Bataan Death March Survivor Dies

[BaalChatzaf]

God-given, self-evident rights? One of the supposedly self-evident rights that the Constitution upheld was for slave owners to to be able to haul their runaway Africans back to the plantation without Yankee abolitionists interfering.

But perhaps "decent" slaves had no complaints.

OK we got it. As you well know, certain issues that made there way into the document were "compromises."

Like the one (now no longer in effect) one negro slave = 3/5 person

[Selene]

God-given, self-evident rights? One of the supposedly self-evident rights that the Constitution upheld was for slave owners to to be able to haul their runaway Africans back to the plantation without Yankee abolitionists interfering.

But perhaps "decent" slaves had no complaints.

OK we got it. As you well know, certain issues that made there way into the document were "compromises."

Like the one (now no longer in effect) one negro slave = 3/5 person

Yes Bob, just like that one.

A...

[Francisco Ferrer]

As you well know, certain issues that made there way into the document were "compromises."

"There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil."

--John Galt

[Brant Gaede]

As you well know, certain issues that made there way into the document were "compromises."

"There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil."

--John Galt

As you well know, certain issues that made there way into the document were "compromises."

"There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil."

--John Galt

Galt's wrong.

--Brant

that's why we missed out on General Thrmonuclear War by compromising with Korea, Vietnam and the Cold War--true, two of the three were "evil," but WTF?

is this that old "excluded middle" fallacy?

the old "We don't negtiate with terrorists" public consumption crap from Galt Rand to you: if you think of her as head of the Objectivist Government and think of her thinking of you as a good Objectivist citizen, she's easier to figure out--that's some of the time, not all of the time

[moralist]

My Post #47 refutes your claim in Post #47 that Adams's belief that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" is true today.

No it doesn't. The fat bloated corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy you see today only exists because people aren't moral.

Greg

[Francisco Ferrer]

"There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil."

--John Galt

Galt's wrong.

--Brant

that's why we missed out on General Thrmonuclear War by compromising with Korea, Vietnam and the Cold War--true, two of the three were "evil," but WTF?

is this that old "excluded middle" fallacy?

the old "We don't negtiate with terrorists" public consumption crap from Galt Rand to you

In the context of forcing free men to do the bidding of dealers in human chattel, Galt's words ring true. The abolitionists were right, the slaveholders were wrong, and the compromise that forced non-slave states to return men to their bondage was evil. There was no Fugitive Slave Clause under the Articles of Confederation.

[Francisco Ferrer]

My Post #47 refutes your claim in Post #47 that Adams's belief that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" is true today.

No it doesn't. The fat bloated corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy you see today only exists because people aren't moral.

Greg

No one has made any statements in this thread about the causes of "corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy." The issue is your claim that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" and such a condition holds true today.

I am an atheist. I do not pray and I do not wish to be in a group that is led in prayer--most emphatically not on a daily basis. As a child, due to compulsory attendance laws, I was forced to be a party to prayer in schools. The Supreme Court's 1962 Engel v. Vitale decision held that prayer as an activity for public school children violated the Constitution's Establishment Clause.

Wrote Mr. Justice Black for the majority: "We think that, by using its public school system to encourage recitation of the Regents' prayer, the State of New York has adopted a practice wholly inconsistent with the Establishment Clause."

This decision ended organized prayers in my school.

Thus, 136 years after Adams's death, the Constitution was used to defend the rights of a non-religious person (me).

In order to prove the idea that "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people" and that such a condition remains true, you would have to prove that

a) I was actually a religious person in 1962, or

b) The Constitution was not invoked in the Engel v. Vitale decision.

Good luck with that.

Also, good luck with proving that the Constitution's requirement that slaves be returned was designed for moral people.

[Brant Gaede]

My Post #47 refutes your claim in Post #47 that Adams's belief that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" is true today.

No it doesn't. The fat bloated corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy you see today only exists because people aren't moral.

Greg

No one has made any statements in this thread about the causes of "corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy." The issue is your claim that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" and such a condition holds true today.

