I think convincing Justice Ginsberg of the beauty of the U.S. Constitution is a lost cause. I am afraid she is too liberal in all of her views to appreciate the perfect balance between strong government versus personal freedom that the document seeks to embody. Shame on her for failing to grasp this while sitting on the highest court in the land.

Because we have no government, armed with power, capable of contending with human passions, unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge and licentiousness would break the strongest cords of our Constitution, as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

Our Constitution was written for a a people with over 150 years of self government and a people with a strong and abiding Christian faith. I don’t think concepts rooted in Christianity and the rights of Englishmen is all that appropriate for a benighted, third world crap hole like Egypt.

The constitution was not handed down on high. Nor is it entirely precise. Nor is it a tome to liberty, although the Declaration of Independence is. Much like how the founding fathers did not passionately fight to end slavery, this simply isn’t true. That being said, wouldn’t you like to amend the constitution in certain ways? I’m sure you would. I would find most of them abominable, but nonetheless, even you would agree that the Constitution is imperfect like all human creations.

So you might be pleased to know that in foreign countries, statesmen have taken inspiration from the US Constitution, added the lessons of experience, or tailored it to local conditions, and written new ones in the last 200 years, which are more directly relevant to present situations.

Cheers!

Thank you for running for that elected position that reeks with the odor of pig sweat. Thank you for invoking the Constitution during your campaign. I only wish a few more of your fellow members would have followed your lead. Maybe they will yet.

Very respectfull article Rep Bachmann or should i say Michelle. More respect than Justice Ginsberg gave to our constitution. Justice Ginsberg through her many unwise positiions may have been given up to a reprobate mind. Consistently her words and positions appear as such. Appreciate your post.

Thank you soo much for visiting our community.
We are deeply honored.
Maybe you and Perry should circle up the wagons.
If nothing else, it would make them all go completely crazy.
It could be a lot of fun.
Thanks again,
Mark

Probably the main issue with using the U.S. Constitution as a model for modern nations is the strong executive. The events in Egypt in the past months have proven that military is probably the #1 player in the country, and is only allowing democracy to proceed as they see fit. Giving commander-in-chief status to one person in a militarized – and somewhat divided – country is very dangerous. There has been a lot of talk about the Muslim Brotherhood on this site; keep in mind that it is very likely an MB candidate would win the presidency if their constitution created such a strong position.

at least while you’re posting here you can’t be busy threatening the public health and safety. So, welcome.

Justice Ginsberg did not say the Constitution is irrelevant. Making, in my eyes at least, your premise and so entire diary irrelevant.

Sorry.

Go onto any college campus in the US and you will find nothing but people with exactly the same attitude as Ginsburg. My wife just finished her teaching degree and had anyone at her school held a different point of view they would have been forced out. Sound extreme? Well, until you see the intolerance of the ‘tolerant’ left you have seen nothing.

I knew exactly what Ginsburg meant as soon as I heard her comments the other day. She doesn’t respect the US constitution and she certaintly has no respect for original intent or the ideas of the men who created that document. For people like her the model was the old Soviet or similar constitutions. These documents, unlike ours, could run to many, many pages and had promises of all sorts and guarantees of rights galore. Unfortunately, those meant nothing because all of those promises led to an all powerful state unlike ours which created a fairly weak central government and left the state governments alone in most things.

I also strongly disagree with all on here who say our constitution is not a model for other nations. Ours is the perfect model for any other nation that wishes for individual freedom and responsibility such that a strong federal governent is not required to run everything and everyone. Ignorance, superstitions and a lack of Christian morals may doom societies to living in a state of dictatorship and tyranny, but that doesn’t mean that we have to tell those people that this is their natural state and ultimate lot in life. We can’t impose values such as a love of freedom, individualism and Christian morality on other societies or backward cultures via force of arms, but we can and should encourage such things in our writings. People do have the right to be free, but it is also something they have to earn, respect, cherish, work for and protect at all times.

One final thought – quit attacking Rep. Bachmann and echoing the MSMs criticisms of her! She is one of the few Reps we have who has consistantly criticized congresses’, Bushes’ and Obama’s love of big government and spending and is one of the few people up there who is actually trying to reduce spending. Don’t magnify her mistakes and minimize her accomplishments – the libs wll do that anyway.

