Exercise 3: Written-Down vs. Easy-to-Change Are Two Separate Properties — Possible Solution ================================================================================================================== The chapter's own warn-box states the claim directly - being written down in one document and being easy to change are not the same thing - and the codified-vs-uncodified comparison table gives the real evidence for it. WHAT "CODIFIED" ACTUALLY MEANS Codified just describes WHERE a constitution's rules physically live: collected into a single document, as opposed to scattered across many separate statutes, court rulings, and unwritten conventions. It says nothing on its own about how hard or easy those rules are to change once written. THE US CASE: WRITTEN DOWN, BUT HARD TO CHANGE The US Constitution is unambiguously codified - one physical document, the oldest such document still in force anywhere in the world. And yet Article V makes formally amending it deliberately difficult: a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress to propose an amendment, then ratification by three-fourths of all 50 state legislatures. The real, verifiable result of that high bar: only 27 amendments have ever been ratified across more than 237 years since the Constitution took effect in 1789 - genuinely rare, formal constitutional change. THE UK CASE: NOT WRITTEN DOWN, BUT EASY TO CHANGE The UK constitution is the reverse case. It is genuinely uncodified - no single document holds it - built instead from ordinary Acts of Parliament, court cases, and unwritten convention. But because of Parliamentary sovereignty, an ordinary Act of Parliament, passed by a simple majority in a single sitting, can in principle change any part of that constitutional arrangement, including how Parliament itself is elected. There is no equivalent of Article V's supermajority requirement standing in the way. WHY THIS PROVES THE TWO PROPERTIES DON'T HAVE TO MOVE TOGETHER If "written down" and "hard to change" always moved together, the codified US Constitution should be the flexible one and the uncodified UK constitution should be the rigid one. The real evidence shows the exact opposite pairing: the codified document is the hard- to-change one (27 amendments in 237+ years, via a deliberate supermajority process), and the uncodified system is the comparatively easy-to-change one (an ordinary Act of Parliament, a simple majority, one sitting). That mismatch is the clearest possible proof that "codified" and "flexible" are two independent design choices, not two labels for the same underlying property. ANSWER: "Written down" (codified) describes only where a constitution's rules are physically located; "easy to change" describes a completely separate design choice about how much consensus is required to amend those rules. The real US and UK figures prove they're independent: the codified US Constitution requires a 2/3-Congress-plus-3/4-states supermajority and has been amended only 27 times in 237+ years, while the uncodified UK constitution can in principle be changed by an ordinary Act of Parliament passing with a simple majority in a single session - the codified document is actually the harder one to change, not the easier one. WHY THIS WORKS AS AN ANSWER ------------------------------ It states the general principle, then backs it with the chapter's own real, specific figures from both systems (27 amendments/237+ years vs. a single-session ordinary Act), showing the mismatch is what actually demonstrates the two properties are independent rather than just asserting it.