Posted on 01/28/2010 4:16:03 PM PST by history_48
One would hope the President of the United States would know the difference between the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. But in last night's State of the Union Address, President Obama said:
We find unity in our incredible diversity, drawing on the promise enshrined in our Constitution: the notion that we are all created equal….
Um, wrong founding document, Mr. President. It is in our Declaration of Independence that we read:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
As a Facebook friend of mine quipped, "So, does he blame the speechwriter or Bush?"
“Agreed, his face definitely looks as if he needs an enema.”
Yup - nothing but $hit comes out of his mouth.
Couldn’t have said it better myself. :)
we don’t have to “duel” over it but Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address does not absolve Obambi of the charge of historical and constitutional incompetence.
I don’t believe anyone except a handful of people far more learned and subtle than Obambi think of the word “constitution” as referring to something other than the 1787 document in the National Archives, and its amendments: the words, principles, ideas which are actually expressed from 1787 onward in the “constitution” and its ratified amendments.
Any “normal” usage of the word “constitution” in that context refers to the document itself, its words and principles, and not to a more comprehensive but unratified, un-recognized “National Constitution” embracing Jefferson-to-Lincoln or more.
If Obambi meant something more or different or more complex, there had to have been at least some allusion to the idea that he was talking about combined 1776-1787-1863 documents-ideas-events, not simply about the “constitution” which to every last one of his listeners referenced to the 1787 document and not to some more academic “National Constitution” which only 20 people alive would refer to in that way.
Also, even the references to “all men are created equal” in both the Declaration and the Gettysburg Address do not remotely correspond to what Obambi means by “equal” in 2010. For both Jefferson and Lincoln “equality” meant a kind of formal equality before the law. No one to be treated differently by law and officials according to their place in society....
Yes it can certainly be argued (quite persuasively I’ll say) that the terms in which Lincoln framed his brief, famous address tied the “founding” of the nation back to the D-of-Independence, but I don’t think that changes in any way the ordinary reference to the word “constitution” which in Obambi’s sentence meant the document of 1787 which was then ratified over the coming 1-2 years and amended 27 times in our history.....
when anyone refers in a political speech to the “constitution” it is a specific reference to that document and its amendments — no matter how many theories can be offered about how Lincoln subsumed both the Declaration and the Constitution into a new understanding of the nation, I don’t believe one can ever say that the simple reference to “constitution” in his speech subtly means a more intricate “National Constitution” including the Declaration and other documents, principles and values which were not spelled out in the 1787 constitution.....
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Well, not exactly no one.
Jefferson meant free men, mainly free white men.
Lincoln meant free men, with the implication that all men would soon be free.
Neither had any intention of treating women equally with men, at the time that just wasn't taken seriously by society in general, including by the vast majority of women.
To pick a major nit, it's in there.
See the 13th, 14th, 15th and 19th Amendments. Taken together they do a pretty good job of stating we will all be treated equally by the law, although not specifically referencing this being because we are created equal.
Although I seriously doubt this was what the pres had in mind.
this just proves he didn’t even read the cliff notes
"Well, dammit, I know I read it somewhere."
This must be why he won't let us see his grades.
re: “no one”
yes, for sure, but I mean only the logical sense of referring to what “all men are created equal” was supposed to imply in those very different eras.... it’s a question of what was the political universe of “citizens” at each of those times... neither Jefferson nor Lincoln really meant for every human being alive in their respective eras to fall under the protection of “equality” — but for those who did qualify for each of them, equality was supposed to be a real protection and not merely a word
“no one” in that context refers back to the logical converse of “all men” which of course was understood in those bad ol’ days (1776) to (1) exclude women, with some rare exceptions for widows with property; and (2) non-whites, also with rare exceptions; and (3) for most purposes (in Jefferson’s day) non-property-holders; (4) and sometimes non-Christians or even the “wrong” type of Christians according to a particular state or a colony.
so yes, in 1776, 1787, and 1863 the understandings of who would be included under the rubric of equality differed greatly from today (and in some ways among those different eras, too).....
“dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal” defines the principles that are espoused in the Declaration of Independence. I seriously doubt that Lincoln viewed the DoI as being the original Constitution that establishes the rules for government, at least I’ve seen no evidence of it. If Bambi thinks that it does it would be be interesting to hear him say so.
