Every federal employee, from the president of the United States to the janitor at a national park takes the same oath. To: "Protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic."
Most of us -- and I say "us" having served very humbly in the United States Army -- take our oath very seriously. As many of us will happily point out, we are NEVER relieved of said oath, and it remains in effect until our dying breath. (Longer if possible.)
Some, however, most of whom reside on the left side of the aisle these days, treat their oath as some insignificant hoop through which they must jump to get what they want, and to serve their own selfish needs.
Consider that the overturning of Roe v. Wade was an absolutely correct, very simple 10th Amendment case, that even leftist hero Saint (Notorious) RBG even saw coming. She said so before she died.
"Before the Court suddenly discovered in the Constiution a virtually unlimited right to abortion, (sarcasm, abortion isn't in the Constitution) many state legislatures were doing what legislatures are supposed to do in a democracy: They were debating and revising laws to reflect changing community thinking." -- Justice R.B. Ginsburg (Frommer, Washington Post, 5/6/22)
The Justice knew that Roe was on "shaky legal ground" because of the 10th Amendment, which reads:
"The Powers not delegated to the United States, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Roe was overturned by absolutely correct interpretation of the 10th Amendment. Abortion does not appear in the Constitution, therefore the issue is remanded to the states or to the people. The states are absolutely free to decide the issue in their respective legislatures, or allow the people to vote on it. Though I rarely have had the opportunity to say this in my life, I agree with Justice Ginsburg. And I agree with the Supreme Court, which correctly decided this 10th Amendment case.
As you know, instead of remanding the case to the states as the Constitution mandates and the high Court decided, democrats immediately stepped in, trying to codify Roe at the federal level.
The people who claim to care about average Americans, will do anything to protect our rights, and are the unquestioned moral authority, REMOVED from We the People the right to decide this issue for ourselves. They did this in violation of the SCOTUS decision, the 10th Amendment, and the Constitution they all swore to "protect and defend."
If you disagreed with them, you were called a "right-wing extremist." You were told you support some mythical "assault on the Constitution." And of course, you were told you hate women, women's rights, and ALL reproductive freedom. That's right. They called their violation of the Constitution an assault on it by YOU.
Nothing could be more incorrect. Most Americans have immense respect for our nation, its founding documents, and especially its Constituion. (Which, by the way, has provided more opportunities to more different kinds of people than any other single document in human history.)
Most Americans also cherish our right to vote, and to decide on the issues that affect us. Our Founders, in their awesome wisdom knew this would be true. Hence, the 10th Amendment which gave US the right to decide issues they did not foresee, and to do so at the state level.
Make no mistake, it is the democrat theft of your ability to have any input on this issue that is an assault on the Constitution, extremist behavior, and an unconscionable assault on women. I mean, women have had the right to vote in the United States for 102 years. Democrats unilaterally and deliberately removed their ability to vote on this issue that impacts ONLY them...at least physically.
If it wasn't bad enough that democrats have appropriated rights that don't belong to them to fight for something that is NOT in the Constitution, their assault on the things that are is at least equally heinous.
Take for instance President Biden's executive order that forced all members of the United States military to be vaccinated against COVID. (Federal employees were not exempted by the SCOTUS, which decided the president cannot force all Americans to be vaccinated, as was his goal.)
I'm all for force readiness. I do not want anything to slow our military in any way when they are called on to protect us. But. Joe Biden's executive order did NOT allow a religious exemption.
Faith is one of the few areas were members of the military do not surrender their personal freedoms. In fact, the leaders of our armed forces are required to accomodate the religious beliefs of our servicemembers to the extent possible. There is now a government-issued turban for servicemembers of the Sikh faith, for example.
I personally benefitted from a religious accomodation during basic training. I was Lutheran at the time, but there was no Lutheran chapel. I tried the non-demoninational service, but it just wasn't for me. So I went to the Chaplain, a Catholic, explained my situation, and asked if I could attend his services...and further...I asked to participate in communion.
