Posted on 04/13/2013 4:18:53 PM PDT by Jacquerie
Ah—my friend — any written law is but a thing of wax in the hands of the ambitious. A written law is only as good as our ability to write the law on our hearts. If a written law is read often— and if it is taught to our youth,properly.If we the people are educated and informed of the laws -and understand the meaning of the terms —IF we the people insist that the laws be upheld as they are written—and if we the people hold forth the written law and insist violation be remedied——it is incumbent upon us—is it not to be the wellspring of our Constitution and laws?The written word can only do what it was intended it is up to us to determine how and to what extent the written word will be of use.
“What is the usefulness of a truth in theory, unless it exists constantly in the minds of the people?”
Post #11 is also pertinent.
An excellent question. I was enjoying the discussion until I came to those replies.
Re Hamilton: read this and tell me that he wasn't hawking one set of ideas, while implementing something quite different. My take is that he was doing the bidding of our creditors to raise cash sufficient to sustain a standing national defense (particularly a navy), having little faith in the militia alone. His argument, particularly in Federalist 75, is so dishonest as to call into question his integrity.
All told, however, though it has been seriously altered in many ways, overall the BOR has proven essential in thwarting bad government more times than can be counted, because the systems of checks and balances are far less capable in doing so.
The evidence of this lies in Britain, that had no written BOR, and has suffered markedly because of it.
And, it should not be forgotten, that when the government does stray, the original document and the BOR exists as a reminder of what it should be, and a guidepost to what the government should return to.
For example, if you took 100 strong conservatives, and gave them a year to argue how to restore the country, they would likely not need a year, because they wouldn’t need to experiment with untried ideas. Instead they could refer to “what worked before”, and “why did we stop doing it that way?”, as their guideposts.
The results of this would be the discovery that when we stopped doing something that was right, it was done for pragmatic reasons that no longer apply. So there is no reason to continue the change, and we should go back to doing things the right way.
This in no way is “reactionary”, because a reactionary path is one that seeks a false, idealized former system. Instead we would be returning to a system we *knew* had worked, so most likely would work again.
Your link is worthy of a separate post. It is unrelated to this thread.
??? Uh, as a practical matter, little of it remains.
the original document and the BOR exists as a reminder of what it should be, and a guidepost to what the government should return to.
Yes. That is what Madison said near the end of my post.
I couldn't agree more with your last two paragraphs.
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