UPDATE : What is the true genius of the US constitution?
I have my own theory of this topic but I really wanted to hear other views on this topic.
Please keep it civil.
What is the true genius of the US constitution?
UPDATED :
There have been many interesting answer as well as a few idiotic ones.
My thought is :
The genius of the constitution is that it can always be changed, the genius is that the constitution makes no permanent rule other than the faith in the wisdom of ordinary citizens to govern themselves.
The founding fathers were a bunch of farmers but they were also great men because they knew the one thing that all great men should know, that they didn't know everything. They knew they were going to make mistakes but they made sure they left a way to correct those mistakes.
They didn't look at themselves as leaders, they wanted a government of citizens NOT royalty, they wanted a government of listeners NOT lecturers, they wanted a government that could change and not stand still.
Woh woh woh
what? Aren't some truths immutable, unalienable? Doesn't McManus give a good explanation of this in his explanation of governments?
I mean...do you ever think it would be a good idea to prohibit speech freedom?
...I suppose both ideas can exist, as long as those immutable truths always remain.
LibertyDefined.org | If | Not Perfect
The genius of the
The genius of the constitution is that it can always be changed, the genius is that the constitution makes no permanent rule other than the faith in the wisdom of ordinary citizens to govern themselves.
The founding fathers were a bunch of farmers but they were also great men because they knew the one thing that all great men should know, that they didn't know everything. They knew they were going to make mistakes but they made sure they left a way to correct those mistakes.
They didn't look at themselves as leaders, they wanted a government of citizens NOT royalty, they wanted a government of listeners NOT lecturers, they wanted a government that could change and not stand still.
www.retakecongress.com
www.revolutionbroadcasting.com
www.RJHarrismoneybomb.com
checks and balances
The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin - Mark Twain
On the "genius" of the Constitution
Can be reduced to the ease of which corporatism, mercantilism, democracy, socialism or fascism (take your pick) can be forced upon us, the supposed "sovereign" masses (for the greater good!), while we worship the lofty words enshrined in a document which can do nothing for us, other than exist in our favor when we choose to do something for ourselves as sovereign individuals.
Thank you, Mr. Hamilton (not!).
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"The consolidation of the states into one vast republic, sure to be aggressive abroad and despotic at home, will be the certain precursor of the ruin which has overwhelmed all those that have preceded it."
- Robert E. Lee, 1866
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RON PAUL 2012
Actually, the US
Actually, the US Constitution has provided for more liberty and economic prosperity than any document in history, the separation of powers between states, and federal branches is a great burden on the NWO.
The Aritcles of Confederation were tailor made for the NWO. To corrupt them, they only need to get rid of the unaminous vote rule. That would have come quickly, and certainly when the next war came along. As things were not settled with France or Britian, that would have been soon.
A military dictator could have occupied Rhode Island if they didn;t get in line. How long do you really think Rhode Island would have been able to stop the rest fo the States? Unless you are an idiot, not long.
Once the AoC could vote by majority, they could set up a court sytem and executive leader, without modifying the charter. The executive leader would have become a dictator with emergency powers. Regional alliances with Georgia favoring Spain, the rest of the South favoring France, and NE favoring Britian would have formed quickly, and almost formed anyway. Then regional civil wars would start. Petty little states like Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Georgia would get gobbled up.
Eventually an bogus governemt would have been formed within 20 years.
Thanks to the Constitution, that didn't happen.
A vote for Ron Paul is a vote for James Madison.
We The People Of The "United" States....
Key word United !
Please think about this, right in the Constitution's it is mandated that every person elected or appointed to any government office takes an oath { Verbal Contract } to uphold the "Laws" of the Constitution which is supposed to unite all who take the oath to one purpose;
Protect, defend and "Obey" the Constitution's laws !
Now, from what I've read, in the 1700's an oath was considered a sacred pledge of personal honor,,,,however, anyone who does not want to take this oath is not punished but is free to go about their own business as long as they don't break any local laws.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that anybody that is convicted of breaking their Constitutional oath of office is committing the act of treason the only crime mentioned in the Constitution.
Ron Paul Is My President ! He has upheld his oath of office with honor !
beesting
Jefferson and Madison on Constitutional Interpretation
Jefferson and Madison on Constitutional Interpretation
Some controversy has arisen in our comments section, charging "Machiavellianism" in the federalist and "textual" approaches to judicial philosophy. The names of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison came up. And so, let go to the horses' mouths:
“The true theory of our Constitution is surely the wisest and best, that the States are independent as to everything within themselves, and united as to everything respecting foreign affairs...”
“On every question of construction [of the Constitution] let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or intended against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.”
---Jefferson
Which is OK, but I like Madison even better:
"It is to be the assent and ratification of the several States, derived from the supreme authority in each State -- the authority of the people themselves. The act, therefore, establishing the Constitution will not be a national but a federal act."
