Verbalisation of key concepts of CONSTITUTIONAL LAW in the text of the Constitution of the United States

Abstract

Introduction. In the modern global information space, particularly its segment oriented toward Western cultural values, the United States is conceptualised as a model of long-standing democratic tradition in state-building and legal regulation of public life. The foundation of North American democracy is embedded in the text of the U.S. Constitution, which has remained virtually unchanged for nearly a quarter of a millennium. This text verbalises the key concepts that form the legal segment of the American linguistic worldview. Its significance for Ukraine is determined by the role of the United States as the country’s primary strategic partner.

Methods. The study employs a linguo-conceptual approach, which involves the analysis of verbal markers representing the key concepts articulated in the text (in this case, those belonging to the legal segment of the worldview).

Results. Based on textual verbal markers — at the levels of lexemes, collocations, sentences, and larger textual fragments — the study identifies and analyses the general principles of conceptualising the STATE in the U.S. Constitution, the specifics of conceptualising the type and structure of the STATE, the concept of the federal STATE as a key element of the American legal and political system, the conceptualisation of the POWER trichotomy as the legal foundation of balance in a democratic society, the conceptualisation of SECULARISM in law and legal syncretism, the UNDEMOCRATIC (NON-EGALITARIAN) legal concepts of the original text of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights (Amendments 1–10) as a verbalisation of the concept of HUMAN RIGHTS, and subsequent amendments as markers of the legal system’s evolution.

Conclusions. Overall, the U.S. Constitution verbalises the macroconcepts of DEMOCRACY and FEDERALISM (with a dialectical balance between the rights of individual STATES and the federal GOVERNMENT). The text reflects key concepts underpinning the American state-legal order: the SECULAR nature of power and law (i.e., the absence of sacral authority), the REPUBLICAN (anti-monarchical) and EGALITARIAN (anti-hierarchical) nature of the state (with non-egalitarian elements of the original text — particularly in relation to the rights of women, Indigenous peoples, and African Americans — subsequently corrected through amendments), the SEPARATION OF POWERS (the balance between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches), and the CENTRALISATION OF POWER (a strong presidency in the absence of a prime minister). A historically conditioned feature of LEGISLATIVE power inherited from British governance is the BICAMERAL structure of the U.S. Congress, where U.S. states replace British counties. Among the specific features of the American legal system, compared to other Western legal traditions, verbalised in the Constitution is the mechanism of INDIRECT ELECTIONS via the system of ELECTORS.

Information about the author:

Oleksiy Tertychnyy – postgraduate student, junior research fellow at the Department of Romance, Germanic, and Baltic Languages of the O. O. Potebnia Institute of Linguistics of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine

E-mail: o.tertychnyy@gmail.com