Alan Keyes
Another judge targets Christianity, discards Constitution
Alan Keyes cites 'nonsensical' ruling regarding flying privately owned
By Alan Keyes
There are times when a federal judge's blatant disregard for the unambiguously plain language of the U.S. Constitution defies all reason and common sense. Because this is an assertion about the Constitution, Americans who are not lawyers (much less constitutional scholars) often assume that they are forbidden from using their common sense to criticize some judge's idiocy. However, the Constitution relies, directly or indirectly, on the reason and common sense of ordinary citizens to perform the most important function of sovereign power, which is to choose the people responsible for its use. American citizens have to make judgments about all the officials in the governments (national, state and local) who are supposed to represent them.
People often remark on the fact that, in comparison with all the written constitutions subsequently produced, the U.S. Constitution is remarkable for its brevity and, with few exceptions, its use of language readily understood by ordinary folks. Tragically, self-serving elitists determined to impose oligarchic rule on the people of the United States have encouraged the view that constitutions, laws, and other legal documents are simply beyond the purview of untrained minds. They have become, like the arms of medieval knights, totems of power, upon which those uninitiated in the arcane mysteries of the legal profession may only look from afar and never presume to touch.
I supposed this is why federal judges like Denise Casper assume their errant nonsense will not be closely scrutinized by members of the sovereign body of the people charged, in their capacity as voters, with overseeing (through their elected representatives) the use and abuse of government powers derived, according to America's founding premises, from their consent. In the case we are considering, Judge Casper pretends to treat religious speech as one subject matter and non-religious speech as a matter of various perspectives. Given the great variety of religions, this is a distinction that makes no difference, except to provide cover for blatantly prejudicial discrimination against any and all religious perspectives.
But it also distracts from the most relevant fact, which is that the U.S. Constitution forbids interference with the free exercise of religion. This prohibition applies to religious expression, whether as subject matter or as a matter of perspective. One could argue that this prohibition forbids imposing this or that religious perspective upon conscience, by force of law. But it does not forbid interfering with religion in general as a subject matter of speech. However, when the people of the United States ratified the Constitution, Christianity was the predominant religion among them. Christ parted from his followers with the command to "Go and teach all nations." Teaching requires speech. Therefore, the use of speech to share religious subject matter is essential to the free exercise of the Christian religion.
Ages before Americans produced the U.S. Constitution, Christ's imperative made it right (according to God) to preach the Christian religion. Christians did so as individuals. But they also did so as communities. Hence the fact that constitutions adopted by the various states before the U.S. Constitution, including that of Massachusetts, referred to God's authority. More to the point, they implemented the Christian understanding that God's authority, by his endowment of right, substantiates the meaning of justice (i.e., determines its content). Most states referred to this fact in their constitutions, flags, and other tokens of sovereign authority. Their power to do so was a matter of unalienable right, endowed by God. It was therefore among the powers not delegated to the United States (Congress shall make no law, etc.) and therefore "reserved to the states, respectively, or to the people."
But it was also clear evidence that, before ratification of the U.S. Constitution, Americans possessed the individual right to freely honor God, according to their Christian religious conscience, in speech, writing, and other forms of expression. The Ninth Amendment explicitly forbids any construction of the enumeration of rights in the Constitution that denies or disparages the retained (and therefore antecedent) rights of the people. This immunity from interference that this prohibition entails, first attested in the context of the government of the United States, is then affirmed in respect of the states, by the 14th Amendment.
The logic that makes nonsense of Judge Casper's decision is not rocket science. It is not some arcane mystery fathomable only to legal initiates. It was and is the common sense of the American people, rooted in reverence for the pre-eminence of God – without which, the whole idea of our self-government as a people has no logically reasonable foundation in principle. Soon and very soon, we must fully awaken to this truth, or it will perish.
