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Wed. Nov 26, 2003

Constitutional Obscenity

Constitutional Obscenity – It’s another election year, which invariably means much puffery about amending the Constitution to right the various perceived wrongs of this country. However, such an amendment takes more than one puffed up politico on a campaign stump. It requires the approval of two thirds of the Senate, two thirds of the House, and three quarters of the 50 state legislatures, and thus, is simply political grandstanding 99% of the time.

And there’s a lot of it going around.

Let’s start with Wesley Clark: ”Breaking with most of his Democratic rivals, retired Army Gen. Wesley Clark said Tuesday he favors amending the Constitution to ban flag burning.”

”In June, the Republican-controlled House approved a one-line change to the Constitution – ’The Congress shall have power to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States’ – for the fifth time in eight years. The Senate never has passed the proposed amendment.”

”Among Democratic presidential hopefuls in Congress, Sens. John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and John Edwards have opposed the amendment. Reps. Dick Gephardt and Dennis Kucinich have supported it. Kerry said Tuesday, ’As I’ve said before, if I saw someone burning the flag, I’d punch them in the mouth because I love the flag, but the constitution that I fought for preserves the right of free expression.’”

That’s nice logic. Kerry fought to defend the right to free speech, but would have no problem punching out someone using that right. In the end, I’m left looking at one, and maybe two Democratic candidates who do not seem to understand the basic concept of the Constitution.

Have you figured it out yet?

Here’s another 500 pound hint. This morning, another Constitution amendment was introduced in Congress, the Marriage Amendment: ”A proposed constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of a man and a woman has been introduced in the Senate.
Colorado Republican Wayne Allard is sponsoring the Federal Marriage Amendment, with Republicans Sam Brownback of Kansas and Alabama’s Jeff Sessions as co-sponsors. The measure was previously introduced in the House, where it has 100 co-sponsors [...] Congressional votes on the Federal Marriage Amendment aren’t expected this year, but it could be re-introduced when Congress reconvenes in January.”

You know, before you start amending a document, you might want to read the document and all previous amendments to it, to get ”The Big Picture.”

The first ten amendments to the Constitution are also known as (here’s another 500 pound hint) the Bill of Rights. They are the ones by which the US government guarantees the individual rights of freedom of religion, freedom of speech, the right to bear arms, protection from unwarranted search or seizure, right to a jury trial, etc. The rights and freedoms we hold dear.

The later amendments cover electoral procedures, end slavery, and describe who can vote and/or run for office (stripping race, gender, and age restrictions). Again, they define and guarantee individual rights, and protect them from government interference.

With two notable exceptions. In 1913, the 16th Amendment brought us federal income tax … not exactly a great offering of individual freedom. And in 1920, we got Prohibition. Yes, the moral question of whether Americans should be allowed to have a choice to drink liquor was stupidly decided by a Constitution Amendment. Thirteen years later, they had to make another amendment to reverse their moral folly.

There’s a big honkin’ clue in that one. Hang on to it.

In fact, our forefathers placed a big honker right at the top of the list of Amendments, at the beginning of the Bill of Rights: ”The Conventions of a number of the States having, at the time of 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…”

The US Constitution is about preserving, even expanding, the rights of the individual. It defines government power, and handcuffs it. If you wish to attack or remove the rights of individuals, you need some tool other than handcuffs. Maybe a billy-club or a gun.

This country is filled with state and local level laws that range from sad to silly, and that’s the proper venue for such temporary moral crusades and election year grandstanding, not the 216 year old framework for our nation. So go ahead and ban flag burning in Texas. Prevent gay marriage in Utah. Compel gays who get married in Berkeley to burn a flag while doing so. Whatever.

But leave my Constitution alone. It has a much greater purpose, and you clearly don’t understand it well enough to tamper with it. Those on some kind of moral crusade to impose their One True Way onto others need to do a better job of selecting the proper tool for their goal.

And should you proceed, we all know you can’t succeed (remember the Equal Rights Amendment? If you don’t, that’s exactly my point), as it thankfully takes a whole lot more than one legislative body to change the Constitution. It takes 40 of them (House, Senate, and at least 38 state legislatures), plus the signature of the President.

So let’s stop kidding ourselves this is anything more than pandering for votes in an election year. And, should it matter, there are some of us who tune you out as a voting option when you first open your yap about amending the Constitution to restrict the rights of individuals.

You don’t understand the basics of our government well enough to deserve my vote.