So, the Dread Dormomoo and I were discussing a conversation with a callow yout' who wishes to school me on Things Political, and herself brought up the Constitution, which document figures quite small in the young person's thinking. "The Constitution", sez she "is what CONSTITUTES the Nation. If you do not follow the Constitution, then you no longer have the same Nation."
This is a pellucid truth: if you attempt to play Monopoly with the rules of Parcheesi, well, you would have a damnably boring game; neither would you be playing Monopoly. It would be neither fish, nor fowl, nor Good Red Herring, and this is what faces the YouEssofAY here in the early Twenty-First Century. We are playing the Game badly, and Not By the Rules. The young'un sees America as it is now, bloated with barren bureaucracies, enslaving the very people it purports to help with its small largesse, sees and, Behold, It Is Very Good. But most today do not see the USA through the eyes of the past, through the dim mirror of history, through the Constitution. It is as Bush the W proclaimed it: "that damned piece of paper", the one we were all supposed to read, but instead read the history-book descriptions. Cliff's Notes Civics. And how foolish to even consider governing such a changed world of Now by so foreign and ancient a scrap of parchment. How silly to consider a two-century old blueprint a chart for navigating our Ship of State. Almost as ridiculous as using "thou shalts" and "thou shalt nots" as lodestones for behavioral guidance.
The Constitution defines what we are - and what we are not to be - as a nation. If we are to be the United States of America, then we MUST play by those rules. If we don't, then we aren't.
5 comments:
I congratulate you and the Dread Dormomoo on finding a callow youth who was actually in a mood to discuss (as opposed to argue or pronounce or stipulate or demand). I would've liked to have met such a rare creature.
The beauty of the Constitution (at least to me) is that it does not micromanage but, rather, provides the general concepts for the maintenance of the American society. Rather like a sonnet: it provides an overall framework while, at the same time, allows some "wiggle room" to deal with circumstances. If I have a complaint it's in my feeling that amendments are far too easily attached. Everything we need has already been established but, unfortunately, some feel it is their mission in life to gild the lily. I would rather maintain the Constitution as an inviolable document than leave openings for things such as anti-Federalism (and the chimera of States' Rights) to squeeze in and grow like a tumor. The French damn near came close to what we achieved with their Declaration Of The Rights Of Man And Of The Citizen, but unfortunately its value was overshadowed and almost lost in the madness of the Revolution.
It is the mandate of the Constitution to apply to all citizens which I feel is responsible for its longevity as a blueprint for government, and the original form has managed to work quite well so far.
In other words: if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Actually, the person was holding forth on FaceBook.
Have I said lately how much I hate FB?
Chimera of States' Rights? You ain't one a' them "Saint Abe" critters, are ye?
Biggest problem with the French Revolution was its lack of the "christian consensus" as Francis Schaeffer termed it. The self-governable were able to be governed in the US, as they had an understanding of the Biblical milieu. Not everone was Christian by any stretch, but biblical morality and world-view permeated the culture of the Colonies. The French self-consciously denied and ignored the Biblical template, and with the governor removed from their revolutionary motor, plunged into an abyss of violence and amorality.
And yess, no need to tinker with ours.
I'm not really a "Saint Abe" sort of person, but the States Rights people give me hives.
"When you throw away the rule book, the game is over." - Vince Lombardi
We've been throwing away the rules for a long time, and if people have no self-discipline, they cannot be self-governing.
Point exactly, G-I-T-B!
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