Posts Tagged ‘united states constitution’
National Popular Vote is Bad Idea
U.S. CONSTITUTION, PHYLLIS SCHLAFLY Moving quietly without any publicity is a plan to change how U.S. Presidents are elected. It would bypass the procedure spelled out in the U.S. Constitution which has been used successfully for over two centuries. The Constitution prescribes how we elect our Presidents. It is a mirror image of the Great [...]
The Individual Mandate: There’s More To It Than Just Health Care
EDWARD WHITE, ACLJ At the end of March, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral argument on the constitutionality of the health care law, otherwise known as ObamaCare. The main legal challenge is to the individual mandate, the provision requiring millions of Americans to buy and indefinitely maintain health insurance or face annual penalties, [...]
ACLJ to SCOTUS: Reject ObamaCare’s Individual Mandate
JAY SEKULOW, ACLJ The argument we are making to the Supreme Court is clear and concise: ObamaCare's individual mandate, which forces Americans to purchase health insurance under penalty of law, violates the Constitution and usurps the rights given to states. Today, we filed a very significant amicus brief, posted here, on behalf of 119 [...]
“Money Isn’t Speech” and “Corporations Aren’t People”—So What?
FIRST AMENDMENT, PAUL SHERMAN Most of the popular arguments against the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC boil down to two sound bites: “Money isn’t speech” and “Corporations aren’t people.” Both of these statements are obviously true. But neither has anything to do with whether political spending—even [...]
Senate, Don’t Confirm Appointees Unless Obama Retracts Unconstitutional Appointments
Liberty Alerts, American Center for Law and Justice The ACLJ is calling for the Senate to take strong action in response to the “dangerous precedent” set by President Obama’s non-recess appointments. In a letter sent to Members of the U.S. Senate yesterday, Jay Sekulow, ACLJ Chief Counsel, urged: On behalf of our organization and the [...]
Obamacare’s Assault on Religious Freedom
Mike Brownfield, Heritage Foundation It has not even been two years since Obamacare was enacted, and already the President’s health care law has taken another victim — the religious freedoms Americans hold dear, as reflected by the First Amendment. The Obama Administration recently reaffirmed a rule under Obamacare that requires many [...]
Executive Directives Unconstitutional
Called Unto Liberty, 20th Century Sermons, J. Reuben Clark Jr. In violation of the fundamental concept of the Constitution that there are three mutually independent branches of government m the legislative, judicial, and executive—neither of which may usurp or have granted to it the power to intrude upon the functions of the other, we have [...]
The Target is Obama!
BY HENRY LAMB Many people are convinced that this President has done more to destroy the United States in three years than all the other presidents combined. The only hope of preventing another four years of even more drastic destructive policies is the election of one of the four remaining Republican candidates. The two frontrunners are [...]
Unconstitutional Recess Appointments
By Phyllis Schlafly Barack Obama's latest unconstitutional action is his attempt to make four so-called recess appointments to high-level, well-paying jobs in the federal bureaucracy when the Senate was NOT in recess. He appointed three people to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), plus Richard Cordray to head the newly created Consumer [...]
White House Sides With TSA over Detainment of U.S. Senator Paul
U.S. NEWS, NEWSROOM AMERICA The White House on Monday said it was backing the Transportation Security Administration for detaining U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., at the Nashville airport after the senator refused a pat down. "I think it is absolutely essential that we take necessary actions to ensure that air travel is safe," said White House [...]
ACLJ: Take a Stand With Us Against Obamacare
Liberty Alerts, American Center for Law and Justice Can Congress require you to purchase health insurance? Is it constitutional for Congress to penalize you if you don't? Those questions are at the core of legal challenges of ObamaCare, which the Supreme Court will consider in March. Our position is clear: the individual mandate is wrong. [...]
Mark Levin on ‘Ameritopia:’ ‘We Now Live in a Post-Constitutional Country’
TERRENCE P. JEFFREY, CNSNEWS.COM In an interview with CNSNews.com about his new book—“Ameritopia: The Unmaking of America”—Mark R. Levin said he believes America has already largely become “a post-constitutional country.” The book, released Monday, compares the Utopian and unworkable schemes laid out by political philosophers [...]
