The Constitution Study podcast

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431 - Presidential Immunity 07/22/2024

431 - Presidential Immunity When the delegates to the Constitutional Convention debated the role of the chief executive, many expected George Washington to become our first king. Between Mr. Washington’s humility, and the delegates recent experience with a king, they decided we'd be better off with a President rather than a king. With the recent case of Trump v. United States, many have asked, have we turned the office of President into the office of king? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/32114972

430 - Biology at the District Court 07/15/2024

430 - Biology at the District Court Rarely does a single sentence so completely crystalize the situation as the first line of the court order in Tennessee v. Cardona. The case involves the attempts by the Biden Administration to rewrite Title IX’s protections of women in education and their access to competitive sports. The single sentence? “There are two sexes: male and female.” That one sentence is the foundation of Judge Reeves' injunction against the United States Department of Education’s attempt to ignore biology, rewrite law, and set back women’s rights by decades. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31917477

429 - Bumping Into the Law 07/08/2024

429 - Bumping Into the Law When does a rifle become a machine gun? That is the question asked in the Supreme Court case Garland v. Cargill. When the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives suddenly decided to redefine bump stocks as machine guns, many Americans simply complied. However, when Michael Cargill surrendered his bump stocks to the ATF, he did so under protest, filing suit to challenge the rule under the Administrative Procedure Act. Those of us who enjoy and exercise our right to keep and bear arms owe Mr. Cargill a debt of gratitude, but the fight is not over. Thanks to Mr. Cargill’s determination and persistence, the ATF’s bump stock rule has been found to have not been created correctly, meaning we get our bump stocks back. However, it also leaves open the chance for Congress to do what the ATF could not, violate the Second Amendment one more time. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31887602

428 - Lives, Fortunes, and Sacred Honor 07/01/2024

428 - Lives, Fortunes, and Sacred Honor Things looked bleak for the colonies in 1776. The question of freedom had life and death consequences. Those 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence knew they were committing treason against their king. They knew that freedom would cost them greatly. Yet they still pledged to each other their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. Today, groups of people around this nation are still fighting for their independence. Not from political affiliation, but from ever expanding governments dedicated to taking away our independence, our freedom, and our right to life, liberty, and to pursue happiness. Will you stand by while your birthright as an American is taken away from you and your family? Will you join with others to make sure this remains the land of the free by making sure we are the home of the brave? Will you pledge your life, your fortune, and your sacred honor, not to me or to this nation, but to your children and those who will follow? As we remember Independence Day and the 56 men who pledged themselves to purchase it for us, let us renew the call of freedom. Let us take this opportunity to remind tyrants and despots that the American people were not born enslaved to their governments. Let us declare that liberty and freedom will not vanish from this nation. That we will not allow tyranny and fear to rule us. We will not go silently into that good night of subjugation. This July 4th, let us loudly proclaim: /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31829287

427 - Who's Protecting Our Children? 06/24/2024

427 - Who's Protecting Our Children? Probably the most powerful instinct as a parent is to protect our children. Parents work hard, sacrifice, and sometimes risk their own lives to protect their children. Most parents believe the government is there to help them protect their children, but is that true? Take, for example, the case of Parents Protecting Our Children UA v. Eau Claire Area School District Wisconsin. Parents Protecting, an association of parents, sued the Eau Claire Area School District to prevent them from enforcing guidelines that interfere with a parents right to make decisions for their child. However, both the District and Circuit Courts denied the parents, claiming that no child had yet been harmed by the school policy, and therefore do not have the right to petition their government for a redress of their grievance. If a court can tell parents they are not allowed to protect their children, then who is? Because it is not the school district. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31752217

426 - Fraternal Twin Court Cases Point to the Death of Justice Worldwide 06/17/2024

426 - Fraternal Twin Court Cases Point to the Death of Justice Worldwide Late May in the United States is usually a time of cook-outs and remembrance as we memorialize those who gave their lives in service to this country. 2024 however, should be remember for another death, the death of courts of justice. First it was the International Criminal Court. Prosecutor court Karim Khan sought arrest warrants for the leader of both Hamas and Israel, alleging he had reasonable grounds to believe they had criminal responsibility for war crimes. Then, barely a week later, Judge Merchan concluded his biased case against Donald Trump with biased instructions to the jury, which found Mr. Trump guilty on all 34 counts. After some consideration, I realized that these cases are so similar, they could be fraternal twins. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31633512