He was thinking of the Kenyan constitution.
We shall need to re-educate them. So, get me my towel and a bucket of water ~ who wants to be first?!
actually, that does give him his “out” as a supposed con law dude b/c he and his supporters will say that he is referring the the “constution” which embraces and incorporates all of its amendments......
I did refer to the constitution including its amendments in a couple of my previous comments, and Obama can claim that everyone versed in constitutional law thinks of it that way, but I do still believe that when one uses the word “constitution” in a political speech it is meant to refer to the original document.... but yes, the Obamanators will claim that he was thinking of “equality” as expressed and developed in those amendments
The DoI is not a contract between the government and the people as the Constitution is, it’s just a set of principles. It doesn’t make them any less sacred in terms of what the Founders believed or what Lincoln believed and like the Constitution we are more or less dedicated to living by them, although the Constitution actually backs up the DoI with the force of law. That’s the difference.
At some point we'll find out what they are. They can't be too good the way he's trying to keep them hidden.
Separation of Powers also was considered to be the real "genius" of the Constitution, and Obama came precariously close to advocating violations of that important aspect of our liberty's protection also. The Legislative Branch was intended to make the laws, the Executive to execute the laws, and the Judiciary had its appropriate assigned duty also.
This former "professor" threatened to legislate by Executive Order and then used his podium to publicly challenge a decision of the Judiciary, another equal branch.
James Madison devoted Federalist 47-51 to an explanation of the three branches, and how they were "to be wholly independent of each other, yet bound together through intricate system of checks and balances." "He wrote, 'The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many . . . may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." ("Our Ageless Constitution," p. 33)
Perhaps this President should spend some time with THE FEDERALIST--a collection which Thomas Jefferson and the Board of Visitors of the University of Virginia directed to be used as the text for its law school as the study of "the general principles of liberty and the rights of man."
Jefferson's record of the meeting stated, "The Federalist constitute 'an authority to which appeal is habitually made by all, and rarely declared or denied by any as evidencee of the general opinion of those who framed, and of those who accepted the Constitution of the U. S. on questions as to its genuine meaning.'"
Who better understands the idea of "separation of powers"--Madison, Jefferson, et al, or the current occupant of the White House?
Bbbbbut... The Magic Teleprompter said it was in the constima2shumthing. Magic Teleprompter wouldn’t lie, would it?
hmmmmm..... 1790?
now I will have to quibble... the document was “adopted” by the Constitutional Convention in Sept. 1787, ratified by the 9th new state (New Hampshire) in 1788...which brought the national (constitutionally) into existence with that 9th state ratification.... . and the new federal govt began to operate (in a formal sense) in March 1789
then the first 10 amendments were ratified in 1791
I suppose if one thinks we had to wait on lil’ ol’ Rhode Island to be the 13th ratification then 1790 is the important year.... but the United States of America existed, legally and constitutionally, in 1788.
North Carolina and Rhode Island took longer to get their acts together, but there was a USA with 11 states in existence in 1788
maybe we should all speak of 1787-1791, since virtually everyone nowadays thinks of the “Bill of Rights” as part of the original constitution
but how it can be “revisionism” to regard the Declaration of Independence as something prior to our “constitution” well I look forward to what you have to say about that
in what sense was there a “constitution” prior to even the Articles of Confederation??? which were themselves explicitly not a constitution for a NATION, but rather an agreement on how newly sovereign entities could “confederate”
the real, dramatic “revisionism” is in saying there could be a “constitution” before there even was a United States of America... I wouldn’t argue with Lincoln’s sense that a series of ideas and beliefs and documents from 1776 onward could be embraced into some larger conception of the USA as a nation, but this is not the UK where there is explicitly an uncodified “consitution” which they sometimes refer to there.... we have an actual document called the “constitution” and regardless of rarefied theories expanding the constitutional universe, the 1787-91 text is (I believe) the main referent of the word “constitution” for 99.9% of Americans (well let’s leave out those who don’t even know that a constitution was ever written or ratified)
Obama may have 50 IQ points on the idiots that voted for him but not in the rest of us.
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