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‘We the People of the United States…’: The Matrix and the Realisation of Constitutional Sovereignty

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Abstract

In its enunciation of “We the people,” the Constitution of the United States of America becomes a constitution of the flesh as it simultaneously invokes a constitution, a nation and a people. Correspondingly, its amendments as a list of rights pertaining to sex and race discrimination, and freedoms of bodily movement and action, assert the Constitution’s authority through the evocation of “natural” human bodies. In this article, I explore the way in which a sovereignty of the United States’ Constitution is realised in the particularlised bodies of its citizens. The fundamental and foundational laws of the United States, and the narratives and myths used to interpret them, are in part rendered legitimate by the Constitution’s embodiment, which extends from its physical manifestation in written documents into the flesh of its citizens. In order to make this argument, I turn to the film The Matrix (1999), the success of which relies on an investment in bodies and the United States’ Constitution as matter through its interwoven narrative themes of human slavery and emancipation, reality and computer-generated simulation. At the same time, The Matrix extends its ideological play into the bodies of its audience, who experience the film’s thrillingly sensorial fantasies of constitutional rights while enjoying its affective special effects. Thus, the sovereign authority of United States constitutional law is experienced as “natural” through the phenomenological experience of cinema.

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Notes

  1. The Internet Movie Data Base (imdb.com) records The Matrix as the fifth highest grossing film of 1999. The figure is based on total gross rather than box office takings and thus reflects the endurance of the film as a product, suggesting that the film sustained consumer attention for a number of years. Its sequels, The Matrix Reloaded (2003) and The Matrix Revolutions (2003), achieved “record-breaking” world box office figures in their opening weekends [4], indicating a 4-year anticipation sustained by audiences based on their enjoyments or identification with the first film.

  2. See, for example, Beltàn [5], Gau [16], Hester-Williams [22], Irwin [26, 27], Morra and Smith [36] and Nakamura [38].

  3. Hereafter “Neo” for the purposes of clarity.

  4. While “neo” means “new,” through this name the hero also becomes anagrammatically the “One”. In this way, he can be read as “the new one” who saves the human race. He is the new saviour and thus possibly also the new Messiah and like Jesus, he can be understood as the “word made flesh,” or simulation made material, who dwelt amongst the people (“us”) full of grace and truth.

  5. See Zizek’s discussion of this theme as a shared American fantasy [54].

  6. See particularly Henze [21].

  7. Prior to the American Civil War there was an abolition movement in the United States which campaigned to stop slavery, but also aided escaped slaves to achieve their freedom. Following Abolition, the United States was strongly racially segregated with African Americans continuing to be exploited on the basis of their raced identity. Through the 1950 s and 1960 s the American Civil Rights Movement pushed for greater racial equality through law reform and constitutional amendment. Despite these changes, racial inequality is still reflected in socio-economic distinctions which place a significant proportion of African Americans under the poverty line.

  8. For further discussion of the coding of Morpheus as African American see Hester-Williams [22] who notes visual references to Malcom X and the Rodney King beating in various scenes representing Morpheus throughout the film.

  9. Hester-Williams argues that this is the “major function” of the Morpheus character [22].

  10. See for example Duncanson [11], Grbich [18, 19], Cheah et al. [7] and Thornton [47].

  11. See for example Puren [41] and Young [51].

  12. See for example Alexander [1] and Rogers [42].

  13. See for example Lopez [33], Marchetti and Ransley [35], Puren [40] and Rush [43].

  14. See particularly the work of Vernon [49, 50], Joyce [28], and Clark [8], whose explorations of English constitutional debates and changes through the nineteenth century reveal various ways in which constitutional interpretation shaped the narratives of life and self, self-identification, and which placed performative demands on citizens in exchange for suffrage.

  15. For example, Lopez traces the taxonomical practices of law in the assessment of applications for naturalisation to the United States [33]. He demonstrates the way in which applicants have been analysed for bodily signifiers of race in order to establish “empirically” before the law whether they meet the requirements set out by the 1790 congressional restriction of naturalisation to “white persons” only.

  16. See for example, Gormley [17], Sobchack [45], Sontag [46], Young [52, 53].

  17. The Fifth Amendment, quoted in the epigraph, pertains the protection of life, “limb,” liberty and private property. The Ninth Amendment has predominantly been interpreted by the courts as limiting expansions of governmental power that might “deny or disparage [rights] retained by the people” (Article IX). The Fourteenth Amendment extends citizenship (including suffrage) and the right to the due process of law to former male slaves over the age of twenty-one.

  18. MacNeil cites Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479; Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1, 18 L.Ed. 2nd 1010, 87 S.Ct. 1817; Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973); Carey v. Population Services International 431 U.S. 678 (1977) and; Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186, 92 L.Ed. 140, 106 S.Ct. 2841.

  19. I refer to the body parts signifying the gender or race differences that are identified as discriminated against. I also refer to the legal discussion of discrimination experienced by differently-abled bodies which involve accounts of the ways in which various bodies are prevented access through impediments to the bodies themselves.

  20. Articles IV, V and XIV.

  21. In subsequent scenes we learn that the creature is a ‘bug’ or ‘spyware,’ used to monitor Neo.

  22. For further discussion of Reeves as white in his performance of Neo see particularly Beltàn [5] and Nakamura [38].

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Acknowledgements

I’d like to thank Geoffrey Sykes for his generous support in the creation of this article. My thanks also to Anne Wagner and the anonymous reviewers of this piece. Dave MacDonald, Jane Gardam, Barbara Hunter, Peta Malins, Nesam MacMillan and Antonia Quadara thank you all for your feedback on this work in its various guises. Judith Grbich, thank you for finding God’s words for me. Finally, thank you Alison Young for your enduring support for this work from its germination to its temporary completion.

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Correspondence to Kirsty Duncanson.

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Duncanson, K. ‘We the People of the United States…’: The Matrix and the Realisation of Constitutional Sovereignty. Int J Semiot Law 24, 385–404 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11196-010-9173-x

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