425 - Rights After Conviction 06/10/2024

425 - Rights After Conviction According to federal law, if someone is convicted of a crime and punished with more than one year in jail, they loose their rights protected under the Second Amendment. A recent decision by the Ninth Circuit Court not only brought that federal law into question, but decided it was wrong. The court didn’t find that this federal law violated the Constitution, rather they found it violated Supreme Court’s Bruen decision. But is that all this federal law violates? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31562732

424 - When Did the Federal Reserve become the National Treasury? 06/03/2024

424 - When Did the Federal Reserve become the National Treasury? Article I, Section 9, Clause 7 of the Constitution states “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law;” That seems pretty straight forward. So how could Congress establish a government agency funded not by appropriations from the treasury, but by fees paid to another federal entity? This was the question brought to the Supreme Court in the case CFPB v. Community Financial Services Assn. of America. Sadly, it seems that the Supreme Court once again showed they have a hard time reading and understanding the English language. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31444107

423 - The Treaty That Cannot Be 05/27/2024

423 - The Treaty That Cannot Be It’s been in the news again lately, the World Health Organization (WHO) Pandemic treaty. Not only does this United Nation want the power to take over the world in a “health emergency”, but numerous politicians and commentators keep claiming that if Joe Biden signs this treaty, it would be legally binding. The truth is, that is just not true, for several reasons. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31342112

422 - What Can the Constitution Do For You 05/20/2024

422 - What Can the Constitution Do For You I meet a lot of people who think the Constitution is useless, while others wonder how people can get away with violating it. While these may appear to be opposing positions, I believe they stem from the same misconception. That the Constitution of the United States is some super hero that will come flying in to save the day. Rather, the Constitution is ink on parchment, a tool, and nothing more. Like any other tool, the Constitution is absolutely useless unless it is picked up and wielded. And like any other tool, unless you learn how to use the Constitution, you’re much more likely to crush your own thumb than those who are infringing your rights. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31222627

421 - Presidential Immunity 05/13/2024

421 - Presidential Immunity In one of the many cases against Donald Trump, his attorney’s are claiming that he cannot be criminally charged for an act he performed in his official capacity as President. Why? Because of something called Presidential Immunity. Is there such a thing as Presidential immunity? If so, where is it stated in the Constitution? Or is the idea Presidential immunity just the latest attempt to turn the President of the United States into a king? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/31148123

420 - Maine Becomes the Latest State to Throw Away The Republic 05/06/2024

420 - Maine Becomes the Latest State to Throw Away The Republic Maine's governor allowed an unconstitutional piece of legislation to become "law" without her signature. LD 1578, An Act to Adopt an Interstate Compact to Elect the President of the United States by National Popular Vote is not only foolish and unconstitutional, but the latest attempt to change the United States from a union of republics into a monolithic democracy. It seems, just as with the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Amendments in 1913, states are not only willing to give up their sovereignty, but deprive their citizens of their rights in pursuit of socialism. After all, I believe it was Vladimir Lenin who said "Democracy is indispensable to socialism." /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30992498

419 - Is the Constitution a Threat to National Security 04/29/2024

419 - Is the Constitution a Threat to National Security A policy statement released by the Executive Office of the President, Office of Management and Budget effectively made a very bold statement, that the Constitution of the United States was a threat to national security. Does this not remind you of the saying from Benjamin Franklin? “They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.” Benjamin Franklin Are the American people willing to give up their right to be free from unreasonable searches for the promise of national security? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30876738

418 - A Case of Advice or State Intimidation? 04/22/2024

418 - A Case of Advice or State Intimidation? If there is a boogie man in the anti-gun community, it’s got to be the National Rifle Association. Accused of complicity in almost every gun crime from gang violence to mass murder, the NRA has become the lightning rod for the vitriol of those whose fear of firearms has grown to an irrational state. What happens though, when government actors advice others about the dangers of doing business with such a company? Is it merely warning of the dangers of sleeping with dogs, or an attempt to use their power to intimidate others into abandoning those they otherwise would do business with? The case of NRA v Vullo is just such a case? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30802118

