And half the time they disagreed with each other. Both the Declaration and the Constitution are masterpieces of compromise, avoidance and postponement, and what emerged after their debates evaded many of the issues they themselves were divided on, such as the distribution of power in government, and slavery. Especially slavery.

Their true genius was that they were able to transcend their differences and forge a lasting community among a diversity of conflicting interests, particularly religion, which was the principal divisive force of their age. They took men from different geographical regions, diverse politics, multiple economic interests, differing social station and profound philosophical differences and hammered out what turned out to be the oldest democracy on the planet. A democracy, which by the standards of their time (certainly not ours), was the most inclusive in the world. A democracy, which in spite of enormous modification, adaptation and a Civil War, can trace its origins without a break to those origins. That is a phenomenal accomplishment.

We should read, study and honor works like the Federalist Papers for what they were, individual manifestoes and philosophical declarations of principle, the thoughts of great men. They have enormous historical significance but they are not the law. The Law, in capital letters, is what emerged collectively from those minds and ideas in congress assembled. It is the composite of what all those men thought, with those things they could not agree on left for future generations to interpret and consider, and hopefully, resolve.

Conservatives would have us believe that they alone have the ability to time travel and read minds and impose their own prejudices on what happened over two centuries ago, and surprise surprise, it always seems to agree with what they want to happen right now. What insufferable arrogance. Its not what those men individually believed that matters, its what they collectively agreed on. They are my founders and framers, too. I will not allow religious fanatics, commercial opportunists and political cynics to claim them for their own.

And one more thing, quit capitalizing the 'founders' and the 'framers' as if they were your personal demigods and patrons of your own political and social cults. That has a name you know: fetishism. It is insulting not only to them, but to those of us who respect those men for what they were, fallible but heroic; not for the self-serving fantasies we impose on them today.

As another one of us here once so eloquently put it, today's conservatives aren't fit to lick the horse shit off the founders' boots.