[radicalamericannationalist]

That is precisely what I'm saying. Four decades change a person's perspective. The most accurate measure of a word or phrase's meaning is what is said at the time of its use, not half a century later when the political landscape and motive for saying things have dramatically altered.

If you need further illustrations, see John Kerry. While I am most emphatically not comparing the two men, they are both political actors who faced changed political circumstances over their careers. So tell me, would you accept as the authoritative Kerry view on Vietnam - atrocities and other nonsense - what he says now or what he said then? His motives for speaking today are far different from thirty years ago. The contemporaneous statement is the more telling.

[tacticalogic]

The contemporaneous statement is the more telling.

You might have a point if you had a contemporaneous quote that contradicts it. You're maintaining that since he didn't say it explicitly at the time of the ratification, it can be assumed that he meant something different when he said it 40 years later. You're asking me to believe he advised that the constition should be interpreted according to the commonly held meaning of the words at the time they were written, then immediately proceeded to disregard his own advice.