Posted on 06/29/2002 1:57:34 PM PDT by theoverseer
God Is Not in the Constitution
We receive our rights from God. —George W. Bush, denouncing the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decision that the Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional because it includes "one nation under God," CNN, June 27
This decision is nuts, just nuts. —Democratic Senate leader Tom Daschle, CNN, June 26
If this decision is not overturned, we will amend the Constitution. —Democratic senator Joseph Lieberman, Fox News, June 26
In 1943, during our war against Hitler, the United States Supreme Court handed down a decision concerning the Pledge of Allegiance that created fierce controversy around the country—just like last week's Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling.
The West Virginia Board of Education had expelled children of Jehovah's Witnesses for refusing to salute the flag and stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. These deviants were to be sent to reformatories for criminally minded juveniles, and their parents were threatened with prosecutions for causing juvenile delinquency.
The majority of the Court, in a decision written by Robert Jackson—later chief American prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials—defined the very essence of Americanism as they rebuked the West Virginia Board of Education and sent those kids back to school:
"If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox politics, nationalism, religion, or any other matters of opinion, or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein." (Emphasis added.)
Since then, there has been a long line of federal court decisions affirming the right of students to refuse to stand for the pledge or salute the flag—for a wide spectrum of reasons of conscience.
As I described in Living the Bill of Rights (University of California Press, paper), a number of principals and school boards have nonetheless punished students for following the 1943 Supreme Court decision, and these "educators" have been overruled by the courts.
Now we have nearly the entire House and Senate, along with an array of fashionable law professors and such dubiously anointed "legal analysts" as Jeffrey Toobin of The New Yorker and CNN, scorning the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling that the phrase "one nation under God" puts the Pledge of Allegiance in violation of the separation of church and state.
First, contrary to such instant experts as Connie Chung of CNN, the pledge has not been banned across the nation. The decision affects only the nine states within the Ninth Circuit's purview, if it is not overruled. Second, even within those nine states, a public school student can still recite the pledge, omitting God. Or he or she can recite the pledge, including God—but not as part of an officially mandated public school exercise.
What Judge Alfred Goodwin, a Nixon appointee, did in his Ninth Circuit decision was to follow the rule set by Justice Robert Jackson in 1943:
The fact that "boards of education are educating the young for citizenship is reason for scrupulous protection of constitutional freedoms of the individual, if we are not to strangle the free mind at its source and teach youth to discount principles of our government as mere platitudes." (Emphasis added.)
In his decision in Newdow v. U.S. Congress, Judge Goodwin—like Jackson in West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette—was affirming the fundamental constitutional command that the government cannot endorse any particular religion or all religions. Otherwise, like China, we would have certain preferred religious beliefs especially protected by the state.
From Judge Goodwin's decision about why including "one nation under God" is a violation of the establishment clause of the First Amendment:
"Particularly within the confined environment of the classroom, the policy is highly likely to convey an impermissible message of [government] endorsement to some, and disapproval to others, of their beliefs regarding the existence of a monotheistic God."
As he pointed out, the phrase "one nation under God" was added to the pledge by Congress in 1954 to advance religion for the sole purpose of differentiating the United States from atheist Communist nations. And, Judge Goodwin emphasized, "such a purpose" is forbidden by the establishment clause, which prohibits the government from advancing religion "at the expense of atheism."
Goodwin also pointed to the "age and impressionability" of the children at the Morse School in Elk Grove, California, the site of the lawsuit. But on Friday morning, there on television were the elementary school students of that very school, with their hands on their hearts, reciting the pledge, including "one nation under God"—and to hell with the establishment clause of the First Amendment.
"Impressionable," however, is not the word for the members of the House and Senate who thronged to excoriate the Ninth Circuit. And on the Capitol steps, in a proud bipartisan display of ignorance of the Constitution's separation of church and state, the House members, hands on hearts, recited the pledge and broke into a righteous "God Bless America."
The cause of all this belligerently conformist patriotism is Dr. Michael Newdow, an atheist and emergency room doctor who also has a law degree and acted as his own lawyer. He sued to preserve the constitutional rights of his eight-year-old daughter, a second-grade student in the Elk Grove Unified School District.
For exercising his constitutional right to confront his government in court, Dr. Newdow says, he is receiving "personal and scary" threats: "I could be dead tomorrow. . . . A lot of God-loving people think that killing other people who don't agree with them is OK."
Dr. Newdow may not receive a warm, protective response from Attorney General John Ashcroft, who insists that "this decision is directly contrary to two centuries of American tradition."
An even longer American tradition is that there is no mention of God in the Constitution. The Declaration of Independence, heralded by opponents of the Ninth Circuit decision for its references to God, does not have the force of law. And the Constitution says plainly, "No religious test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public trust under the United States." We all have the right to freedom of belief, or nonbelief, in God.
Ignorance?...SOS...DD.
FMCDH
Are you seriously contending that TJ & Madison were wrong, and that the constitution should mention that our government derives power from god through our consent? -- I hope I'm wrong. Please explain.
