[Vision2020] Re: Living document

[thansen@moscow.com]

Greetings Visionaires -

It is my understanding that the U.S. Constitution is a "living" document as it 
may be interpreted different ways, by different people, at different times.  
That said, it is clearly not required that we understand the Constitution in 
the same identical manner in which the framers did.  I seriously believe that 
the framers purposely used generic terms so that the document could (and would) 
withstand any and all societal evolutions.

It is as simple as, "You have your truths and I have mine."

Take care,

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

> I'm puzzled, frankly, by the idea that the Constitution could be anything 
> but a "living document," which I take to be shorthand for "a document which 
> is understood at different times in different ways."   Is there any other 
> kind?
> 
> But perhaps I'm more amenable to the idea of an evolving understanding 
> because without that change, I'd be taxed without representation (women's 
> suffrage took 189 years to catch on, even while people were trying to claim 
> with a straight face that the word "man"--as in "all men are created 
> equal"--really means women, too), and members of my family would still be 
> property, not people.
> 
> According to Charles Beard, the majority of the 55 framers were lawyers, 
> half of them were lenders of money at interest, forty of them held 
> government bonds, and most of them held land, slaves, manufacturing, or 
> shipping wealth.  They naturally enough looked to their own interests in 
> writing the Constitution.  Luckily, their work was sufficiently ambiguous to 
> permit of the gradual extension of basic rights of citizenship to groups of 
> people they never imagined--women, blacks, Indians, the poor.
> 
> When we argue that the Constitution should be understood as it was by the 
> framers, I seem to hear a self-satisfied voice declaring, "And if we did, we 
> wouldn't have all these problems that we have today."
> 
> Melynda Huskey
> 
> 
> 
> 
> "The things that make us happy make us wise."  John Crowley
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> >From: Douglas <dougwils@moscow.com>
> >To: vision2020@moscow.com
> >Subject: Living document
> >Date: Fri, 13 Dec 2002 11:08:46 -0800
> >
> >Dear visionaries,
> >
> >Tom's correction is accepted, and his caveat noted. Our elected officials 
> >could be replaced if we wanted to do it. But we don't -- which is why I 
> >began by saying we have met the enemy and he is us. We don't want the 
> >Constitution to be read right side up anymore than anyone else does. But we 
> >should at least be willing to live with the consequences of our actions -- 
> >which in this case involves toppling another government without a 
> >declaration of war.
> >
> >Carl Westberg asks my view on John Ashcroft. I do disapprove of many of the 
> >actions taken by the Justice Department under Ashcroft, and I do so with 
> >exuberance and enthusiasm. Ashcroft is a professing Christian, but he has 
> >bought into the idea that you can worship like a Christian and govern like 
> >a modernist. Which he does. Most progressives oppose him because they think 
> >he governs like a Christian. I oppose him because he doesn't.
> >
> >Cordially,
> >
> >
> >Douglas
> 
> 
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