"A Republic, If You Can Keep It?"
May, 1787. The Constitutional Convention assembled to revise the Articles of Confederation. In Mid-June, the delegates decided to redesign the government. After three days of debate, they signed the original Constitution of the United States. This document consisted of seven articles laying out the configuration and duties of the three branches of government, Executive, Legislative and Judiciary, (which was needed to keep the first two branches in check, deciding the constitutionality of federal law and disputes about the law).
Upon leaving this assembly which produced the four-page constitution, Benjamin Franklin was asked, "Which form of government do we have?", Franklin responded, "A republic, if you can keep it."
1791. The first congress assembled, led by James Madison, to consider amendments to the constitution. The first ten amendments became known as The Bill of Rights. Madison realized that The Bill of Rights would help educate ordinary Americans about their government and prevent the same abuses of power they faced under British rule. Madison proposed amendments that emphasized individual rights rather than the rights of state.
How simple! The Constitution, including seven articles controlling the working of the new government, and the first ten amendments or Bill of Rights, of the citizens of the United States.
Did we Keep It?
It is reported there are some 23,000 pages of federal law and 300,000 statutes (laws). Two recent challenges presented to the Supreme Court are examples of long held laws that are now discarded as unconstitutional.
- Fifty years of being deceived that abortion was a right found in the constitution.
- 1984 Clean Air Act, where the EPA set observers on fishing boats collecting data. The Supreme Court said government agencies can't make laws, that is up to Congress.
How do we restore what is lost? First, by restoring ourselves to thinking of ideals higher than ourselves and then restoring the original intent of the constitution.
"Liberty begins with self-governance, for one can never truly be free until one is ruler over one's appetites and passions. The less one rules oneself, the more one must be ruled by others." Quote from John Adams Academy on self-governance and personal responsibility.
John Adams, in a letter to the Massachusetts Militia said, "Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." Perhaps the reason by many in society and government today have problems with our constitution and look to undermine it.
David A. Myers