Posted on 11/17/2002 11:50:51 AM PST by Willie Green
Edited on 04/13/2004 2:34:52 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
I found myself at a conference last month in Cologne, Germany, sitting amid 200 European leaders and academics, sipping Mineralwasser and Coca-Cola "Light," debating the wisdom of a proposed constitution for the European Union. At one point, it struck me: We Americans do not appreciate, nearly enough, how lucky we are that our Founding Fathers put our Constitution on parchment.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
What a frightening prospect that is.
Uh, I don't think so Skippy... |
Remain forever vigilant.
"Without a written Constitution, the United States would have likely fallen into obscurity before the Founding Fathers were laid to rest"
Without a written Constitution, the United States would have likely fallen into socialism, as the citizens voted away their rights in return for the empty promises of charismatic politicians.
There is already a mechanism, amendments, in place to change the Constitution whenever we wish. It is good enough.
So far no foreign constitution has come close to our document, which takes "rights" to mean those rights which are concerned with individual freedom and personal liberty, as opposed to "entitlements," which can only be granted by allowing government the ability to arbitrarily take from one citizen to give to another.
Once rights are something that the government "provides," such as "the rights of the elderly to lead a life of dignity and independence," then the government is also empowered to take them away. In fact, it cannot provide anyone with anything without taking away from someone else.
Our Constitution is unique and precious in that it protects our rights from the government rather than making government an all powerful authority that is the bestower of rights, as in other countries.
"Our Constitution is unique and precious in that it protects our rights from the government rather than making government an all powerful authority that is the bestower of rights, as in other countries."
THE PREAMBLE TO THE BILL OF RIGHTS
Congress of the United States
begun and held at the City of New-York, on
Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine.The Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution. Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all, or any of which articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of the said Constitution; viz. Articles in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.
Yadda, yadda, yadda...
Heard it all before...
You're just P-O'd about getting too many points on your driver's license...
I'm not into tinfoil hat interpretations.
At least once it got turbo-charged by the 16th amendment.
Making feminazi-ism part of our Constitution.
We DO have the opportunity, just as we have every day since the document was adopted. YOU, "Professor," just don't like that said opportunity requires a huge number of Americans to agree on any such fundamental change. YOU just want to change the rules so that you would have a several-orders-of-magnitude better chance to force upon the rest of the nation new rules that YOU know are extremely unpopular. Nice try, but you'll always be a loser.
*...new!
Creation/God...REFORMATION(Judeo-Christianity)---secular-govt.-humanism/SCIENCE---CIVILIZATION/perfection'*!
Originally the word liberal meant social conservatives(no govt religion--none) who advocated growth and progress---mostly technological(knowledge being absolute/unchanging)based on law--reality... UNDER GOD---the nature of GOD/man/govt. does not change. These were the Classical liberals...founding fathers-PRINCIPLES---stable/SANE scientific reality/society---industrial progress...moral/social character-values(private/personal) GROWTH(limited NON-intrusive PC Govt/religion---schools)!
Evolution...Atheism-dehumanism---TYRANNY(pc/liberal/govt-religion/rhetoric)...
Then came the SPLIT SCHIZOPHRENIA/ZOMBIE/BRAVE-NWO1984 LIBERAL NEO-Soviet Darwin/ACLU America---the post-modern age of lies/revision*...
This is why I don't ever want to see a constitutional convention. What is being defined these days as "norms" are abberations and freaky wierdness. No way do I want a bunch of oddly educated, liberals, socialists, homosexual, abortionists. involved in rewriting our constitution.
Mr.M
We need to repeal the 16th Amendment, make property rights secure against unneccessary seizures (for golf courses, scenic interstate spots, animals, etc), explicitly forbid the Judiciary from making law (should only able to declare laws unConstitutional), and addresss the open border/immigrant benefits issues.
Unfortunately, the Socialists will find a way to ramrod some utterly horrid ideas through, so it probably isn't a safe bet.
That doesn't mean that our constitution was flawed. Rather, it worked well: power was set against power to increase and preserve individual liberty. But it would be wise if Europe were to spell out some things that were left out of our constitution: particularly the process of leaving or dissolving the union, if a nation or region desires.
It seems like all recent constituions have incorporated the idea of judicial review which developed here in the US. There's something to be said for allowing judges to decide the constitutionality of laws but it's not always a good thing. Judicial review can provide a means of increasing federal power at the expense of other government units and the beliefs of large parts of the population.
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