From Bill Buckler's Privateer, 2013 Volume - Early January Issue - Number 719

“Let’s Give Up On The Constitution”:

Since we do not read the New York Times, we are indebted to ZeroHedge for bringing what follows to our attention. ZeroHedge provided this link to Michael Krieger’s Liberty Blitzkreig blog:

http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2013/01/02/new-york-times-op-ed-lets-give-up-on-the-constitution/

This is a link to an Op Ed which appeared in the New York Times on December 30. We have used its title -verbatim - as our headline to this section. What makes the editorial scary, and utterly pathetic, is that it was written by a man named Louis Michael Seidman who has been a professor of constitutional law at Georgetown University in Washington DC for the past four decades. Georgetown University runs what is probably the most prestigious law school in the US. It receives more applications to enroll in its law programs than any other US university and is reputed to be the most selective law school in the nation in terms of the applicants it selects. It is a pillar of the US educational establishment.

We strongly urge ALL our subscribers to read this New York Times op ed with care and attention. The entire thrust of Mr Seidman’s “argument” is summed up the last paragraph.

We quote:

“...perhaps the dream of a country ruled by ‘We the people’ is impossibly utopian. If so, we have to give up on the claim that we are a self-governing people who can settle our disagreements through mature and tolerant debate. But before abandoning our heritage of self-government, we ought to try extricating ourselves from constitutional bondage so that we can give real freedom a chance.”

(Emphasis by The Privateer)

Toxic Trial Balloons:

It is impossible that a so-called “constitutional scholar” who has taught in the top law university in the US for four decades does NOT know that a constitution is NOT designed to put “We the people” in bondage. Its purpose is the exact opposite. The Privateer has said this many times in our publishing history and we here say it again: A CONSTITUTION IS THE LAW WHICH GOVERNMENT MUST OBEY!!

Any rational definition of the term “freedom” is simply stated. Freedom is the ABSENCE of coercion. There is only ONE institution in any given nation which takes for itself the monopoly of the use of coercion and that institution is government. Any government MUST have such a monopoly in order to function at all. Without it, ANY law - whether it adheres to principle and truth or not - is unenforceable. If laws cannot be enforced, a government cannot function. The result of that, as all history proves, is chaos.

A free individual is a precursor of any free society. Such an individual is one who possesses a right to life, liberty, and property. That right belongs to the person who exercises it ON PRINCIPLE. As long as that individual does not transgress against the equal right to these things possessed by ALL other individuals, that person can and should be able to live an entire lifetime with no interaction with government whatsoever. He or she can certainly vote for their preferred representative in government - or they can abstain from doing so. In either case, a government in a FREE society does not interfere with individual rights. Nor does it interfere with any individual UNLESS and UNTIL that person interferes with the rights of others. A government in a free society is there to defend individual rights, that is their ONLY legitimate function.

To talk about the “constitutional bondage” of a free people is a piece of populist drivel which would leave the intellectual apologist for any tyrant, divine right monarch or dictator helpless with astonishment. Their instant reaction would be a variation on this theme: “Surely you don’t expect the people to swallow THAT??” Mr Seidman apparently does. So does the New York Times. And so do the US establishment.

A political constitution can be and has been imperfectly written. It can be and has been “interpreted” out of all resemblance to its original intention. It can be and has been revised and “amended” into near impotence. None of this changes the political purpose of a constitution. That purpose is to PREVENT the people from sinking into bondage by specifying the actions which government is FORBIDDEN to take.

From Ed:

Georgetown is "Associated with Cass Sunstein so why is anyone surprised at what these punk Trotskites come up with? Simply put the US Constitution is incompatible with the philosophy of Marx and Lenin and these two can't operate in any other environment and neither can Obama for that matter."

A search testing the above assertion: "Cass Sunstein" Georgetown Marx Lenin

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A DISCUSION, MOST RECENT AT BOTTOM:

From: Onesilver:

"Simply put the US Constitution is incompatible with the philosophy of Marx and Lenin and these two can't operate in any other environment and neither can Obama for that matter."

From Onesilver:

Sent: 1/10/2013 2:10 PM

Well Bum I take it you are European or other non-American and as such cannot understand the US. Constitution, it's intent, or construction. That is certainly no surprise as no other nation either past and present has ever established such a body of Law based on the general welfare of it's citizens. I find it interesting that in your last paragraph you mention the word "potestas" which in Roman law means the power of force whereas in the US Constitution power is determined by the authority of the people. In essence the US government exists for the benefit of all it's people. I suspect that you take this for Marxism but this idea of the common good goes back well before Marx and well before Hegel's ideas of Absolutism.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_does_Provide_For_The_Common_Good_mean_in_the_constitution

If you are saying that the present government of the US is not operating

in accordance within it's own laws, then you have a point as it is not, at

least of late. You might also say that since there has been no outcry

about this, then it is being done with the people's consent. That however

is subject to change and may very well do so with the current attempt to

overrule the 2nd Amendment.

From: Bum 1/10/2013 3:07 PM

Does one really have to be an American to understand the US Constitution? Most American jurists I know tell me that the average American citizen is entirely clueless about their constitution and a surprisingly high proportion are even oblivious of its existence. Could that be because the original document was written in an incoherent language understood only by “Americans”?

I thought the original was written in English.

But then we are talking about a nation here which presently leads the world in only three categories,

number of incarcerated citizens,
total debt per capita owed, under threat, by the central state, to the central state and
total defence spending which exceeds more than the following 26 nations combined, all of whom are allies.

Are these really the hallmarks of a “free nation”? A nation ruled by the “consent” of its people? I guess you’re right, one really would have to ask an American to explain the language of the US Constitution.

From: Onesilver 1/10/2013 3:53 PM

Well no one doesn't have to be an American to understand the US Constitution but since it would be foreign to them it could be difficult.

Now of course the vast majority of Americans don't know much about their constitution but how many citizens of any other country has a good understanding about their own. Take the British for example. How many of them know they live in a society modeled on the life of insects? Not many I assume but since it works for the elites, there is no need for anyone else to even think about that. Knowingly or not, that that is the way it is and as an American over there you can spot it in a heartbeat.

The problem here and the reason so many Americans don't know much about the Constitution is that it is not taught outside of the Law Schools. Our Law Schools have been unfortunately been infltrated by Hegelian Communists like Obama and Louis Michael Seidman and Fascists in the mold of Antonia Scalia, Samuel Alito, and Clarence Thomas, all of which are Constitutional

heretics.

From Andy: 1/10/2013 5:14 PM

I'm labouring under the impression that the whole of the common law of the British was in force at the declaration of independence and was continued. Whatever was the common law at the time was continued. I also believe that the founders modelled the constitution on (or were inspired by) the Declaration of Arbroath, and that the founding fathers were freemasons of the Scottish Rite.