Posted by
Jim Hunt on Tuesday, December 16, 2008 8:00:00 AM
Yesterday was the anniversary of the adoption of the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution. This group of amendments, pushed for and passed by the Anti-Federalists, is designed to place limits on the government that had been created by the Constitution.
It is not a document granting rights, but rather affirming that government could not interfere with the God-given rights of the people. (“We are endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights…” remember that?)
The first eight amendments enumerate specific limitations on the government from the protection of free speech to the guarantee of trial by jury. The ninth and tenth amendments make the full intent of the founders crystal clear:
Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Amendment X
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.
These two amendments, and particularly the tenth, have become the forgotten amendments, observed mostly in the breach. The tenth amendment was specifically designed to prevent the government from growing overly large and taking over our lives.
I urge you to think about this amendment and try to justify our current government programs in light of these strictures. Where is the authority for the Department of Education, Social Security, Housing and Urban Development, Welfare, the National Endowment for the Arts, National Institute of Health and so many, many more?
Note the sleazy way the federal government got around this for setting national speed limits, seat belt requirements and national drinking age. The government used extortion – no more highway money if you don’t do what we say. The bureaucrats and politicians in Washington are drunk on power and they have pulled out all the stops to gain more, regardless of the clear intent of the Constitution. Only we can stop them, only by fully understanding our rights and the limits on their power that are in place but not enforced.
President-elect Obama (he really is President-elect now) seems set on a course to make the government even bigger, to control more and more of our lives. I do not want to debate the merits of any given government program at this point. What I do hope you will think about is whether the Constitution allows the programs to be created at the national level or whether, as the Constitution says, these powers should be reserved to the states respectively, or to the people?
How many of you have read the Bill of Rights or read them recently? Please do, it might be an eye-opening experience. You can find them listed by clicking on the following link: Bill of Rights
God Bless America