Due to mounting college homework and the ever present summer vacation season, I may not be writing for a little while, but hopefully won’t be in a non-writing position for very long. Every once in awhile my love of politics kind of dives, mostly due to liberal backstabbing and a need to refocus on school work. To those who may come, I recommend clicking on some of my favorite links on the page, they are good reading and may change your mind even more than I have. Thanks for visiting and do come again.
By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
WASHINGTON — With Republicans facing a potential backlash at the polls in November, a renewed national debate over gay marriage can only boost the morale of the party’s religious conservative base, which for a variety of reasons is near mutiny, say sources in the movement.
“It could be an issue that may not necessarily bring them back, but it will bring them out, which is the key thing for the fall elections,” said Bill Greene, head of RightMarch.com, an Atlanta-based conservative activist organization.
He described the Republicans’ conservative base as “pretty ticked off” over the way GOP senators have handled illegal immigration reform, the budget and President Bush’s judicial nominations, many of whom are still stalled in the Senate. But Greene said a constitutional amendment that would ban gay marriage “may be one prong of a multifaceted attempt at re-energizing the base.”
On May 19, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the Federal Marriage Amendment. And the Associated Press reported Thursday that Bush will lend support to the amendment in an announcement Monday.
Link
As much as I agree with most Americans that the ultimate definition of marriage should be a union between a man and a woman only, a constitutional amendment is not needed to regulate an issue which I believe, clearly lies with the states.
Republican leadership and the Bush Administration, attempting to pass a constitutional amendment defining marriage, has turned the constitution into a catalyst for social change, something I fear could be harmful to our republic in the long run. I believe the proper place for such social change, like the definition of marriage, lies squarely on the shoulders of the states or the people. The attempt to socialize the constitution, in my opinion, is a cheap trick designed to win votes in the November election, a short term priority for the Republican Party. Passing an amendment to the constitution and changing the basis of our laws altogether is a permanent action, an action that will forever change legislation and hamper the struggle to renew states rights.
Using the constitution as a catalyst for social change cheapens the respect it deserves and shows that officials in our federal government have no respect for a once thriving federalism, but only care about the power of the central government in Washington.
By Charles Hurt
The long-fought Senate immigration bill that opponents say grants amnesty to 10 million illegal aliens is unconstitutional and appears headed for certain demise, Senate Republicans now say.
A key feature of the Senate bill is that it would make illegals pay back taxes before applying for citizenship, a requirement that supporters say will raise billions of dollars in the next decade.
There’s just one problem: The U.S. Constitution specifically prohibits revenue-raising legislation from originating in the Senate.
“All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives,” according to the “origination clause” in Article I, Section 7.
Republicans — including the bill’s supporters — say this will kill the bill, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist says he’s offered a simple solution. He wants to attach the immigration bill to a tax bill that has already passed the House. It would then proceed as planned to a “conference committee,” where negotiators from the House and Senate hammer out differences between the two chambers’ immigration bills.
“This is a procedural issue that we could overcome,” said Carolyn Weyforth, spokeswoman for Mr. Frist.
But Minority Leader Harry Reid won’t go along with that fix. His office said yesterday that the concerns raised by Mr. Frist and House Republicans are “technical in nature” and can be ignored.
“If Republicans are serious about enacting comprehensive immigration reform, I’ve got a deal for them,” spokesman Jim Manley said. “All they have to do is nothing. Just let the House and Senate bills go to conference and let the conferees work their will.”
The bill as written, however, will never make it to conference, Republicans say. Under House rules, any member can introduce a “blue-slip resolution” to return the legislation to the Senate. And although there are plenty of House conservatives eager to kill the Senate bill any way they can, Hill staffers say it would likely be done based on “policy-blind constitutional issues.”
“If there is a blue-slip issue, it is not about policy,” said one House aide familiar with the matter. “It’s about procedure and the House’s prerogative to uphold the United States Constitution.”
Link
While most Americans agree that immigration reform is needed, the Senate bill raises serious issues about how much Congressional leadership favors following the U.S. Constitution, the basis of our republic.
Harry Reid may not think Article 1, Section 7 of the constitution is a big deal, but if the Senate leadership does not care about simple tax revenue rules in the constitution, how much more respect for the constitution could the leadership really have? The constitution is the basis of our republic, it is the base of our laws and our way of life. Even the simplest clause must be followed if we are to pass the freedom our constitution gives us to our grandchildren.
James Madison once said:
I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.
I believe Madison is right. Attaching a tax revenue amendment to the Senate bill is in my opinion, a gradual and silent encroachment into unlawful territory forbidden by our constitution. If the tax bill is allowed to stay in the bill as originally created, the Congress will not only have shown the American people the constitution means nothing, but will have denounced the American way of life and everything the founding fathers stood for. This usurpation of government power must not be tolerated. Republican Party leadership must seize this opportunity to uphold the constitutional principles our nation was founded on.