21st Amendment

The Attack On Birthright Citizenship And The 14th Amendment By Donald Trump, Mike Pence, And Lindsey Graham

Ronald 4 Comments

Donald Trump has opened up a new area of attack on constitutional law, claiming that he can, by executive order, end birthright citizenship for infants born of undocumented immigrants, bypassing the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of citizenship for all born in the United States in 1868, exactly 150 years ago.

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, for once, is correct when he says that is not possible legally, as executive orders cannot end what is in the Constitution or its amendments.

It is also a fact, despite some, like Vice President Mike Pence, and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham who claim otherwise, that legislation by Congress also cannot end what is in the Constitution or the amendments.

The only way to change what is in the Constitution or its 27 amendments is by another constitutional amendment, as occurred when the 18th Amendment banning liquor (Prohibition) was passed in 1919 and fourteen years later, with much discontent, the amendment was repealed by the 21st Amendment, the only way Prohibition would ever have ended.

If it was that easy to change what is in the Constitution or its amendments, then there would be a move to end the Electoral College, but that will never happen legally unless an amendment is passed by two thirds of each of the two houses of Congress, and three fourths of the states’ legislatures (38 out of 50).

The idea that Lindsey Graham is suddenly a great friend of Donald Trump, after the way that Trump trashed his good friend, the late Arizona Senator John McCain, is infuriating. One can be certain that McCain would fight this idea that Trump has suggested that he has the authority, all on his own, to destroy the language of the 14th Amendment. It is certain that McCain would be angry at Graham for his changed behavior, and it makes one wonder what is going on in Graham’s disturbed mind that he does not know the basic reality of constitutional law.

Of course, those on the Right would say the Supreme Court could justify what Trump wishes to do, and in theory, a lawless Court, which has already made decisions clearly and purely political in the last ten years, could by a 5-4 vote, including compromised Justice Brett Kavanaugh, do such. But it is hard to imagine that Chief Justice John Roberts would wish to be part of a majority that would undermine his reputation and that of his Court in the long run of history.

If such a disgrace were to happen, the Supreme Court would lose its credibility for all time, and would be helping Donald Trump to destroy our democracy, and impose an authoritarian dictatorship on our nation.

There is absolutely no moral or ethical way that this could happen, and be allowed to stand!

And also, the thought that an infant would not have the opportunity for a good life in America, simply because his or her parents were not documented at the time of his or her birth, is to deny the whole point of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, and the reality that tens of millions of immigrants, and not all legal, with many “slipping in” through our borders and not realized what they had done, contributed to our nation’s greatness.

Think of the refugees from Cuba and Vietnam who came to a nation welcoming them from their personal tragedies in the past half century, and think of the refugees who came from all over the world over two centuries to a nation that gave them a chance to succeed and prosper, and benefit all of the American people!

Conservative Right Wing Attack On The Constitution: The Threat Of Another Constitutional Convention Wiping Out Constitutional Amendments!

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The Founding Fathers gave us a Constitution, admitting in the process that there would always be room for improvements, so made clear that amendments were appropriate over time.

So we have had 27 Amendments, including the first ten that make up the Bill of Rights.

When one looks at the amendments, particularly those that came after the Bill of Rights, one realizes that the vast majority of them were “progressive” in tone, designed to expand democracy in America, or else, amendments dealing with the office of the Presidency.

So the “progressive” amendments included the 13th (ending slavery and involuntary servitude); the 14th (promoting due process and equal protection and making African Americans citizens); the 15th (guaranteeing the right to vote for African Americans and others which had been denied that right); the 16th (providing for a federal income tax to raise revenue to deal with mounting social and economic issues); the 17th (granting the people the right to elect their two United States Senators by popular vote); the 19th (guaranteeing women the right to vote); the 23rd (guaranteeing residents of Washington, DC the right to vote); the 24th (preventing a poll tax for voting); and the 26th (guaranteeing young people 18-21 the right to vote).

So nine of the seventeen amendments after the first ten of the Bill of Rights promote progressive change, while the 12th, 20th, 22nd and 25th deal with the office of the Presidency.

The only amendment that was ever passed to limit the freedom of Americans was the 18th (prohibition of liquor), but later repealed by the 21st Amendment.

Now we have the real threat by right wing conservatives, including the Tea Party Movement, who want a new Constitutional Convention to wipe out these “progressive” amendments!

They do not like voting rights for African Americans, other minorities, women, residents of Washington DC (mostly African Americans) and young people; and they are unhappy that African Americans are considered equal under the law, and if they had the ability to do so, they would love to re-enslave poor people, which by corporate power is occurring in an informal way for many minorities, as well as white lower class people struggling every day to survive!

And they wish they could restore the US Senate elections to the corrupt state legislatures, taking away the popular vote. Finally, they hate the federal income tax, even though many of them avoid substantial taxation by having investments, rather than working for a living like most of us do. So they would prefer a sales tax, which is regressive, and would hurt the middle class and the poor much more than the wealthy elite!

But that is exactly the extremist right wing intention—to restore the “good old days” when they were in charge, and everyone had to kowtow to them!

We must not allow such a threat to develop, so the battle for progressivism is never ending, as a result!

1913: A Year Of Two “Progressive” Amendments To The Constitution, 16 And 17!

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A century ago, as the Presidency of William Howard Taft came to an end, and as Woodrow Wilson was about to be inaugurated, the Constitution had two new amendments added within two months of each other—the 16th Amendment and the 17th Amendment.