Heber J. Grant: Be True to the Constitution
Called Unto Liberty, 20th Century Sermons, Heber J. Grant I counsel you, I urge you, I plead with you, never, so far as you have voice or influence, permit any departure from the principles of governments on which this nation was founded, or any disregard of the freedoms which, by the inspiration of God our Father, were written into the [...]
Beware of Disloyalty
Called Unto Liberty, 20th Century Sermons, David O. McKay We owe at least the consideration to be loyal to this country and to spurn with all the soul that is within us the scheming disloyal citizens who would undermine our Constitution, or who would deprive the individual of his liberty vouchsafed by that great document, and some of our men [...]
No Inadaquacy in the Constitution
Called Unto Liberty, 20th Century Sermons, J. Reuben Clark Jr. Having in mind the loudness with which some few cry out against the inadequacy of our system, I may observe that the mere seeming existence of an exigency not apparently covered by our fundamental instrument, or the appearance of an inconvenience of mere administration under it, [...]
Obama’s Arrogant Authoritarianism
IMPERIAL PRESIDENCY, LACHLAN MARKAY Last week, President Barack Obama took the latest step on his road toward an arrogant, new authoritarianism with four illegal appointments that entirely trampled on the Constitution’s requirements. More troubling still, the President chose to shred the Constitution all in the name of serving his Big Labor [...]
Opposition Growing to Obama’s “Recess” Appointments
JAY SEKULOW, ACLJ It's an issue that has struck a constitutional chord with the American people and a growing number of members of Congress. The issue: President Obama's overreach last week in making appointments to federal agencies - appointments that bypassed the Senate - appointments that violated the separation of powers. In just a few [...]
Constitutional Scholar: White House Entirely Ignoring Article 1, Section 5
LIBERTY ALERTS, FRED LUCAS, CNSNEWS.COM John C. Eastman, a professor at Chapman University School of Law who is an expert on the constitutional separation of powers, says that the White House simply ignored the section of the Constitution, which governs when Congress can adjourn, when President Obama claimed to use the "recess" appointment [...]
The Speech President Obama Should Make About Bullying
BY IZZY KALMAN This is what the President should tell us about bullying. Our President is facing a barrage of pressure to make our society, and especially our schools, free from bullying. Major anti-bullying organizations have been disseminating a petition to Obama urging him to make the bullying stop. Lady Gaga has met with the White [...]
Why Hasen Is Wrong About Foreign Speech
PAUL SHERMAN, INSTITUTE FOR JUSTICE Readers of Make No Law may recall that the Institute for Justice recently filed a brief in Bluman v. FEC, urging the U.S. Supreme Court to hear that case, a challenge to the federal prohibition on political spending by noncitizens. Now election-law scholar Rick Hasen has posted a commentary at The New [...]
Lee Sponsors Bill to Protect American Civil Liberties
LIBERTY ALERTS, LEE.SENATE.GOV Last Thursday, Senator Mike Lee co-sponsored the Due Process Guarantee Act of 2011, which clarifies that a declaration of war or authorization for the use of military force by Congress does not authorize the indefinite detention of American citizens or legal residents who are apprehended in the United [...]
James Wilson on Constitution, State Sovereignty, and Consolidation
Liberty Letters, James Wilson Convention of Philadelphia, December 1, 1787 Mr. WILSON. The secret is now disclosed, and it is discovered to be a dread, that the boasted state sovereignties will, under this system, be disrobed of part of their power. Before I go into the examination of this point, let me ask one important question. Upon what [...]
What George Washington REALLY Thought About the Constitution
By Dennis Behreandt Visitors to The Atlantic’s Website on November 1 were likely enticed by the prospect of learning from “Murrow Award winning legal analyst and commentator” Andrew Cohen what George Washington, the nation’s first president and most well-known Founding Father, “thought about the Constitution.” Darkly, Cohen warned [...]
Massachusetts
Founders Corner Library Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, by Joseph Story, 1833 Volume 1, MASSACHUSETTS § 61. ABOUT the period when the Plymouth colonists completed their voyage, James the First, with a view to promote more effectually the interests of the second or northern company, granted1 to the Duke of Lenox and [...]
