…that can be later used to keep your representative on the straight and narrow. No need to over-complicate your life.

These are great ideas. Getting the video is the key.

Further suggestion: After asking your elected representative who is sworn to support the Constitution, and keeping in mind that only laws passed “in pursuance of the Constitution” constitute the supreme laws of the land, ask them to recite for you, specifically, the exact words of Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution that provides Congress the authority to enact ANY legislation in the area of the health of individual citizens, as clearly this power was reserved to the States and the people themselves.

Have a pocket copy of the Constitution with you. Hand it to your elected representative, who is supposed to be intimately familiar with the Constitution, especially Art. I, Section 8. Demand that they read the exact words.

Then ask him how he squares the forcing of people into the so-called “public option,” whereby people will be forced to pay into the system or be fined, squares with the Thirteenth Amendment’s abolition of involuntary servitude – we don’t have slavery any more, do we? And what happens if someone refuses to pay the fine? What will the federal government do to that person? Lock them up? (Ultimately, government can only make people do something under the threat of lock up – men with guns come and grab you and put you behind bars, and this will be the ultimate sanction for those who will not abide by the so-called “public option.”)

The dirty little secret our federal elected representatives in the Congress don’t want us to find out and focus on is that they have been, for decades, simply ignoring the enumerated powers of Art. I, Section 8. Why? Because “we the people” have fallen asleep at the switch and have not DEMANDED that they follow their oaths and the Constitution. We need to read, and re-read, both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and, as Abraham Lincoln admonished, “Study the Constitution!” “Let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislatures, and enforced in courts of justice.” (Lincoln’s Sacred Effort, Morel, L.; p. 30.) Imagine if every constituent at these congresscritters’ town hall meetings prefaced every question with a reference to the Constitution while holding a pocket copy in their hands.

Here are the provisions of the Constitution you can use for reference (the Preamble, Art. 1, Section 1; Art. I, Section 8; Art. VI; the Ninth Amendment; the Tenth Amendment; the Thirteenth Amendment) from http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/index.html :

The Constitution of the United States of America

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Article I.

Section 1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.

Section 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;

–And

To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.

Article VI

This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

Amendment XIII

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

You probably are all aware that The Heritage Foundation will send you a free pocket copy of the Declaration and Constitution. Go to www.heritage.org. I prefer The Citizens Rulebook published by Whitten Printers, which they sell in bulk for a dollar or less a piece: Whitten Printers, 1001 S 5th Street, Phoenix, AZ 85004, phone: (602) 258-6406. (The Whitten Printers website appears to be under revision at the moment; a good, short article about the Rule Book is here:

http://www.eeevilconservative.com/archives/2007/07/the_citizens_rule_book_jury_ha.html . A download of an earlier version of the Rule Book, published before the 27th Amendment was ratified, can be found here:
http://www.archive.org/details/TheCitizensRuleBook )

Thank you.