Constitutional Reverence

by Mike Calpino

With the swearing in of the new congress, an interesting controversy has arisen. Speaker Boehner and the new Republican majority in the house not only read the Constitution of the United States, the document every congressman, president, soldier and federal employee swears to uphold and defend, but they want to cite it as justification for any law they pass. Many Democrats and liberals/statists have decried this as a stunt, a fetish, unnecessary and foolish. To a statist any impediment, real or imagined, that stands in the way of increasing government power and control is anathema, kryptonite or, even better, the wooden stake in the heart of the totalitarian monster.


As always, there are two extremes. On the Democrat, statist side, the Constitution is an antiquated document that is simply ignored. Who can forget ex-speaker Pelosi’s reply when asked for the constitutional justification for the health care bill; "are you kidding?" To a totalitarian, there are no practical limits to government’s power, constitution or no constitution. To them, it is occasionally a tool to justify a libertine agenda, a twisted cover for the restriction of liberty, or an antique full of politically incorrect ideas whose time has past. On the other side are the Republicans and conservatives who hold the Constitution to be divinely inspired, the greatest organization of government ever to be implemented on earth. Of course, conservatives in government who believe that the Constitution should be adhered to according to its plain meaning and original intent rarely, if ever, go on record as opposing the more popular social programs like Medicare and Social Security that are the heart and soul of the redistibutionist program that conditioned the American people to accept the forcible extraction of their wealth and limits on their freedom necessary for our massive government expansion. It was just such a government that the framers of the Constitution feared and sought to prevent.

The Constitution fits neither of these extremes. It is the law of the land, not to be ignored or abused, but it is not divinely inspired, etched in stone, whose form and composition can never be surpassed. The truth is that the constitution was the best means the framers could come up with to implement the ends eloquently stated in the Declaration of Independence. As such, it was a document of compromises necessary for the times, the two major conflicting goals of which were first, to preserve the libertarian ideals for which the revolution was fought and second, to form a government strong enough to forge a nation out of thirteen very different states. I would also remind you that some very intelligent and committed patriots, Patrick Henry and George Mason among them, were passionately opposed to the adoption of the Constitution because they saw how its ambiguities and powers could be misused in the hands of those who did not share their absolute commitment to the people’s liberty.

The conversation we, as a nation, are having about the Constitution is a very promising step but we cannot become fixated by it nor use it in the way the statists have to simply give cover to an agenda that may not meet with the approval of Washington or Jefferson either. The fact is the Constitution, because it is a means to an end, will only have value for our liberty to the extent those to whom its implementation is entrusted value those original revolutionary ends. We have seen the violence that can be done to the constitution by those who do not hold our original principles of liberty and private property in high esteem. Finding a constitutional justification for Medicare or the EPA is no different than finding justification for homosexuality in the Bible. It is not there. One can go through all kind of verbal gymnastics and rationalizations but in either case, an honest evaluation of the history, intent and the plain language of either document will show that not only is either outside the tenor of the writ but contrary to their plain language. While those who try to justify their statism by cloaking it in the Constitution are rightly condemned by those who value it, politicians and officials who decry such "unconstitutional" encroachments of government power are no better when they demonstrate their dishonesty and inconsistency through their support of popular but equally unconstitutional programs. Popularity or longevity are not and cannot be the test for constitutionality.

The conversation we really need to have is over the ideals we will apply through the constitution. What do we believe about the role of government and the nature of man? What do we mean by terms like freedom, liberty, tyranny and totalitarianism? What is the difference between societal duty and government enforcement? How are rights and responsibilities to our fellow man protected and discharged? It is only when we understand who we are that we will become the men and women we were created to be and find our rightful place in society and the world.

The only thing that will restore our liberty under a limited government is if the people who are entrusted with our government truly believe "that all men are created equal and are endowed by by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men..." A man or woman in congress who was committed to that would never vote to take the hard earned property of one man and give it to another. A president who believed it would never enforce a law that interfered with the ability of one man to contract for a good or service with another. A judge who believed it would n

ever allow an individual to force his morality on the majority just because he found himself offended. A government that operated according to the principle that its only role was to protect basic God-given rights would not be involved in ninety five percent of what our present government is involved in. A government that seeks only to protect and not to provide will require very little of its citizen’s liberty or wealth. It is when the men and women in our government believe in and apply these original revolutionary ideals through the Constitution that we will once again be a beacon of true freedom for all the nations of the world.
Michael Calpino