Origin and Settlement of New England
Founders Corner Library Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, by Joseph Story, 1833 Volume 1, ORIGIN AND SETTLEMENT OF NEW ENGLAND § 52. We may now advert in a brief manner to the history of the Northern, or Plymouth Company. That company possessed fewer resources and less enterprise than the Southern; and thought aided by [...]
The Anti-Federalist Papers No. 23: A Federal Republican
Certain Powers Necessary For The Common Defense, Can And Should Be Limited Brutus, January 3 and 10, 1788 In Federalist No. 23, Alexander Hamilton spoke of the necessity for an energetic government. "Brutus" replied. Taken from the 7th and 8th essays of "Brutus" in The New-York Journal, January 3 and 10, 1788. In a confederated [...]
The Anti-Federalist Papers, No. 12, Cincinnatus
How Will The New Government Raise Money? Cincinnatus, Nov. 29 & Dec. 6, 1787 Note: "Cincinnatus" is an Antifederalist writer. In this essay, from an Address to a Meeting of the Citizens of Philadelphia, the writer responds to James Wilson's statements about Congress' powers to tax under the Constitution. It appeared in the November [...]
The Religion Card Is Turned Face Up
By Pat Buchanan Is a religious war breaking out in the Republican Party? On Friday, Pastor Robert Jeffress of the 10,000-member First Baptist Church of Dallas took the podium at the Values Voter Summit to introduce and endorse Rick Perry. Gov. Perry, said Pastor Jeffress, is a leader with "a strong commitment to biblical values" who [...]
Our Outmoded Constitution: No Claim Could be More False
Called Unto Liberty, Bruce R. McConkie From time to time an idea gets out into the political field to the effect that the Constitution of the United States is an anachronism, a mass of dry bones, an instrument of government adapted to a horse and buggy age. Some of our politicians and would-be politicians are preaching that our form of [...]
Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States: Preliminary Chapter
Founders Corner Library Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, by Joseph Story, 1833 Volume 1, PRELIMINARY CHAPTER Plan of the Work The principal object of these Commentaries is to present a full analysis and exposition of the Constitution of Government of the United States of America. In order to do this with clearness and [...]
Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States: Preface
Founders Corner Library Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, by Joseph Story, 1833 Volume 1, PREFACE I now offer to the public another portion of the labours devolved on me in the execution of the duties of the Dane Professorship of Law in Harvard University. The importance of the subject will hardly be doubted by any [...]
Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States: Dedication
Founders Corner Library Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, by Joseph Story, 1833 Volume 1, DEDICATION TO THE HONORABLE JOHN MARSHALL, LL. D., CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. SIR, I ask the favour of dedicating this work to you. I know not, to whom it could with so much propriety be dedicated, as to [...]
Dennis Behreandt: In Praise of Gridlock
By Dennis Behreandt According to conventional wisdom, the U.S. government’s legislative process is broken. What’s more, this opinion is held on both sides of the aisle and by the media. If there is anything anyone in America can agree on about politics it’s that the U.S. government is hopelessly botched. Helpfully making the media’s [...]
A Run for the Border
by Diane Alden The NewsMax Years #28 Still ON TARGET: July 30, 2000 Every year 900,000 legal immigrants are allowed into the United States. Many of them have critical technological skills, which corporate America and government need because not enough Americans graduate in technical and scientific fields. A bill stalled in Congress, held up [...]
Constitution of the United States
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. Article. I. Section [...]
James Madison on the Commerce Clause
Liberty Letters, James Madison, Regarding Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 (Commerce) The defect of power in the existing confederacy, to regulate the commerce between its several members, is in the number of those which have been clearly pointed out by experience. To the proofs and remarks which former papers have brought into view on this [...]
The Bill of Rights to the United States Constitution
In force December 15, 1791 The First Congress, at its first session in the City of New York, September 25, 1789, submitted to the states 12 amendments to clarify certain individual and state rights not named in the Constitution. They are generally called the Bill of Rights. Influential in framing these amendments was the Declaration of [...]
