Letter from Adrian Kuzminski

Defending the Constitution

The Declaration of Independence is a sacred text in American society. It anchors the sovereignty of the United States of America firmly in the “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.” All it tells us of this God is that it created Nature, which includes us, who are special enough to be given “certain inalienable Rights,” including “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” The Constitution is also a sacred text. It does not mention God, but it seeks to institute the rights implanted by God in every one of us by creating a government based on “the consent of the governed.” These rights are enumerated in the Bill of Rights and other amendments. They include, among others, the right to free speech, to a free press, to bear arms, to assemble freely, to be free of arbitrary search and seizure, to due process, to trial by jury, and to vote as a citizen.

The Executive Branch of government is currently usurping the most basic of these rights, with the passive approval of Congress and the Courts. ICE and the other immigration authorities in particular are seen to act in willful violation of the Fourth Amendment, which protects citizens against arbitrary searches and seizures, not to mention summary executions. More generally, arbitrarily declared states of emergency, as well as hundreds of executive orders by this and previous administrations of both parties, have widely usurped the legislative powers of the Congress. The Supreme Court has usurped free speech by declaring that money is speech. In foreign affairs, this and earlier executives have attacked and invaded numerous foreign sovereign states, engaging in endless wars without the constitutional sanction of Congress.

We are now at the point of a rogue administration openly trampling the Constitution. It can be restrained only by a return to constitutional accountability. The defense of the Constitution rests particularly upon our public officials, from the local to the federal level, who are bound in common by their oaths to defend it. An appeals court recently upheld that members of the military have a duty not to follow unlawful orders. Similarly, public officials under oath have a moral duty not to tolerate unconstitutional activities.

To give our public officials the courage to uphold the Constitution, our protest movements should place our constitutional rights at the center of their resistance. The Constitution is far from perfect. It endorsed slavery, tolerated racial segregation, permitted corporate monopolies and corrupted politics by allowing the interests of campaign donors to override those of actual voters. One day, after the current struggle to save it has been won, perhaps the Constitution can be improved to abolish these and other abuses. In the meantime, we are lucky to have it as our guide in the storm. This is not the time to abandon the Constitution. It is the time to reaffirm it.

Adrian Kuzminski
Fly Creek