September 3, 2018
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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.... (United States Constitution, Amendment I)
The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. (U.S. Constitution, Amendment IX)
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. (U.S. Constitution, Amendment X)
No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States;...nor shall any state...deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. (U.S. Constitution, Amendment XIV, Section 1)
There are times when a federal judge's blatant disregard for the unambiguously plain language of the U.S. Constitution defies all reason and common sense. Because this is an assertion about the Constitution, Americans who are not lawyers (much less constitutional scholars) often assume that they are forbidden from using their common sense to criticize some judge's idiocy. However, the Constitution relies, directly or indirectly, on the reason and common sense of ordinary citizens to perform the most important function of sovereign power, which is to choose the people responsible for its use. American citizens have to make judgments about all the officials in the governments (national, state and local) who are supposed to represent them.
People often remark on the fact that, in comparison with all the written constitutions subsequently produced, the U.S. Constitution is remarkable for its brevity and, with few exceptions, its use of language readily understood by ordinary folks. Tragically, self-serving elitists determined to impose oligarchic rule on the people of the United States have encouraged the view that constitutions, laws, and other legal documents are simply beyond the purview of untrained minds. They have become, like the arms of medieval knights, totems of power, upon which those uninitiated in the arcane mysteries of the legal profession may only look from afar and never presume to touch.
I supposed this is why federal judges like Denise Casper assume their errant nonsense will not be closely scrutinized by members of the sovereign body of the people charged, in their capacity as voters, with overseeing (through their elected representatives) the use and abuse of government powers derived, according to America's founding premises, from their consent. In the case we are considering, Judge Casper pretends to treat religious speech as one subject matter and non-religious speech as a matter of various perspectives. Given the great variety of religions, this is a distinction that makes no difference, except to provide cover for blatantly prejudicial discrimination against any and all religious perspectives.
But it also distracts from the most relevant fact, which is that the U.S. Constitution forbids interference with the free exercise of religion. This prohibition applies to religious expression, whether as subject matter or as a matter of perspective. One could argue that this prohibition forbids imposing this or that religious perspective upon conscience, by force of law. But it does not forbid interfering with religion in general as a subject matter of speech. However, when the people of the United States ratified the Constitution, Christianity was the predominant religion among them. Christ parted from his followers with the command to "Go and teach all nations." Teaching requires speech. Therefore, the use of speech to share religious subject matter is essential to the free exercise of the Christian religion.
Ages before Americans produced the U.S. Constitution, Christ's imperative made it right (according to God) to preach the Christian religion. Christians did so as individuals. But they also did so as communities. Hence the fact that constitutions adopted by the various states before the U.S. Constitution, including that of Massachusetts, referred to God's authority. More to the point, they implemented the Christian understanding that God's authority, by his endowment of right, substantiates the meaning of justice (i.e., determines its content). Most states referred to this fact in their constitutions, flags, and other tokens of sovereign authority. Their power to do so was a matter of unalienable right, endowed by God. It was therefore among the powers not delegated to the United States (Congress shall make no law, etc.) and therefore "reserved to the states, respectively, or to the people."
But it was also clear evidence that, before ratification of the U.S. Constitution, Americans possessed the individual right to freely honor God, according to their Christian religious conscience, in speech, writing, and other forms of expression. The Ninth Amendment explicitly forbids any construction of the enumeration of rights in the Constitution that denies or disparages the retained (and therefore antecedent) rights of the people. This immunity from interference that this prohibition entails, first attested in the context of the government of the United States, is then affirmed in respect of the states, by the 14th Amendment.
The logic that makes nonsense of Judge Casper's decision is not rocket science. It is not some arcane mystery fathomable only to legal initiates. It was and is the common sense of the American people, rooted in reverence for the pre-eminence of God – without which, the whole idea of our self-government as a people has no logically reasonable foundation in principle. Soon and very soon, we must fully awaken to this truth, or it will perish.
To see more articles by Dr. Keyes, visit his blog at LoyalToLiberty.com and his commentary at WND.com and BarbWire.com.
© Alan KeyesThe views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
