Studying the Constitution -- activating the brain before the mouth

[heirtothewind]

Exploring Constitutional Law

Excellent layman site for learning about the Constitution, its history, and major supreme court decisions interpreting it.

A more scholarly site is Constitutional Society [www.constitution.org].

It is a good idea to learn something about a topic before mouthing off about it.

 

[Hossfly]

Exploring Constitutional Law

Excellent layman site for learning about the Constitution, its history, and major supreme court decisions interpreting it.

A more scholarly site is Constitutional Society [www.constitution.org].

It is a good idea to learn something about a topic before mouthing off about it.

I take it you're a Constitutional lawyer so I may have some questions later you can answer in layman"s terms.

 

[pismoe]

ANOTHER SOURCE , suggestion to compliment the o.p. info . HILLSDALE College offers a free course on Constitutional studies . Just type in Hillsdale college constitutional studies for more info .

 

[georgephillip]

Yet another good source for understanding America's Constitution, both written and unwritten:
"'America’s Written Constitution' is now being offered as the first of two new stand-alone courses.

"The second course, 'America's Unwritten Constitution,' will be offered in January 2015.

"These two courses were offered together in January 2014 under the name 'Constitutional Law,' however feedback from our students suggested the learning experience would be more valuable and effective if we split the course into to distinct offerings."
Coursera.org
This course started yesterday (10/20/14) and is free unless you want a certificate of completion.

 

[Mad Scientist]

What's a matter OP? You get pwned in another thread or something?

Well, maybe you should learn about a topic before you mouth off about it.

 

[georgephillip]

Ready for "fuzzy?"
"I understand, however, from years of teaching that constitutional law is not every student's cup of tea. Some students become frustrated with its 'fuzziness.'

"Yes, it is fuzzy--and one cannot take a clear picture of a fuzzy object.

"There are relatively few clear answers in constitutional law (and those that are clear--e.g., 'Can a 27-year-old be elected President?'--tend not to be very significant to lawyers).

"The indefiniteness of constitutional law is a function of many things, including: (1) a text that is the product of long gone eras, (2) a text that in many cases (e.g, 'due process of law,' 'equal protection of the laws') was intentionally vague to accomodate the needs of a changing society, and (3) important (and often emotional) issues that tend to bring the values and politics of judges into play more than in other areas of law, where judges are more likely to think of their judging as an intellectual exercise or puzzle."
Introduction to the Study of Constitutional Law

 

[DGS49]

How Tyranny Came to America aka God Man and Law

Everything you need to know about the Constitution in one, relatively long essay. It is dated but still accurate.

The problem with studying "Constitutional Law" is that it often has nothing to do with the Constitution. In fact, it often CONTRADICTS the Constitution.

Take for example, the "constitutional" "Right of Privacy."

It doesn't exist.

And because it was made up by judges, it is flexible enough to encompass just about anything some shyster lawyer wants it to mean. Birth control pills, abortion, sodomy...even marriage to someone of your own gender, all protected rights under the "constitutional" right of privacy. And because it is a "constitutional law" principle, it trumps actual laws that were passed legitimately by Congress and the state legislatures.

Read the essay. You will be glad you did.

 

[Roadrunner]

Exploring Constitutional Law

Excellent layman site for learning about the Constitution, its history, and major supreme court decisions interpreting it.

A more scholarly site is Constitutional Society [www.constitution.org].

It is a good idea to learn something about a topic before mouthing off about it.

The majority of people here could not pass my 50 item eighth grade civics final.

Civics was not on the eighth grade curriculum, but so many kids failed it in 9th grade, I taught a quicky course before I sent them home.

I never had a student pass my final and fail ninth grade civics

 

[Roadrunner]

How Tyranny Came to America aka God Man and Law

Everything you need to know about the Constitution in one, relatively long essay. It is dated but still accurate.

The problem with studying "Constitutional Law" is that it often has nothing to do with the Constitution. In fact, it often CONTRADICTS the Constitution.

Take for example, the "constitutional" "Right of Privacy."

It doesn't exist.

And because it was made up by judges, it is flexible enough to encompass just about anything some shyster lawyer wants it to mean. Birth control pills, abortion, sodomy...even marriage to someone of your own gender, all protected rights under the "constitutional" right of privacy. And because it is a "constitutional law" principle, it trumps actual laws that were passed legitimately by Congress and the state legislatures.

Read the essay. You will be glad you did.

The passage of the 14th Amendment, at bayonet point, was the end of the Constitution.

