Charlie Rose

NeilMacCallister  02/20/2013 03:00 AM Report

Mr. Amar? ..is my mortgage contract ALSO a "living, breathing" document?

Are my obligated car payments actually "unwritten" and fluid???

If I once signed on to coach my kid's swim team, ..can I now excuse my absence by saying "times have changed"?

If I promised my wife I would be there for her, in sickness and in sorrow, ..can I later shrug my shoulders, and just phone her to say that "my commitment has evolved"?

***

If you think you have a better Constitution, ..Why don't you just pass it around the States, and see if you get any responses???

And what do you want to call your new nation????

And how did you get a job teaching "The Constitution" at Yale????

***

I believe SWFL's topic of "Balanced Budgets" is the REAL "un-voiced Constituion".

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/14/2013 03:24 AM Report

Balanced Budget Amendment?

In STATE governments, budgeting and balance budget requirements are ubiquitous. Every state has a budget, and every state other than Vermont has some form of constraint on fiscal discretion, including requirements for governors to submit a balanced budget, requirements for legislatures to pass a balanced budget, restrictions on rolling over a deficit, and restrictions on issuing debt to cover the deficit.

The wide use of balanced budget requirements suggests that state governments perceive balanced budget requirements to be net beneficial.

(Sounds like this possible Constitutional Amendment will pass Akhil's three tests.)

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:47 AM Report

Lawrence "Larry" Lessig has called for state-based activism to promote substantive reform of government with a Second Constitutional Convention.

Charlie, you only gave Akhil 22 minutes.

Perhaps Larry and Akhil on for the hour to plan a Second Constitutional Convention?

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:42 AM Report

He told us 8,000 words.

The Constitution contains 4,543 words, including the signatures and has four sheets, 28-3/4 inches by 23-5/8 inches each.

It contains 7,591 words including the 27 amendments.

There are 788,258 words in the King James Bible--ABOUT 100 TIMES MORE!

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:33 AM Report

The word “democracy” does not appear once in the Constitution.

We are definitely NOT textualists.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:30 AM Report

A proclamation by President George Washington and a congressional resolution established the first national Thanksgiving Day on November 26, 1789. The reason for the holiday was to give “thanks” for the new Constitution.

Now it is football, feasting, family and Black Thursday (replacing Black Friday).

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:24 AM Report

He forgot a BIG ONE!

John Tyler was the first Vice President to assume the responsibilities of the Presidency upon the death of William Henry Harrison in 1841.

There was nothing in the Constitution that provided for the vice president to BECOME the president. Article II, Section 6 of the Constitution states that: “In case of the removal of the President from office, or of his death, resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said office, the same shall devolve on the Vice President...” The Article did not state that the vice president would BECOME the President! Tyler immediately began to refer to himself as the President with no actual Constitutional authority to do so, and every succeeding vice president in the same position did the same.

It was not until the Twenty-Fifth Amendment was passed in 1967 that the vice president technically BECAME the president. This amendment legitimatized Tyler’s assumption!

Unwritten Constitution indeed.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:19 AM Report

Of the forty-two delegates who attended most of the meetings, thirty-nine actually signed the Constitution.

Edmund Randolph and George Mason of Virginia and Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts refused to sign due in part due to the lack of a bill of rights.

See . . . even on day one there was an unwritten, unsignable Constitution by 7% of the FOUNDING FATHERS.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:13 AM Report

Next up for a Constitutional amendment, he tells us, is direct election of President—one person, one vote like for Governor. Direct election because one person, one vote is the bedrock of America.

James Wilson originally proposed the President be chosen by popular vote, but the delegates agreed (after 60 ballots) on a system known as the Electoral College. Although there have been 500 proposed amendments to change it, this “indirect” system of electing the president is still intact.

That is a shame.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/13/2013 02:09 AM Report

We are told the best way to get Constitutional amendments passed are for both parties to be in favor of it, it should ideally add to liberty or equality in order to be a fulfillment and it should be road tested by the states.

Yes but the Independents are 40% while the Republicans and Democrats are both 30% and the biggest party of all is the non-voting party so this "both parties in agreement" may not be a valid requirement.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/12/2013 05:47 PM Report

Motion to Amend the US Constitution ~ Sign the Petition

http://movetoamend.nationbuilder.com/petition?utm_source=movetoamend&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=wt pa_announce&recruiter_id=23527

We, the People of the United States of America, reject the U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling and other related cases, and move to amend our Constitution to firmly establish that money is not speech, and that human beings, not corporations, are persons entitled to constitutional rights.

AMAR:

"So I do think we need campaign finance reform. I think there are lots of ways of doing it that are different than the McCain-Feingold law that was at issue in Citizens United. And the basic idea that, we need to keep two ideas sort of central in mind, one person, one vote is one of them.

And the other is we want to have very vigorous expression. Even if corporations don't have a full right to speak as corporations, I, as a sovereign citizen, have a right to hear things. I want to hear what people are saying. I want to be able to make up my own mind."

