We start with first principles. The Constitution creates a Federal Government of enumerated powers.
~ Chief Justice William Rehnquist, United States v. Lopez (1995)
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation and foreign commerce.
~ James Madison, Federalist Papers, No. 45
At the ascendancy of our 44th president of the United States and a new administration, I have one simple question to ask: Constitution or corruption? The latter principle of governance has dominated politics beginning with the liberal Theodore Roosevelt (1901-09) and his “Fair Deal.” Next came the socialist junta of Woodrow Wilson (1913-21) followed by FDR (1933-45) where the apotheosis of leviathan government over every aspect of our lives was ubiquitously called “The New Deal.” Nevertheless, I truly believe that we can reform our decadent ways and return to the original intent of the Constitution’s framers. How?
First of all, “We the People” must demand that all of our elected leaders and judges explicitly follow the black-letter text of the Constitution. Here is the oath every one of the 535 members of Congress must take:
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.
A similar oath is mandated by every Supreme Court justice, federal, circuit and district court judge – even the president of the United States and his entire Cabinet must obey this sacred oath. Nevertheless, few of these “public servants” care one whit about the Constitution.
Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution explicitly outlines the only legitimate duties that Congress has:
- Borrow money
- Regulate commerce among the states
- Regulate naturalization
- Regulate bankruptcies
- Coin money
- Fix weights and standards
- Punish counterfeiters
- Establish post offices
- Establish post roads
- Record patents
- Protect copyrights
- Create federal courts
- Punish pirates
- Declare war
- Raise an army
- Provide a navy
- Call up the militia
- Organize the militia
- Makes laws for Washington, D.C.
- Make rules for the Army and Navy
The Constitution’s framers had the prescience to foresee those corrupt politicians that would come down through history who craved and lusted after power and who wanted to expand their supremacy over We the People for their own totalitarian ends. Therefore, the framers added the Ninth Amendment, which reads: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
The 10th Amendment reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Because the powers contained in Article I, Section 8 are delegated from the people, they are the only constitutional powers Congress has. But our Founding Fathers went further than simply listing what Congress could do. They also listed in the Bill of Rights many specific things the government could not do. Note to whom the Bill of Rights is addressed: “Congress shall make no law …”
Rep. John Shadegg, R, Ariz., has since 1995 proposed an “Enumerated Powers Act,” or EPA (H.R. 1359 in the 110th Congress). If this important bill were passed, it would force all 535 members of Congress to literally cite chapter and verse of how their proposed legislation lines up with the Constitution. The implication being if they could not clearly show the constitutionality of their legislation, ipso facto it would be deemed unconstitutional and summarily rejected from even given the respect of a vote by Congress, because the proposed bill would have to first pass constitutional muster to even be considered.
Can you imagine how many welfare programs and multi-trillion dollar spending plans America is currently entangled in would be stopped dead in their tracks if Congress simply followed the original intent of the Constitution’s framers and enacted Rep. Shadegg’s Enumerated Powers Act? Government by definition and necessity would become smaller and decentralized. The people would have more of their own money to do with it what they will, and lazy bums who have lived all their lives off other people’s money would be compelled to get off their butts and get a job. It would be tantamount to a third American Revolution.
In the early 1930s, FDR used the pretext of the Great Depression to take Theodore Roosevelt’s and Wilson’s experiments in socialism to a more comprehensive level with his blatantly unconstitutional New Deal programs, including Social Security, Aid to Families with Dependent Children, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Federal Housing Administration, the Tennessee Valley Authority, Works Progress Administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission and Fannie Mae, just to name a few leviathan federal programs that have denigrated the liberty and freedom of every American citizen. America is essentially a welfare state where almost daily more of our liberties are confiscated by the government. President-elect Barack Obama has promised to give America “FDR, part II.” God help us all.
In conclusion, I appeal to every American out there who loves this country and hasn’t fallen prey to our Stalinist public schools to demand that every politician pledge to sign on to Rep. John Shadegg’s Enumerated Powers Act. Let’s return government back to the people who created it and gave a measure of power to the Executive, the Judiciary and Congress over We the People as part of a sacred social contract. Those politicians that refuse to support the EPA should not be elected, or if already in office, should summarily be impeached for violating their oath of office.
Admittedly, that last statement is Pollyannaish. At the end of the 110th Congress last year, Rep. Shadegg’s bill only had 53 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives and no support in the Senate from the likes of that great “maverick” Sen. John McCain, former Sen. Barack Obama or Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. And you wonder why Congress just spent $621 million on a Visitor’s Center – why? “You could literally smell the tourists coming into the Capitol,” said Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., in his remarks at the opening ceremonies. “That’s no longer the case,” he added.
Translation: Like the talking barnyard animals of George Orwell’s “Animal Farm,” We the People stink!