"As a guide in expounding and applying the provisions of the Constitution, the debates and incidental decisions of the Convention can have no authoritative character. However desirable it be that they should be preserved as a gratification to the laudable curiosity felt by every people to trace the origin and progress of their political Institutions, & as a source perhaps of some lights on the Science of Govt. the legitimate meaning of the Instrument must be derived from the text itself; or if a key is to be sought elsewhere, it must be not in the opinions or intentions of the Body which planned & proposed the Constitution, but in the sense attached to it by the people in their respective State Conventions where it recd. all the authority which it possesses."
Machiavellianism has nothing atall to do with it. In fact, it's those who substitute their interpretations of the Constitution over its meaning when it was ratified who are guilty of it.
Posted by Tom Van Dyke at 12:17 PM
25 comments:
http://americancreation.blogspot.com/2009/09/jefferson-and-m...
A vote for Ron Paul is a vote for James Madison.
IN ORDER* It provides for
IN ORDER
* It provides for fair representation in the government, including state representation, elections, and proportional representation.
* It divides power between the national and local interests in a rational way based on the study of history.
* It divides power, making usurpation much more difficult.
* It it filled with roadblocks to usurpation, including the Bill-of-Rights, but also rights in the original Constitution.
* It provides for a method on amendement that is not too easy, but not impossible, with all ultimate power retained by the states and the people.
* It reflects the brilliance of James Madison, the most profound political thinker who has ever lived.
A vote for Ron Paul is a vote for James Madison.
It deaclares our unalienable rights
No other Constitution in the world does that as far as I know.
Originally Norwegian I was in Norway in May. I read the Norwegian Constitution. Or part of it. Well it declares all the power that the King has, that he is like God and can't be accused of any wrong.
The people have the rights that he decides.
i fixed your spelling errors.
Ron Paul is my President
Ron Paul is My President
Credit the collective minds
Not enough credit is given to George Mason, who wrote the Virginia Constitution. It was later used as a model for the U.S. Constitution, with re-writes from Madison initially, and then later Jefferson, Franklin and the gang. They made each other better and wiser in their discussions; also compromise was essential - give some, take some. Wasn't easy.
Most of the founding fathers owned slaves, but omitted any reference to slavery in the original draft. That later came in the form of an amendment.
John - thanks for the points of correction. One of the reason Mason didn't attend was that his wife was sick and, for him, that took priority.
Jefferson took no part in the Constitutional Convention
or the Virginia Ratification Convention. He was in France.
George Mason opposed the Constitution
1) He refused to sign it at the Constitutional Convention.
2) He voted against it at the Virginia Ratification Convention.
3) The 3/5 rule implicitly recognizes slavery in the Constitution.
The 3/5th rule provided an
The 3/5th rule provided an incentive to end slavery. Any state that ended slavery would get a boost in their House representation and in the Electoral College.
The 3/5th rule was taken from the Articles of Confederation, which Mason didn't seem to have a problem with.
The original Virginia Plan by Madison said that the states should be represented by either free population or economic impact. Since economic statistics were not readily available back then, population was used. The 3/5th rule was used because a slave was considered to be only 60% as productive as a free person. The Constitution, hence, recognizes that slavery is not as efficient as freedom.
A vote for Ron Paul is a vote for James Madison.
Constitutional Lawyer Edwin Vieira Says:
The two things that make the Constitution powerful are the "Power" of money and the "Power" of the sward in the hands of "We the People"!
The power of the sward is covered in the several references to the militia of the several states because it is their job to "Enforce" all the other "Laws" spelled out in the Constitution that "Limits" the power of government.
The power of the purse references the use of only Gold/Silver money will be the legal tender in payment of debt.
Article I
Section 10.
If these two things were still in effect we would not have the problems America faces today, and I think Ron Paul would agree with this.
beesting
An argument exists that the
An argument exists that the US Constitution is a debt instrument with three parties signed on as surety: the federal government, the States, and We the People. It goes something like this:
In 1782 the Articles of Confederation tried to guarantee the huge revolutionary war debt in Article XII. Unfortunately, it had no "substance", no collateral, no enforceability, and thus did not work as an international commercial instrument to make national contracts.
1782
+ 7 years of intra-national/individual bankruptcy, just like us
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1789, when the the federal government was incorporated with the Constitution, the States and People added as surety to guarantee the prior debts in Article VI. Unfortunately, history shows no one paid it...
1789
+ 70 years of an inter-national body in bankruptcy
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1859, when the second surety party was required to pay the debt. The South, rich in resource-wealth, thought it wiser to form its own country without settling this debt. Civil War ensues; notion of states rights disappears as a result, for the states were incorporated. The (present tense) Union becomes the (past tense) United States, republic gone, military democracy in place. (war decorations began here, too, just ask Smedley Butler!)
1859
+ 70 years of an international body in bankruptcy
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1929, when the third surety party, We the People, were required to pay the now massive debt. Surely by construction, the People were wholly unaware of such a deal at this time. (Good thing the gold wealth was being take out of the nation as interest to the Federal Reserve, set up prior, just in case) The stock market crashed, which quickly resulted in birth certificates being issued and social security benefits; the People were incorporated.
