With Probably More to Go

5 Civil Rights Americans Lost to the COVID-19 Panic

Imagine That, Proxy Voting is Unconstitutional

In win for Paxton, court declares $1.7 trillion federal omnibus was passed unconstitutionally

It will be appealed and we'll see if the decision holds.

Quote of the Day

My scholarship (past and forthcoming) argues that administrative power undermines equal voting rights by shifting much lawmaking power out of Congress into the hands of unelected administrators. My work shows, moreover, that this shift occurred when the knowledge class regretted the boisterous sort of politics that came with equal voting rights. Woodrow Wilson candidly explained that “the reformer is bewildered” by the need to persuade “a voting majority of several million heads”—especially when the reformer needed to influence “the mind, not of Americans of the older stocks only, but also of Irishmen, of Germans, of Negroes.” One could go on at length with such quotes, and certainly administrative power has been dominated by whites of a certain class, but the point is not narrowly about racism. Instead, it is about how a class that expected deference to its knowledge was disappointed with the results of equal suffrage in a diverse society. It therefore welcomed a transfer of lawmaking power out of the elected legislature and into the hands of the right sort of people.

The argument, in other words, is not against an elite, but against the administrative dilution of representative government and equal voting rights. There will always be elites, and this is part of the valuable differentiation that can occur within a free society. Rather than oppose such differentiation, my scholarship suggests that all Americans, even elites, should confine themselves to working through the Constitution’s representative framework of government.

H/T to Sebastian.

Interesting...

...and a can of worms the Democrats don't want opened.

Should We Elect An American President?

Which means both Rubio and Cruz are ineligible leaving the GOP nomination firmly in the hands of Trump. And then there's the last two elections...

On amending the Constitution

Glenn Reynolds: Blow up the administrative state

Some on the Left have given Texas Governor Abbott holy hell for his proposals for an Article V convention. They don't oppose amending the Constitution. Just this method. Why? They can't control it. The fact they oppose such a convention is a good enough reason to go ahead with it. Maybe we end up with a smaller more restricted Federal government. Maybe not. What I do know is that if we continue as we are this bloated bureaucracy will continue its uncontrolled growth and we in "flyover country" will continue to suffer.

As if I needed more reasons not to vote for Jeb Bush.

Jeb Bush is perfectly OK with violations of my 4th Amendment rights by the NSA...

Bush doubled-down Tuesday on his assertions that there is "no evidence" the data collection violated civil liberties. "I've found not one" case, he said.

...but when it comes to threatening the citizenship of the children of Illegals born in this country...

Separately, Bush told CBS News that he disagreed with rival Donald Trump on the birthright of children born in the United States to parents who are immigrants living in the country illegally.

"That's a constitutional right," Bush said. "Mr. Trump can say he's for this because people are frustrated that it's abused. We ought to fix the problem rather than take away rights that are constitutionally endowed."

...he wants to get all constitutional on us. Inconsistent much, Jeb? The children of illegals born in this country are citizens and that must be honored just as my right to be secure in my person, house, papers, effects, and their modern equivalents, against unreasonable searches and seizures must be honored. The entire Constitution, and not just the parts you like, are important and should be enforced.

Oh, and Donald, that goes for you too.

Yeah, but there have been a lot of Presidents...

... that have had a problem with that one.

Bypassing the Constitution

Ted Cruz criticizes DOJ for arguing international treaty can trump the Constitution

The matter in question involved a woman charged by the DOJ with violating the Chemical Weapons Convention Implementation Act when she used toxic chemicals to harass a woman who had an affair with her husband. Who is to say whether Holder's DOJ won't do the same with the U. N. Small Arms Treaty to bypass the Second Amendment?

Via Bearing Arms.

On the Constitution...

The reason for claiming that the Constitution alone among legal texts is inaccessible to lawyers is not that its original communicative content is unclear, but that some of its original meaning is all too clear and some people don’t like it, so it must be gotten rid of somehow. - Randy Barnett

H/T to David.

"The Constitution For Dummies"

We have no rights they are bound to respect.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Senate bill rewrite lets feds read your e-mail without warrants

Seems like a clear violation of our Fouth Amendment rights to me. It's clearly worth an email to your representatives in Congress. Oh, and to Law Enforcement. I don't care if my rights make your job hard. You guys have the power to take away a person's freedom. That should be hard.

Constitution Day

Perhaps a better way to celebrate this radical document would be actually trying to follow it for once. - Sebastian

Is too.

It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices. - Chief Justice John Roberts

If the function of the Supreme Court is not to protect the Constitution, then it has no function. - ASM826

...and then there's this.

Chief Justice Roberts Is A Genius

I really really hope his analysis is correct. Borepatch seems to see it about the same. I pray they're both correct and Obama chokes on his "win".

That cartoon is so on target...

...it ought to have a bullseye painted on it except it'd kinda, like, ruin the point.

No rights the government is bound to respect.

I hope that in the future Chief Justice John Roberts is held in the same contempt as Chief Justice Roger B. Taney. The government can do whatever it pleases to us as long as they call it a "tax". We have no choice now but to back the Republicans, take the Senate, and pray they follow through on their promise to repeal. Personally, at this moment they can all go straight to hell. For now that's it. Maybe I'll see it differently tomorrow. Right now I'm spectacularly pissed.

Replay

Appears the First Amendment doesn't apply in Maryland...

...at least in one courtroom.

Do you sometimes get the feeling...

...that certain members of Congress see the Constitution as nothing more than toilet paper?

Should the Military Be Allowed to Detain Americans Indefinitely?

Two hundred and twenty-four years ago today...

...the United States Constitution was signed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.