Could it be? We do not live under the Constitution of the United States. The document has been a dead letter for a century, maybe longer.
Ours is a Post-Constitutional America.
Surely, there have been great moments of executive usurpation.
Andrew Jackson, in defiance of the Supreme Court, and against all normal principles of law and justice, removed the Cherokee from their agrarian holdings in Georgia and contiguous southeastern United States, sending them marching to Oklahoma. The Supreme Court said his order was unconstitutional. Jackson’s response? Not really much different from “nyah nyah, nyah nyah, nyah nyah.”
Much of the Civil War and Reconstruction was undertaken on the shakiest of constitutional grounds. And then came the “great progressive” presidents.
Republican Teddy Roosevelt and Democrat Woodrow Wilson defied the explicit intent of the Constitution’s authors — as written in The Federalist as well as in the state houses that adopted the new compact. Both presidents construed the Constitution as authorizing the federal government to do pretty much darn near anything not explicitly forbidden in the document.
That was not the original understanding.
And then there is war. The U.S. Congress hasn’t declared an explicit war since World War II. But we’ve been in a never-ending string of wars.
With Obama, the post-constitutional prevarication has reached new … effrontery. The current president says that, though he had previously declared the “Iraq War” a done deal, over, finito, he now says his new attacks upon ISIS are constitutionally justified by 2002’s Authorization for Use of Military Force against Iraq.
“Post-constitutional”? It means our leaders are liars, beyond the law.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
5 replies on “Dead Document?”
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And yet we should still be thankful?
The document is dead only to those who ignore it (yes, that’s YOU democrats and RINO’s). It is far from dead in the eyes and hearts of conservatives and libertarians. It will completely lose relevance if conservatives and libertarians stop fighting the radical left and their enablers. Yes, I’m talking about YOU establishment republicans Boehner, McConnell, et.al. Cowards and/or sympathizers, all. Look at how the radical left continue to cite it when it suits them and when they wish to deceive the uninformed. If it was completely dead and irrelevant, they would not do that.
We are in the fight of our lives for the heart of this country, the radical left has infiltrated every corner of our government, judiciary, and the bureaucracy. We must continue to fight if we are going to save our constitutional system. I think we are in a critical period of our history and on the cusp of either an American Renaissance or complete tyranny. Fight for the outcome you wish to see.
It all depends on whose ox is being gored. One of Richard Nixon’s articles of impeachment said he ‘lied to the American people’.
Bill Clinton wagged his finger and lied, but that was ‘only about sex’.
How do we guard against feelings of helplessness and hopelessness? I see less and less reason to care what happens.
Barack Obama is just the latest version of a runaway executive. This country withstood many challenges but we can’t stand against our own failings. The welfare state trumps all. The idea of a ‘great society’ will be our undoing. Perfect has become the enemy of the good.
Both presidents construed the Constitution as authorizing the federal government to do pretty much darn near anything not explicitly forbidden in the document.
They never read the 10th amendment.