PART 1

Firstly I want to do away with this notion that the United States constitution is somehow 'really outdated'. I've seen this thrown around before and it betrays a fundamental lack of understanding about both the contents of the United States constitution, and how the US legal system itself works.

If you are comparing either the legal system in the US or the constitution itself to that in Austria, these are things that, immediately you need to know you really shouldn't do. The basic function of the judiciary (the courts) and the legal system itself in Austria is drastically different. These are both tied into some of the constitutional differences. I'm going to try and keep this next part simple.

Essentially, in Austria the legal system is what you call 'civil law'. This is the system that the vast majority of countries in the world use - it's why the Austrian system has more in common with the Indonesian legal system than that of the US. Generally, a civil law system includes the following features:

• Legislation (and a constitution) tends to be the only source of binding law. This means that legislation in civil law countries is generally codified, with everything written out in detail in each legislation.
• Decisions of judges do not create law, and courts are not bound by their previous decisions. It's only really in administrative law that judges have a bit more freedom.

There are of course other aspects of civil law systems which I won't go into for lack of importance here. Suffice to say, civil law systems are noted for being very prescriptive and inflexible, although that can lead to somewhat quicker court decision-making processes. Every country in Europe, except for Ireland and the UK, is a civil law country.

The United States however operates a totally different legal system called 'common law' (mostly; the state of Louisiana is a unique situation). There are few countries using this system - mostly former-British colonies. South Africa, India, Singapore, Australia and South Africa are examples of other countries that operate common law systems. Generally, a common law system is noted by the following differences:

• There are multiple sources of law. Legislation is still a source of law, but judges are themselves able to create law in their decisions. This means that laws are rarely codified, and are often quite barebones frameworks.
• This also means that common law countries sometimes don't even have a formal constitution at all, such as in the United Kingdom or New Zealand. These countries do not have actual constitutions in the sense of a written document that supercedes all legislation. When you hear british people or new zealanders talk about a "british constitution" what they're really talking about is just a collection of well-respected legislations that are considered controversial for their parliaments to alter.
• Most importantly, the decisions that judges make in court are actually legally binding and can only be overturned by higher ranking courts. If the highest court itself made a decision, then only that court can overturn it. Decisions of judges are actually legally binding on governments and society itself.

Again, there are differences I haven't written about here, i.e. with contract law. To summarise the differences relevant to this thread:

• Civil law countries codify almost every aspect of law. Legislations in civil law countries are very detailed, lengthy documents that cover everything you can think of. Judges decisions are not binding and they cannot create law.

• Common law countries rarely codify law. Instead, legislations tend to be more general documents, and much shorter than their codified civil law equivalents. This is because decisions of judges are binding law, so it is their job to interpret the basics that are written into legislations and create law out of them.

These are of course generalities - there are exceptions to the above. For instance, many common law jurisdictions do codify taxation and criminal law, and many civil law jurisdictions allow judges to have some precedential powers in administrative law. So there are exceptions of course.

Anyway, these differences are what leads to the result that civil law constitutions tend to be extremely lengthy, detailed documents. It also means they have a sort of laser-focus on procedural matters - as you say, a framework of the nation that regulates every aspect of governance. This is why the Austrian constitution goes on, and on, and on, across hundreds of articles, with many hundreds more sections within the articles.

By contrast, common law constitutions are virtually never this sort of document. They cover the absolute basics, which it is then the job of judges to rule on and develop, and change over time.

This is why Article 14 of the Constitution of Austria has 10 sections across two pages for matters of defining schools, what laws can be made bout schools, what relationship churches can have with schools, and more - meanwhile, neither the Constitution of the United States nor the Constitution of Australia even mentions education. The Singapore Constitution does mention education, but only in the context of civil liberties in its bill of rights.

The Austrian Constitution seems to go on forever, detailing every possible area the government could deal with, and how it can deal with those areas, and how instutitions can operate, and so on. Because of the purpose of a constitution like this, Austrians naturally don't have much interest in the Constitution. It is, essentially, a boring legal document only interesting to bureaucrats and lawyers. There's really no reason for ordinary people to take an interest in it. Especially with these documents rarely having much focus on civil liberties.

So when we look at Constitutions in common law countries like the US, or Singapore, you might be wondering - what are they really even for, if they aren't extensive frameworks detailing the specifics of national governance? What do they even have in them? Well, these constitutions include the basics of how national (or federal) governance is to work. The job of a constitution like this is solely to set up the federal government and specify what it is allowed to do. It doesn't go into any detail whatsoever on matters outside its responsibility. So really, constitutions in common law countries aren't about regulating government activity, but simply exist to set up levels of government, delineate what powers governments do and do not have, and leave it at that.

These are much shorter documents as a result. Whereas the Austrian Constitution contains 151 articles and hundreds more subsections in around 30,000 words, the United States constitution contains only 7 articles and 27 amendments in the entire document - around 7500 words in its entirety (with amendments). The Australian Constitution seems much more like the Austrian constitution with its 128 sections - but each sentence is rarely longer than one or two sentences, and the whole document is only around 11,000 words - approximately a third the size of the Austrian Constitution.

These constitutions are much shorter by design - they leave room for courts to update and re-interpret restrictions on government in real time, without having to deal with the political process which can often take years, and multiple elections, to deal with. Because these constitutions are focused on division of power and restrictions on it, this means that civil liberties typically play a much larger role in their jurisprudence (except for the Australian constitution, which, quite dangerously, contains no bill of rights whatsoever, leading to many abuses over the years).

So you can understand by this point how there are drastically different legal systems here, and drastically different intentions for constitutions within those legal systems. You appear to be viewing this document with a distinctly Austrian view towards a Constitution, leading to a perception of the document that must make the document, and how Americans view it, seem quite strange. But you must keep all of the above in mind, because the US is a world away from Austria in the difference between a common law and a civil law country, and the purpose of a Constitution within it.

PART 2 FOLLOWS