Posted on 07/05/2011 8:53:47 PM PDT by neverdem
There's little that's intelligent or informed about Time magazine editor Richard Stengel's article "One Document, Under Siege" (June 23, 2011). It contains many grossly ignorant statements about our Constitution. If I believed in conspiracies, I'd say Stengel's article is part of a leftist agenda to undermine respect for the founding values of our nation.
Stengel says: "The framers were not gods and were not infallible. Yes, they gave us, and the world, a blueprint for the protection of democratic freedoms -- freedom of speech, assembly, religion -- but they also gave us the idea that a black person was three-fifths of a human being, that women were not allowed to vote and that South Dakota should have the same number of senators as California, which is kind of crazy. And I'm not even going to mention the Electoral College."
My column last week addressed the compromise whereby each slave was counted as three-fifths of a person for the purposes of determining representation in the House of Representatives and Electoral College.
Had slaves been counted as whole people, slaveholding states would have had much greater political power. I agree the framers were not gods and were not infallible, but they had far greater wisdom and principle than today's politicians.
The framers held democracy and majority rule in deep contempt. As a matter of fact, the term democracy appears in none of our founding documents. James Madison argued that "measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority."
John Adams said: "Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."
Stengel's majoritarian vision sees it as anti-democratic...
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Jefferson could also be a little hard to figure. I have to think that had he been there, his instincts would have run counter to federalist intention. But between Washington, Madison, and Hamilton, the fix was in.
LOL, you're right. That's what I get when I wave my arms and type at the same time : )
don't worry you dummies, just get a guy like Obama in and he will solve all these silly constitutional problems!!!
re: Jefferson and “coincidence”
Thomas Jefferson went to France in May 1785 to serve as Minister to France. Between that time and the very beginning of the Constitutional Convention there was no expectation anywhere that I’m aware of that Jefferson should return by summer 1787 or that anyone before the spring of 1787 really expected to write a constitution to completely replace the Articles of Confederation.
Madison is probably the only person (given his aims) who might conceivably have written to Jefferson urging him to sail home before the summer of 1787, except that Jefferson was occupying a distinguished and important position for the young USA and there’s no plausible scenario that would have brought Jefferson home in time to help create a new constitution in that year (in the eyes of his peers Jefferson would have been throwing up a vitally important public appointment to meddle in an unknown, unforeseen, and uncertain process).
Whether one calls it coincidence or accident, no one (least of all Jefferson himself) saw TJ as in the mix to be debating and writing a new constitution in the summer of 1787.
I'm with you on this, brother.
I understand what the BOR was trying to do, but it equated to letting the Tyranny Camel's nose under the tent.
It's intent has been has been reversed (perversed?) by the hoi polloi into a statement of what we are allowed, not what the government is allowed.
They tried to fix it with the 10th....but oh what a can 'o worms!
"Had slaves been counted as whole people, slaveholding states would have had much greater political power."
counting slaves as 3/5ths of a person was a dang sight better than 90% of the world was treating them at the time.
Leftists love to compare them with todays values
True enough, but it was nice to read the real reason for the 3/5th compromise, not the usual nonsense about prejudice.
Yes, it was Patrick Henry who reportedly said he “smelled a rat” and wanted nothing to do with the convention (which was billed as a meeting to merely revise the Articles of Confederation).
Hancock was supposed to attend as a delegate from Massachusetts but stayed home due to ill health, I believe.
Hancock did become the presiding officer over the Mass. ratifying convention, and although he did have misgivings and stayed mostly silent on the issues (perhaps also due to his failing health), he did give a speech near the end solidly supporting ratification. Massachusetts only ratified by a narrow margin and Hancock’s support of ratification is said to have been crucial. Hancock had reservations but did not at any time oppose drawing up or ratifying the new constitution, so far as I’ve ever read.
Short counting slaves also kept the slave states from mob ruling their will onto the non slave states.
yes, it was the slave-holders of the south who WANTED to count slaves as “whole persons” (without any votes or rights for the slaves, of course) in order to give the southern states more representation in the House of Representatives.....
It was the generally anti-slave north which wanted not to count slaves at all in order to limit the political power of the southern states.
Thus the 3/5 compromise was nothing but numerical compromise.... ZERO would have been better for the anti-slavery position over time (although the most critical balancing was usually in the Senate which of course had 2 votes/Senators per state), so the people who whine about “3/5 of a person” are simply silly and ignorant. The best anti-slavery position at that time would not have counted the slaves at all toward allocating representation in the House.
Stengel is an ass.
The greatest problem with the Constitution is that no written document can prevail against the ill will of a majority who wish to subvert it. And certainly by the 1930s, that ill-educated and unthinking majority existed.
Just a bunch of “dead white guys” in their minds.
Excellent point. Just another way the left lies.
Could you explain why you find some of their life spans curious?
“But the Constitution, as written, was a mistake, compared to what could have been.”
Probably true of any human endeavor—even the really successful ones.
Don’t forget, most of the modern constitutional mischief has been caused by the enthusiasm of the post-civil-war congress to enforce reconstruction on the South. The post-civil-war amendments were very broadly worded instead of being phrased in terms of their intended scope—wiping out slavery. If they are read literally (and not in the context of wiping out slavery), a lot of the 14th amendment makes no sense whatsoever (the “equal protection” clause comes to mind). This broad wording allowed liberal justices since the 40’s to remake America in their image. Overall, I think the constitutional scheme, as imperfect as it may have been, would have survived but for the 14th Amendment.
There's little that's intelligent or informed about Time magazine editor Richard Stengel's article "One Document, Under Siege"It wasn't an article, it was an op-ed.
Yep considering there was no computers at the time, it was amazing that Constitution convention did what needed to get done and prevent spies also.
What can I say? I live out in the country. Only connection available here is dialup. I ain't happy, but I am resigned :)
I would have thought DSL could be had anywhere dialup could be had. I’m surprised.
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