Free Republic

The teaching of history has become a flashpoint in the culture wars. But while the battle is fierce, it’s not new. An earlier round in the conflict in the 1920s — over the teaching of the American Revolution — indicates that it will be crucial for historians to weigh in loudly and forcefully during the current debate. That will give them the space to continue to teach the most accurate, up-to-date version of U.S. History and prevent forces that fundamentally don’t understand the job of historians from shaping what American children learn about the past. In the late 19th century,...

Jenna Ellis, a former Trump lawyer turned hysterical anti-Trumper, referred to the 45th President as “malignant” during an unhinged rant involving establishment Republican Steve Deace, who bizarrely suggested America’s Founding Fathers have gone to hell.Deace, who wanted Trump to lose in 2016, now supports Ron DeSantis for the 2024 GOP nomination. The Florida Governor recently tweeted that he was “proud” to have received Deace’s endorsement. In the clip below, Deace can be heard insisting:“[W]e need to remember there are Founding Fathers who are in hell for all of eternity, who did some great work, but they didn’t bow the knee...

The few remaining viewers of CNN got a remarkable dose of news on Saturday. Just in time for Constitution Day, CNN’s dwindling audience learned that the Consitution of the United States — the oldest written government charter in the world and the document that gave birth to the nation that has spread democracy around the globe — has become so “outdated” that it’s actually a “threat to democracy.” Of course, that’s democracy as CNN’s scholars understand it. And you can’t spell ignorance without “C-N-N.” The word came on “Newsroom,” anchored by former CNN White House correspondent Jim Acosta. Acosta interviewed...

When liberals lose in the Supreme Court — as they increasingly have over the past half-century — they usually say that the justices got the Constitution wrong. But struggling over the Constitution has proved a dead end. The real need is not to reclaim the Constitution, as many would have it, but instead to reclaim America from constitutionalism.

King George III ruled the largest empire that planet earth had ever seen. Download as PDF ... The Declaration of Independence was signed JULY 4, 1776. It listed 27 reasons why Americans declared their independence from the 38-year-old King: "... He has made judges dependent on his will alone ... ... He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. ... He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies ... ... To subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution ... ......

David McCullough, who was known to millions as an award-winning, best-selling author and an appealing television host and narrator with a rare gift for recreating the great events and characters of America’s past, died on Sunday at home in Hingham Mass. He was 89. The death was confirmed by his daughter Dorie Lawson. Mr. McCullough won Pulitzer Prizes for two presidential biographies, “Truman” (1992) and “John Adams” (2001). He received National Book Awards for “The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal” (1977) and “Mornings on Horseback” (1981), about the young Theodore Roosevelt and his family. Deep...

The Left continues to push a narrative that the SCOTUS is compromised by "conservatives" -- let's set the record straight. In the exposition of laws, and even of Constitutions, how many important errors may be produced by mere innovations in the use of words and phrases, if not controlled by a recurrence to the original and authentic meaning attached to them! - James Madison, fourth president of the United States, often called the “Father of the Constitution” (1826) Immediately after the recent SCOTUS rulings on abortion and the EPA, many voices from the Left immediately labeled the justices “extremist,” undemocratic,...

So you’re unhappy with the Supreme Court justices who turned back the clock on environmental protection, abortion, school prayer and guns? You’re angry because they’re ideologues with a reactionary agenda, flexing their muscles to eliminate rights, weaken government and endanger the planet? Me too. They’re reprehensible. But let’s be honest: The problem isn’t just with the justices. The problem, or at least a substantial portion of it, lies with the U.S. Constitution itself. Here are some of the criticisms. The Constitution created the undemocratic U.S. Senate that allots the same representation — two senators — to a state like Wyoming,...

So you’re unhappy with the Supreme Court justices who turned back the clock on environmental protection, abortion, school prayer and guns? You’re angry because they’re ideologues with a reactionary agenda, flexing their muscles to eliminate rights, weaken government and endanger the planet? Me too. They’re reprehensible. But let’s be honest: The problem isn’t just with the justices. The problem, or at least a substantial portion of it, lies with the U.S. Constitution itself.

One of the more popular grievances from the contemporary left revolves around the notion that our nation has been subverted by “minority rule.”Here is the pollster Nate Silver:“Despite the various, very serious threats to American democracy, things would *mostly* be fine if the balance of elected power more closely reflected the popular will (e.g. Senate seats proportional to population, no Electoral College, less gerrymandering).”Silver is confusing the inability to coerce others with minoritarianism. It is not a serious threat to American democracy that New Yorkers are unable to dictate Oklahoma’s abortion laws. Nor that Texans can’t compel Rhode Islanders to...

