The Bill of Rights 219 years later
The Bill of Rights, the first 10
amendments to the U.S. Constitution, is the most incredible set of guarantees
against intrusion into the lives of individuals ever written.
It’s ironic that politicians who
swear an oath to the Constitution—and that some reporters who owe their
professional autonomy to the First Amendment—are calling for the head of
WikiLeaks founder and editor Julian Assange.
The irony is in the timing. Dec.
15 is the 219th anniversary of the ratification of the Bill of
Rights. Those constitutional guarantees became law in 1791.
There are some people who refer
to the Bill of Rights as the Bill of Prohibitions since they prohibit the
government from taking certain actions. Consider the opening five words of the
First Amendment: “Congress shall make no law…”
Those guarantees mean that the
government may not infringe on a person’s right to speak, publish, practice a
religion—or not—to assemble or to petition the government for redress. And
that’s just in the First Amendment.
Other amendments guarantee an
individual’s right to keep and bear arms, to be secure in his or her “persons,
houses, papers and effects,” to due process and more.
“More” also includes—among other
things—the fact that the enumeration of certain rights “shall not be construed
to deny or disparage” other rights.
The United States was never a
perfect nation. Despite the eloquence of the Declaration of Independence on the
subject of liberty, despite the guarantees of the Bill of Rights or the
limitations on government as expressed in the body of the Constitution, rights
have been violated from the beginning of our nation’s history.
There was institutional black
slavery, but that was finally abolished. There was the genocidal treatment of
Indians, but that, too, has ended. Women were denied the vote, but they now
hold elected and appointed office.
Yet, while all those abridgements
of liberty have been corrected, there remains a continued insidious assault on
the rights of individuals.
There should be no surprise that
politicians and bureaucrats who lust after power—even for supposed good
intentions—would encroach on rights. Ultimately, they are after power.
Yet, there are pundits who
scream that Mr. Assange should be tried for treason or assassinated and that
WikiLeaks should be shut down.
Ignorance is ignorance, not
bliss. It’s also dangerous.
Mr. Assange can’t be tried for
treason because he’s not a U.S. citizen.
Assassinated? How disgusting!
He’s committed no crime. Just as the New York Times had the right to publish
the Pentagon Papers provided by Daniel Ellsberg, WikiLeaks has the same right
to publish information supplied by Pfc. Bradley Manning (should it be proven
that he did steal the information in the first place).
The screams from those on the
neocon right demonstrate their ignorance or lack of commitment to the concept
of due process.
Those people also demonstrate a
selective view of history and a poor understanding of what liberty is all
about.
They should be reminded of the
words of Thomas Paine: “He that would make his own liberty secure must guard
even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty, he establishes a
precedent that will reach to himself.” — Thomas Paine First Principles of
Government (1795).
If the government shuts down WikiLeaks,
it may also do the same to the New York Times and the Washington Times.
Remember the Bill of Rights.
It’s only adherence to those principles that separated the United States from
any other country.
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