More Established

The New York Times is threatening the Constitution with today’s editorial. Regularly, the Constitution gets threatened by those who would extract an enhanced meaning into what is written in the pages of the document. They do this according to what they see and understand as right, fair, and equitable.

  In order to make the Constitution conform to their idea of justice they are willing to do a semantic tap dance on this revered document.

  The case of a Cross being constructed and maintained on federal property is again the question. This time from San Bernardino, Calif.

  The Times thinks the Cross should come down. It sends the wrong message. They suggest the court should consider that the Cross runs afoul of the establishment clause. They go on to invoke the Danbury Letter.

  If I put my pencil into the pencil sharpenter and sharpen it to the maximum; at my first use the sharpened point will always break off. The pencil point was not to be defined that exact. Same with our Constitution. The Constitution is a dull instrument.

  The people who live at the time of the Constitution, and in fact, the people who wrote the document knew we were a Christian nation. Of course, they did not codify that reality into the Constitution. To do so would have invalidated the rest of the document. For those who did not practice the Christian faith, like the celebrated deists, they observed the teachings of the Bible. Both the Old Testament and the New Testament was the fundamental guide book.

  To violate the establishment clause of Article I the offense has to be more established than what we now know of the pending case. The man in California who was offended by the Cross did not have the exercise of his own faith seriously obstructed by this display of the Cross.

  Is everything equal, fair, and just at the Mojave National Preserve?  No, but neither has the establishment clause been violated! The establishment clause infers some kind of written or acknowledged code. Jefferson said the same! The Times almost said this in the last paragraph of their editorial.

  The Times is worried that if you give the Bible thumpers an inch they will take a mile. Where have we heard that before?

  The current Supreme Court, in it’s wisdom, should continue to interpret some of these cases on a very narrow basis. That should take care of some of the Times fears.