This Fourth of July, watching people fight over what the Constitution means, I ask people, if you could change the Constitution, what would you change?"The forefathers knew what they were doing," said one woman.But the Constitution originally accepted slavery. It's good that we can amend it.So what should we change?"Add a balanced budget amendment," suggests Glenn Beck.David Boaz of the Cato Institute recommends 18-year terms for the Supreme Court. "Maybe confirmation fights would be less bitter and partisan."Others suggest term limits for Congress. Stossel TV's Mike Ricci takes the idea further. "If your father, mother, siblings, uncle, cousins were elected...

A Georgetown University law professor says Americans are “slaves” to the U.S. Constitution as their adherence to that document — written by a “tiny group of white slave-owning men” — has turned the country into a “war zone.” Rosa Brooks made the comparison yesterday on MSNBC’s Joy Reid show and highlighted the recent mass shooting in Highland Park, Illinois. “[T]here are people all over the world who have lived during armed conflicts, and when does the mortar fall on your house, when does the soldier or the tank come down the street and just kill you,” Brooks said. “We are...

Obergefell, like Roe, was a particularly arbitrary, extreme, and unjust imposition on the people. Like Roe, it had no basis in the Constitution’s text or American custom. It was simply dreamed up by a group of unelected judges who decided the time had come for them to impose a radically new understanding of the most fundamental institution of human society. Like Roe, Obergefell took away from the people the power to decide the most basic moral questions and daily life in their communities. As Justice Scalia put it at the time, the Court was violating “a principle even more fundamental...

As is usual, the Supreme Court saved its most important decisions for the end of this term, and the three biggies were handed down within days of each other: “Bruen (gun rights), Dobbs (abortion rights) and West Virginia (administrative regulation of CO2).” You don’t have to be a constitutional law scholar to wade through all this and the footnotes, citations, and legal disputations. Francis Menton has done it for you: (You can’t rely on the major media to do it. For the most part they share the same ideological viewpoint as that of the three dissenting justices, a view Menton...

The conservative supermajority has weaponized this harmful judicial philosophy as a way to embrace a racist, patriarchal narrowing of political rights. Even as the first Black woman to sit on the Supreme Court was sworn in Thursday, the slate of rulings from the newly empowered, right-wing and originalist court majority this term has made it clearer than ever that the court is motivated by a reliance on the white supremacist patriarchy of the Constitution’s framers. With Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade last week, and New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, the...

On September 17, 1787 — 234 years ago today — the delegates to the constitutional convention who had approved the final document signed it and sent it on its way toward ratification. We now celebrate that date as Constitution Day, to acknowledge our debt to them and remind ourselves (as it’s plain we could use the reminding) of the extraordinary governing framework they created. If you’re free and online at 11 a.m. Eastern today (or if you want to look in on the video later), you should check out the American Enterprise Institute’s annual Constitution Day lecture, which will be...

The presidential election of 1800 has long been notorious for both the ferocity of the partisan rancor it produced and the unforeseen constitutional problems it presented.Yet despite all the ink spilled on these issues, an unresolved question has persisted for two centuries.Snip Jefferson was also confronted by uncertainties about his institutional authority. As noted, the Constitution refers to both the Senate president and the two houses of Congress in describing the vote count. But the text fails to state clearly who should decide questions about contested ballots. If Jefferson were to raise questions about the Georgia vote from the chair,...

The passing of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg gives conservatives and Republicans what they claim to have wanted since judicial activism became the norm in the 1960s. From outlawing prayer and Bible reading in public schools, to the infamous Roe v. Wade decision, which legalized abortion, conservative Republicans have yearned for a time when a Republican president and Republican majority Senate might put an end to judges making law and return to the day when Congress was the legislator. Yet, Republican presidents have appointed several liberals to the Court. President Dwight Eisenhower appointed five members to the Supreme Court,...

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that states can prohibit their Electoral College representatives from disregarding voters when casting their ballots in presidential elections. The unanimous decision, arising out of a case from Washington state, essentially gives states the right to outlaw "faithless electors" who cast their votes for people other than those chosen by their voters. "Nothing in the Constitution expressly prohibits States from taking away presidential electors’ voting discretion as Washington does," Justice Elena Kagan wrote in the majority decision. --This breaking news report will be updated.

America great? Justice James Wilson "It is the BEST form of government which has EVER been offered to the WORLD" He was one of six founding fathers to sign both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. President Washington appointed him to be a Justice on the Supreme Court. His name was James Wilson. Born in Scotland, James Wilson was one of the first to argue against British dominance. In 1774, James Wilson wrote "Considerations on the Nature and Extent of the Legislative Authority of the British Parliament," reasoning that since the colonies had no representation in Parliament, the Parliament...