This idea stems from 18th century liberalism [specifically from the French revolution], which was hostile to all previous forms of political theory...specifically the theory that sovereignty resides with God....and that if power isn't exercised in harmony with God's laws, it wasn't legitimate, no matter how many people consented to it.
And again...God isn't mentioned in the constitution. And by placing sovereignty in the people alone, rather than in Divine law, the framers left the door open for any evil so long as it was justified by majority rule.
The framers specified in the constitution a republican form of government, not majority rule. -- And they also specified that congress shall make no [divine] law respecting an establishment of religion, -- .
Ultimately, the reason the constitutional system was perverted is not the fault of the governmental system set forth in the constitution, but rather that the constitution allows matters of truth and morality to become open questions.
Again, the framers specificly enumerated some rights, but left all others to the people. -- And your questions of religious truth & morality are best left to your discussions with your God, imo.
Not in our courts or legislatures.
Over time, those 16 words have been debated as However, before the American Revolution, five of the 13 states had government-sponsored churches supported by tax revenue, and most schools were church run. For many of the earliest settlers, the First Amendment came in answer to their prayers.
What is clear is that the men who framed and ratified the Constitution, as well as the Bill of Rights, sought to protect religious freedoms and to provide an active role for the government in promoting the "moral character" of the people.
George Washington, in his Farewell Address, said "Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."
James Madison, who wrote much of the Bill of Rights, said: "We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We have staked the future of all of our political institutions ... upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God."
One Nation Under Siege
Yes yes, the old "the worlds going to the devil in a hand basket" argument, which there has always been a certain amount of the people, in every generation, since the beginning of the country making that claim.
So has does one make the determination that the moral value of the country is in decline?
In the state where I live years ago we use to have a law on the books that mandated that one was not allowed to go outside of the boundaries of there home on Sunday morning before noon, unless the were going to church. Eventually the law was repealed and people could go wherever they wanted on Sunday morning.
So does this represent a decline in moral values because people were no longer mandated by law to be setting in church on Sunday morning fearing God, or being a prisoner in there own homes? Or does it represent a rise in moral values because some people made a stand for their rights of freedom and the ability to determine where they wanted to go on Sunday morning?
I'm sure it would depend on who you ask.
There is no mention of apples or roller skating in the Constitution either. I guess the government is therefore free to prohibit those as well.
What a dumb argument. And how pathetic it is that Hentoff constructed a whole column around it.
For one thing, the above quoted sentence is in violation of the Ninth Amendment.
Are you seriously contending that TJ & Madison were wrong, and that the constitution should mention that our government derives power from god through our consent? -- I hope I'm wrong. Please explain.
This idea stems from 18th century liberalism [specifically from the French revolution], which was hostile to all previous forms of political theory...specifically the theory that sovereignty resides with God....and that if power isn't exercised in harmony with God's laws, it wasn't legitimate, no matter how many people consented to it.
And again...God isn't mentioned in the constitution. And by placing sovereignty in the people alone, rather than in Divine law, the framers left the door open for any evil so long as it was justified by majority rule.
The framers specified in the constitution a republican form of government, not majority rule. -- And they also specified that congress shall make no [divine] law respecting an establishment of religion, -- .
Ultimately, the reason the constitutional system was perverted is not the fault of the governmental system set forth in the constitution, but rather that the constitution allows matters of truth and morality to become open questions.
Again, the framers specificly enumerated some rights, but left all others to the people. -- And your questions of religious truth & morality are best left to your discussions with your God, imo.
Not in our courts or legislatures. --------------------------- Hmmm -- Italics begone?
I am attempting an explanation as to why the constitution and its system of checks and balances was perverted so quickly. Certainly, TJ and Madison never envisioned the supreme court becoming virtually absolute with no real check on power, and yet...it has become just that.
Why? The political philosophy of the founders was based on French liberalism, which made the individual conscience the sovereign judge of truth--religious and otherwise. Thier philosophy was formulated by atheists, agnostics and deists, who rejected moral absolutes. It emphasizes that men should be free to do whatever they want in moral matters and that political authority comes from the people themselves who should be free to overthrow the government--by violence if necessary--and set up new governments based on the will of the majority, as interpreted and guided by "intellectual" leaders. This stuff sparked the French revolution.
Here in America Jefferson, Franklin, and Henry, who were familiar with the writings of the French philosophers, adopted much of their philosophy and applied it to the American situation.
So...was the breakdown of our constitutional system the ramifications of liberalism? I think so. I am never popular for stating this opinion around here, but I would remind folks that all authority comes from God and if authority isn't exercised in harmony with God's law, then it isn't legitimate.
The framers specified in the constitution a republican form of government, not majority rule. -- And they also specified that congress shall make no [divine] law respecting an establishment of religion, --
Understood. But if the people were allowed to have a vote on abortion, and voted to allow all forms, the majority will have spoken. Doesn't make it right, which is why I mentioned the moral values of citizens and its leaders. Any system is only as good as the people who live under it. Also, one can acknowlede a divine creator without establishing a religion.
And why do you think the constitutional system corrupted so quickly? Please don't say "Abe Lincoln!"