417 - Remembering the Battle of Lexington 04/15/2024

417 - Remembering the Battle of Lexington Listen, my children, and you shall hearOf the midnight ride of Paul Revere, Paul Revere’s Ride by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Most of us who grew up here in America learned about the battles of Lexington and Concorde from this Longfellow poem. Who does not remember, "One if by land, and two if by sea;" or Paul Revere's cries of "The British are coming! The British are coming!"? Most of the stories we have heard are not true. Whether poetic license or outright propaganda has been lost to history. However, the story behind those battles is not only well worth the telling, but of great importance to anyone today who still claims the title American. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30686893

416 - The Problems With The TikTok Bill 04/08/2024

416 - The Problems With The TikTok Bill I have a lot of issues with TikTok, and it’s one social media platform I refuse to use. However, when I look at how Congress plans to deal with this problem, I see even more. I’ve also read and listened to several commentators about the bill, and find even more problems with their suggestions. So what do We the People do when our representatives in Congress have a personal vendetta against a foreign company? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30587638

415 - A Question of Choice 04/01/2024

415 - A Question of Choice The word “choice” has all but been taken over by the pro-abortion crowd, but that is not what I want to discuss here today. Recent history, both public and private, has displayed the fundamental function choice plays in a person’s independence, liberty, and freedom. Yet said history has shown that many of the American people have given up the ability to choose, placing that responsibility on others. By doing so, people have voluntarily abandoned their position as free citizens in order to become enslaved subjects to those who do the choosing for them. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30504048

414 - Disarming The Militia Act 03/25/2024

414 - Disarming The Militia Act The gun grabbers in Congress are at it again. Attempts to disarm the American people have only been moderately successful over the past few years. So a bill was recently introduced in the House of Representatives entitled “Preventing Private Paramilitary Activity Act of 2024”. This bill wants to make it a crime for private citizens to work together to defend their rights. If this bill were to become law some day, even training together could not only get you fined, but placed in jail, possibly for life. Have these members of Congress forgotten that our war of independence was started by an attempt by the British governor of Massachusetts' attempt to disarm the people? That the the battles of Lexington and Concord were fought by private citizens who formed a militia? Or could it be that they just don’t care about our rights and the Constitution, and are just looking for another way to subjugate the American people? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30484678

413 - How the 16th Amendment Destroyed the Republic 03/18/2024

413 - How the 16th Amendment Destroyed the Republic As April 15th approaches, and people spend valuable time and money on filing their income tax return. While plenty of people grouse and complain about paying income taxes, most don’t realize that the cause of their pain is the actions of the states back in 1913. When the states ratified the Sixteenth Amendment they did more than just help the feds collect income taxes, they fundamentally changed the republic for the worse. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30380193

412 - Sovereign Immunity 03/11/2024

412 - Sovereign Immunity When can you sue the government? What started out as an erroneous credit report filing has turned into the heart of the question brought before the Supreme Court in the case Department Of Agriculture Rural Development Rural Housing Service V. Kirtz (USDA v. Kirtz). However, what the court found, and how it got there, points to a serious flaw in the constitutional education of lawyers and judges throughout this nation. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30193568

411 - Electing a U.S. President 03/04/2024

411 - Electing a U.S. President Every four years, the United States goes through the ritual of electing a President. I use the term ritual for two reasons. First, most Americans' understanding of the election process is based in custom or rites rather than the law. Second, most of the customs Americans follow directly contradict the actual process of electing a President of the United States. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/30191368

410 - Is Refusing to Wear a Mask Unconstitutional? 02/26/2024

410 - Is Refusing to Wear a Mask Unconstitutional? I've spoken repeatedly about the unconstitutionality of most mask mandates. Recently, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals was asked to review two cases where people were punished for attending school board meetings while refusing to wear masks. Sadly, the cases, as described in the Circuit Court opinion, seem poorly founded, thus leading to decisions against the plaintiffs. I think a closer look will not only show the flaws in the case, but help others build better ones in the future. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29998543

409 - Abuse of the No Fly List 02/19/2024

409 - Abuse of the No Fly List while looking through recent oral arguments at the Supreme Court, I stumbled across the case FBI v. Fikre. At first, I thought it was another simple procedural case, but something about it caught my attention. The oral arguments held before the Supreme Court were about whether Mr. Fikre's case that his rights were violated when he was placed on the No Fly List was no moot because he ad been removed from the list. As I stated looking deeper into the case though, I found intrigue worthing of a Grisham novel. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29862183

