The Quill Year in Review

As we approach the end of the year, we are pleased to share with you the following highlights and achievements

The Reconstruction Amendments

In July 2022 we launched a new digital collection charting the creation of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, which ended slavery in the United States and are fundamental to the modern understanding of citizenship and civil rights. The culmination of more than three years hard work in conjunction with students at Utah Valley University (UVU), this project makes archival material available to the public for the first time, and contextualizes the creation of these transformative amendments in ways that will further understanding of them for years to come. We marked the publication with a major academic conference in Oxford at which two UVU students assigned to the project had the opportunity to present.

Judicial Forum

August 2022 saw our inaugural Judicial Forum at Pembroke College, an opportunity to bring together senior US and UK justices to discuss the challenges that courts face globally in an era of populism and challenge to judicial independence. The workshop was a great success, and we intend to build and expand upon it in future years.

K-12 Education

A personal highlight of the year for Nicholas Cole was participation in the UVU Constitutional Literacy Institute, a summer programme for high-school teachers. In order to implement some of the teachers’ suggestions for adapting Quill for the classroom, we have appointed our first UI specialist to focus on making our digital materials more accessible for use in education and by the general public. We look forward to showcasing his work in 2023!

Celebrating Students

With the easing of travel restrictions, Nicholas was able to connect with the UVU undergraduates who had joined the project during the pandemic, and we were excited to host not one but two summer schools at Pembroke: our two-week course on the writing of the 1787 Constitution, along with a new programme focused on Civics. We are proud to be promoting renewed interest in the history of constitutional law, so a particular delight this year was the news that one of our student researchers from UVU is embarking on doctoral studies in the subject at the University of Missouri.

Plans for 2023

Constitution-Writing in the American West

In 2023, we anticipate the publication of our project examining Constitution-writing in the American West, funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, and culminating with conferences in Oxford and Utah. Renewing Interest in Constitutional Law After decades of neglect, there is a new interest in the history of constitutional law, and for the first time a proper focus on US state constitutional law. Our priorities in the coming years will be work on two major projects:

• The Fifty in Ten project will work to put online comprehensive collections charting the negotiation of the current constitution of each of the fifty states. We have been able to make a start on this effort thanks to the generous funding of the NEH and others, but there are 43 states left to go!

• The First Fifteen project will chart the creation of America’s first fifteen state constitutions. These documents and the interpretation of them are important as the Supreme Court increasingly looks to the Founding Era when interpreting the 1787 Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

Giving to Quill

We are extremely grateful to all of those who have made philanthropic donations to the Quill Project, without which our work this year would not have been possible. To help us to build on our successes and continue to have impact through our innovative work, such as the projects outlined above and adapting Quill for use in schools, we would be honoured if you would consider donating through the Pembroke Foundation of North America, pcfna.org.

IMPACT

Making a difference.

The research conducted by the Quill Project is cutting edge but also has immediate application to some of the most pressing issues in our societies.

Our impact is felt most immediately in the legal and education sectors.

Law

The importance of Quill’s work to the legal profession was highlighted recently when the current Supreme Court clearly signalled a new willingness to consider historical arguments as it evaluates the basis for claims of constitutional rights. Our flagship projects offer the most detailed examination ever produced of the writing of the 1787 Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Reconstruction Amendments, the historical documents at the centre of most contemporary constitutional controversies in the U.S.

At every stage of its development, Quill has engaged with the legal community to ensure technical innovations and digital tools are used effectively to promote more accurate legal scholarship, and it is regularly cited by practising lawyers and academics. We have trained legal clerks in Utah in the use of the Quill models and in summer 2022 we welcomed a delegation of senior US justices to Pembroke College for a closed workshop on judicial reform.

We recognize that more could be done to ensure that the rigorously researched resources published by Quill are disseminated and made of optimal value to lawyers and clerks. For this reason, one of our key fundraising priorities is to appoint a post-doctoral researcher in law to expand the programme of workshops we run for clerks and initiate more meaningful dialogue with the legal community. The postholder would also have responsibility for adding relevant introductory material and annotations to existing collections, including indexing of the Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, and planning new projects around areas of greatest need in the legal community.

Education

Within months of the initial publication of the 1787 Constitutional Convention debates in October 2016, our platform was being used for teaching the history of the constitution in American Universities and High Schools. Since then, we have been working with a number of not-for-profit organizations to further develop materials for high-school level students.

Our partnership with UVU has been particularly helpful in evaluating more clearly what teachers need and how this can be best incorporated into the Quill platform. UVU has expertise and opportunities around K-12 education that Oxford cannot rival. With their support, we have partnered in the Summer Institute for Teachers and built relationships with a range of education partners in Utah State.

To date our educational resources have been built by our partners in education and guided students through exercises and activities that exploit the resources offered by Quill. The next stage for the project is to integrate interfaces designed to engage young people directly in the platform. This development work is a core aspect of our Good Friday Agreement project, Writing Peace, and will directly benefit the other projects in our portfolio.

Quill partners with UVU in the annual Summer Institute for Teachers

Improving prospects for young people

“Working so closely with Dr. Cole has created a research opportunity that is found nowhere else on campus. [Three of the research assistants] now have plans for law school and [a fourth] will be going to graduate school... this project sets them apart.”

— Danielle Maddox, Research Assistant

One of the most innovative aspects of Quill’s approach has been the development of multi-user editing techniques and an editorial methodology which allows teams of students from diverse institutions and backgrounds to collaborate with one another and academic advisers on digital editions of legally significant texts. After initial training, students transcribe and enter data from the negotiation into the Quill platform, and as they do so are guided through a series of editorial decisions to build a model which mirrors as closely as possible the processes followed by the legislative body they are studying.

It is hard to underestimate the benefits to students of being involved in this kind of project. In the words of one student, ‘working so closely with Dr Cole has created a research opportunity that is found nowhere else on campus… it has also given each of us a first-hand experience of researching the creation of the Constitution.’ A member of staff at UVU observed that Quill ‘immerses students in real-world activities outside the classroom to increase professional competence and confidence.’

Quill provides a unique opportunity for undergraduate students to become involved with a multi-disciplinary research team and to gain a thorough understanding of archival work, the process of documentary-editing and editorial decision-making, and the challenges of building tools for analysis and presentation, as well as providing a thorough grounding in the history of constitution-making and in many cases has inspired students to take on higher degrees or pursue legal careers.

Many of the students working on our Utah project in particular come from educationally and economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Working with Quill has given them an opportunity to take on paid employment which has a positive rather than detrimental impact on their academic studies by training them in research skills, critical thinking, and data analysis, and providing them with a deeper understanding of historical and constitutional issues and their own civic responsibilities. Initial evidence suggests that immersion with Quill has given students who may not previously have had the confidence to do so, the support and experience they need to consider higher degree courses and legal careers.

The core of the Quill Project remains its focus on expanding knowledge of constitutional and institutional development, through a combination of traditional archival and editing work and the development of new digital approaches. The surprise has been how integral the work of a diverse group of undergraduates has become. They have proven that the humanities can indeed benefit from student contributions to long-term, collaborative research projects, not merely as ‘data-entry’ assistants, but as colleagues.