Who Attacks Our Bill of Rights--Who Defends Them
Posted by Zenphamy 8 years, 11 months ago to Government
The link I offer in this discussion is for the decision released by the US 2nd Circuit on Wednesday determining that the NSA 'Bulk Collection of Telephone Meta Data' is illegal by the justifications offered by the President and the DoJ: " In a sweeping decision out of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, ACLU v. Clapper, the federal court has ruled the National Security Agency’s (NSA) bulk data collection program, which sweeps up millions of Americans’ phone records without a warrant, to be illegal." I've just finished reading the entire 97 pages of the decision. I often do this tedious task on issues that interest me as well as many of the case filings leading up to the decision and it's a revealing effort to undertake, particularly in attempting to understand how and why our legal system and our government operates the way it does. This is not an exercise I recommend for a relaxing evenings read by the firelight. These cases are not easy to read, nor understand, and finding and reading the cites which then leads to further cites will drive you up a tree -- not to mention digging into their procedures and rules, logic and word definitions.
What this case, as so many others in the past, brings to mind, besides the facts and reasonings revealed in the documents and arguments, is the question I ask of all of you in the heading to this post:
Who Attacks Our Bill of Rights--Who Defends Them -- and I might add, Where Do We Find Justice?
In the last few years, I've read literally hundreds of case decisions that affect my individual and natural rights, as discussed in the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and by Ayn Rand throughout her writings. And in nearly everyone of those cases, those arguing for a literal and liberal interpretation and application of those rights are individuals and organizations outside of government--never government. The government represented by the Solicitor General of the United States or the Dept. of Justice, or the Attorney General of a State, always take the position that the right doesn't exist, or needs to be ignored in a particular case, or the interpretation of the right is different than what you think it means, or the right doesn't apply, or the individual bringing the case lacks standing, or that if the right does exist it should be limited in pursuance of a necessary operation, or good by the state or Federal government.
Those men and women arguing against individual rights all have had to pass their state bar, the Federal bar, and the Supreme Court bar, or in the case of the federal to have been specifically accepted. These aren't just your everyday run of the mill divorce, personal injury, cooperate and contracts, tax, prosecuting, or defense lawyers. For the most part, these people are the cream of the crop that have studied long and hard to reach this point in their careers and their compensations and their future careers. And while I fully understand the adversarial basis of our court systems, everyone of these attorneys have studied the Founding Documents and as a requirement of their office, have sworn an Oath to uphold and defend the Constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic.
Yet while they're in court representing their government, they're given a pass on that Oath part and are actually encouraged by their ruling attorneys' doctrine (and threatened with the most dire attorney's punishment of disbarment if they fail), to vigorously defend and attack, against the individual's attempt to claim and defend his individual rights. Further, in reading the writings of several of these attorneys in cases and in other writings, they don't even personally believe much if not at least some of what they're arguing, and some even bemoan the rulings and decisions that they win, yet are still proud of their work.
Why, you may ask, is it our government with all of its tremendous financial and manpower might that attacks us at every step in cases such as these in court, while we are limited to the picayune resources available to us, unless we're able to interest the ACLU, go pro se, or qualify as a pauper from prison or on death row? Particularly when it comes to an issue of individual rights protection which is the sole purpose of the government as spelled out in the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Oath all governmental officials take.
Indeed, Why You May Ask! Why are we named as enemies of the state, why do the police lie, brutalize, and kill us, why are we thrown in jails and prisons at inordinate numbers, why do bureaucracies and regulators seem to fight us at every breath, why do our legislators agree to all of this? WHY??? WHO Defends our Rights???
What this case, as so many others in the past, brings to mind, besides the facts and reasonings revealed in the documents and arguments, is the question I ask of all of you in the heading to this post:
Who Attacks Our Bill of Rights--Who Defends Them -- and I might add, Where Do We Find Justice?
In the last few years, I've read literally hundreds of case decisions that affect my individual and natural rights, as discussed in the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and by Ayn Rand throughout her writings. And in nearly everyone of those cases, those arguing for a literal and liberal interpretation and application of those rights are individuals and organizations outside of government--never government. The government represented by the Solicitor General of the United States or the Dept. of Justice, or the Attorney General of a State, always take the position that the right doesn't exist, or needs to be ignored in a particular case, or the interpretation of the right is different than what you think it means, or the right doesn't apply, or the individual bringing the case lacks standing, or that if the right does exist it should be limited in pursuance of a necessary operation, or good by the state or Federal government.
Those men and women arguing against individual rights all have had to pass their state bar, the Federal bar, and the Supreme Court bar, or in the case of the federal to have been specifically accepted. These aren't just your everyday run of the mill divorce, personal injury, cooperate and contracts, tax, prosecuting, or defense lawyers. For the most part, these people are the cream of the crop that have studied long and hard to reach this point in their careers and their compensations and their future careers. And while I fully understand the adversarial basis of our court systems, everyone of these attorneys have studied the Founding Documents and as a requirement of their office, have sworn an Oath to uphold and defend the Constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic.
