Do you believe the U.S. Constitution is a "living" document?

[yiostheoy]

I used to think not because I was under the assumption that if the constitution was a living document then there would be no need for amendments. However, I've done some research into the differences between Anglo-Saxon Common Law and Roman Edict Law (Civil Law). Since our constitution was written in the spirit of common law which is characterized by precedent, jury trial, and folk-right I now believe the constitution is a living document that can be differently interpreted as the American populaces opinions will be reflected in future precedents. Personally, I wish our constitution was more like civil law since I don't like the idea of the allotted broad interpretation in common law.

Thoughts?

Yes it can stand and benefit to be amended.
But it doesn't mean it's open to anyone's interpretation.

It still has to be changed by consent and vote of people and states.

So, for example, going sideways through Congress and Courts, passing ACA first as a health bill then ruling on it as a tax doesn't count. That still should require voting on an amendment to the Constitution to explicitly expand the powers of federal govt to manage health care before taking this liberty from people and states.

Abusing judicial authority to make laws on marriage for the people and states is also outside the Constitution. So that isn't what is meant by the Constitution being a living document. It still has to be changed using the given processes instead of abusing political power to bypass representation and checks and balances built into the process.

I was going to mention the precedent that statutes set in our legal system. We do have a little bit of both in our legal system but common law is the most prevalent.

Jeeze your language sucks when you are trying to impress people and sound smarter than you are.

Statues do not set precedents.

 

[yiostheoy]

Progressives have been pushing the lie that the Constitution is a living document all in an effort to neuter it. Is your mortgage or lease a "living document" as well?

The Constitution had a built in provision for making changes to it, called the Amendment Process. Can you say, "Amendment"?

Starting with FDR, Progressive Jihadists realized that could get from the courts they changes they would never get by Amendment. Hence, the "living document" lie

Take a look at the list of amendments, CrusaderFrank .

The Congress began to amend it almost immediately in 1793 to overrule the SCOTUS decision in Chisholm v. Georgia. This was due to a technicality arising over an issue not even mentioned in the Constitution. 11th Amendment.

Then in 1803 Congress decided that making the top 2 candidates POTUS and VP was also not a good idea, so they changed that too. 12th Amendment.

Now the document was fine, finally for the next 60 years until the issue of slavery was settled. While the Civil War raged, Lincoln acted unilaterally, which is why Booth assassinated him.

After the Civil War, Congress quickly passed the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendment regarding the slaves.

The South was in no condition to disagree or hold up legal constitutional emancipation any longer.

So hopefully everyone sees that the Constitution IS a living breathing document that can grow and change with the times.

They never fixed abortion though, so Roe v. Wade had to give women the freedom to get abortion on demand.

And the 2nd Amendment never got any reasonable Federal regulations. So Heller v. DC is the only good SCOTUS law that we have on guns and gun possession in private and in public. The next trial over guns will be assault weapons.

 

[yiostheoy]

Yes, as it is based on case law made up from the courts power of judicial review. You do realize why the supreme court is a equal branch of government, right?

Outside of the few limitations put in the bill of rights the constitution is very broad and allows the government to live within the time. If it couldn't do this we'd be some kind of backwards shit hole with a government that couldn't do the will of the people. I'd fully support a new constitution if it wasn't able to adapt to the time.

Yes, I do know the Supreme Court is an equal branch of the federal government.

We could not really tell since it is doubtful you went to college yet and you don't seem to have grasped what a "living breathing document" means.

If you get a chance to take college level world history, then you should study Solon and Lykurgas the ancient Greek constitutionalists for Athens and Sparta. Their constitutions for those cities were NOT living/breathing, they were fixed and unchangeable.

 

[yiostheoy]

The Constitution is neither ‘living’ nor ‘static.’

Its fundamental principles are enduring, safeguarding the protected liberties of all Americans.