I am an atheist. I do not pray and I do not wish to be in a group that is led in prayer--most emphatically not on a daily basis. As a child, due to compulsory attendance laws, I was forced to be a party to prayer in schools. The Supreme Court's 1962 Engel v. Vitale decision held that prayer as an activity for public school children violated the Constitution's Establishment Clause.

Wrote Mr. Justice Black for the majority: "We think that, by using its public school system to encourage recitation of the Regents' prayer, the State of New York has adopted a practice wholly inconsistent with the Establishment Clause."

This decision ended organized prayers in my school.

Thus, 136 years after Adams's death, the Constitution was used to defend the rights of a non-religious person (me).

In order to prove the idea that "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people" and that such a condition remains true, you would have to prove that

a) I was actually a religious person in 1962, or

b) The Constitution was not invoked in the Engel v. Vitale decision.

Good luck with that.

Also, good luck with proving that the Constitution's requirement that slaves be returned was designed for moral people.

Your parents sent you to those schools. Isn't the issue with public schooling not "the establishment of a religion"? Why didn't the SCOTUS abolish public schooling also which is its own kind of religion--a state religion?

I think "moralist" is slightly up on you here, though open to serious criticism about whom the Constitution was made for. Americans do have public education because they want it. If Americans wanted prayers in schools they'd have put up a Constitutional Amendment by now--but there was never a peep about that as I recall. The Court really didn't suffer much blowback on that one.

I do think "thoroughly corrupt" or "rotten" is too emcompassing much. Stupid-ignorant and greatly brain-dead has to fit in there someplace.

--Brant

[Backlighting]

The topic of this thread was Bataan Death March Survivor Dies.

It has become, like other threads, a minestrone soup instead.

-J

[Brant Gaede]

Nature of the beast.

--Brant

[Selene]

Wrote Mr. Justice Black for the majority: "We think that, by using its public school system to encourage recitation of the Regents' prayer, the State of New York has adopted a practice wholly inconsistent with the Establishment Clause."

The Supreme Court's 1962 Engel v. Vitale decision held that prayer as an activity for public school children violated the Constitution's Establishment Clause.

Would that be the Mr. Justice Black that was an anti Catholic bigot and a KKK member?

Just wondering ...

[Reidy]

Black was part of a 6-1 majority, so his personal opinions don't figure seriously.

[Brant Gaede]

My Father told me about this story decades ago. It seems back then it was common and expected for politicians in the South to be Klan members.

FDR had just had Black put on the Court with Senate confirmation. Black went on the radio and FDR went on a train so he wouldn't have to listen to him or comment on what he hadn't heard.

"Yeah, I was a member of the Klan." (Southern accent.)

So the joke went that on the train FDR kept hearing, "Clackity clack! Hugo Black! Clackity clack! Hugo Black!"

--Brant

[Selene]

Black was part of a 6-1 majority, so his personal opinions don't figure seriously.

That was not the point of the grand cover-up of his background.

Secondly, my belief is that they improperly interpreted the "establishment clause" in that decision.

A...

[Backlighting]

Understood... but not an fan of it.

[Francisco Ferrer]

Your parents sent you to those schools.

Under penalty of law.

Isn't the issue with public schooling not "the establishment of a religion"? Why didn't the SCOTUS abolish public schooling also which is its own kind of religion--a state religion?

I agree. Statist dogmas remained in public education even after the Little Lord Jesus was booted out of the curriculum. (The socialist-penned "Pledge of Allegiance," which I have not uttered since high school, is a form of prayer to the gods in the District of Columbia.)

However, if my goal is to counter Moralist's claim that "The American system of government was designed to work only for decent people" or that "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people" and that such a system holds true today, all I have to do is show that individuals who are either non-religious or immoral or both have controlled or benefited from government power in America.

I do not know how thoroughly non-religious the plaintiffs in Engel v. Vitale were (did they refuse to engage in American Flag idolatry?), but I can tell you the closeted atheist in me derived considerable relief from not being made to bow my head to that imaginary being "Our Father" each morning.