Shameless Compromisers
by Diane Alden The NewsMax Years #27 Still ON TARGET: July 20, 2000 Not long ago liberal journalist Anthony Lewis asked, "Does Clinton want to be remembered as the one who sold out our civil liberties?" One could also pose the question, "Do the Democrats in Congress and some Republicans make this sellout possible?" Recently, Senator Don [...]
The Federalist Papers No. 77: Alexander Hamilton
Liberty Letters, Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 77 The Appointing Power Continued and Other Powers of the Executive Considered April 2, 1788 IT HAS been mentioned as one of the advantages to be expected from the co-operation of the Senate, in the business of appointments, that it would contribute to the stability of the [...]
John Adams: A Defense of the Constitutions of the United States, Letter 2
Liberty Letters, John Adams, 1786 My dear Sir, MR. Turgot is offended, because the customs of England are imitated in most of the new constitutions in America, without any particular motive. But, if we suppose that English customs were neither good nor evil in themselves, and merely indifferent; and the people, by their birth, education, [...]
What Happened to the Constitution?
By Henry Lamb Constitution Day is September 17th, the day many citizens celebrate the foundation upon which all American law is supposed to rest. New laws are emerging every day, however, that rest not upon the U.S. Constitution, but on a newer document called Agenda 21. The Fourth Amendment says: “The right of the people to be secure in [...]
America’s Culture War and How to Fight It: Curbing the Courts, III
By Virginia Armstrong, Eagle Forum's Court Watch "The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws and not of men,"declared Chief Justice John Marshall. Contemporary constitutional scholar Raoul Berger rightly concludes, "The written Constitution was thus the highest expression of the 'rule of law' . . . ." [...]
A Republic If You Want It
Matthew Spalding, Ph.D., Heritage Foundation Our federal government, once limited to certain core functions, now dominates virtually every area of American life. Its authority is all but unquestioned, seemingly restricted only by expediency and the occasional budget constraint. Congress passes massive pieces of legislation with little [...]
Was Freeborn John Tortured in Vain?
The Importance of the Right Against Self Incrimination The Freeman, Wendy McElroy “Taking the Fifth” – invoking the right against self-incrimination – is a mainstay of mafia movies in which heinous criminals hide behind liberties guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. Today guarantees such as due process are often portrayed as [...]
The Threat Of Liberal Judicial Activism Reaches New Heights
By Lester Jackson In making the case for judicial review, Chief Justice John Marshall pointed out that judges take a sworn oath to uphold the laws of the United States. Until last month, it would have been unnecessary to stress that he was obviously referring to actual laws, not the unfulfilled fantasies of a lone member of Congress. [...]
Stay the Course
Book of Mormon Journal with Steve Farrell Faith in Jesus Christ leads to covenants with God the Father, and covenants inspire commitments with Him to do what is right, to stay the course, to endure every trial maintaining fidelity, come what may. The Prophet Joseph Smith said, "All difficulties which might and would cross our way must be [...]
The Fourteenth Amendment Is No Blank Check for Debt Increase
Andrew Grossmn, Heritage Foundation, Constitutional Law Abstract: A clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides, “The validity of the public debt of the United States…shall not be questioned.” Far from authorizing the President to incur more debt—a power vested solely in Congress—this clause bars [...]
The Federalist Papers, No. 23: Alexander Hamilton
Liberty Letters, Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 23 Tuesday, December 18, 1787 THE necessity of a Constitution, at least equally energetic with the one proposed, to the preservation of the Union, is the point at the examination of which we are now arrived. This inquiry will naturally divide itself into three branches -- the objects to [...]
What Happened to Freedom?
By Henry Lamb To listen click here When Constitutional scholar Barack Hussein Obama, and the assortment legal advisors that surrounds him, decided that the commerce clause authorized the federal government to force private citizens to purchase a product, freedom vanished from America. With this newly declared authority, the federal [...]
The Federalist Papers, No. 9: Alexander Hamilton
Liberty Letters, Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 9 Wednesday, November 21, 1787 A FIRM Union will be of the utmost moment to the peace and liberty of the States, as a barrier against domestic faction and insurrection. It is impossible to read the history of the petty republics of Greece and Italy without feeling sensations of horror and [...]