In countries where the religious heritage is different from that of Judeo-Christianity, there is little reason to expect that representative democracy with equality of all is a concept that will be accepted and practiced. The U.S. Constitution was representative of the wishes of the vast majority of English-Americans, a commonality factor which has not existed in well over 125 years. As the diversity of the people increased, the aspirations of the few have been diminished in importance by the complexity of issues which have plagued minority groups. Inspite of the civil rights act and the war on poverty of the 1960s, the push for some kind of equality that is not gotten by hard work and rugged individualism has placed a financial burden on the few whose success has made them “unequal.” A constitution is only as good as the people who honor its provisions as the law of the land and the basic criterion with which all laws are determined to be constitutional or not. The provisions of the American Constitution have been maintained by the sacrifices of several million citizen-soldiers in times of war. We have learned in the 20th century that there is no longer a belief in the common obligation to sacrifice for the country. It is a free-will choice to serve or not to serve in the armed forces. We have also learned that even personal choice is something which, at the whim of a president or the congress, can be changed at the stroke of a pen to be what it was or was not previously.
Since what happens in a country during and after revolution is frequently determined by the rule of martial law or the gun, the equality of citizens and a consensus on governance, as we have seen in Iraq, are elusive foreign ideas that may never take root until a commonality unites the surviving majority. English Americans might wish for the same, but the representation of the diverse is what has changed America forever. Whereas her strength was commonality, her weakness is diversity and the justice expressed that fact.

She could have easily answered along the lines of “Create a form of government that all people can respect. Create one that respects property rights because that will also protect human rights. Guarantee those human rights. Create a government of laws, not of men. Create a government whose institutions are worthy and responsible to all citizens. Create a government of fairness, of propriety, and always remember that government is a burden on its citizens – a necessary burden, but a burden all the same. Therefore, burden them equitably.”

She did not have to trash the US Constitution. But she did – that speaks a lot to premises she holds and from which she launches here every thought and argument.

that as a supporter of any Constitution other than the U.S. Constitution, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg could be removed from her position.
After all, her position and the work she performs is directly tied to her fidelity to that single document that describes the workings of our Government and the Rights of the people it governs.
That document describes, in a broad and yet very clear way, the LIMITS of powers bestowed upon the Government by The People who created it for The People who came after and must live with it.

If SHE no longer believes in it’s value as THE defining text that gives life to The Government, how, in Heaven’s name, can SHE rule in it’s behalf?

I would like to believe that if a judge shows as little respect for The Constitution as SHE does, reflecting contempt for The People it protects, then The People should have the power to remove her, or any judge that shows the same contempt.

And if they do have this power, it should be exercised immediately

caution is urged in agreeing with her on her comments to foreign entities. To Ginsburg the Constitution is a springboard for reform, not a guide or body of law to be referred to as well as deferred to. The political program is paramount, as it was to Warren and others before him. A living document as with any other living thing is constant change, great for the birds & the bees, less so for laws and nations.

Was she possibly thinking this whole constitution recommendation through? Maybe she’s aware of what the two Adams POTUS said regarding “our” Constitution:

John Adams: [I]t is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue.[W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If “Thou shalt not covet,” and “Thou shalt not steal,” were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society, before it can be civilized or made free.

John Quincy Adams: The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application-laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws. There are three points of doctrine the belief of which forms the foundation of all morality. The first is the existence of God; the second is the immortality of the human soul; and the third is a future state of rewards and punishments. Suppose it possible for a man to disbelieve either of these three articles of faith and that man will have no conscience, he will have no other law than that of the tiger or the shark. The laws of man may bind him in chains or may put him to death, but they never can make him wise, virtuous, or happy.[The quote by John Adams is particularly strong—”Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

I see what she may have (accidently?) done there in Egypt. Just trying to put the best light on an otherwise disgusting and anti-American comment by the SCOTUS nominated by the impeached president.

The Founders wanted a weak Executive. Had any Enlightenment-era nation thrown off monarchy and instituted a parliamentary system that gives political factions a different way to shape the majority, our US Constitution would have been very different.

Much ado and a manufactured outrage.
Especially over Egypt which is about to retreat into the 14th century with ‘modified’ Sharia law embedded in whatever new government takes hold this year, until the next military coup, which is inevitable for a nation with >40 million people below the poverty line requiring food imports for which there is no longer any foreign exchange reserves.

And we should stop giving it $1.5 billion for being an ally. And prob. close the embassy and get out of there before we have another Tehran 1979.

The South African Constitution was the first constitution to guarantee rights and protections specifically to homosexuals. One not need to look any deeper into Justice Ginsburg’s love of that constitution other than that reason. It’s really quite and that simple.

Maybe I’m being pedantic here, but immediately after Rep. Bachmann said of the Constitution’s wording, “we Americans know it by heart”, she misquoted it. The correct beginning is “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union…” The Congresswoman left out “of the United States”. A glaring omission when context is considered. Evidently not all Americans know it by heart. That mistake aside, I did enjoy the article.