For another example, we have to go no further than the saintly John Adams himself, who signed into law and enthusiastically enforced the Sedition Act which restricted speech critical of the federal government.

Under that Act, if on the books today, most of the words on http://www.objectivistliving.com/ would be censored.

I suppose people who were truly "decent" (i.e. kept their mouths shut) didn't have to worry about prison time.

[Francisco Ferrer]

Would that be the Mr. Justice Black that was an anti Catholic bigot and a KKK member?

Yes, you can use Google's picture search and find photos of Black standing out among the other high court members because of his white robe.

[moralist]

My Post #47 refutes your claim in Post #47 that Adams's belief that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" is true today.

No it doesn't. The fat bloated corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy you see today only exists because people aren't moral.

Greg

No one has made any statements in this thread about the causes of "corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy."

I have.

The issue is your claim that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" and such a condition holds true today.

Yes it is.

The unconstitutional immorality of government today is directly linked to the immorality of the populace. People have created the immoral government they deserve in their own immoral image.

Greg

[Francisco Ferrer]

My Post #47 refutes your claim in Post #47 that Adams's belief that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" is true today.

No it doesn't. The fat bloated corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy you see today only exists because people aren't moral.

Greg

No one has made any statements in this thread about the causes of "corrupt unconstitutional government bureaucracy."

I have.

The issue is your claim that the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people" and such a condition holds true today.

Yes it is.

The unconstitutional immorality of government today is directly linked to the immorality of the populace. People have created the immoral government they deserve in their own immoral image.

Greg

Answer the question: If the Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people," then why did it explicitly protect and preserve slavery through the Fugitive Slave Clause?

Slave-holding members of the Constitutional Convention

1. Richard Bassett (DE)
2. Jacob Broom (DE)
3. John Dickinson (DE)
4. George Read (DE)
5. William Houstoun (GA)
6. William Few (GA)
7. William Samuel Johnson (CT)
8. Daniel Carroll (MD)
9. Luther Martin (MD)
10. John Francis Mercer (MD)
11. Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer (MD)
12. William Livingston (NJ)
13. William Blount (NC)
14. William Richardson Davie (NC)
15. Alexander Martin (NC)
16. Richard Dobbs Spaight (NC)
17. Pierce Butler (SC)
18. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney (SC)
19. Charles Pinckney (SC)
20. John Rutledge (SC)
21. John Blair (VA)
22. James Madison (VA)
23. George Mason (VA)
24. Edmund Randolph (VA)
25. George Washington (VA)
26. George Wythe (VA)
27. Robert Morris (PA)

[Brant Gaede]

But it was good for slaves to be slaves. It was moral to provide them jobs and homes.

--Brant

sorta like today--just needs a little more ramp up

[Selene]

Would that be the Mr. Justice Black that was an anti Catholic bigot and a KKK member?

Yes, you can use Google's picture search and find photos of Black standing out among the other high court members because of his white robe.

Cute response and evasive.

I have admired some of Black's opinions, Engel v. Vitale was not one of them.

If you did not want to pray at least have the balls to stand up and not pray, or, refuse to even stand up.

You made no declaration of your position.

I did. I was supported by my parents and I was willing to take whatever "penalty" the local school system intended to hand out.

Wound up that the school acted as if nothing happened.

Nothing did except folks who wanted to stand and pray stood and prayed. Folks who did not, did not.

A...

[Francisco Ferrer]

Would that be the Mr. Justice Black that was an anti Catholic bigot and a KKK member?

Yes, you can use Google's picture search and find photos of Black standing out among the other high court members because of his white robe.

Cute response and evasive.

I have admired some of Black's opinions, Engel v. Vitale was not one of them.

If you did not want to pray at least have the balls to stand up and not pray, or, refuse to even stand up.

You made no declaration of your position.

I did. I was supported by my parents and I was willing to take whatever "penalty" the local school system intended to hand out.

Wound up that the school acted as if nothing happened.

