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http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=145854
Type of Content: Article Click the link to see the forum post!! Bryan will join me tommorrow to discuss the thread from Ron Paul Forums about the Constitutional Challenge. Please join us 9am Eastern I was on Kurt Wallace's show on BTM today and tossed out a challenge on how to "fix" the Constitution. My argument is that, while the Constitution has provisions to separate powers and limit to size and scope of the government to secure the rights of the people we can see that after 200+ years the checks and balances have been subverted (including redress). Basically, we wouldn't be in the mess we are today if there wasn't a flaw somewhere. So the question is, how can it be fixed? It's not an easy question to answer and there is no perfect solution. Kurt did allude to something that is fundamentally true, that without a free press the people will be ill-informed which will lead to a subversion of any system-- this is true. I still contend however, that some form of added checks and balances could be established to stand up to stronger assaults. In my imperfect solution, the system can not reply upon money or political connections to gain access to the new checks and balances-- an example of how this could be done is to have a specifically defined 4th branch of government, that is composed of random citizens (who wish to partake) that have the power to repeal unconstitutional law, and remove people from office in some cases. Maybe have a peoples congress of 50 or so citizens from each congressional district. Again- this has flaw (you'd need to keep random truly random), but what could work better? Let's hear the ideas- else, after this revolution we'll doom our inheritors to a system that would be sure to fail again. Why else would we expect different results? Read »
Created 11 weeks 4 days ago
Made popular 11 weeks 4 days ago |
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Although I would phrase it differently. The constitution does not need to be fixed. The government's lack of adherence to the constitution is the problem. The founders made a great effort to keep government within its constitutional bounds. They limited the federal government's powers to only those things specifically authorized by the constitution. They created three branches of government and required all members of each branch to be bound by an oath to support the constitution.
And yet here we are. We have a president who derides the constitution as "just a piece of paper." We have a president who declares American citizens to be enemy combatants and throws them in jail without habeas corpus, without charges, without trial, and without due process. We have a president and congress who pass legislation which encroaches on freedom of speech, and the privacy rights of the 4th amendment. We have a constitution which gives the power to declare war only to congress and yet we are at war without a declaration of war. We have a Supreme Court that nullified property rights in their decision on Kelo v. New London. And that same court was able, by only the slimmest of margins, to conclude that the second amendment means what it says.
So the question I would ask is; how can we force government to abide by the constitution? I would oppose creating a 4th branch of government to be the ultimate arbiter of the constitution for the following reasons:
1) You need a constitutional amendment.
2) Selecting people at random, as you suggest, means you will select from the general population without regard to their knowledge of the constitution. So most of them will be morons.
3) We already have three branches and that doesn't work.
I think one place where the founders missed the boat was that they didn't specify punishment for those congressmen, judges and executives who violate their oath to uphold the constitution. I would suggest that anyone who was found to have violated the constitution should be immediately removed from office and permanently barred from ever serving any office of the public trust again, and perhaps subjected to jail time. Of course determining who decides when the constitution has been violated would still be problematic. But I think the fear of a severe punishment would cause the politicians to be very cautious about doing anything which might violate the constitution.
Unfortunately it is not likely that the current crop of crooks who inhabit government would pass legislation that might land them in jail. So my answer to the question is "I dunno."
The first thing to look at would be where the break in the damn occured. What started the water pouring out? What started the erosion?
What action was the first to dismiss the COnstitution and how did it come about?
Lacking the answer, I'll run off now...
If my knowledge of U.S. serves me correct, I believe the first overall "breech" of the checks and balances occurred under the First Supreme Court chief Justice John Marshall. This breech was the start of judicial review, which came out as a decision under Marbury v. Madison. Judicial review is not clearly stated within the constitution (The quote that they give of the constitution doesn't really define it.) Much of judicial review's power comes from the precedent set by the common law of England.
I must agree overall though, that there are terms that need to be fixed within the constitution. However, this is the beautiful thing about the document. You can get amendments, and if we can get our state legislatures on board, I am sure the passage of amendments to clear up "gray" areas would greatly understandable if the nature of them are understood to ensure their own protection.
Not sure I follow the reasoning behind posting your particular comment on this announcement. Please explain your logic.
What exactly did you do to help the Ron Paul campaign, or any campaign for that matter to help fix the mess we are currently in?