Montana values, transcribed

People want all the freedom they can get.

By the late 1960s the “copper collar” that the 1889 Montana Constitution had clamped on the state was way too tight and restrictive. 

More than 65% of Montana voters approved of the Constitutional Convention. 

They recognized that “we’ve got a problem — let’s try to solve it,” according to Helena attorney Rylee Sommers-Flanagan, who recently began crisscrossing the state as part of the free, public Montana Constitution Roadshow. 

The tour touched down in Kalispell on March 10 as Sommers-Flanagan presented state constitutional history and document details to a small, engaged group in the basement meeting room of the library. The 1889 Montana Constitution — hastily written in the run for statehood and closely overseen by Copper King William A. Clark — set the stage for Montana to be run as a “company colony,” she said. It would cater to the interests of industry more than the people. 

Fast-forward to 1972 when 100 elected delegates convened in Helena with a job to do. 

None of the delegates could be sitting officials. These drafters of the new state constitution came from all over the state; they were ranchers, farmers, a beekeeper, a motel operator, housewives and educators and ranged in age from 24 to 73. “For This and Future Generations,” a documentary on the 1972 Constitutional Convention, called out the group as “extraordinarily ordinary,” united only in their “complete ignorance of constitution writing.” 

No matter: A crack team of researchers had spent six months compiling thousands of pages of reports about constitution creation going back to ancient Greece and Asia. Delegates even read them. 

Sitting alphabetically, the delegates put aside party affiliations and debated philosophical differences with civility and seriousness as they crafted the 12,000 words that would shape Montana’s future. 

As a kid growing up a few miles away from the action at the Capitol, I was oblivious to the 54-day sprint to a new constitution even though my granddad came from Billings to testify. But reading it now, particularly the Declaration of Rights in Article II, gives me the chills. The 1972 framers doubled down on freedom, preserving for Montanans many more rights than in the federal Constitution. 

Perhaps the 100 delegates of 1972 wanted individual rights for us as limitless as our big sky, or, in their 1970s optimism, they simply thought, Why not? Whatever the case, the document they drafted, signed by all 100 in March of 1972, then ratified by the voters, remains a cornerstone of Montana life. 

Sommers-Flanagan highlighted some of her favorite provisions, such as that the people “are in charge of state government — we decide”; “Even if we are in the minority we still get to say our piece”; and a firm “stay-in-your-lane command” protecting individual dignity. 

Census data from 2022 showed that in the state’s fastest growing counties, such as Flathead, native Montanans now are in the minority. The roadshow’s education blitz may provide to many a mini history and civics lesson in what makes this place special. 

Let freedom ring. 

Margaret E. Davis, executive director of the Northwest Montana History Museum, can be reached at mdavis@dailyinterlake.com.