Other than the original ten amendments, the Bill of Rights, never was the country to be so affected by constitutional change that transformed the nation, as with these two amendments.

President Taft, the so called “conservative” leaving office, supported both of these amendments, and they have have a massive impact on the nation ever since.

The 16th Amendment established the “progressive” federal income tax, at a time when we had seen the tripling of population, and the multiplication of social and economic injustice since the Civil War 50 years earlier. Without the federal income tax, there was no way that the nation could ever have moved forward and met its responsibilities to its citizens. The only problem was that over the years the wealthy would find all kinds of ways to manipulate the system, and so, today, the federal income tax is no longer very “progressive”. And also, there is a move on by conservatives and libertarians to repeal the income tax amendment, and have a national sales tax instead, a move that will not happen, but it if did, it would mean greater taxation based on consumption, and would hurt the poor and the lower middle class much more than the wealthy and upper middle class.

The 17th Amendment, the most democratizing amendment we had yet seen, called for direct popular election of the United States Senate, a move encouraged by muckraker David Graham Phillips and his book, THE TREASON OF THE SENATE, published in 1909. Instead of corrupt politicians in state legislatures choosing US Senators, an indication that the Founding Fathers did not trust the masses to choose their Senators, the decision was to allow the people to choose their Senators for a six year term.

How could anyone find fault with this, even with the recognition that often states may make “bad” choices for their Senators? Whatever we think about the choices, it is still better to have the people select their Senators, and in a sense, to be held accountable if they make an embarrassing, or disastrous choice. This is the power of the people, a movement toward direct democracy. And yet, there is a movement among conservatives to repeal this amendment, as well as the 16th Amendment.

Fortunately, it is very difficult to accomplish an amendment, and only the repeal of prohibition of liquor, the 21st Amendment effectively negating the 18th Amendment, has ever occurred.

We can look back on a century of the 16th Amendment and the 17th Amendment, and applaud what progressives accomplished a century ago!

The Tea Party Put Into Action: The Tragedy Of Kansas Governor Sam Brownback

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Kansas is the state that helped to bring on the Civil War, due to bloodshed in that territory after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854, allowing the possibility of the expansion of slavery into that Great Plains state.

Kansas was one of the centers of the Prohibition Movement, which led to the 18th Amendment and the Volstead Act, outlawing the manufacture and sale of intoxicating beverages in 1919, although Prohibition was ended by the 21st Amendment in 1933.

Kansas was the center of the segregation battles, as the only truly non Southern state to allow segregation of the races, becoming the center of attention in the Brown V. Board of Education Of Topeka, Kansas case in 1954, outlawing school segregation nationally.

Kansas was also the state of some of the major anti abortion battles, the murder of an abortion provider, Dr George Tiller, and the present attempt to prevent all abortions in the state, contestable in the federal courts right now.

And now, Kansas is the center of the greatest experiment of all in the promotion of the Tea Party Movement, with former Senator Sam Brownback now the new Governor of Kansas, and determined to promote its basic principles.

The goal of Brownback is to cut expenditures for education; take action against the Obama Health Care legislation; promote massive cuts in social service agencies and the arts; reduce the number of laws and regulations and state agencies; cut the number of state workers; and take advantage of the biggest Republican dominance in the state in a half century by working to eliminate even moderates in the party who oppose such drastic change.

Brownback is promoting the virtues of limited government, but his critics accuse him of “slash and burn” tactics, and a level of arrogance tied to his devout religious beliefs. The influence and support of the Koch Brothers, Charles and David, is clearcut in Kansas.

The critics believe Kansas will be damaged long term by what Brownback is doing, and that his hope of promoting economic growth in a state that has not seen for decades any major population surge will fail to be achieved.

Meanwhile, Kansas will continue to be at the center of some of the major controversies in the nation, as it has been since its beginning!

Human Rights Vs. Popular Vote, Religion, And Constitutional Amendments

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With the passage of gay marriage rights in the New York State legislature, the debate is again beginning about the opposition of religious groups, the call for a vote of the people on the issue, and talk of a federal constitutional amendment to prevent gay marriage nationally, and in the states.

Only once has a constitutional amendment been passed to limit human rights–the 18th Amendment ban on the manufacture and sale of intoxicating beverages–and it was repealed by the 21st Amendment fourteen years later.

The purpose of amendments has always been to improve on human rights, not restrict human rights, and gay marriage is a human right!

Organized religion has often been opposed to human rights internationally, as well as in this country, as witness the religious groups which supported slavery, racial segregation, and denial of equality for women. Of course, not all religious groups promoted denial of human rights, and there are glorious crusades on the opposite end of these issues that dignify America’s history as a country improving its human rights record over time. But should any religious group or individual views on gay marriage be determinant of such a human right existing? The answer is clearly NO!

Should the American people be able to vote on the issue of human rights, and deny unpopular groups their basic human rights? Again, the answer is NO, as it is clear that if one had had a vote on interracial marriage in the 1960s, the vast majority would have opposed it, but so what? It is none of anyone’s business what other adults do in their personal lives and for their personal happiness!

It is likely that large percentages of Americans today do not like interracial marriage, do not like racial integration, do not like that women have become so equal with men, but that is a personal thought, and should not rule on the issue of human rights!

Human rights should be inviolable, not subject to anyone’s whims or prejudices! No one should be able to deny or take away anyone’s human rights under any circumstances, as this is democracy and human freedom on its grandest scale!