Have We Got a Constitutional Crisis?, Part Two, 6-22-2010

[Continued from Have We Got a Constitutional Crisis?, Part One. sch 12/11/22]

The Fourteenth Amendment provided for federal protection of our civil rights. The original intent crowd and the small government crowd worry me by ignoring the federal government's role in protecting our civil rights. They seem to ignore how the Civil War Amendments (the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments) changed the federal government's relationship to the states.

From the Civil War onward, we created an extra-constitutional empire, fought two World Wars, and now are fighting a War on Terrorism and a War on Drugs. What we did not do was to change the essential structures of the federal government. We merely piled on more responsibility, poured more money into, and brought more people under a governmental form unchanged from the original thirteen states clinging to the Atlantic seaboard.

At this point, the federal structure does not match up with the national community. This I could easily put this down to electoral politics, especially by the Republicans. The Republican political strategy from the days of Nixon to Karl Rove was one of division. They did not create the original divisiveness of this country, but they manipulated the original divides of race and section.

We are at the limits of ourselves as a national community. The original Constitution limited the community to commerce and national defense. [I think here I missed a point, the national defense was the defense of American commerce - see the War of 1812 and Jefferson war on the Barbary pirates. sch 12/11/22.] The states had a different purpose. They represent a broader community of interests, even as each represents a smaller physical community. The federal government's power over commerce represents the place where the people of different states interact with one another, and where Americans interact with foreigners.

I say this better explains the Federalist obtuseness about the demands for a federal Bill of Rights. This also explains some rights in contemporary state Bills of Rights. (No, the Ninth Amendment does not wholly explain this omission when the state Bills of Rights have an analog of the Ninth and the rights omitted by the federal Bill of Rights. I got these ideas over the years from The Federalist and Garry Wills' Explaining America and reading all the state Bills of Rights.

The Civil War did change some things. However, I proffer the income tax amendment as also marking a permanent change. With the income tax came enough money to pay for anything and everything. States shifted responsibilities to the federal government as the means of avoiding the raising of state taxes, which might cause enough pain for politicians to lose their positions.

The Tea party crew find fails to address what we want from government and their desire for a smaller government. Distrust all claiming they want a smaller government without explaining in detail what they want less of and how they plan on getting there. 

That government will not easily shrink is us and the bureaucrats. There aree no easy solutions without costs. Repealing the income tax sounds like a good thing, but then how to pay for the Navy?

Let us have a constitutional convention to work out the role between states and the federal government. Statutes will not be enough.

sch

[It was in the halfway house I first people talking about how we need a revolution in this country. In prison, many times I was surprised by the number of Blacks favoring conservatives. What I gathered was that they thought a smaller government would mean less federal law enforcement. I never thought this - the conservatives are the very people favoring more federal law enforcement. In 2022, I am far less sanguine about a constitutional convention - it all depends on the process of selecting delegates. No way I could have predicted the failed coup of January 6, 2020, or that the front-runner for the Republicans would call for the canceling of the United States Constitution in 2022 without being laughed out of the room. sch 12/11/22.]