According to Catholic teaching, he should have told me no. Not being Catholic, I would not be welcomed to take communion at any of my local Catholic churches. But the Chaplain, understanding my concerns, made the correct decision. He allowed me to participate in the sacrament, and he allowed me to serve as a lector and cantor during his services. I wish I could recall his name so I could give appropriate credit; a truly great man.
The guidance the Army gave him told him to make the accomodation. Just as Sikh soldiers have been accomodated with turbans they can wear while in uniform. I willingly surrendered some of my freedoms while I served. I wasn't permitted to criticize the president, for example. But in terms of faith, the military had a responsibility to accomodate me, and they did.
Contrast that with President Biden's action; barring military members from refusing the COVID vaccine on religious grounds. That is a direct assault on the indivual servicemembers, their faith, and the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Who's the extremist again? I submit that it's the man refusing 1A rights when he swore to protect and defend them.
I should also make it clear that I willingly accepted all vaccines, pills, and other mandatory medical procedures that come with enlistment. I don't know what most of the things injected into my body -- with my consent -- even were. I trusted that the Army had a vested interest in keeping me alive, strong, and healthy, so that I could serve my country on the battlefield if it became necessary.
The COVID vaccine is different. I would not have taken it. And in Joe Biden's ever-dwindling ranks, I would have been kicked out, even if I asserted a First-Amendment right to religious freedom. As I have explained, that was a right I did NOT have to willingly sacrifce as a result of my service.
I could make a First Amendment case for Donald Trump being booted from all social media except his own truthsocial.com as well. A handful of monopolies control social media. So while I recognize the right of private enterprise to behave as they see fit, I could make a valid argument that these monopolies have colluded to silence Trump. Hopefully he'll bring a federal suit and make that case at some point. God knows the silencing and "fact checking" of conservatives, while leftists enjoy free reign, deserves to be challenged.
These rights-seizing leftists also know why our Founders provided us with the Second Amendment.
As Thomas Jefferson succinctly put it, "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." (monticello.org)
Here again, I can certainly make the case that a man who tried to force all Americans to receive the COVID vaccine -- whether they wanted it or not -- is a tyrant. To my knowledge, it is the only time in U.S. history any president has attempted to force anything into the bodies of all Americans.
Further, the tyrant in this case has nuclear weapons. Please tell me exactly what I should be allowed to have to protect myself from that.
I am not suggesting that every American should have a nuke silo in the backyard. Far from it. And there absolutely ARE Americans I don't believe should be allowed to own firearms: rapists, murderers, and the provably clinically insane, to name a few. What I AM suggesting is that the Americans we bar from having the means to protect themselves from tyranny should be VERY small. Again, our Founders in their unambiguous glory made it so clear even a child can understand it: "...shall not be infringed."
If you're a democrat and you've made it this far, thank you. You have earned my respect. Just don't try to make the "well-regulated militia argument." Heller v. DC decided that "well-regulated militia" and "shall not be infringed" are wholly separate thoughts. My right to own a firearm is not contingent upon being in a militia, or any other organization. NSRPA v. Bruen unequivocally confirmed the right of Americans to carry.
That's the law of the land. Just like Roe was the law of the land until recently. But here again, democrats' assault on my repeatedly-affirmed constitutional right to keep and bear arms has not ceased. In fact, just today, the House voted to ban "assault weapons."
Make no mistake, today's democrats know that it's the Second Amendment that protects all others, and keeps them from crossing the line into tyranny. And that is PRECISELY why they seek to undermine it at every turn.
Democrats will fight until death for abortion, which again is not in the Constitution anywhere. And they will fight until death to remove the rights of good American citizens that actually ARE in the Constitution they swore to protect and defend.
At some point, we have to ask ourselves when modern democrats become domestic enemies of the Constitution. In my humble opinion, we have reached that point.
What say you?
God bless you, and God bless these great United States of America.
-- Jason Fornwalt, managing editor, Treehouse of Liberty Times
