Hands over hearts, about two dozen people stood outside the Polk County Courthouse Saturday, Sept. 17, Constitution Day, pledging allegiance to the flag and singing the national anthem.
For the next 45 minutes, they listened intently as various people stood at a podium to read the United States Constitution.
“We owe our thanks and our blessings to our founding fathers who constructed this wonderful document for us,” said Polk County Republican Party Chairman Debbie Arceneaux.
Arceneaux’s husband, Art, read the Declaration of Independence because Debbie said she would cry through the reading as another woman did during last year’s event.

Arceneaux said she is so passionate about the document because it was created by people who were struggling through what she said very closely mirrors the country’s current situation.
“It is the people’s book, it is the people’s work,” Arceneaux said. “It tells us that we are free; that we are the owners of this country.”
Constitution Day and Citizenship Day was established as a holiday in 2004 with the passing of an amendment to the Omnibus spending bill. Today it is celebrated specifically in schools receiving federal funds.
On this day people around the country join to read and study the U.S. Constitution. This is the second year a group has gathered outside the courthouse to read the document.
Schools across the nation are also required to take time each year to focus on the Constitution. But Arceneaux said its impossible to truly teach the document in a day. So, she and others hope to eventually offer enrichment classes for various age groups to bolster what they are learning about American history and the Constitution in particular.
“It’s very, very important to us. I think that the children need to have an understanding outside of what they learn in the classroom … about why our founding fathers wrote the constitution in the way that they did,” Arceneaux said.