The United States Constitution is our contract with the federal government, defining the areas of our lives where the government is permitted to tread. Over the past several decades, though, an alarming trend has taken root and grown at breakneck pace. The federal judiciary, at every level, is abusing its power by creating--rather than interpreting--laws, and in doing so the courts have begun to alter the very meaning of the Constitution. The government is thus attempting to change the terms of its contract with the people, without the people's involvement or approval!
The courts have taken the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech and twisted it to support pornography and condemn organized political speech. The First Amendment's guarantee of religious freedom has been turned into an outright ban of all things spiritual in the public sphere. The Second Amendment's guarantee of our right to keep and bear arms has largely been ignored, and remains in a precarious state. The Fourth Amendment's protection of personal privacy has, on one hand, been thrown out the window in favor of nationalization of finances, medical care, retirement savings, etc. ad nauseam, while on the other hand being extended and twisted to the extreme as a justification for denying children their unalienable right to life based on their physical location--in utero.
If anyone has any doubt regarding the extent of the Judiciary's usurpation of power, one need only observe the ferocity of the politics surrounding the confirmation process for nominees to the federal bench. The reason our parties have "litmus tests" for federal judges--that is, they want to know each nominee's personal feelings about abortion, gun control, free speech, etc.--is precisely because they know that federal judges no longer base their rulings on the law as prescribed by the Constitution, but exactly the opposite: the law is now based upon their rulings. Thus, conservative leaders attempt to nominate "constructionist" judges, who accept the clear "original intent" of the Constitution--what the document actually states--as its meaning, rather than those who believe that the words of the Constitution are open to reinterpretation at a judge's whim.
In our attempts to correct this problem, we can propose constitutional amendments to address specific issues as they arise: for example, homosexual "marriage," slavery, abortion, prohibition. But what use are such amendments, if the Judiciary can change their meaning at its will?
The Constitution grants the sole power of impeachment to the Legislature, so the Congress does in fact have the ability to remove unruly justices from the bench; however, history has proven that this is simply not going to happen. The basic problem is that the original language in the Constitution pertaining to impeachment is broad and vague, the Founders' (obviously incorrect) assumption being that the Legislature would always be populated with self-governed people capable of discerning when impeachment was appropriate and necessary. The tenure of judges is based on "good behaviour," and considering the behavior of many in the Legislature, one must wonder just what a justice could possibly do to offend that body--and, even if they managed to do so, whether it would matter, given the Legislature's unwillingness to expend the "political capital" of the impeachment process.
What has become painfully necessary is a constitutional amendment that would force the judiciary to be bound by the clearly expressed language of the Constitution, or face impeachment. Such an amendment would specifically require the Legislature to impeach any justice who attempted to legislate from the bench (in effect, amending the Constitution without due process), thus removing any doubt as to what We The People demand of our elected and appointed officials. This simple change would effectively halt the onslaught of judicial activism that currently threatens to destroy our society.
With these things in mind, I encourage you to read about the proposed Enumerated Powers Amendment and, if it makes as much sense to you as it does to me, sign the petition of support:
It is an amendment whose time has come, and it deserves the full support of every American citizen who still cares about liberty and freedom.
"The original error [was in] establishing a judiciary independent of the nation, and which, from the citadel of the law, can turn its guns on those they were meant to defend, and control and fashion their proceedings to its own will." (Thomas Jefferson)
Posted by jon at March 5, 2004 01:38 PM