408 - Primaries, What Are They Good For? 02/12/2024

408 - Primaries, What Are They Good For? I propose that all board elections for non-profit corporations should be run by the state at taxpayer expense. After all, we already have taxpayer funded elections for private organizations. We call them “Primaries”. While this year's presidential primary is pretty much a fait accompli, there are still hundreds, if not thousands of primary elections that will be held over the next few months. In some cases the race is so partisan that the primary effectively decides the race and the general election is moot. What is the purpose of these taxpayer funded private elections? Why to limit your choices on election day of course. So why do we keep paying for someone else to take away our choices? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29776713

407 - Chevron Deference 02/05/2024

407 - Chevron Deference For decades, Congress has been turning over more and more lawmaking power to the Executive Branch. Frequently this is done by legislation giving the head of some agency or department the power to establish rules which have the force of law. What happens when the legislation doesn't explicitly say that such-and-such department has the power to make a certain rule? To deal with this, courts have come up with something called "Chevron Deference". While the case Loper Bright Enterprises, v Gina Raimondo, Secretary Of Commerce deals with who pays the salaries of federal observers on fishing boards, a more fundamental questioning of the court's deference to government agencies interpretation of law is the cornerstone of the petitioner's arguments. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29652753

406 - Regulating Your Life 01/29/2024

406 - Regulating Your Life Have you noticed how often the government of the United States decides how you should live your life? It seems everything from food and drugs to the lightbulbs in your home are regulated by Uncle Sam. And whenever some bureaucrat deems it necessary, they simply roll out another "rule" or "regulation" to clamp down on the American people. It seems though, that one of those agencies may have bitten off more than they could chew, at least according to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. In the case Louisiana, et. al. v. U.S. Department of Energy the court decided that one of the DOE's rules was illegal, but was it unconstitutional? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29573438

405 - The Real Insurrection in America 01/22/2024

405 - The Real Insurrection in America Although I've talked about the recent attempts to keep Donald Trump off the 2024 ballot on the radio program, I realized I haven't taken the time to do an in-depth article here. I apologize for taking so long to broach this extremely important topic in this venue. Unless you've been hiding from everything politics in the United States, you are aware that there are actors in several states that have sued in their state courts to disqualify Donald Trump from being on their states primary election ballot for President of the United States. As of this writing, in only two states, Colorado and Maine, have those actors found some measure of success. While this case will undoubtably find its way to the Supreme Court, this truly is a state issue, even though it has national importance. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29532943

404 - Lawsuits for Revenge and Profit? 01/15/2024

404 - Lawsuits for Revenge and Profit? One of the most common ways for an American to seek a redress for some grievance is to file a law suit. This has made the United States a very litigious society. I was not able to determine the number of lawsuits filed, but in 2023 there were more attorneys in the United States (1.33 million) than doctors (1.08 million). As you might imagine, it is unlikely that all of these lawsuits are legitimate. Take for examples the case of Acheson Hotels, LLC v. Laufer. In this case, Acheson Hotels claims that Deborah Laufer filed a lawsuit against them not because she was harmed by their hotel, but because she is an activist using the Americans with Disability Act to harass companies who do not advertise whether or not they have handicapped accessible rooms. While the Supreme Court found that the case was moot, both the facts of the case and the courts decision points to what appears to be a case of Ms. Laufer using lawsuits for both revenge and profit. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29461948

403 - What is Income? 01/08/2024

403 - What is Income? There are certain words that are so commonly used we think they have a universal understanding. One of those words is "income". Think about it, what is income? Your paycheck? Dividends on your investments? Profits from your business? When does an increase on the value of something you own become "income"? The answer to that question is important to more than just the parties in the case Moore v. United States, but to just about every American. Can the United States tax you, as income, for the value of something you have not sold yet? /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29329358

402 - New Years 01/01/2024

402 - New Years I don't "do" New Years Resolutions. To me, they're one step above a campaign promise. (At least you intend to keep your resolutions.) That said, the beginning of a new year is a good time to consider your future. What plans do you have for the new year? While I do not make New Years Resolutions, if you do, here are a few ideas I think you should consider. /episode/index/show/constitutionstudy/id/29157923

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