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To: Support Free Republic
I am an unabashed proponent of tradition. Its not just American. Jews who look at the Torah note how its written in the present tense which implies the past is a guide to the future and those not alive yet, owe a debt to those long gone for the rules and precepts they live under. In Judaism this is reinforced in a long tradition of religious ritual as well as in teachings of The Sages. At no point is it suggested tradition is to be devalued and the teachings themselves changed in the light of the conditions whatever time people happen to live. Tradition just is. The U.S Constitution has a similar view towards the future and for a long time the Supreme Court interpreted it as it was written. Tradition commanded it be enforced exactly as it was written. Liberals despise the past and the teachings of ancestors. They view it as an unbearable restraint upon the new, the exciting, and the provocative impulses of life. And increasingly the courts have agreed with this view. But if the Constitution is not a repository of tradition and the wisdom of The Founders and if it be malleable with the times, it cannot be certain guide either to good government, to social morals, or to the conduct of society. Without tradition, as Tevye of Anatevka was wont to lament, "our lives become as shaky as the fiddler on the roof." For all of the aforegoing reasons stated by bias and the operation of my own prejudice is clear. I am in favor of a dead Constitution.
5 posted on 07/08/2003 9:15:18 AM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
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To: goldstategop; MarkL
Great replies, both. I reckon there are two sides to a coin.
15 posted on 07/08/2003 11:07:48 AM PDT by cornelis
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