In an earlier article, many of the local benefits to flow from the elimination of the public schools were outlined. But eliminating public schooling, an institution not extant at the country's founding, would have national implications extending well beyond the boundaries of any one state. Chief beneficiaries would be an overall strengthening, and rehabilitation, of the American federal system and an increase in individual liberty.
Freedom for Federalism. Some of us have actually read the U.S. Constitution. Readers may know the document I mean, the written one, the one containing the set of behavioral limitations placed upon the created government. Not the imagined version penned with invisible ink whose words and meaning are discernible only by elites with special glasses. (Pointedly many of these elites so-called have either been elected or appointed and thus have been required by the written Constitution's Article VI to take an oath u201Cto support this Constitution,u201D meaning, because of the Framers' deliberate use of the definite article u201Cthis,u201D the one visibly available to the rest of us.(*)) When reading that Constitution, we know that the created federal government has no authority to legislate on any matter dealing with education. On this point we have Mr. Madison in our corner. u201CThe powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government, are few and defined [(**)]. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.u201D ~ Federalist #45.
(*) In addition to Clause 3 of Article VI (the Oath/Affirmation Clause), the phrase u201Cthis Constitutionu201D appears in 11 other provisions of the Framers' 1787 document, demonstrating unequivocally that the Framers' use of the definite article u201Cthisu201D in pointing at the words of their written document was intentional, not inadvertent.
(**) We know precisely what those few and defined powers are because they are listed – in writing – in the document itself. Education is not on the list.
Government Schools Are...
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This understanding undergirds the 9th and 10th Amendments. u201CYou may go this far, but no farther.u201D Despite these clear restrictions, we have today a huge federal superstructure called the U.S. Department of Education(!) which intrudes not only into K-12 education but also into the collegiate system. Since no provision in the Constitution authorizes federal involvement in education (among countless other federal intrusions), this can only be the result of government officials being unfaithful to their voluntarily-taken oaths to u201Cthis Constitution,u201D acting without the consent of the people, compounded by the people's own failure to appreciate the genius of the American constitutional system: by restricting governmental power, individual freedoms are maximized.
There is nothing inherently American about a top-down, one-size-fits-all public school system, a system drawn from the authoritarian Prussian model (promoted circa 1840s by Horace Mann, a Massachusetts liberal, among others). Hearthside teaching aka home schools, private tutoring, and small community-based private schools (with the emphasis on small) are representative of the American tradition.
The elimination of the public schools would deprive Congress of the excuse that it u201Cmustu201D take money from taxpayers in order to support education by connivingly offering u201Chelpu201D to the several states, provided of course that those states agree to a few controlling strings. In short, eliminating the public schools assists Congress by forcing it to obey the written Constitution. When government is limited, then ipso facto the people have more freedom. u201CThe course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases.u201D Thomas Jefferson.
That Congress has strayed from the essence of the Constitution – limiting the reach and power of the created government – can ultimately be laid at the feet of the electorate. Not enough of us have demanded that Congress obey the Constitution because not enough of us know the Constitution, not a co-incidence since the public schools have gone out of their way to avoid teaching the country's foundational underpinnings. It's no surprise then that a sizeable percentage of the population does not honor our Constitution since appreciating its ingenuity has been replaced by academically-approved Statism and its worship, a tactic accelerated under Obama but which began in earnest in the 1930s. Certain constitutional symbolisms may still prevail – congressional and presidential terms still begin and end on January 3rd and January 20th respectively; those nominated for federal office still receive the advice and consent of the Senate; state of the union addresses are given u201Cfrom time to timeu201D; and so forth – but the substantive core thesis of the Constitution – its raison d'être, namely, strictly limiting the reach of the created government – has been so grossly ignored that the u201Csystem as practicedu201D would be unrecognizable to the Framers.
Dumbing Us Down: The H...
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Consider the all-too-typical routine: (i) Congress (whether D or R controlled) passes a putative u201Clawu201D that has no textual authority, thereby neglecting its institutional duty to check-and-balance itself and only enact measures for which there is express constitutional language, with affirmatively-voting Members disregarding their individually-taken constitutional oaths to support u201Cthis Constitution.u201D (ii) The president, failing in his independent check-and-balance duties to ascertain a law's compliance with the Constitution and unfaithful to his special constitutional oath, signs that u201Claw.u201D (nb: Both D and R presidents have been equally guilty.) (iii) That u201Clawu201D when tested in the federal courts is, surprise, surprise, found to be u201Cconstitutionalu201D because the judiciary, ducking out on its own independent check-and-balance duty, relies on a long-practiced, judicially-created legalistic convenience, wink-wink, nudge-nudge, known as presumption-of-constitutionality, an artifice which holds that anything and everything done by Congress is to be presumed by all courts (both federal and state) as constitutional. [Having the benefit of this presumption is an enormous strategic advantage: it shifts the burden of proving constitutionality from the government (the proponent) onto the shoulders of citizen-challengers who are then burdened to disprove the u201Claw'su201D constitutionality, a very high legal standard to overcome.] In all other venues of life, a proposition's proponent bears the burden of proof and persuasion, but perversely not in the one venue where it really should be mandated because in the federal law-making venue can be exercised the greatest measure of control over the greatest number of people. The ObamaCare u201Clawu201D easily comes to mind, and supporters of this pretense at law-making have been quick to assert the presumption-of-constitutionality trump card against the people.
