Do You Read Me?
I can't say I oppose Republicans reading the Constitution on the House floor. It may be the first time many of the Representatives (those who choose to stick around) have actually heard it. It's a stunt, to be sure, but as stunts go, not bad--it isn't hypocritical, can't end up in bad legislation, and won't last too long.
Really, though, is this information going to change any minds on anything? Perhaps a few people will be surprised at what the Constitution doesn't mention (e.g., education, health care, a supreme being), but most of the document is housekeeping rules. This is a blueprint for a government, not a call to arms.
They may also discover, in the original document, a fear of too much democracy, which has since been mostly superseded, de jure and de facto. And then there's the Founders' suspicion of a standing army. What will they do about that?
posted by LAGuy @ 12:17 AM
4 Comments:
Will they reverence the three fifths of a person provisions?
We've been through this before. It no longer applies, of course, but the original reason for having it dealt with representation in Congress. Slavehholders didn't give any rights to slaves, but wanted to get extra representation for them anyway. Those opposed to slavery would have preferred they not be counted at all. The compromise was three fifths, and had nothing to do with slaves (or anyone else's) value as a person.
No but if you're going to treat the Constitution as a fetishistic magical biblical type document and the founders as some sort of superhero saints, don't you think the original language would be interesting and instructive.
I see that the reps have dispensed with reading this clause as well as prohibition and some of the superseded succession rules instead of reading them and then later reading the amendments which changed them. Only one day and they're Washington elitist insiders already departing from the sacred script.
PS This may not be what you meant I don't think slaveholders wanted to get representation for their slaves- I mean they couldn't vote and didn't have have most rights- how could they be represented. Perhaps you meant extra representation in extra for the numbers of slave bodies. Its hard to say with a straight face that this had nothing to do with their value as a person.
Maybe I wasn't clear. The higher the count in your census, the more Representatives you get in Congress. So the question becomes how do slaves, Indians, others fit in? Those who supported slavery would have liked slaves to be counted as a full person for purposes of representation, while those opposed to slavery would prefer zero. If you're claiming the three-fifths has something to do with their value as a person, then you are claiming that slaveholders thought more of them a people than abolitionists.
There are some who read the three-fifths clause as a clever abolitionist move, and maybe it was, but the vulgar belief that it was about judging the worth of certain people, except as a parody to mock slaveholders, makes no sense.
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