 

[heirtothewind]

Holmes and Brandeis wrote the article on constitutional privacy in the Harvard Law Journal in 1890. SCOTUS has recognized this right since 1928 [the Olmstead case]. I really have to go with the opinions of legal scholars rather than the babblings of the right-wing lunatic fringe.

 

[georgephillip]

How Tyranny Came to America aka God Man and Law

Everything you need to know about the Constitution in one, relatively long essay. It is dated but still accurate.

The problem with studying "Constitutional Law" is that it often has nothing to do with the Constitution. In fact, it often CONTRADICTS the Constitution.

Take for example, the "constitutional" "Right of Privacy."

It doesn't exist.

And because it was made up by judges, it is flexible enough to encompass just about anything some shyster lawyer wants it to mean. Birth control pills, abortion, sodomy...even marriage to someone of your own gender, all protected rights under the "constitutional" right of privacy. And because it is a "constitutional law" principle, it trumps actual laws that were passed legitimately by Congress and the state legislatures.

Read the essay. You will be glad you did.

From your essay:
"If you suspect I’m overstating the change from our original principles, I give you the late Justice Hugo Black. In a 1965 case calledGriswold v. Connecticut, the Court struck down a law forbidding the sale of contraceptives on grounds that it violated a right of 'privacy.' (This supposed right, of course, became the basis for the Court’s even more radical 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade, but that’s another story.)

"Justice Black dissented in the Griswold case on the following ground: 'I like my privacy as well as the next [man],' he wrote, 'but I am nevertheless compelled to admit that government has a right to invade it unless prohibited by some specific constitutional provision.'

"What a hopelessly muddled — and really sinister — misconception of the relation between the individual and the state: government has a right to invade our privacy, unless prohibited by the Constitution.

"You don’t have to share the Court’s twisted view of the right of privacy in order to be shocked that one of its members takes this view of the 'right' of government to invade privacy."

Seven of nine Justices ruled in opposition to Hugo,claiming the Connecticut statute violated the Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments.

"Griswold then appealed her conviction to the Supreme Court of the United States. Griswold argued that the Connecticut statute against the use of contraceptives was contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which states, 'no state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law...nor deny any person the equal protection of the laws,' (Amendment 14 Section 1).[7]

"The U.S. Supreme Court concluded that the Connecticut Statute was unconstitutional."

Griswold v. Connecticut - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

 

[DGS49]

There are elements of privacy in the Fourth Amendment. There are aspects of privacy to be found in the Ninth Amendment.

But consider...Congress and the state legislatures were well aware of these actual Constitutional principles when they drafted and passed laws banning homosexual sodomy, prohibiting abortion, and defining marriage as between one man and one woman.

Then the Supreme Court "discovers" that the "right of privacy" obviates these laws.

In technical terms, this is bullshit.

 

[Roadrunner]

There are elements of privacy in the Fourth Amendment. There are aspects of privacy to be found in the Ninth Amendment.

But consider...Congress and the state legislatures were well aware of these actual Constitutional principles when they drafted and passed laws banning homosexual sodomy, prohibiting abortion, and defining marriage as between one man and one woman.

Then the Supreme Court "discovers" that the "right of privacy" obviates these laws.

In technical terms, this is bullshit.

The Fourth Amendment was repealed by the War on Drugs.

 

[DGS49]

There are two "bottom lines" in this whole issue.

First, the Supreme Court must occasionally have the humility to say, "This is a bad and/or stupid law, but it does not violate the Constitution, so if you want relief you have to go back to your state legislature." But is lacks that humility.

Second, since roughly the "New Deal," Supreme Court justices have taken it upon themselves to re-write the Constitution through "interpretation," changing its meaning from what the writers intended it to be to what they think it should have said in the first place.

The longer a Supreme Court decision is (in pages) the more likely it is turning the Constitution on its head to achieve the result desired by the majority of the Court.

 

[georgephillip]

There are elements of privacy in the Fourth Amendment. There are aspects of privacy to be found in the Ninth Amendment.

But consider...Congress and the state legislatures were well aware of these actual Constitutional principles when they drafted and passed laws banning homosexual sodomy, prohibiting abortion, and defining marriage as between one man and one woman.

Then the Supreme Court "discovers" that the "right of privacy" obviates these laws.

In technical terms, this is bullshit.

Isn't it also possible, the Constitution is a living document whose interpretations can change as society does?
"In United States constitutional interpretation, theLiving Constitution (or loose constructionism) is the claim that the Constitution has a dynamic meaning or that it has the properties of an animate being in the sense that it changes. The controversial idea is associated with views that contemporaneous society should be taken into account when interpreting key constitutional phrases.[1"
Living Constitution - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

 

[DGS49]

"Living document" theory makes sense for interpreting the Bible, which can never be changed. We find out medical facts, astronomical facts, geological facts, biological facts, and have to take a second look at the document to see whether it is necessary to understand, for example, The Great Flood in a different context.

