well as being one of the most recent constitutional conventions, this Convention was heavily influenced by the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, as well as demonstrating a continuation of the trend we observe from the nineteenth century of writing increasing amounts of policy into constitutional law itself and removing it from legislative control. The records for this convention have been well organized and preserved, but have not been digitized or transcribed before.
The modelling of the Illinois State Constitution began in 2019 and is yet to be completed and made public.