Constitution of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Chapter V, Section II

Why this matters

Chapter V, Section II of the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780 is the most explicit founding-era statement of state responsibility for education. John Adams drafted it; the people of Massachusetts adopted it; it remains in force, the oldest continuously functioning written constitution in the world. The section’s opening sentence — on wisdom and knowledge as necessary for the preservation of liberty — is the closest thing the founding generation produced to a constitutional fiduciary mandate for public education. The Library carries it because it sits one step closer to the school-trust system’s animating logic than even the Northwest Ordinance does. The Ordinance committed a federal territory to encouraging schools; Massachusetts committed a sovereign state to cherishing the entire infrastructure of learning.

What’s in it

• Heading — “The Encouragement of Literature, etc.”
• The opening clause — wisdom and knowledge as necessary for the preservation of rights and liberties.
• The duty of legislatures and magistrates — to cherish the interests of literature and the sciences.
• The institutions named — public schools and grammar-schools in the towns; the university at Cambridge; private societies and public encouragements.
• The civic-virtue catalogue — humanity, general benevolence, public and private charity, industry, frugality, honesty, punctuality, sincerity, good humor, all social affections, and generous sentiments among the people.

Most-quoted passages

“Wisdom and knowledge, as well as virtue, diffused generally among the body of the people, being necessary for the preservation of their rights and liberties; and as these depend on spreading the opportunities and advantages of education in the various parts of the country, and among the different orders of the people, it shall be the duty of legislatures and magistrates, in all future periods of this commonwealth, to cherish the interests of literature and the sciences, and all seminaries of them; especially the university at Cambridge, public schools, and grammar-schools in the towns…”

This is the sentence the Sacred Compact white paper draws its frame from. It does three things at once. First, it names the end: the preservation of rights and liberties. Second, it names the means: wisdom and knowledge diffused generally — not concentrated, not class-restricted. Third, it names the duty: legislatures and magistrates, in all future periods, are to cherish the institutions that produce the diffusion. The temporal scope (“in all future periods”) is the same kind of intergenerational claim as the Northwest Ordinance’s “forever.”

“…to encourage private societies and public institutions, rewards and immunities, for the promotion of agriculture, arts, sciences, commerce, trades, manufactures, and a natural history of the country…”

The breadth of the mandate. Adams was not naming a narrow instructional duty; he was naming an entire civic-economic ecology — the universities, the learned societies, the artisans, the natural philosophers — that the Commonwealth was bound to sustain.

“…to countenance and inculcate the principles of humanity and general benevolence, public and private charity, industry and frugality, honesty and punctuality in their dealings; sincerity, good humor, and all social affections, and generous sentiments among the people.”

The catalogue of civic virtues that the schools were to inculcate. Read against the present-day discourse around public education’s purpose, the distance is striking. The Library carries this passage without commentary and lets the reader register the contrast.

How it connects to the Library’s argument

Chapter V, Section II is the constitutional template the rest of the school-trust architecture builds on. The 1785 Land Ordinance reserves the land; the 1787 Northwest Ordinance names the federal purpose; Massachusetts in 1780 names the state-level fiduciary duty in language so explicit it reads almost as a trustee’s job description. “It shall be the duty of legislatures and magistrates, in all future periods of this commonwealth, to cherish the interests of literature and the sciences.” That is the fiduciary frame the Sacred Compact picks up directly.

The drift-of-purpose argument can be tested against this text more cleanly than against any other founding-era source. Adams names what the schools are for (the preservation of rights and liberties), who they are for (the body of the people, the various orders), who is responsible (legislatures and magistrates), and how long the duty runs (all future periods). When a present-day legislature treats the school-trust corpus as a budget-balancing reserve, when a present-day magistrate construes “cherish” to mean “minimally fund,” when “wisdom and knowledge diffused generally” is replaced by metrics of workforce readiness, the institution has drifted from a duty written in plain language. The Library carries Chapter V, Section II so that the duty remains visible.

How to engage

• Full text (Avalon Project, Yale Law School): https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/mass.asp
• Massachusetts Court System, Constitution of the Commonwealth: https://www.mass.gov/the-massachusetts-constitution
• Founders Online (Adams drafts): https://founders.archives.gov/
• Submit a correction or annotation: /contribute/

Curated by

Library editorial team, 2026-05-07. This editorial summary is the Library’s contribution and is open to community revision.