Wednesday, September 30, 2009

One Glaring Error

There is one glaring error in the Constitution, it was the Supreme Court.

The Founding Fathers truly believed that men of honor could only read the Constitution using the words on the document, but only a few short decades after our country was founded, justices began "reading between the lines" for such things as intent. When intent wasn't enough to justify ignoring the words on the page, they moved towards the infamous "living document".

Today, they've moved right past that into the "What the Supreme Court says is law!" And in essence they are right - unless a specific Amendment is passed to allow/disallow a specific law, the Supreme Court is the law of the land - regardless what our Congress decides.

The great error of making the Supreme Court so powerful isn't rooted in the checks and balances, which is an excellent system, but rather the fact that a majority of justices makes a decision. I was recently reminded of the Kelo et al v. City of New London decision - allowing states to take land away from private citizens and give it to other private citizens who promise to increase tax revenues. The decision, like so many BAD decisions, was passed 5 - 4, and there is the glaring error. Four of the most important justices in the land thought the right of a town to forcibly confiscate land from a private homeowner to make way for town homes was blatantly unConstitutional, yet the law was upheld.

How to fix this problem - we need to ask our Congress to begin the process of Amending the Constitution. Like all Amendments it should be short and simple. Here's what I propose:

"Any Supreme Court decision, that is not unanimous, will be construed as a ruling against the government."

Five to four decisions, like
Kelo et al v. City of New London, would automatically be victories to the citizens. In situations where a gov't is suing an individual, as in the Bufferd v. Commissioner Of Internal Revenue, anything but a 9-0 decision would rule against the gov't. For reference, the Commissioner of Internal Revenue won that case 9-0.

With many legitimate questions about such things as the "Patriot Act", going to war without a Declaration, and the previously mentioned issue of Eminent Domain - is it so much to ask that the Supreme Court at least be unanimous in approving MORE government power?

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Most Americans Agree

Many Americans feel they are free, simply because their elected Congressman votes for or against specific bills - and they have the right to vote every two years to keep him/her in office. Every four years they can vote for President and every six for one of their two Senators.

Unfortunately, voting does not equal freedom. They voted in the U.S.S.R., and they still vote in Iran; yet few Americans would classify either of those voters as "Free".

Our founding Fathers were quite fearful of a majority rule, and put together our Constitution specifically to keep the majority from taking away the rights of the minority.

The argument "Most Americans agree", usually followed by "with our President" or "in this poll" should be discarded from every debate you hear on the streets, supermarkets and Internet chat rooms. It is a meaningless and uneducated statement that simply allows the person to participate in a debate they are unwilling to prepare themselves.

"Most Americans agree" is the false belief, created by our public schools and repeated by the media relentlessly, that we live in a Democracy. We don't and never have. We live in a Republic and have specific rights outlined by our Constitution. I beg all of you to stop using this neanderthal argument during debates.

Speak for yourself, and if unable to, then educate yourself first.

Thursday, September 10, 2009

About This Blog

I'd like to use this first blog to simply state its purpose - helping myself and others understand what freedom means. As our freedoms have been eroded over the past century, we continue to see politicians passing laws that are clearly unConstitutional. The Supreme Court has proven a poor arbitrator on what is or isn't Constitutional. They allowed thousands of American citizens to be locked up during World War II, simply because of their Japanese ancestry. The Patriot Act, which clearly violates our 4th Amendment, is still in full force.

Out government should be protecting our freedoms, yet it is pursuing policies are placing every child born into financial debt. How free can anyone be when they are born owing money to another. We are now creating the 21st century version of indentured servitude.