Go check out VFR's suggestion for what we should do about the Islamic plan to take over America, uncovered by the Justice Department.
I've said before, and I'll say again that fundamentally the threat of Islam on these shores comes down to a problem with our form of Government. The fact that our form of Government was fundamentally changed by the incorporation doctrine, where all power must ultimately reside in the central authority, is what gave rise to leftist liberalism, which in turn gave rise to the Islamic presence in this country...
However, short of an immediate "return to constitutional government," which is impractical, the United States is left vulnerable by the lawful presence of Islam in this country, due to its subversive doctrines and practices, and something has to be done about it.
Auster has offered an interesting solution to amend away the threat posed by this presence. If we could push such an amendment through, we may thereby be afforded an opportunity to concentrate our efforts on returning to constitutional, or, balanced government, soberly, reflectively, and free of the fear and subversive influence of Islam.
If the practice of the religion of Islam continues to be treated as a protected religion by the first amendment, meaning that it is equally protected with the religion of Christ, then the internal threat from Islam will continue to grow, and we will be left to fight both it, and the political doctrine most responsible for giving rise to it as itself a viable and growing political force in this country. The battle against leftist liberalism is itself difficult enough without our having to fight both it, and this political holy jihad subversively waged against us by adherents to the religion of Mohammed.
It's an interesting approach that deserves to be taken seriously.
"God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it." -Daniel Webster
Mr. Morris writes:
ReplyDelete"The fact that our form of Government was fundamentally changed by the incorporation doctrine, where all power must ultimately reside in the central authority, is what gave rise to leftist liberalism, which in turn gave rise to the Islamic presence in this country..."
The rise of Islam in America is due to immigration which let the Muslims in, and to the First Amendment which prohibits any infringement on religion. The only role played by the Incorporation Doctrine would have been in imposing the First Amendment on states and localities, removing any ability of local government to exclude or restrict an unwanted religion. Does Mr. Morris think that in the absence of the Incorporation Doctrine, Muslims wouldn't have come to the U.S.? If states and local communities, in the absence of the Incorporation Doctrine, had been able to pass whatever regulations on religion they wanted to, what would they have done about Islam? Maybe a town here and there would have been less friendly, but I don't think it would have affected the overall growth in the numbers of Muslims.
Therefore I don't see the Incorporation Doctrine as a major factor in the rise of Islam in the U.S. It's primarily a national, not a state and local, problem. It's national (1) because immigration is national, and (2) because any effective limits on the practice of the Islamic religion would need to be national. Therefore the immigration laws need to be changed, and the working of the First Amendment needs to be changed, either by a federal law declaring that Islam is not a religion under the meaning of the First, Amendment, or by a Constitutional amendment restricting or prohibiting the practice of Islam in the U.S.
Mr. Auster,
ReplyDeleteThanks for coming by, and for leaving the thought provoking comments.
But let me ask, are you suggesting that under constitutional government our current immigration policy would be the same that it is today?
-Terry
Terry, it sounds like the answer to that question is "yes". I think that's part of what he meant in his post "Fixing the Founding", which he's recently referenced; the Christian foundations of America weren't made explicit in the Constitution. With that flaw, what you refer to as "constitutional government" might well have become unraveled, with or without an Incorporation Doctrine.
ReplyDeleteI do tend to side with you, though, when saying that states and localities likely might have passed much tougher measures against Islam. But you should spell out why. I suppose much of the premise of Balanced Government rests on the assumption that lower levels of government are less corruptible by radical forces, such as leftist special interests.
It's interesting: Although immigration is effectively national as Mr. Auster says, in a constitutional system it might not be entirely so. If every state had tough laws against Islam, for example, no Muslims would want to come. But if only some states prohibited Islam, would those laws hold up once the other states had significant Muslim populations? In other words, could the states effectively seize control of this issue from the federal government in a constitutional system?
