Antone Blansett asks: Nick, can you tell me how any new Constitutional Amendments will do any good if the Congress already doesnt obey the Constitution? First of all, the premise of this question is false. If you study history, you will see that Congress doesnt obey all of the Constitution all of the time, but it does obey most of it most of the time (or at least some of it, some of the time). The same is true of the other branches. Need examples? Term limits for the President. Direct popular election for the Senate (ugh). The origination of appropriation bills in the House. Each House of Congress setting its own rules. Political free speech and association (for the most part since Citizens United). Right to bear handguns, if not guns generally (since Heller/MacDonald). Notice, however, that the willingness of the federal government to respect the Constitution waxes and wanes and is a constant game of tug of war. This was true from the very beginning. President Adams and the Federalists passed the Alien and Sedition Acts and tried to imprison Jefferson and others like him for free political speech. So the truth of the matter is that the Constitution is not and never has been completely enforced, at best it has been mostly enforced, at worst it has been mostly ignored, but the Constitution has never, ever been totally irrelevant. So your question should really be, given that the Constitution is relevant and either mostly or sometimes enforced, although not foolproof and ironclad, how will Amendments do any good? Heres how: Amendments set very important boundary lines for political conduct. It gives immediate moral high ground to the constitutional side, and it forces the opponents of the Constitution to wait for extreme situations, sneaky tactics, or pure political muscle to override it. It is a clear political advantage for the extreme progressive Left, for example, to have the 16th Amendment (income tax) and the 17th Amendment (direct election of senators) in place. It is a clear political advantage for gun rights advocates to have the 2nd Amendment in place. These amendments, and others, set the stage for who is right and who is wrong in the political debate. They skew that debate in their favor, if nothing else. And if you add to the advantage politically, an occasional or frequent willingness of courts, congress and the President to enforce those amendments, then you get an overall huge advantage politically. In short, there is nothing more important to winning the political game than control over the rules of the political game, even if those rules are breached! Thats what amendments are. Folks who cede power over amendments to their political opponents are losers.
Posted on: Sun, 19 Jan 2014 15:07:53 +0000
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