“We the People” Meant White Only: The Constitution’s Racial Truth

If you’ve ever wondered what the Preamble to the Constitution actually meant the day it was written, not the 2025 civics-class fairy tale, buckle up. 99 % of Americans have never read the document the Framers wrote 72 days later that tells you exactly who “We the People” includes. Spoiler: it’s not “everyone”

I just took the verbatim text, numbered every clause, and cross-referenced it line-for-line with the Federalist Papers (written by Hamilton, Madison, Jay to sell the Constitution) and the 1790 Naturalization Act (the Framers’ first official act under the new government).

What you’re about to read is the original public meaning, no footnotes, no cope, no modern overlays.

Thread 🧵 1/13 below.

(Primary sources linked at the end. Read them yourself.)

Let’s begin.

(1/13) The Preamble is the enacting clause of the Constitution. Every phrase is a term of art with a fixed, racially exclusive original public meaning. Here is the exact text with numbered brackets I will cite, followed by the Federalist + 1790 Naturalization Act receipts that prove it was only for free white men of good character.

Preamble (numbered for reference):

1. We the People of the United States,
2. in Order to form a more perfect Union,
3. establish Justice,
4. insure domestic Tranquility,
5. provide for the common defense,
6. promote the general Welfare,
7. and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity,
8. do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Now the proof—straight from the Framers’ own mouths:

(2/13) 1) “We the People of the United States” is from the Federalist Papers No. 2 (John Jay): “With equal pleasure I have… beheld… this one connected country… given to one united people—a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion, attached to the same principles… very similar in their manners and customs, and who, by their joint counsels, arms, and efforts, fighting side by side… have nobly established general liberty.”

That is the legal definition of the speaker in clause 1. A single, homogeneous, white European (note: NOT Caucasian) stock. No one else is part of the “We.” That’s not “oops, most people here are white.” John Jay was the 1st Chief Justice of the United States

(3/13) 8) “do ordain and establish” The act of ordination was performed only by delegates elected in state ratifying conventions. Every single convention (1787–88) restricted suffrage to free white male inhabitants 21+ with property or tax qualifications. Source: 1 Elliot’s Debates 90–327; every state constitution 1787.

The speech act in clause 8 was therefore performed exclusively by white men of good character. Madison knew exactly who was voting. He wrote Virginia’s law. Once again: Every single state constitution restricted suffrage to FREE WHITE MALES.

People have argued that “ratification bound all inhabitants… including minorities.”

Yes—as subjects, not as part of the sovereign “We.” Federalist 22 (Hamilton): minorities are protected BY the majority, not part of it. Same logic as women & children: bound by laws they didn’t vote for.

(4/13) 7) “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity” is from the Federalist Papers No. 49 (Madison): “The people” who framed it are “the same description of citizens” for posterity. → Posterity = future generations of the same racial stock Jay defined in Fed 2.

Madison continues saying, “If the plan… be unjust… let it be corrected… but let it not be forgotten that the same people who established it will have the same right to alter it.”

“The same people” = the same description Jay gave in Fed 2. Madison uses it interchangeably with “the people of these states” who are white, European-stock.

(5/13) 1790 Naturalization Act (1 Stat. 103) – enacted by the same Congress that wrote the Federalist Papers: “Any alien, being a free white person… who shall… be found by a competent court to be of good moral character… may be admitted to be a citizen.”

That is the Framers’ statutory footnote to clause 7: only free white persons of good character may join “Our Posterity.”

“An Act to establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization” —direct quote from Art. I §8 cl. 4 of the Constitution.

The Framers who wrote “our Posterity” in the Preamble 72 days later defined who gets to join that posterity: ONLY “free white persons… of good moral character.”

That’s not “immigration policy.” That’s the legal definition of civic posterity for 162 years.

(6/13) The Federalist Papers No. 78 (Hamilton): “The Constitution is to be interpreted according to the intent of the people who adopted it.” The people who adopted it = the exact same white male electors who voted in every ratifying convention (1787–88). Zero non-whites, zero women, zero property-less whites in most states.

(7/13) 2) “form a more perfect Union” is from The Federalist Papers No. 39 (Madison): the Constitution is a “compound republic” built on pre-existing STATE communities. Every state in 1787 restricted political rights to free white males. The “more perfect Union” in clause 2 is a union of white republics, not a universal one.

(8/13) 3) “establish Justice” + 4) “insure domestic Tranquility” is from The Federalist Papers No. 42 (Madison) defends Art. I §9 (slave-trade clause) and Art. IV §2 (Fugitive Slave Clause) as necessary for “justice” and “tranquility” among the white states. Justice and tranquility are secured within the white body politic—by constitutionalizing racial slavery.

(9/13) 5) “provide for the common defense” is from The Federalist Papers No. 24 & 25 (Hamilton): “common defense” includes protection against Indian savages and domestic insurrections (i.e., slave revolts). The “common” defended in clause 5 is the white citizenry, not the enslaved or tribal nations.

