Happy Constitution Day, tomorrow September 17th. This should be the national holiday of the Tea Party. From yesterday's National Journal article, where Dawn was quoted multiple times.It all comes back to this little amendment, my favorite, the 10th:But, tea partiers say, if you think moving votes and passing bills are what they are really all about, you have not taken the full measure of their ambition. No, the real point is to change the country's political culture, bending it back toward the self-reliant, liberty-guarding instincts of the Founders' era. Winning key congressional seats won't do that, nor will endorsing candidates. "If you just tell people to vote but you don't talk about the underlying principles," Martin says, "you just have to do it again and again and again, in every election."
What will work, they believe, is education: DVDs on American history; "founding principles" training; online reading lists; constitutional discussion groups; cultural and youth programs. In Tennessee, says Anthony Shreeve, an organizer there, groups are giving courses on the Constitution and "socialism and the different types of isms," bringing in speakers from around the state. "Our members have gotten more involved and learned about our local government, how it works, and what kind of influence we can have," Shreeve says. "Education has been the biggest thing."
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.My favorite lefty litmus test is to ask this, "Under the Interstate Commerce Clause and the 10th amendment, what if any limits are there on federal authority to regulate economic activity?" Your lefty, knowing he/she is trapped, will him and haw and not answer the question.
Exhibit A:
Notice how the question never gets answered. This is what we get when we ignore the principles of our founding. This is why the Tea Party isn't just a good idea, it's a necessity to save the nation. Please join our protests and educate yourself on the constitution.
Programming note: Sarah's video montage with Muses' Uprising so perfectly captures the spirit of our movement that I decided to unilaterally make it the Official Music Video of the movement, as noted in the column at right.
"the self-reliant, liberty-guarding instincts of the Founders' era."
ReplyDeleteWell, let's not forget that many of these self-reliant liberty guardians owned slaves and designed a document that had to be amended to correct that. I'm not sure many would be comfortable with the degree to which States had power back when the Constitution was originally passed.
Happy Constitution Day to you too! Patriots moms all across America are bugging the pie out of their local school districts, demanding that they comply with the federal mandate to observe this fine new(ish) "holiday." Thank you, Sen. Byrd.
ReplyDeleteSee you Sunday!
P.S. Thanks for the plug on the video :)
Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteSo over two centuries of experience showing that limited constitutional government is highly successful is trumped by the fact that the founding fathers didn't solve the slavery problem in their generation? You are right that many might be not be comfortable currently, but not as many as you think. It is the intent of the Tea Party to get the rest of the country acquainted with our history and therefore comfortable with limited government again.
SarahB,
Thanks, looking forward to Sunday as well.
I wasn't saying that at all, but the notion that bending the Constitution back to the way it was when it was originally passed seems a bit ironic. Liberty and self-sufficiency in that context is almost Orwellian. The Constitution gave people the 'liberty' to own other people back then. And this being "The Liberator", it is perhaps well to remember that Garrison publicly burned the Constitution calling it an "agreement with hell."
ReplyDeleteGarrison also shut down The Liberator after the passage of the 13th amendment. The existence of slavery did not de-legitimize the concepts of limited government in the constitution. The abolition of slavery and the extension of the right to vote to women extended the promise of the original constitution to all Americans, albeit imperfectly. The course of the current and previous administrations is to reverse economic and personal freedom for all people. The Tea Party's vision is to extend the original vision of a self reliant people without regard to race, or other distinguishing characteristics, so that we do not rely so much on government. Reducing reliance on government increases liberty and prosperity. We seek to show that such reliance is neither necessary nor beneficial.
ReplyDelete