John Savage wrote:
ReplyDelete"In other words, could the states effectively seize control of this issue from the federal government in a constitutional system?"
John, under a constitutional system the States would not need to seize control over immigration from the national government. Under constitutional government immigration would not be national, but would devolve primarily on the states and local governments. And let's not forget or trivialize the local governments because they're as important to a federal system (which we certainly do not have now) as the states are. The whole is exactly equal to the sum of its parts.
I want to make clear that under constitutional government, truly constitutional government, where the constitution and the spirit manifested in the debates (Jefferson) actually means something specific, the national government is granted authority merely over one aspect of immigration law, and for very specific purposes. Providing a uniform rule of naturalization is not the same thing as controlling immigration policy, not even close.
If the country is in any way to have a national immigration policy, then it is to be determined by the state policies on immigration, which are to be determined by the local policies on immigration, not the other way around, under truly constitutional government.
That said, the reality is that we currently live under a system, and a thought pattern that says immigration is a national, not a state and local issue. To my mind that's a dangerous and insidious political docrtrine which comes straight from the depths of liberalism. That puts us in, no; it has put us in a very precarious situation which needs to be dealt with in an immediate fashion, which is primarily the reason I'm receptive to Auster's idea of amending away the threat of Islam.
I'm not a big proponent of amending the federal constitution unless such amendment deals with a defect -not necessarily inherent to the constitution itself, but to our interpretation of it- in what the original document was meant to do. For instance, I disagree with Auster on the FMA.
Our constitution, as it was originally written, interpreted, and applied, is a document primarily intended to divide the powers of government up, set boundaries to those powers, to provide checks against abuses of, and encroachments on those powers; in short, to make us several as to ourselves, one as to all others (Jefferson); it's a document intended to establish our form of government. It was never intended to define Marriage, nor to provide for a balanced budget, and so on and so forth. If you want to do those kinds of things, you have to have the right form of government to support and uphold them, because if you don't, they're just going to break down anyhow irregardless of whether you constitutionalize them or not.
Even if you had a very simple FMA that said only this: "Marriage is to be defined, under this constitution, as between one man and one woman," it's a new power granted the national authority wherein an additional section would have to be added stating: "Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." That opens the door for the potential to all kinds of abuse. Who's going to determine, for instance, what legislation is 'appropriate' to defining, and by extension, governing marriage? The fed is, of course. The national authority would have to determine what constitutes legitimate reasons for divorce, and to codify them, who and what entities would be legally entitled to perform marriage ceremonies, to provide for pre-marriage counseling and education, there would have to be federal oversight of all these things, with agencies created to the purpose, and so on and so forth. That's a can of worms I just don't care to open up for my children and grandchildren.
As to why States and local governments would more strictly govern such things as the influence of Islam, to me it is obvious, but I suppose I should spell it out as you say.
The reason they would do so is because they would be, and are, more directly, negatively, and immediately impacted by the presence of Muslims. Muslims in this country can have nothing but an overall negative impact on the local communities in which they live and operate. That influence is allowed to grow in proportion to what level of government is controlling it. Under constitutional government, the local governments would understand that they have authority to discriminate against any group of people (religious, political, whatever) whose worldview is subversive of their government and society. This would isolate Muslims within our borders and relegate them to a relatively few areas of the country where their influence would be confined to a small scope. As they gained power in those areas and became dangerous (which they cannot do otherwise), the local authorities would have to do something about them, and they would have authority to do something about them. And as long as the national government is not there to protect the Muslim communities, their influence would be put down at the local level. If local government failed to deal with them effectively in certain areas dominated by liberals, for instance, then other communities would become alarmed and petition their State governments to deal with them properly. Muslims would eventually stop coming here because they wouldn't have an open-door invitation to come, and they wouldn't be comfortable in this environment.
As much as anything, I suppose, it's just a matter of attitude. But I'm running out of time, so if anyone has any questions, feel free to ask them and I'll try to answer them the best that I can.
