A Quote by Harry S. Truman
I have little patience with people who take the Bill of Rights for granted. The Bill of Rights, contained in the first ten amendments to the Constitution, is every American's guarantee of freedom.
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The first ten amendments were proposed and adopted largely because of fear that Government might unduly interfere with prized individual liberties. The people wanted and demanded a Bill of Rights written into their Constitution. The amendments embodying the Bill of Rights were intended to curb all branches of the Federal Government in the fields touched by the amendments-Legislative, Executive, and Judicial.
You don't know who the next group is that's unpopular. The Bill of Rights isn't for the prom queen. The bill of rights isn't for the high school quarterback. The Bill of Rights is for the least among us. The Bill of Rights is for minorities. The Bill of Rights is for those who have minority opinions.
The Constitution was written to protect individual freedom and limit the ability of the government to encroach upon it. The liberals don't like that. The Democrats are very unhappy. The Constitution limits government too much. So they want to rewrite it, have a second Bill of Rights. So they want a new Bill of Rights that spells out what government can do instead of a Bill of Rights that tells government what it can't do.
Democracy is not freedom. Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch. Freedom comes from the recognition of certain rights which may not be taken, not even by a 99% vote. Those rights are spelled out in the Bill of Rights and in our California Constitution. Voters and politicians alike would do well to take a look at the rights we each hold, which must never be chipped away by the whim of the majority.
The Framers of the Bill of Rights did not purport to 'create' rights. Rather, they designed the Bill of Rights to prohibit our Government from infringing rights and liberties presumed to be preexisting.
From my admittedly cranky perspective, Bush/Cheney are lousy on the Bill of Rights, Clinton/Gore were lousy on the Bill of Rights, and everyone within bribing distance of the 2008 election (Hillary, McCain, Giuliani) are lousy on the Bill of Rights, too.
Painful as it may be to hear it, there's nothing special about the people of this country that sets them apart from the other people of the world. It is the Bill of Rights, and only the Bill of Rights, that keeps us from becoming the world's biggest banana republic. The moment we forget that, the American Dream is over.
The next time you get the urge to shut somebody up because they don't see the world exactly the same way you do, take a deep breath, get out your Bill of Rights, and count to the ten amendments.
Some may more quietly commemorate the suffering, struggle, and sacrifice that has triumphed over much of what was wrong with the original document, and observe the anniversary with hopes not realized and promises not fulfilled. I plan to celebrate the bicentennial of the Constitution as a living document, including the Bill of Rights and the other amendments protecting individual freedoms and human rights.
They came up with a civil rights bill in 1964, supposedly to solve our problem, and after the bill was signed, three civil rights workers were murdered in cold blood. And the FBI head, Hoover, admits that they know who did it, they've known ever since it happened, and they've done nothing about it. Civil rights bill down the drain.
Germany doesn't have a Bill of Rights, England doesn't have a Bill of Rights, nobody else has a Bill of Rights. You know, the United States is very unique, and that is in the Bill of Rights and the fact that one third of the population is armed... nobody's armed in Canada, nobody's armed in England, nobody's armed in Germany, it's amazing, the United States is a really stand alone class act.
I'm working on "Living the Bill of Rights," and it's about people - well, it starts with Brennan and Douglas as people who not only live the Bill of Rights, but try to shape the reason for that.
The Constitution and the Bill of Rights we designed to get the government off the backs of the people -- all the people. Those great documents guarantee to us all the rights to personal and spiritual self-fulfillment. But that guarantee is not self-executing. As nightfall does not come all at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such a twilight that we all must be most aware of the change in the air -- however slight -- lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness.
In my judgment the people of no nation can lose their liberty so long as a Bill of Rights like ours survives and its basic purposes are conscientiously interpreted, enforced and respected so as to afford continuous protection against old, as well as new, devices and practices which might thwart those purposes. I fear to see the consequences of the Court's practice of substituting its own concepts of decency and fundamental justice for the language of the Bill of Rights as its point of departure in interpreting and enforcing that Bill of Rights.
The Bill of Rights is a born rebel. It reeks with sedition. In every clause it shakes its fist in the face of constituted authority. It is the one guaranty of human freedom to the American people.
The full impact of printing did not become possible until the adoption of the Bill of Rights in the United States with its guarantee of freedom of the press. A guarantee of freedom of the press in print was intended to further sanctify the printed word and to provide a rigid bulwark for the shelter of vested interests.
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