Wars of choice, a plethora of changing tariffs and sanctions on countries across the world, and a historically high number of executive orders characterize the first year of Donald Trump’s second presidential term. And all this has been accomplished by the executive branch with minimal pushback from the legislative branch.
Tag: Constitution
United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) cops — often masked, out of uniform, and intent on quickly escalating the force they initiate while yelling out orders and curses — have been demonstrating over the past few months the danger of police directed to menace and suppress instead of to serve and protect.
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Gun Rights Are People’s Rights
“Take the guns first; go through due process second,” recommended Donald Trump in a meeting with Congress members during his first term as president. Through this comment offered in support of imposing rights-trampling “red flag” laws to deprive people of their guns, Trump displayed disdain for the right to bear arms and the right to due process, both protected in the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution.
The Eighth Amendment of the Bill of Rights addresses the national government’s power in regard to bail. As with many other provisions in this set of the first ten amendments to the Constitution, the declaration regarding bail is one of limitation on the national government’s power rather than a grant of power. “Excessive bail shall not be required,” the amendment commands.
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The Ten Seconds Census
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is in the news for claiming it has eliminated several Census Bureau surveys and that it will be reviewing others in turn. That may do some good. But how about the US government takes a much bigger step and limits the Census Bureau to conducting the one and only census task provided for in the United States Constitution — a once every ten years census that would take about ten seconds for each person in America to answer?
The tariffs President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday are massive in size and scope, Indeed, some early analysis indicates Trump has raised the United States average tariff rate to higher than did the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 that contributed to the American people’s suffering in the Great Depression. A big difference, though, is that Trump on his own was able to impose his sweeping tariffs this week, while the 1930 tariffs were imposed via legislation approved by votes and in the United States House of Representatives and Senate and then signed into law by President Herbert Hoover.
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Bring Back Constitutional Money
The United States Constitution specifies that gold and silver are money. “No State shall … make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts,” declares the Constitution. Further, one of the enumerated powers the Constitution lists for the US Congress is the power to “coin Money” (not print money) and “regulate the Value thereof.” Indeed, coining money containing gold and silver was ordered by the new US Congress via the Coinage Act of 1792. Lower value coins such as pennies and half pennies containing copper also circulated.
Most members of the United Sates Congress repeatedly and, it seems, without a second thought vote for legislation that violates the restraints imposed by the US Constitution. It has been this way for many years. That situation has helped a government of limited, enumerated powers become a behemoth.
In his March 1 State of the Union speech, President Joe Biden threatened, in a comment directed to people he termed “Russian oligarchs,” that “we are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts your luxury apartments your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains.” Since then, US government agents have been doing just that, seizing Russians’ property wherever it can be found.
On Monday, Georgia Governor Brian P. Kemp and Lieutenant Governor Geoff Duncan issued a joint statement in which they rejected a request from some state senators for the calling of a special session of the state legislature for the purpose of the choosing presidential electors.