-Terry
Terry, thank you. Since you have confirmed that you mean what Auster didn't think you meant, I think you should submit a question to him and see if you can come to an agreement on that. I suppose you don't give a lot of weight to the "uniform rule of naturalization" statement, though that seems to open up a big can of worms.
ReplyDeleteThat is, I guess it's generally agreed that the Fourteenth Amendment defined what makes a citizen, which wasn't well-defined before then. In its absence, then, is it up to the states to define what makes a person a citizen? And then, say, if New York makes a person (perhaps a Muslim) a citizen of New York, and then he wants to move to Oklahoma, then Oklahoma would have the right to deny him entry? Or only to avoid making him a citizen of Oklahoma, regardless of how long he stayed? Would that lead to a system where you have to go through Customs at state borders, to prevent people from illegally entering a state? Would people ever accept such a state of affairs, rather than have a national immigration policy (even if transferring the immigration policy to the national level required amending the Constitution)?
Just wanted to understand you clearly. Thank you again.
TM,
ReplyDeleteYou said something interesting:
"If the country is in any way to have a national immigration policy, then it is to be determined by the state policies on immigration, which are to be determined by the local policies on immigration, not the other way around, under truly constitutional government."
While I don't disagree with your formation of this position, in the converse, there is, however, a role for the federal head in immigration policy.
Let's suppose, instead of the States being in the right on the issue, they engage in destructive behavior. As an example, suppose Arizona embarked on a policy of open borders, welcoming **anyone** who decided to cross into that State. The federal government properly has a say in the matter as one of the responsibilities of the federal sphere is the defense of the whole country. Should AZ welcome in unsavory characters (jihadists, MS-13 gang members, anti-American socialists, whatever) who would then proceed to move about the rest of the country, the federal would be within its rights (pursuant to its responsibility for the nation's defense) to intervene in the affairs of the state.
And while I don't necessarily disagree with Auster's amendment (mostly because of what I would consider a shared worldview), we must acknowledge that this constitutes what most people would consider an egregious violation of the spirit of one of our critical foundational values - as expressed in the First Amendment.
In other words, how are a majority of Americans going to be convinced of the true nature of Islam, if indeed the traditionalist view of it is correct?
(I'm inclined to think it is, but you already know that)
For that matter, if we're going to make the practice of a "religion" prohibited in some degree, what's to stop secularists and demagogues from targeting Mormons (or Evangelicals, or Catholics) for the same?
Good conversation, hoping you don't mind the questions.
-MT
Mike,
ReplyDeleteI don't mind the questions, I'm just getting tired of answering them. No; just kidding (sorry, bad joke).
I do not want to lose sight of the fact that our current situation involves the very opposite of the conditions in your scenario. These people you speak of; they're already here, trapsing about the country at will. How did this happen? Our national policy on immigration let them in. Why are they able to move about the country at will with little or no molestation from state and local law enforcement? Our national policy on immigration is supposed to supercede State immigration law.
In fact, I can't think of a more sure way to lull states into abdicating their responsibilities toward immigration law than to convince them that it is not their responsibility; that immigration is the domain primarily of the national authority.
On your question about the first amendment, the free expression and the establishment clauses imply discrimination against those who believe there should be no free expression of religion, and/or, that there should be an establishment of religion, both of which precisely describe Islam and its converts. If that applies to Catholics, or Mormons, or Protestants, or whomever, then the first amendment implies that these are to be discriminated against.
But I think Islam is unique in that it teaches doctrines subversive of not one, but both religious clauses in the first amendment. And there's no reconciliation to be found in Islam to these first amendment priveleges. Indeed, the provisions of the first amendment beg, no; demand to be applied in the case of excluding Muslims. As Auster says, Islam is incompatible with our government; it is extremely subversive of it.
-Terry
oops! I meant the "free exercise clause," not the free expression clause, of course.
ReplyDelete