> Doesn't it, though? Could you imagine the United States without a constitution? It would be completely and utterly different from the society that we know. And I'm not just saying that the mere having of a constitution is all that matters either.

I'd expect a very similar nation, actually. Has the Constitution ever actually stopped a ruling party from doing whatever it wishes? Think of the wildly different interpretations given to the same words by the Revolutionary generation, Lincoln, the Warren court, and us. It seems to me that each generation of leaders has managed to find their own ideas mirrored in the document, regardless of how a straightforward reading might give the opposite ideas. How could a Constitution restrain leaders, anyway? Who could have the authority to enforce it?

Restraints on the state, it seems to me, have only been enforced in two cases. The first is when the population strongly favors it. For example, in the US we have excellent freedom of speech (which the typical American likes) but quite subdued economic freedom (which the typical American is leery of). The second is when we get ideologues into positions of power, and they restrain themselves. In neither case has the reasoning been much related to actual text of the Constitution.

Now, a "moral constitution" could be a very effective thing, where much of the population follows the same moral code. And, though it's unwritten and undergoes changes, that's what I'd say we actually have.