1929
+ 70 years of international bankruptcy
------
1999, whereupon Bill Clinton was put on trial, for perjury regarding...sexual relations? The lens of time cannot yet focus on what truly happened then...though + 2...
Thoughts?
LibertyDefined.org | If | Not Perfect
US debt was paid down to
US debt was paid down to effectively nothing, about $10,000 if memory serves, during the Jackson administration.
paid down, but panicked up
it was paid down to around $30,000, but the panic of 1837 increased it by 10, and it steadily crept up until the Civil War, at which point it exploded again. Don't know what that does to this argument, but my point is it was never fully paid off.
LibertyDefined.org | If | Not Perfect
Correct!
I too recall that...hm...The only discrepancy may be that debt accumulated from the first and second central bank schemes, not necessarily the war debt.
LibertyDefined.org | If | Not Perfect
Wrong, the war debt
Wrong, the war debt preceeded both banks.
In fact, neither bank would have passed had there not been war debt.
The Founding Fathers passed these banks as short term financial stopgaps, resulting from our two wars for Independence from the British Empire.
These banks were never intended to be permanent, nor were they deemed necessary once the economy got going & all the debt paid off.
If people would pay attention to the principles of the Fopunding Fathers, they would see that we should not have a central bank today.
A vote for Ron Paul is a vote for James Madison.
Interesting. Who holds the debt and where are the contracts?
Ron Paul's Convention Speech
Ron Paul's Convention Speech
Some say England, or France,
Some say England, or France (?!), but European banks of the time were already part of the Rothschild banking empire, prone to enslave nations with war debt. Assuming debt == control. Rockefeller would later say "own nothing, control everything".
Historically, we issued debt certificates as promises to pay anyone who bought them.
But I doubt extant contracts, should any remain, to inarguably prove this will ever see public scrutiny.
I just find it an interesting argument.
LibertyDefined.org | If | Not Perfect
they understood human behavior
they knew power corrupted absolutely. they understood what freedom and liberty meant. not in the catchphrase sense.
Patrick Henry who opposed the Constitution
was the true genius. He saw its faults and where it would lead. It was devised to create a more powerful central government and was successful beyond the wildest dreams of its supporters.
As someone said the Constitution got us here or couldn't stop us from getting here. I'll not worship the thing.
The Constitution is Not What Got Us Here. Not Following it IS.
And the most destructive force against our Constitution is fraudulent money.
Ron Paul's Convention Speech
Ron Paul's Convention Speech
So the problem is a couple of centuries
of bad Presidents, bad Congresses,and bad Supreme Courts, what terrible luck. If so, the Constitution was unable to protect itself and was consequently flawed.
Buddy you're on the wrong site.
To be attacking the constitutions principles.
Find out if you have a local militia - http://www.uaff.us/
Real Patriots for 9/11 truth -- http://patriotsquestion911.com/
The Constitution was not a sacred document that
came down from the right hand of God. It replaced a far superior Articles of Confederation
I'm not saying anything Patrick Henry didn't say. If someone wants to bar the point of view of the Anti-Federalists when history has shown them to be correct, go for it.
Not everyone here acts like a small child worshiping a flawed document.
Those who seek the truth must get beyond what we were all told in elementary school.
Hologram of Liberty
"Hologram of Liberty" by Kenneth W. Royce (http://www.amazon.com/Hologram-Liberty-Constitutions-Shockin...) gives a pretty good critique of the Constitution imho, and how the influence of certain founders (especially Hamilton) may have allowed for the eventual centralization of government power we live with today.
Our Constitution does not
Propaganda (1928)
by Edward Bernays
Our Constitution does not envisage political parties as part of the mechanism of government, and its framers seem not to have pictured to themselves the existence in our national politics of anything like the modern political machine. But the American voters soon found that without organization and direction their individual votes, cast, perhaps, for dozens or hundreds of candidates, would produce nothing but confusion. Invisible government, in the shape of rudimentary political parties, arose almost overnight. Ever since then we have agreed, for the sake of simplicity and practicality, that party machines should narrow down the field of choice to two candidates, or at most three or four. In theory, every citizen makes up his mind on public questions and matters of private conduct. In practice, if all men had to study for themselves the abstruse economic, political, and ethical data involved in every question, they would find it impossible to come to a conclusion about anything. We have voluntarily agreed to let an invisible government sift the data and high-spot the outstanding issues so that our field of choice shall be narrowed to practical proportions. From our leaders and the media they use to reach the public, we accept the evidence and the demarcation of issues bearing upon public questions; from some ethical teacher, be it a minister, a favorite essayist, or merely prevailing opinion, we accept a standardized code of social conduct to which we conform most of the time.
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It is good and proper to respect the U.S. flag, perpetuated with the blood of American heroes. It is a fatal mistake not to recognize those who wrap themselves in the same flag to cover up their crimes against the American people.
~ Sherman H. Skolnick
. @ @ . Power to the People!
@ O @ -----> PEOPLE
. @ @ . NOT Corporate Entities!