The Constitution, however, provides for changes within its own text. If it is necessary to change it we have the ability to do so, and we have principles of representative democracy that must be followed.

Take for example, Social Security. This innovation was (and is) prohibited by the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution, which states that the powers delegated to the Federal Government are limited to those that are expressly stated (mainly in Article I, Section 8).

If the American People, acting through their Congress and State Legislatures, thought that this was something that was NECESSARY, a Constitutional Amendment could have been promulgated in the legal way. But rather than doing this, Roosevelt and his Fellow Travellers cooked it up in Congress and induced a renegade Supreme Court to "interpret" the Constitution to allow it.

Barry and the Progressives have attempted another "end-around" with Obama-Care. Totally Unconstitutional.

IF THE PEOPLE WANT THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO GET INTO THE HEALTHCARE BUSINESS (AS IT IS IN MANY COUNTRIES) THEY HAVE THE ABILITY TO AMEND THE CONSTITUTION TO ALLOW IT! Doing it through the back door is, as I have said, bullshit.

Just like the "living document" theory of "interpretation." Bullshit.

 

[georgephillip]

The Constitution and Social Security:
"The constitutional basis of the Social Security Act was uncertain. The basic problem is that under the 'reserve clause' of the Constitution (the 10th Amendment) powers not specifically granted to the federal government are reserved for the States or the people.

"When the federal government seeks to expand its influence in new areas it must find some basis in the Constitution to justify its action.

"Obviously, the Constitution did not specifically mention the operation of a social insurance system as a power granted to the federal government!

"The Committee on Economic Security (CES) struggled with this and was unsure whether to claim the commerce clause or the broad power to levy taxes and expend funds to 'provide for the general welfare,' as the basis for the programs in the Act. Ultimately, the CES opted for the taxing power as the basis for the new program, and the Congress agreed, but how the courts would see this choice was very much an open question. (See the sidebar on 'A Tea Party That Changed History.')"

Social Security seems like a good example of providing for the general welfare, at least to those of us who depend on it for our subsistence.

Social Security History

 

[DGS49]

Anyone with more than a "High School Civics Class" understanding of the Constitution knows that the "general welfare" words in Section 8 are not a carte blanche for Congress to do anything that it deems necessary to promote the general welfare of the country. If this were the intention, then there would be no reason to list 17 specific powers, and/or the text would have included the words "for example," or words of similar import.

Honestly, this argument has been made and concluded for a couple hundred years and is no longer on the table.

If you need some convincing, look up the discussions surrounding the recent USSC decision on Obamacare. The primary question being considered was, where, among the 17 delegated powers of Section 8, could the Court find the power to enact this law? Ultimately, John Roberts decided (perversely) that the penalty for not signing up was really a TAX - which is among the powers delegated to Congress.

If the "general welfare" words meant what the ignorami believe they mean, then this argument need not have taken place. Clearly, Congress felt the ACA was in America's best interests, and that would have been the end of the discussion.

But to get to the bigger point, because the Supreme Court is compromised, we keep getting these programs that are clearly unconstitutional, and Congress & the State Legislatures are let off the hook. They don't have to decide about abortion or gay marriage or socialized medicine or socialized retirement programs. These major policy decisions are being made by lifetime-appointed judges and justices, who have no need to consider public opinion (or the clear meaning of the Constitution), which is, as I have said, bullshit.

 

[gipper]

Why bother studying the Constitution when the power elite have rendered it meaningless?

 

[georgephillip]

It would seem the argument over implied powers or strict construction has been going on a lot longer than US Civics classes:

"The constitutional issue about the taxing power had deep roots running all the way back to the founders and to a dispute between Alexander Hamilton and James Madison. "Although both Hamilton and Madison were Federalists who believed in a strong federal government, they disagreed over the interpretation of the Constitution's permission for the government to levy taxes and spend money to 'provide for the general welfare.' "Hamilton thought this meant that government could levy new taxes and undertake new spending if doing so improved the general welfare in a broad sense. "Madison thought the federal government could only expend money for purposes specifically enumerated in the Constitution. "The Madisonian view, also shared by Thomas Jefferson, came in time to be known as the strict construction doctrine while the Hamiltonian view is called the doctrine of implied powers. Anyone who depends on Social Security to ensure their general welfare knows strict construction is bullshit. Social Security History

[TBODY] [/TBODY]