The New York Times And The Constitution
by Big Dog on Jul 22, 2010 at 04:44 Political
The NYT has an editorial about Elena Kagan and the Republicans who oppose her. The thrust of the piece is that they do not understand the Constitution and they are angered that she would not answer the way they wanted with regard to the Commerce Clause. The NYT is convinced that the federal government can do anything it wants under the guise of the Commerce Clause and that it is settled law because of SCOTUS rulings.
So the Republicans, according to the NYT, are supposed to bow down and vote for a person who has a history of ignoring the Constitution and who believes in Socialism just like her buddy Obama.
The problem is, that while the NYT is busy saying that it is OK to do anything under the Commerce Clause including forcing people to buy health insurance, the writer demonstrates that he does not understand the Constitution. The writer’s words show a definite misunderstanding.
The clause was the legal basis for any number of statutes of enormous benefit to society. It is why we have the Clean Air Act. The Clean Water Act. The Endangered Species Act. The Fair Labor Standards Act, setting a minimum wage and limiting child labor. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlawing segregation in the workplace and in public accommodations. In cases like these, the Supreme Court has said Congress can regulate activities that have a “substantial effect” on interstate commerce, even if they are not directly business-related. NYT
I will not comment on the enumerated acts because I do not know how Commerce fits in and it is not important to the debate. What is important is the sentence; “In cases like these, the Supreme Court has said Congress can regulate activities that have a “substantial effect” on interstate commerce, even if they are not directly business-related.” [emphasis added]
The SCOTUS has ruled Congress can regulate ACTIVITIES. NOT buying health insurance is NOT an activity. The health care law punishes people for INACTIVITY.
The SCOTUS has never ruled that Congress can regulate INACTIVITY under the Commerce Clause (or any other as far as I know). All of the cited items are reported to be results of the imposition of the Commerce Clause and are stipulated as activities.
Even if one buys the argument that the Commerce Clause is unencumbered and allows politicians to regulate any activity whatsoever, no one can make the case that it allows Congress to regulate INACTIVITY. Never in our history has Congress been able to force people to purchase a product.
What will be next? Will we be required to buy a GM in order to help out that car company and its union employees?
The writer is obviously a “Journolist” Socialist who loves the liberal/progressive agenda and that is all well and good. Everyone is entitled to make mistakes.
But let us not take this editorial as some authority on the Constitution.
The writer went after Republicans for their supposed lack of understanding of the Constitution but the writer demonstrates limited knowledge as well.
Not to mention the NYT seems to ignore the Democrats and their leader and the way they trample the Constitution on a daily basis.
Never surrender, never submit.
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Tags: commerce clause, elena kagan, health care, lies, new york times
The Times shares Nancy “Not a serious question” Pelosi’s view that Congress may legislate on any subject, and to any effect, whatsoever. It offends their Omnipotent State sensibilities that someone should raise the subjects of individual rights or Constitutional limitations on government…at least, when one of their heroes is at the tiller.
How, I wonder, would they confront their own premise were a conservative Congress to pass a resolution indemnifying any citizen of the United States against prosecution under a state or municipal gun control law (Article VI, second paragraph)? Or perhaps a limitation-of-jurisdiction bill that removes abortion from the jurisdiction of the federal courts (Article III, Section 2, second paragraph)?
The left would absolutely go nuts as you well know. Suppose a Conservative Congress passed a law saying all people HAD to buy a firearm and keep it in their homes and had to show proof to the IRS. If they can say we all MUST buy health insurance then what would stop them from making us buy a firearm or a car or any other product because it has some effect on commerce?
Any Congress can justify anything (Constitutional or not) under the guise of commerce or some other “for the good of the kids” BS.
Article one, section eight has been prostituted by BOTH sides in the effort to “get stuff done”- both sides have long chafed under the relative slowness that the Constitution demands of the legislative branch, in particular- but also the restrictions on the Executive branch- that is the reason for “Executive Orders”, which are NOT the same as legislative laws enacted by Congress.
SCOTUS has in the past been complicit in the “easing” of the burden of proof that Article one, Section eight should require, therefore they are part of the problem we now face in the progressive’s dismantling of the legislative branch, and soon, coming to a court near you, the Judicial branch as well.
What we need is for the States to rise up and demand a Constitutional convention in order to narrow the loopholes in the Constitution, such as Article one, Section eight, and we should also repeal both the fourteenth and seventeenth amendments.
Neither amendment helps our Republic, but both do much harm, simply by twisting the intent of the Constitution.
It is the “Progressives” who refuse to recognize or honor the Constitution- they see this document as an impediment to their agenda, which is to rule the rest of us “lesser intellects”- and they do not like the necessary glacial pace that the Constitution calls for- hence you get all these “Executive Orders”, as if Hussein can rule by royal fiat. He sure would like to, and the Congress has not helped any by rolling over and showing its collective belly, the better to curry favor.
They forget, when they roll over, it is easier for Hussein to castrate them, and that is what he has been doing.
Congress is almost irrelevent now.