Yet while they're in court representing their government, they're given a pass on that Oath part and are actually encouraged by their ruling attorneys' doctrine (and threatened with the most dire attorney's punishment of disbarment if they fail), to vigorously defend and attack, against the individual's attempt to claim and defend his individual rights. Further, in reading the writings of several of these attorneys in cases and in other writings, they don't even personally believe much if not at least some of what they're arguing, and some even bemoan the rulings and decisions that they win, yet are still proud of their work.
Why, you may ask, is it our government with all of its tremendous financial and manpower might that attacks us at every step in cases such as these in court, while we are limited to the picayune resources available to us, unless we're able to interest the ACLU, go pro se, or qualify as a pauper from prison or on death row? Particularly when it comes to an issue of individual rights protection which is the sole purpose of the government as spelled out in the Declaration, the Constitution, and the Oath all governmental officials take.
Indeed, Why You May Ask! Why are we named as enemies of the state, why do the police lie, brutalize, and kill us, why are we thrown in jails and prisons at inordinate numbers, why do bureaucracies and regulators seem to fight us at every breath, why do our legislators agree to all of this? WHY??? WHO Defends our Rights???
Look about anywhere--
ISIS
Putin
Our own largely corrupt more than equal know-it-all elite betters.
As soon as the federal government became better armed than the average person -- which happened around 1880-1900 -- freedom became doomed. Or at least it became inevitable that we'd someday have to fight another civil war to get it back.
Justice can be found at the business end of 100 million privately owned rifles, and no where else in the USSA.
But John Adams and his Alien and Sedition Act, imprisoning newspaper publishers that were only released when Jefferson was elected--what terrible acts. I've never been able to fully understand how Jefferson and Adams were able to reconcile. I've read some of the letters back and forth between the two. One would think that instead, they would despise each other.
I am surprised that you mentioned Burr as a hero, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burr_conspi.... Do you know something that the rest of us do not about this?
I doubt that I know as much as some about the Burr Conspiracy and resulting Treason trial, but they're all terrific stories
I'm not convinced that many of the people had even a hint about how these systems were set up to operate.
Thanks for the wonderful article. These lawyers are not the cream of the crop, unless you consider political pull the criteria. The Federal and Supreme court trial bar does not truly indicate and special training or skills. Finally, I took two semesters of Constitutional law in law school and in that whole time we barely glanced at the Constitution and never looked at the Declaration - sad but true.
I guess that means it is the nature of the beast. The compromises in the constitution were vulnerabilities that allowed the erosion. The freedom and favorable conditions and overall attitude allowed people to take for granted the Constitution and the ideas that allowed/created those conditions.
Another note relating more directly to (one of) your previous question; Do you think religion may be the leading cause of the erosion? The philosophy leading to the failure? It is the most direct path to the justification of rights violating legislation and, possibly, the hardest to defend against. In the absence of a defined, and proven morality outside of religion, it would have been impossible to defend against. And with that door open, when rights violating laws are acceptable under "certain circumstances", all we are left to do is argue over said circumstances.
Where do you find the 'cream of the crop'? Is the Fed trial bar just the procedures and rules of the courts?
Are there any classes or education offered in the philosophies of the Constitution and Declaration, or is it just left up to the students to form their own opinions, or is it just ignored?
And finally, what philosophy of law or government leads to the system we've evolved to?
It is not in the Fed bar. Like many areas you have to evaluate attorneys for yourself and decide if you want Peter Keating or Howard Roark.
To the best of my knowledge there are no formal classes in the law school on the philosophy of the constitution/Declaration and if there were they would be about tearing them down.
I think utilitarianism/pragmatism are what got us here. Most Americans will not accept outright Marxism or Kant, but with utilitarianism you can get there slowly.
To the best of my knowledge formal legal education does not discuss the philosophy of the Constitution or Declaration and if they do it is about tearing it down.
I would say the fundamental driver what the US has become is utilitarianism/pragmatism. People in the US are not true believers in a social utopia, but they can be brought there inch by inch.
I become more and more convinced that we can never realize an individual rights centered society and government. I'm depressing myself.
Thanks for the responses.
New rule it's ok to bug any conversation starting, passing through or entering our borders without the need for a signed court order. That would include those retransmitted by satellites.
That was added to supplement the existing since 1933 rules on broadcast transmissions.
And yes Virginia Cell Radio Phones are not not telephones once they jump from cell tower cell tower you have no rights of privacy.
As for the Constitution it was I believe replaced with the Patriot Act. The left has such a way with words.
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
- John Adams
Personal integrity is the bridle.