SIGN IT:

http://movetoamend.nationbuilder.com/petition?utm_source=movetoamend&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=wt pa_announce&recruiter_id=23527

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/12/2013 03:53 AM Report

Yes, the Founding Fathers but just as important are the Amending Sons and Daughters who did modify the system:

13th Amendment abolishing slavery.

14th Amendment promises equal rights to blacks and to women.

15th Amendment that says blacks are equal voters.

19th Amendment doubling the franchise, bringing women into the process.

17th Amendment says we're going to have direct election of senators.

Yes, those Founding Fathers need lots of fine tuning.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/12/2013 03:42 AM Report

Akhil tells us that Earl Warren rebuilt the house we live in now.

The US in 1953: apartheid, massive malapportionment in many of the states, organized prayer in the public schools, no broad protection of free speech, no rights for criminal defendants, the Bill of Rights does not apply against the states.

Earl Warren, Hugo Black, Bill Brennan--Governor, Senator and Judge--changed our world.

So why are the 50's such a great decade? Economic dominance and fixing our country?

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/11/2013 10:07 PM Report

"The Constitution was made for the people and not the people for the Constitution." Theodore Roosevelt

Roosevelt tried to negotiate a coal strike in 1902. Roosevelt invited Mitchell and Baer to the White House on October 3 to hammer out a compromise. It did NOT work.

He summoned his War Secretary, Elihu Root, and ordered him to prepare the army. This time, however, the army would not be used against the strikers. The coal operators were informed that if no settlement were reached, the army would seize the mines and make coal available to the public.

Roosevelt did not seem to mind that he had no constitutional authority to do any such thing.

Yes Akhil, at the same time that we are all textualists, we are all unwritten Constitution people too. The Ninth Amendment does give us all non-textual rights.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/11/2013 09:37 PM Report

"Unwritten Constitution":

Rule of law NOT in the written document.

Federalism NOT there.

Separation of powers NOT there.

Checks and balances NOT there.

Limited government NOT there.

Right of privacy NOT in the document.

You won't even find a reference to the Bill of Rights.

Who presides at the vice president's impeachment trial? And when you read the text, the text says seemingly pretty clearly, the Senate tries all impeachments. And it also says that the vice president is the presiding officer of the Senate.

And the text seems to say two plus two equals four, that the vice president presides at his own impeachment trial and that can't be right and it isn't right. But to see why it isn't right, we have to read the Constitution as a whole, see some larger principles. Like, here's another one.

It's connected to the rule of law. No man can be a judge in his own case. And the vice president can't preside over his own trial because that violates the rule of law.

Akhil, you said you are a Christian so we now need you to write about the "Unwritten Bible"--larger principles, read it as a whole, what can't be right and isn't right.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  02/11/2013 09:19 PM Report

Akhil was born in Ann Arbor and at the time he was born his parents were not United States citizens. They were here as students, as medical students at the University of Michigan.

Our Constitution made him a citizen. WHAT A GIFT!

The first sentence of the 14th Amendment said, Akhil, you're a citizen; you're an American.

Akhil is not an anchor baby. Akhil is an American resource.

We need lots more resources.

Immigration reform begins with work visas attached to all graduate diplomas.

tabs  02/11/2013 03:11 PM Report

There are those judical activists that think the Constitution is a living and breathing document that can be modified to meet the extingencies of the day. It is these same people that would take hammer and chisle to Michangelo'ss David, a bucket of paint to the Sistine Chapel and scissors and ink to Shakespear's Hamlet all to make it fit the temperment of the day. What these same people can not fathom is that the authors of the Constitution had risked life, limb, fortune and the well being of their families all to gain their liberty from an opressive tyrant of a King. These men knew of what they spoke and as such not only wrestled with themselves but with each other in order to forge a new government that is about as just and fair as humanly possible. The result of their efforts was their masterpiece, the Constitution of the United States of America.

MS Sotomeyer at the end of her interview said, "Thank God for the First Admendment." One can add, "Thank God for the Second Amendment" as it gives muscle to the people and as such guarntees that the First Amendment will not be infringed upon.

efeinbe2  02/11/2013 01:13 PM Report

I think trusting the people of Wyoming to be selfless about their senators is a little unlikely, but otherwise very interesting interview.

REMant  02/11/2013 01:10 PM Report

This is really too tiresome to bother with. I could hardly even follow his rambling, and he came across not only as a ding-a-ling, but a self-absorbed ding-a-ling, which I'm sure the show's producers realized, airing it in the weakest possible position in the week. I suspect, too, that he's kissed a lot of posteriors to get where he is, and I'd avoid the Boy Scouts if I were he. He is also quite obviously one of the politically correct, the face of New England's famous colleges increasingly appearing thus, but if he were really that smart, of course, he wouldn't have taken up the law, much less decided to propound it.

