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Historians agree that James Madison’s shrewdest maneuver was arriving in Philadelphia for the Constitutional Convention in 1787 with a proto-Constitution already in hand. Writing that draft — the “Virginia Plan” — engaged many months of Madison’s life. Day after day, he pored over treatises and histories about republicanism and democracy, liberty and power, sovereignty and consent.

The man who would later be the fourth president was determined to consolidate all the political lessons of the past into one venerable Constitution. It was a herculean task.

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ChatGPT could have completed the same assignment in about 30 seconds.

No one should doubt that artificial intelligence will enhance the work of a current constitution-maker. “Write me a constitution” has, or will, become the familiar command of the modern James Madison.

And yet AI can do something else that is equally crucial to America’s civic survival: It can enable citizens to see the world as their elected representatives do.

Using tools like ChatGPT, we can now generate constitutional texts that reflect the beliefs, values, practices, priorities, actions, messages and ideals of any elected official. It’s simple: We direct ChatGPT with general constitutional triggers and guide the chatbot with straightforward drafting prompts and, voila, a “Trump Constitution” appears. Do it again and a “Schumer Constitution” spits out. Or an “AOC Constitution.” Or a “Clarence Thomas Constitution.”

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Then, if you place that AI-generated constitution alongside the one displayed in the National Archives, the contrast — the gap in understanding, as we call it — will tell you something important about that official’s political and constitutional attitude.

What this AI experiment reveals is that the attitudes of America’s political leaders are frequently misaligned with the country’s real Constitution. And that’s a problem — because all public officials take an oath to uphold the Constitution.

To illustrate, we used AI to generate a “Trump Constitution.” Unsurprisingly, it bears little resemblance to the 1787 text.

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