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Our Children’s Safety and Judges
(A Scary Story For Halloween)
By Theresa Fritz Camoriano
If we want our children and grandchildren to live in relatively safety and
prosperity, then we must demand judges who respect the Constitution and the rule
of law in order to protect the lives and property of individuals and minorities
against passing fads, emotional whims, and the tyranny of the majority. Without
that protection, our property, our freedom, and our lives are at risk.
We Americans are impatient people. We want to get our way right away. That can
be a wonderful trait, but it also can be very dangerous. Just as the
Constitution often makes it difficult or impossible for us to pass the kinds of
laws we want, it also makes it difficult or impossible for other people to pass
laws that would harm us. If we erode those Constitutional protections in order
to get what we want, then the government will be able to do anything it wants to
us – take away our property, throw us in jail, refuse to allow us to obtain
medical treatment, and even kill us, depending upon the whim of a judge.
The recent Kelo decision by the U.S. Supreme Court is an example of what happens
when judges do not respect the plain, original meaning of a law. The fifth
amendment to the Constitution says private property “shall not be taken for
public use without just compensation”. “Public use” has always meant things like
highways and public buildings that are owned by the government or by
government-regulated utilities and used by the general public, but in Kelo the
Supreme Court decided that the phrase “public use” really meant “public
purpose”. This slight change in wording, from “public use” (the language in the
Constitution) to “public purpose” (a phrase created by the judges), means that
governments now can take our private property for anything they think is a good
idea, including a privately-owned shopping center.
The Roe v. Wade decision also seriously undermined the Constitution and the rule
of law. In that case, the Supreme Court justices did not rely on the plain,
original meaning of any words in the Constitution but instead relied on the
“emanations and penumbras”, or ghosts and shadows, of the Constitution – similar
to reading tea leaves – in order to create a right to abortion that did not
exist in the law. Now, many people who want to preserve the right to abortion
are demanding that we appoint new justices to the court who also believe it is
appropriate to “read the tea leaves” instead of upholding the plain, historic
meaning of the law. They are ready to put up a fight against anyone who dares to
judge based on the original meaning of the law rather than reading the ghosts,
shadows and tea leaves. If we accept this approach, then there will be no
Constitution or rule of law to protect us in the future when we need it. Even
people who strongly support abortion rights should recognize that this is far
too high a price to pay.
It is not difficult to envision many more erosions of our property and safety by
these tea-leaf-reading judges who feel free to ignore the plain, historical
meaning of the law’s text. For example, as the baby boomers age and the number
of elderly people increases, draining resources through Social Security and
Medicare and increasing the taxes on working people, it is entirely possible
that a court will ignore the Constitution’s protections and make it legal or
even required to withhold medical treatment from elderly people or to kill them
if a doctor or bureaucrat thinks it is a good idea.
And if these Constitutional protections are eliminated, then what will the
government be allowed to do to people who are considered to be “price gougers”
(charging more than we want to pay), or people who make “excessive profits”, or
people who are not sufficiently “tolerant”? Should they be thrown into prison;
should all their property be taken away and given to “the people? Should they
and their children be killed in order to purify the gene pool? If a legislature
votes to kill, torture, or imprison all people with a low IQ, or all
homosexuals, or all people with certain religious beliefs or certain ethnic
origins, then there will be no Constitution or rule of law to prevent it.
If we take for granted the institutions that have protected us in the past or
smugly believe that the types of atrocities that have been committed on other
people in other places and times cannot happen to us, we will be in for
something far scarier than Halloween. If we undermine and destroy the
Constitution and the rule of law in order to get our way with others, then we
will render ourselves and our children defenseless against others who want to
abuse us.
We may think such things cannot happen in a modern, enlightened, technologically
evolved society like ours, but they have happened before and no doubt will
happen again if we leave ourselves defenseless against them. As described in the
following poem that is often attributed to
Martin Niemoller: First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out -
because I was not a communist;Then they came for the socialists, and I did not
speak out - because I was not a socialist; Then they came for the trade
unionists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a trade unionist; Then
they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Jew; Then
they came for me - and there was no one left to speak out for me.
We are in a similar situation today. First, we appointed judges who undermined
the rule of law in order to obtain a right to abortion; then we allowed those
judges to undermine the rule of law to enable towns to take private property for
private use; and then…..
We not only must demand the appointment of judges and justices who respect the
Constitution and the rule of law, but we also must explain to our children, our
friends, and our legislators why that respect is so important. Ideas like the
original intent of the Constitution and the rule of law may seem very dry and
boring, but they are essential to the future security and happiness of our
children and grandchildren.
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