Now, I haven't seen this latest scribbling, which he is obviously so anxious to hawk, and certainly won't now bother to, but the last, much lauded one, is just another Constitutional commentary, and not a very good one, exemplifying a level of historical knowledge of which Prof Morgan would likely have been greatly disappointed. If you want commentary, read Rawle, Story, Kent, or Rakove, or use the Founder's Constitution and Library of Congress websites where you can find all of the material.

The best reason for eliminating the electoral college is because as things stand it "privileges" the more heavily populated areas. It wasn't designed to favor anything, simply to manage elections in a primitive environment fairly. But getting rid of it would boost the GOP. The less populated states are "privileged" in the Senate, but this is balanced by popular representation in the House, though ironically this balance has been upset by popular election to the former, because while voters favor anti-big-government types to represent them locally, they put big-government ppl in the Senate, and this was the case even when the states appointed the senators. It is as if the populace wants to give each party its due, or make sure it gets its share, but keep them checked by each other.

This propaganda circulating through the liberal establishment nowadays, and I hope not originating from him, about the 2nd Amendment being intended only to suppress slave revolts is utterly ridiculous, and I'll just direct the reader to my previous discussion of the history. It is my understanding further, that Amar agrees with his colleague Sanford Levinson that the 2nd Amendment means precisely what it says, militias notwithstanding.

If the president tried to make a law, then the Congress would supposedly impeach him - he is not Bagehot's Queen Victoria - altho, of course, Congress has largely abandoned its responsibility to those who elect them, but the Bill of Rights doesn't apply to the Constitution anyway, since the things covered are not among the enumerated powers, as all the Federalists argued. And it cannot be applied to the states by another amendment, because it is inapplicable to begin. The Bill of Rights has been, as Madison and the others feared, used in the attempts to deny exactly what it was meant to defend, and is at best meant only as an exhortation. The idea that these amendments were meant to exclude certain things from discussion doesn't go far enough. They are completely irrelevant. They belonged, if anywhere, where Madison wanted to put them, among the enumerated powers.

This business of a living constitution is like the quantity theory of money, fine if it's understood the living respond to the document and not the document to the living, as it is if it's understood that money responds to productivity, and not productivity to money. One can argue whether that ought to be the case, of course, but as Rehnquist remarked in 1986: "A mere change in public opinion since the adoption of the Constitution, unaccompanied by a constitutional amendment, should not change the meaning of the Constitution." The man who penned the Constitution's preamble and put the thing in its final form, remarked in later years that while doing so he was keenly aware it would be scrutinized and argued over like any contract. The problem is few, if any, have seen it for it is, and Amar is no exception as this quote from a reviewer indicates:

"'An erroneous precedent that improperly deviates from the written Constitution may in some circumstances stand,' he tells us, 'if the precedent is later championed not merely by the court, but also by the people.' 'When the citizenry has widely and enthusiastically embraced an erroneous precedent,' the courts may 'view this precedent as sufficiently ratified by the American people so as to insulate it from judicial overruling.' When this happens, according to Mr. Amar, the erroneous precedent becomes part of America's unwritten Constitution.' Mr. Amar contends that the unwritten Constitution also consists of numerous historical documents - like the Northwest Ordinance and the Gettysburg Address - along with institutional practices of Congress and the White House." This is a fine understanding of Bracton's or Fortescue's constitution, but it's the wrong time and place.

Jeffersonian John Taylor of Caroline remarked in 1814: "Our policy divides power and unites the nation in one interest; Mr. Adams divides the nation into several interests and unites power." While it would appear Amar is trying to argue that the only real check on power lies with the common law, as did Charles McIlwain, today's so-called liberals, nevertheless, side with Mr. Adams.

As McIlwain complained in the midst of the Depression: "The one thing in our political machinery which, more than any other, has fostered the growth of 'pressure groups,' with all their attendant corruption, is the inability to fix responsibility. This has led to 'log-rolling' and every other form of crooked politics; for under any system of balances run wild the result is sure to be government for private interests or groups instead of government for the whole people. Our government has become to an alarming extent a mere process of 'passing the buck,' and that means shifting the responsibility for acts which could not be defended for one moment if responsibility for them could ever be fixed." McIlwain, who thought Montesquieu an armchair philosopher, and admittedly knew nothing of American history, would, however, I think have agreed with Taylor, not Adams. And we have also seen a train of absolutely incredible boneheaded decisions by the courts from 1789 on, too numerous to mention, following from the failure to understand just how simple-minded the Constitution is.

But the issue is moot. Increasingly no one cares about government, and that, which McIlwain, and all the rest of those who approach this issue wearing such blinders fail to see, is because the monarchs had lost actual power and sought to recover it when they had simply run out of money. To enlarge Harrington and perhaps Marx: societies follow the money. The money is in the corporations, and they are our new aristocracy, as Tocqueville understood. Commerce was already the foundation of the American constitution. And well it should be, because custom, as every anthropologist knows no less than any common lawyer, is invariably Byzantine, lacking in both principle and equity, which philosophy provided along with conceptions of contract. And while free will may provide the opportunity for arbitrariness, it is the only means to combat it.