Website Slip Deletes Key Constitutional Clauses
If you had looked up the Constitution on the Library of Congress’s official site this summer, you’d have noticed something jarringly off—whole chunks of the document were just gone. Specifically, Sections 8, 9, and 10 of Article I were missing from the annotated online version, erasing everything from Congress’s ability to declare war to the all-important Habeas Corpus clause. This wasn’t some act of sabotage or a quiet midnight amendment. Instead, it all came down to a slip-up: an XML tag accidentally deleted during a website update.
Behind the scenes, the tech team was rolling out an update that included fresh Supreme Court analyses. But in the shuffle, someone remove a critical tag from the code—think of it as yanking a support beam in a house. Suddenly, the sections that limit congressional and state powers, and even the ban on states signing their own treaties, disappeared. The holes were obvious to anyone looking for the nuts-and-bolts rules that anchor the whole government and individual freedoms.
Tension Rises Amid Political Rhetoric
The timing couldn’t have been more eyebrow-raising. Only days before, talk of suspending Habeas Corpus—mostly from figures surrounding Donald Trump, like Stephen Miller—had put this arcane but vital legal protection back in the headlines. When people noticed the clause had vanished online, worry gave way to suspicion.
Rep. Mark Takano from California wasted no time grilling the Library’s top brass. He called the timing "deeply alarming" and wasn’t shy about linking it to the recent political chatter. Was this a digital accident, or something more sinister? The Library explained it as a straightforward technical blunder that snowballed, not anything secretive. Still, questions and concerns circled for days as the missing content lingered.
For nearly a week, anyone searching for Article I’s Sections 8-10—the backbone of Congressional power and the roadblocks on federal and state overreach—ran into a blank. The hole included not only the Habeas Corpus ban on unlawful detentions, but also crucial rules like how Congress handles interstate commerce and limits on what states can and can’t do on their own.
Not until August 6th did the pages quietly reappear, restored after one more code fix. The Library said they’re making changes to ensure that, moving forward, sloppy tech errors won’t leave the public (or lawmakers) in the dark about the country’s most basic rules. The lesson’s pretty clear: even our oldest legal guardrails can fall through the cracks if no one’s watching the website updates.
