"The great Body of the People in every Free Government, must always be considered as the Husband of the Constitution thereof, and..."

"... consequently that as long as such Constitution performs the duties of Love Honor and Obedience to Her great Constituent Body, or Political Husband, She is entitled to be Kept both in sickness and in Health, with all possible Love and Fidelity by such her said Husband and that on a breach of her Duty she must expect to incur the Pains and Penalties of Divorce.”

So said William Stuart to Griffith Evans, in the debate about whether to ratify the Constitution. New York, 11 July 1788 (CC Vol. 6, p. 258).  I found that at "Constitutional Metaphors, Similes, and Analogies" at the UW's Center for the Study of the American Constitution, where there are many other fascinating metaphors, all from the debates about ratification.

But are there any metaphors in the text of the Constitution?

The question occurred to me as I was reading the comments to the post about the Seventh Circuit case rejecting an Establishment Clause challenge to a public school "Christmas Spectacular" concert. I happened to mention the metaphor of the wall that should, it is sometimes said, separate church and state. Someone appeared to observe that the constitutional text makes no mention of any wall, and it occurred to me that we really don't want any metaphor in the Constitution or in any other legally operable text.

Is there even one metaphor in the Constitution? All I could think of is "no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood" (in Article III). "Blood" refers to a person's descendants. But that scarcely counts as a metaphor. The use of the word "blood" like that goes all the way back to Old English. You might as well consider a metaphor to use "house" for the houses of Congress.

Metaphor is fine in arguments and explanations, so I think it's fine to say "wall of separation" if you want to speak of a strict interpretation of the Establishment Clause. Its absence from the Constitution doesn't mean that the strict interpretation is wrong, only that you don't put metaphors in a constitution.

But how do you like that William Stuart metaphor? The people are the husband and the Constitution is the wife and the Constitution must love, honor, and obey the people.