It was the original intent and understanding of the Framers that the Founding Document be subject to interpretation, where the Constitution exists solely in the context of its case law, as determined by the Supreme Court, authorized to do so by the doctrine of judicial review and Articles III and VI of the Constitution.

Constitutional jurisprudence is the accepted and settled law of the land, reflecting more than two centuries of Supreme Court rulings and well over 800 years of Anglo-American judicial tradition.

As Justice Kennedy explained in Lawrence:

“Had those who drew and ratified the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth Amendment or the Fourteenth Amendment known the components of liberty in its manifold possibilities, they might have been more specific. They did not presume to have this insight. They knew times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress. As the Constitution endures, persons in every generation can invoke its principles in their own search for greater freedom.”

You wish.

You must wish to the Tooth Faerie too. And to your Faerie Godmother.

With Ginsberg on the Court there is nothing in the Constitution that is safe from her ego.

 

[yiostheoy]

The people who spread the "living document" myth are those people who would like the Constitution to say something other than what it does say (or in addition to what it does say), but know that they lack the popular and political support to have an amendment passed by Congress and the required number of states.

Such people have, for the past 100 years or so, silently and steadily have campaigned to get similarly-deluded jurists onto appellate courts, so that they could "interpret" the Constitution and laws to mean what they want it to mean. Just this week, Justice Ginsberg revealed herself for the political hack that she has always been, then after taking heat from her Lefty cronies, tried to roll it back. This was akin to a retired professional wrestler admitting that it's all scripted. Not really a surprise.

Any time you see an appellate court decision that runs more than 50 pages, the writer is NOT trying to explain how the law and constitution can be applied to the facts of the case; they are trying to explain why the Constitution MEANS something entirely different from what it SAYS. And this takes a lot of pages to accomplish.

Consider: the Fourth Amendment says, in essence, that the Government may not conduct random searches of people's stuff - they must either have a search warrant or the search must be pursuant to a lawful arrest.

And from this, we get the principle that the state of Connecticut cannot outlaw artificial birth control pills. And that states' sodomy laws are "unconstitutional."

Whether you agree or not with the propositions (and of course Lefty's tend to agree), the point is that there is NOTHING in the Constitution or in any amendment to the Constitution that gives the U.S. Supreme court the right to strike down these state laws. Those "Constitutional" principles are all made-up nonsense, promulgated by judges who believe in a "living Constitution."

Leftists are evil, anti-democratic, bastards.

John Birch Society obviously.

You might enjoy living in China or N.Korea more than here in America.

You should move.

 

[yiostheoy]

It is a political document. It not only means what it says, it means what people say it means in the moment.
Law is not political. All men are equal when standing before it and truth rules.

It means whatever the b!tch Ginsberg wants it to mean.

 

[regent]

It is a political document. It not only means what it says, it means what people say it means in the moment.
Law is not political. All men are equal when standing before it and truth rules.

It means whatever the b!tch Ginsberg wants it to mean.

Ginsberg did not make the Marbury decision, a conservative Court decided that decision.

 

[regent]

Yes, as it is based on case law made up from the courts power of judicial review. You do realize why the supreme court is a equal branch of government, right?

Outside of the few limitations put in the bill of rights the constitution is very broad and allows the government to live within the time. If it couldn't do this we'd be some kind of backwards shit hole with a government that couldn't do the will of the people. I'd fully support a new constitution if it wasn't able to adapt to the time.

Yes, I do know the Supreme Court is an equal branch of the federal government.

We could not really tell since it is doubtful you went to college yet and you don't seem to have grasped what a "living breathing document" means.

If you get a chance to take college level world history, then you should study Solon and Lykurgas the ancient Greek constitutionalists for Athens and Sparta. Their constitutions for those cities were NOT living/breathing, they were fixed and unchangeable.

Good for Sparta and Athens but most of us are discussing the US Constitution.
As Chief Justice Marshall said (paraphrased) in McCulloch v. Maryland Let it be within the scope of the Constitution, not prohibited, and consistent with the letter and spirit of the constitution and it is constitutional.