Nat Hentoff on America's War Against the Constitution

(Opinion) Nat Hentoff on America's War Against the Constitution

By Cato Institute

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  • caelum
    Have You Read The Constitution?

    You basically just don't like it when people disagree with your interpretation of a law is what you are saying since no one seriously thinks the constitution isn't vague.

    I'd be curious to know how you reconcile the notion that our constitution is "the most concise, unambiguous, easily understood body of law in existence" with the greatly vague notions of our constitution.

    To demonstrate my point, I'm going to use a random number generator to find one of the Bill of Rights and one of the articles and illustrate how vague our constitution is.

    Articles of the Constitution ... #4: Hm. So, how does the full faith and credit clause deal with judgments against an individual in one state (say South Carolina) and try to enforce it another state (say Georgia), when Georgia's statue of limitations barred such judgments. You can't give both full faith and credit to one state while denying that of another. So, here we have a constitutional question our constitution gives no clear answer too (this was decided in McElmoyle v. Cohen btw). What exactly are "privileges and immunities"? Nobody really knows. On the Federal property of territory clause, do insular areas apply, when it is clear these were never considered by our founders? What exactly defines a "Republic Form of Government" since we have dozens of forms of republican government that could be used. Did the founders intend for the states to use the Republic structure designed at the federal level or not?

    Bill of Rights ... #5: So, what exactly constitutes "public danger" and who has the authority to determine whether public danger exists? What exactly is an "infamous crime "? It clearly doesn't mean capital-offenses since the 5th Amendment specifically mentions them, so what exactly are they? If a jury or judge is bribed to obtain an acquittal, does double jeopardy protect against re-trial or do we invoke the 6th Amendments impartial jury line to nullify this arguing he did not have the right to that trial because it was not impartial? What exactly is "just compensation" for the purposes of eminent domain? Is it what the owner believe is just? What the government believes is just? Or what an independent estimate believes is just?

    So, our constitution isn't vague and not open to interpretation ? Sure ....

    - caelumUS November 3, 2009 12:31PM

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    • Don Earl
      Not vague

      Across the board, the Constitution is designed to protect the rights of the people and to limit the power of government . In that context, none of it is vague and every single issue related to it may be decided on a unanimous basis.

      Double jeopardy resulting from a corrupt judge? Quite obviously, the Constitution's authors did not vest the judiciary with the unlimited power necessary to engage in that level of tyranny. If you don't know what "infamous" means, you can look it up in a dictionary.

      "Value" may be subjective, but "fair value" is not. It is subject to a precise definition and may be discovered.

      "Public danger" is not subject to misinterpretation in the context of the Constitution by anyone not acting the fool. Furthermore, it is adequately clarified as being on par with a surprise attack by an invading host of hostile forces.

      The bottom line is there is virtually nothing in the Constitution that is subject to misinterpretation by anyone fluent in the English language, and who is not engaged in frivilous interpretations of the same.

      - Don EarlUS November 3, 2009 3:09PM

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      • caelum
        Not going to bother

        I'm not going to bother trying to counter your argument since its frivolous. Your position is nonsense since you assume everyone interprets a situation exactly the same and so would reach the same conclusion about everything based on subjective wording. You apparently live in a mythical land where there is no disagreement about subjective situations.

        - caelumUS November 4, 2009 11:55AM

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