On June 21, 1915, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down an Oklahoma law denying the right to vote to some citizens. In Guinn v. United States, the Supreme Court found “grandfather clauses” in effect in several formerly slave states — though superficially race-neutral — to be little more than sneaky ways of allowing illiterate white folks to vote while disallowing illiterate black folks.
The war is still chugging along. It extends even to our most private communications, including those now hidden from prying eyes by encryption. Revived legislation in the U.S. Senate threatens the providers of such encryption.
Reclaim the Net’s Dan Frieth observes that under the STOP CSAM Act of 2025 (S. 1829), which targets “child sexual abuse material,” providing a “secure, privacy-focused service could be interpreted as ‘facilitating’ illegal activity, regardless of whether the provider can access or verify the content being transmitted.”
The legislation stipulates that providers may defend themselves from charges of “facilitating” illegal activity by showing that it is “technologically impossible” to remove CSAM without disabling their encryption. But firms would still often have to go to court to make this case, and “many platforms may adopt invasive scanning out of fear, not necessity, just to avoid liability, with real consequences for privacy and user trust.”
Defaulting to routine invasive scanning means an end to providing users with encryption, including users threatened by despotic regimes.
Current law already requires platforms to report known examples of material that entails the sexual abuse of children.
Any good or service that can be put to good use can also be put to evil use. Just as we shouldn’t penalize the makers of knives, forks, mail, curtains, roads, and guns for their use by criminals, the makers of encryption services should also not be so punished.
Nor should we grant to government bodies such a frightening dystopian power, accumulated to override our basic freedoms.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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On the 20th of June in 1787, at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Oliver Ellsworth moved to confine legislative powers to two distinct congressional bodies, and to strike the word “national” from the document. Edmund Randolph of Virginia had previously moved successfully to call the government the National Government of United States. Ellsworth moved that the government should continue to be called, simply, the United States of America.
The final wording eventually became “All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.”
The words “nation” and “national” do not occur anywhere in the Constitution as ratified by the original set of states, or as amended.
John F. Kennedy authored the Encyclopædia Britannica’s article on Ellsworth. This was Kennedy’s only contribution to the encyclopedia.
The image, above, is of a portrait of Oliver Ellsworth by Ralph Earl (1785); it is housed, perhaps with a tinge of irony, in the National Portrait Gallery.
Let it, then, be henceforth proclaimed to the world, that man’s conscience was created free; that he is no longer accountable to his fellow man for his religious opinions, being responsible therefore only to his God.
John Tyler, funeral oration for Thomas Jefferson (July 11, 1826).
Most papers and programs have numerous takes at the top of the page or the hour devoted to Israel’s attack on Iran’s nuclear program; President Trump’s demand that Iran unconditionally surrender, and the government of Iran’s defiance; and Trump’s latest statements vaguing up “his decision” to bomb Iran.
And in a man-bites-dog angle, I’m going to agree with The New York Times.
Specifically, the editorial board’s “America Must Not Rush Into a War Against Iran,” run yesterday.
Where the Times is right regards not the disputed facts and theories about the conflict, but whether the United States military, under direction of its Commander-in-Chief, should bomb Iran.
That is not merely open to debate but must be debated.
Many in Trump’s base oppose any involvement: Trump was voted into office to stop the endless wars.
But it’s not just the matter of politics. It’s a constitutional issue: “An unprovoked American attack on Iran — one that could involve massive bombs known as bunker busters — would not be a police action or special military operation,” the Times declares. “It would be a war. To declare it is not the decision of Mr. Netanyahu or Mr. Trump. Under the Constitution, Congress alone has that power.”
And if we wince at the idea of our dysfunctional Congress grandstanding and bloviating about such a weighty matter, consider this: the congressional debate must occur in a context where Americans debate. We debate; the People.
After all, we end up playing lots of heavy roles in these things.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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All the lessons of history and experience must be lost upon us if we are content to trust alone to the peculiar advantages we happen to possess.
President Martin Van Buren’s Inaugural Address (March 4, 1837).
“Juneteenth” (a portmanteau of June and nineteenth) also known as Freedom Day, Jubilee Day, Liberation Day and Emancipation Day, is a holiday celebrating the emancipation of those held as chattel slaves in the United States. Originating in Galveston, Texas, it has been celebrated annually on June 19 throughout the United States, and on June 17, 2021, it was made into an official national holiday when President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law. It is commemorated on the anniversary date of the June 19, 1865, announcement of General Order No. 3 by Union Army general Gordon Granger, proclaiming freedom from slavery in Texas.
He was a problem way back then. It was as if everything he worked for I worked against! The Democrat really knew how to wield power: going on to become the longest-serving leader of any state or federal legislative body in the history of the United States, holding the position for all but two years from 1983 to 2021.
Well, he’s in the news again— and not for receiving a laurel of appreciation from a grateful state.
“Longest-serving legislative leader in US history given 7 1/2 years in federal corruption case,” reads the Associated Press headline.
In addition to the prison sentence following his February conviction for “trading legislation for the enrichment of his friends and allies,” Mike Madigan has alsobeen fined $2.5 million.
The “Velvet Hammer,” as Madigan was called, was, in the end, hammered, found guilty “on 10 of 23 counts in a remarkable corruption trial that lasted four months. The case churned through 60 witnesses and mountains of documents, photographs and taped conversations.”
At sentencing, U.S. District Judge John Robert Blakey demonstrated anger over Madigan’s perjury on the stand. “You lied. You did not have to. You had a right to sit there and exercise your right to silence,” the judge told the convict at sentencing. “But you took the stand and you took the law into your own hands.”
Just as the corrupt career politician did as Speaker for four miserable decades.
Justice may have taken too long, but I applaud it.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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July 13, 2017
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May 04, 2014
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So far as it depends on the course of this government, our relations of good will and friendship will be sedulously cultivated with all nations.
President John Tyler, first annual message to Congress (June 1, 1841).
At the end of the trial in United States v. Susan B. Anthony, the defendant, Miss Anthony, was found guilty in an infamous trial and fined $100 for attempting to vote in the 1872 presidential election, on June 18 of that year. Anthony never paid the fine.
She had registered in Rochester, New York, and would have voted for incumbent President Ulysses S. Grant if successful.