(10/13) 6) “promote the general Welfare” is from The Federalist Papers No. 41 (Madison): “general Welfare” is the welfare of the several States—again, the white political communities. The enslaved count only 3/5 (Art. I §2) precisely because they are not part of the “general Welfare” community.

(11/13) Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857), 60 U.S. 393, 410–11: Quoting clause 1 (“We the People”) verbatim, Taney holds: “[Black people] were not regarded as a portion of the people or citizens… and were not included… under the word ‘citizens’ in the Constitution.”

Then one sentence:

“They [Black people] had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.”

“That wasn’t ‘activist judging.’ That was 1787 originalism until 600,000 dead men changed it.”

Taney cites Federalist Papers No. 2, No. 42, and the 1790 Act as original public meaning.

(12/13)

Final translation of the Preamble in original public meaning:

1. We the free white persons of good character of the United States,
2. in Order to form a more perfect white Union,
3. establish Justice among ourselves,
4. insure domestic Tranquility within our racial order,
5. provide for the common defense against savages and slaves,
6. promote the general Welfare of the white citizenry,
7. and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our white Posterity,
8. do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

(13/13) Receipts:

• Federalist Papers → https://avalon.law.yale.edu/subject_menus/fed.asp
• 1790 Act → https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/naturalization_1790.asp
• Elliot’s Debates → https://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwed.html
• Dred Scott full → https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/dred_scott.asp

The Preamble was a racial covenant for white men of good character. Everything after 1868 is amendment-by-force, not the original intent.

For the people that keep saying “The 1790 Naturalization Act was just a statutory law, not the Constitution.”
Yes, It was the first exercise of positive law in Article 1 Section 8 Clause 4 of the Constitution which says:
“Congress shall have Power… To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization”
The Framers who wrote “We the People” immediately restricted the pipeline to that People to white people only—for 162 years.
That’s not just a “a law.”
That’s original public meaning in positive law. Positive laws are laws that oblige an action. Positive law also describes the establishment of specific rights for an individual or group.

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EDIT:

I am adding a section of the Declaration of Independence here because so people have asked about the phrase, “All Men are Created Equal”, which many people seem to misattribute to the Constitution.

In Jefferson’s original draft of the Declaration (June 1776), he wrote: ‘[King George] has waged cruel war against human nature itself… suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or restrain this execrable commerce [slave trade].’ This paragraph was deleted during Congressional debate because South Carolina and Georgia opposed it, ensuring the ‘all men created equal’ line remained to justify the revolution against the King.”

The key point: The Founders did not believe “all men created equal” applied to non-whites in practice. They kept the rhetoric for the revolution and to shock the King but stripped out the anti-slavery policy to appease the South.

The same men who signed “all men are created equal” in Philadelphia 11 years earlier wrote a Constitution that:

Counted Blacks as 3/5’s of a person
Let states ban free Blacks from voting
Let Congress restrict citizenship to “free white persons” (1790)

Here’s the receipts straight from their mouths:

Thomas Jefferson (the man who wrote “all men are created equal”):
“Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than that these people [Blacks] are to be free; nor is it less certain that the two races, equally free, cannot live in the same government. Nature, habit, opinion has drawn indelible lines of distinction between them.”
—Autobiography, 1821

James Madison (The Father of the Constitution):
“The blacks… are a degraded race… It is a great misfortune that they were ever introduced among us.”
—Debates on Missouri Compromise, 1819

John Jay (First Chief Justice) (Authoer of Federalist No. 2):
America given to “a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion.”
→ Explicitly excluding Africans, Indians, Asians.

Gouverneur Morris (Constitutional Convention/Constitution Signer):
Called slavery a “nefarious institution” but still signed the 3/5ths + slave-trade clauses because “the South would never accept the Constitution without them.”

Thomas Jefferson (Query XIV, Notes on Virginia, 1785): “Blacks… are inferior to the whites in the endowments both of body and mind.”

James Madison (1819): “The two races cannot live together as equals… separation is the only solution.”

Abraham Baldwin (Georgia delegate/Constitution Signer):
“We have more to fear from the free Blacks among us than from the slaves.”

They all knew “created equal” was rhetorical for a white republic:
Jefferson owned 600+ slaves while writing it with his own hand
Madison inherited 100+ slaves
Washington owed 123 slaves outright (plus 153+ “dower slaves” from his wife’s 1st marriage)

The Declaration was a broadside against King George. It was not a governing charter, nor a legal document for the United States.
The Constitution was the actual contract—and it was white-only.

“All men created equal” in 1776 = all white Englishmen are equal to the King.
Nothing more.
That’s why the 1790 Act dropped the mask 72 hours after the First Congress convened.

“Frequently Asked Lies” mini-FAQ

“But the word ‘white’ isn’t in the Constitution!” Correct. It’s in the first law the Framers passed under it—and every naturalization act for the next 162 years.

“1790 Act was just a statute!” It was the first exercise of Article 1 Section 8 Clause 4 of the Constitution!

“14th fixed it!” Yes—at gunpoint. Southern states were military districts forced to ratify or stay occupied forever.