Constitutional powers the states have, and the feds do not
The Constitution enumerates the power of the federal government—but are there authoritative lists of those powers reserved to the states with which the federal government may not interfere? Yes—many. During the period 1787-1790, while the public was debating whether to adopt the Constitution, the document’s opponents (“Anti-Federalists”) argued that the Constitution would grant the federal […]
The importance of being “natural born”
The Constitution’s Framers thought deeply about the qualifications for federal office. Those qualifications are in the Constitution for very good reasons. Despite some of the snarky commentary you hear on the subject, it has been entirely appropriate to insist that Barack Obama—or any other candidate for federal office—provide proof that he meets the constitutional requirements […]
Control of the state courts—the latest federal takeover target?
[T]his bill . . . is an attack on state courts and on the civil jury system itself.
Is health insurance “Commerce among the States?”
Behind the current constitutional debates over ObamaCare, there is an assumption that Congress has power to regulate health insurance as “Commerce among the States.” However, in various decisions over 150 years, the Supreme Court ruled that “insurance” was not within the Constitution’s definition of “Commerce.” Only a single aberrant Supreme Court case says it is. […]
Obama’s Libyan Operations are Unconstitutional
You can sympathize with the humanitarian motives of our Libyan intervention while still doubting its constitutionality. The Constitution prescribes the rules about how the United States is to enter a war, and the Obama administration has violated those rules. The administration argues that the hostilities, because limited, do not rise to the level of “war,” […]
The Constitution and Property Rights
It is sometimes suggested that the Founders did not consider property rights important because the term “property” was mentioned only once in the Constitution. The truth is that the Founders were concerned about a range of human values, but property rights were high on their list. Their Constitution and Bill of Rights protected property in […]
Corrective Constitutional Amendments?
“A state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation. Without such means it might even risque the loss of that part of the constitution which it wished most religiously to preserve.” – Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), in 2 Select Works of Edmund Burke 108 […]
The U.S. Budget Situation is Worse than Even You Imagined
Last week, Senator John Kerry (D.-Mass) was unhappy with a Republican plan to cut as much as $61 billion out of the federal budget. “I think it’s an ideological, extremist, reckless statement,” Kerry said of the plan. I hadn’t kept up on all the numbers recently, so I took a look at President Obama’s 2012 […]
Supreme Court’s New First Amendment Decision Unrelated to the First Amendment
Commentators and journalists sometimes describe the current U.S. Supreme Court as “conservative.” But that’s not true if your definition of a conservative justice is a traditional or “originalist” jurist—that is, one who applies the Constitution as the American people understood it when they adopted it. Consider, for example, the Court’s latest First Amendment case. The […]
New paper summarizes rules for amending the Constitution
Our sister institution, The Goldwater Institute in Phoenix, Arizona has just published my paper, Amending the Constitution by Convention: Practical Guidance for Citizens and Policymakers. Using my prior research and new findings, it summarizes the rules you should use in drafting Article V applications, answering objections, heading off congressional interference, and so forth. As I’ve […]
Amendments Convention: Answering Those Not-So-Tough Questions
Are you a state lawmaker or reform advocate challenged to answer “tough questions” about a Convention for Proposing Amendments? If so, here are some answers. Recently I traveled to Indianapolis to testify before the Indiana legislature. While there, I learned that opponents of an amendments convention are circulating questions about a convention, apparently designed to […]
How Can Congress Spend All that Money? – Part II
In my last post, I explained that Congress obtains authority to spend money from its enumerated powers. All of those powers inherently require some expenditures—at least to buy the pen and ink needed to write the laws. Some powers, such as the power to “maintain a Navy” (Art. I, Sec. 8, cl. 13) require expenditure […]