In short, we have the textual and apparent form of a limited, appropriately checked-and-balanced government, but not the actual substance which will only occur, indeed, can only occur, when men and women of honest character, whose u201Cyesu201D is their u201Cyesu201D and whose u201Cnou201D is their u201Cno,u201D serve, individuals to whom the letter and spirit of the Article VI oath to maintaining a government of limited reach is a meaningful undertaking. To this point Founder John Adams was prescient in assessing the efficacy of paper handcuffs, u201COur Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
Home Learning Year by ...
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Today we have Members who openly acknowledge that they do not read bills before voting, even apart from performing a thoughtful analysis of a bill's provisions for compliance with the Constitution, a document to which they have taken a personal oath to support. Some even openly acknowledge that most of what Congress does is unconstitutional (see the recent remarks of Democrat Rep. James Clyburn, SC-6, found here). Despite these admissions, they're re-elected! Again and again! have we gone mad? A private employer would never tolerate such behavior from an agent or an employee, but we the American people do. That we are in this state of affairs can be blamed in large measure on the American public school curriculum where an appreciation of the ingenious American system is neither taught nor admired. We've now arrived at the point where a sitting Congressman (Democrat Rep. Phil Hare, IL-17) can openly state (see this recent video here, at 00:45) that he doesn't care what the Constitution says, a sentiment obviously held by a majority of Members since Congress continues to putatively enact u201Clawsu201D in the utter absence of express constitutional text. The recent health care reform act may be the largest and ugliest example, but it hardly stands alone. Contrast the Clyburns and Hares of the world with Davy Crockett (yes, that Davy Crockett), a former Member of Congress (Tennessee, 1827–1831, 1833–1835), in an attributed speech, u201CNot Yours To Give,u201D found here.
Where is the express authority to enact so-called health care reform legislation; or the authority to give billions in u201Cforeign aidu201D; or the authority to enact national educational funding and academic standards; or the authority which enables the executive branch to conduct war/s without express declarations; and on and on? Obviously no such authority exists except in the minds of those privy to the Constitution's invisible ink. To maintain that Congress's authority to do as it wishes may be found in the Interstate Commerce Clause, or in the even more nebulous General Welfare Clause, is to say that the Framers went through their painstaking work of setting forth limitations on power, with memories of the harsh treatment which British unlimited government meted out still fresh in their minds, only to learn that they had written two clauses (ICC; GWC) that swallow and emasculate the core concept of limitation. With this sort of open-ended reasoning, nothing is beyond the reach of Congress, Article I, section 8's enumerated listing be damned.
Weapons of Mass Instru...
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On this score there is no middle ground: Either we have limited government, or we live under its only known alternative, unlimited government. What should we see as worse: Having Members of Congress who are ignorant of the Constitution's purposes, or having Members who understand those limiting purposes but who intentionally undermine them through blatant disregard? One is dim-witted, the other dishonest. The answer to this question may be of little moment since the result is the same: a corrupted government that does not play by the people's agreed-upon rules for conducting self-government. Want proof? Listen to the recent words of Democrat Rep. Alcee Hastings, FL-23, member, House Committee on Rules, u201CWhen the deal [i.e., the process of legislating, -editor] goes down, all of this talk about rules, we make [th]em up as we go along.u201D Video found here.
Contrary to the portrayal by the MSM and the left generally, the current 10th Amendment and Tea Party movements are not anti-government; rather, they are anti-corrupt government. Their existence and the various state proposals to fight the perversion of the Interstate Commerce Clause through intrastate statutes (for example on gun matters or health care reform u201Cmandatesu201D) are healthy signs of an engaged citizenry acting as self-governors. That more and more Americans are carrying pocket-sized versions of the founding documents is evidence that a strong sense of independence from government animates many, and is further evidence that the pathetic efforts of the public schools to erase the personal responsibility heritage of our history have not been altogether successful. Could all these efforts at reviving federalism flourish? Yes, without question, but only if the people follow through and do what they must: Insist that their federal and state representatives strictly confine Congress, binding it, borrowing again from Jefferson, u201Cwith the chains of the Constitution.u201D Such should be a bedrock principle found in the 2010 campaign literature of every worthwhile candidate.
And lastly,
Freedom for Drivers. Eliminating the public schools means never again being caught behind a yellow behemoth as it lumbers red lights aflashing, ever so slowly, from one pick-up / drop-off location to the next.
April 28, 2010