Nothing did except folks who wanted to stand and pray stood and prayed. Folks who did not, did not.

A...

Evade the fact that Black once was a Klansman? Hardly. Perhaps if more legal scholars examined Black's early political associations they'd see just what's wrong with Engel v. Vitale. (That's why I never trusted former liberal Ronald Reagan. Once wrong, forever wrong.)

Yes, shamefully I did not stand up for myself in elementary school. If I had, doubtlessly that the local school board, fundamentalist Protestants all, would have the seen inescapable logic of my objection and ended school prayer on the spot. I did not take the road less traveled by and that has made all the difference.

Much later in life I was delighted to see the Ten Commandments removed from the place where I have to do legal business from time to time. "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." Phooey. Good riddance.

[Selene]

Would that be the Mr. Justice Black that was an anti Catholic bigot and a KKK member?

Yes, you can use Google's picture search and find photos of Black standing out among the other high court members because of his white robe.

Cute response and evasive.

I have admired some of Black's opinions, Engel v. Vitale was not one of them.

If you did not want to pray at least have the balls to stand up and not pray, or, refuse to even stand up.

You made no declaration of your position.

I did. I was supported by my parents and I was willing to take whatever "penalty" the local school system intended to hand out.

Wound up that the school acted as if nothing happened.

Nothing did except folks who wanted to stand and pray stood and prayed. Folks who did not, did not.

A...

Perhaps if more legal scholars examined Black's early political associations they'd see just what's wrong with Engel v. Vitale. (That's why I never trusted former liberal Ronald Reagan. Once wrong, forever wrong.)

Yes, shamefully I did not stand up for myself in elementary school. If I had, doubtlessly that the local school board, fundamentalist Protestants all, would have the seen inescapable logic of my objection and ended school prayer on the spot. I did not take the road less traveled by and that has made all the difference.

Agreed as to the legal scholars. However, the press has been moving to cover marxist's since the early 1920's.

The only "progression" has been in the press becoming "progressively" complicit in it's agenda.

Do not agree with your broad brush stroke of "once wrong, forever wrong." I find that to be an immature position.

I also would not describe your passivity as "shameful."

A...

[moralist]

Do not agree with your broad brush stroke of "once wrong, forever wrong." I find that to be an immature position.

Spot on, Adam. Frank's head is stuck up his past. For him there is still slavery. There was no Civil War. And there have never been any Amendments to the Constitution. People who live in the past are failures at properly dealing with the present.

Wisely included within the Constitution are self correcting mechanisms. Now whether those mechanisms are used for good or for evil purposes is totally dependant on the morality of the nation. The size of the US government today is a living tribute to peoples' utter failure to govern themselves. You can't even blame it for that, because government is only responding to a nation of fukups who are demanding it to make someone else to pay their bills.

Greg

[Francisco Ferrer]

Do not agree with your broad brush stroke of "once wrong, forever wrong." I find that to be an immature position.

Spot on, Adam. Frank's head is stuck up his past. For him there is still slavery. There was no Civil War. And there have never been any Amendments to the Constitution. People who live in the past are failures at properly dealing with the present.

Wisely included within the Constitution are self correcting mechanisms. Now whether those mechanisms are used for good or for evil purposes is totally dependant on the morality of the nation. The size of the US government today is a living tribute to peoples' utter failure to govern themselves. You can't even blame it for that, because government is only responding to a nation of fukups who are demanding it to make someone else to pay their bills.

Greg

Very well, let's take a look at one of those amendments. If the original Constitution was "made only for a moral and religious people," why was it necessary to have a Thirteenth Amendment? Weren't all the "moral and religious people" being treated as decently as they deserved by the Constitution that was made for them and for them only?

"The size of the US government today is a living tribute to peoples' utter failure to govern themselves," you say. Now if it is true, as you have often claimed, that people get the government they deserve, then the size of the government today must be exactly right. If it were any smaller, it could not perform its function of serving up just deserts, of which you apparently approve.

Furthermore, since you "have no complaints about how the government treats" you, then government must be close to perfect.