“The Constitution is not a fetish to be worshipped nor did it come down from heaven a perfect work,” Clark wrote. “Its defects nearly brought us catastrophe.” It did not foresee the steamboat, the railroad, the factory, the bank, the corporation. It was not democratic. He lamented the indirect election of the Senate. He lamented the Electoral College. He lamented the presidential nomination of Supreme Court justices as well as their life tenure.