I am not a fan of Henthoff, nor a libertarian, but He is technically right in saying that God isn't specifically mentioned in the constitution. In fact, its the one serious flaw that the constitution has.
Madison stated that sovereignty should rest with the people alone--or from the consent of the governed. Jefferson made the same point in the declaration of independance when he wrote: "Government's derive their just powers from the consent of the governed."
Are you seriously contending that TJ & Madison were wrong, and that the constitution should mention that our government derives power from god through our consent? -- I hope I'm wrong. Please explain.
This idea stems from 18th century liberalism [specifically from the French revolution], which was hostile to all previous forms of political theory...specifically the theory that sovereignty resides with God....and that if power isn't exercised in harmony with God's laws, it wasn't legitimate, no matter how many people consented to it.
And again...God isn't mentioned in the constitution. And by placing sovereignty in the people alone, rather than in Divine law, the framers left the door open for any evil so long as it was justified by majority rule.
The framers specified in the constitution a republican form of government, not majority rule. -- And they also specified that congress shall make no [divine] law respecting an establishment of religion, -- .
Ultimately, the reason the constitutional system was perverted is not the fault of the governmental system set forth in the constitution, but rather that the constitution allows matters of truth and morality to become open questions.
Again, the framers specificly enumerated some rights, but left all others to the people. -- And your questions of religious truth & morality are best left to your discussions with your God, imo.
Not in our courts or legislatures. --------------------------- Hmmm -- FULL Italics begone?
Yes there is; see the Fifth Amendment (private property shall not be taken without due process) as well as the Tenth Amendment which would seem to render a federal "Department of Education" unconstitutional, leaving it a state matter.
As for religion, the only thing forbidden by the Constitution is for Congress to make a law respecting the establishment of a religion. States are principle still free to do so, and did. (Not that I want this to happen, mind you :)
Best,
That's bull and you know it. Any child can refuse to say the pledge if he wishes. Some children even choose to say it incorrectly ("for witches' stands...."). ;)
It is worth discussion on a forum like this, but will really make little if any difference in our lives, or the fate of our country, again IMHO.
I pledge of legions to the flag... one nation, under God, invisible...
I think I learned the real words in about 3rd grade or so.
---------------------------
I am attempting an explanation as to why the constitution and its system of checks and balances was perverted so quickly. Certainly, TJ and Madison never envisioned the supreme court becoming virtually absolute with no real check on power, and yet...it has become just that.
[No, it hasn't, but granted, its rarely tested.]
Why? The political philosophy of the founders was based on French liberalism, which made the individual conscience the sovereign judge of truth--religious and otherwise. Thier philosophy was formulated by atheists, agnostics and deists, who rejected moral absolutes. It emphasizes that men should be free to do whatever they want in moral matters and that political authority comes from the people themselves who should be free to overthrow the government--by violence if necessary--and set up new governments based on the will of the majority, as interpreted and guided by "intellectual" leaders. This stuff sparked the French revolution. Here in America Jefferson, Franklin, and Henry, who were familiar with the writings of the French philosophers, adopted much of their philosophy and applied it to the American situation. So...was the breakdown of our constitutional system the ramifications of liberalism? I think so. I am never popular for stating this opinion around here, but I would remind folks that all authority comes from God and if authority isn't exercised in harmony with God's law, then it isn't legitimate.
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-- Whew! That's a near indecipherable lecture, imo. Sorry. ------ So, you seem to advocate some sort of 'God' amendment? -- Care to frame a sample of one?
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The framers specified in the constitution a republican form of government, not majority rule. -- And they also specified that congress shall make no [divine] law respecting an establishment of religion, -- .
----------------------------
Understood. But if the people were allowed to have a vote on abortion, and voted to allow all forms, the majority will have spoken. Doesn't make it right, which is why I mentioned the moral values of citizens and its leaders. Any system is only as good as the people who live under it. Also, one can acknowlede a divine creator without establishing a religion. And why do you think the constitutional system corrupted so quickly? Please don't say "Abe Lincoln!"
You write 'understood', -- but then go on, and on, - making it quite clear that you haven't. -- Again, sorry I asked.
I thought it was a fairly concise description of where the founders got their political ideals from. It wasn't a condemnation of the system itself--just that it leaves God out of the equation, which then leaves questions of morality open for speculation. In fact, just about anything can be justified if its declared constitutional [i.e roe vs. wade]. That, imho, is a serious flaw. I would have preferred a little except acknowledging that the source of all authority rests with a supreme creator followed by a paragraph concerning natural law.
The framers specified in the constitution a republican form of government, not majority rule. -- And they also specified that congress shall make no [divine] law respecting an establishment of religion, -- .
Acknowledging God is a far cry from establishing a religion a la Henry VIII.
You write 'understood', -- but then go on, and on, - making it quite clear that you haven't. -- Again, sorry I asked.
I gave you an example of how the majority can vote just about anything in as constitutional. I know you understand what I am getting at. Don't be sorry. I enjoy the challenge. I undesrtand you disagree. So, what is your opinion on why the system corrpted so quickly?
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