SoylentNews

Freeman [soylentnews.org] writes:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/08/coding-error-blamed-after-parts-of-constitution-disappear-from-us-website/ [arstechnica.com]

The Library of Congress today said a coding error resulted in the deletion of parts of the US Constitution from Congress' website and promised a fix after many Internet users pointed out the missing sections this morning.

"It has been brought to our attention that some sections of Article 1 are missing from the Constitution Annotated (constitution.congress.gov [congress.gov]) website," the Library of Congress said today [bsky.app]. "We've learned that this is due to a coding error. We have been working to correct this and expect it to be resolved soon."
[...]
"Upkeep of Constitution Annotated and other digital resources is a critical part of the Library's mission, and we appreciate the feedback that alerted us to the error and allowed us to fix it," the Library of Congress said.
[...]
The temporarily deleted sections of Article 1 consist of about 650 words, as can be seen in an Internet Archive version comparison [archive.org]. This included part of Section 8 and all of Sections 9 and 10. One deleted bit contains authorization for Congress to provide and maintain a Navy, and to call forth a "Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions."

Another victim of the temporary deletion was the section on habeas corpus [congress.gov].
[...]
Of course, the Constitution can't be changed by simply deleting passages from a government website, but the error temporarily made it more difficult for people to look up parts of the founding document.

Original Submission