A Basis for Restoring Constitutional Government

Jan 29, 2008 11:29

Restoring legitimate constitutional government in America will require restoring an understanding of its philosophical foundations through educating the children. The foundation of the constitution is Jewish law given to Moses by god in person.

There are six ideas that must be restored before a citizen is qualified to even offer an opinion about government. First, Jewish law will teach him that no one is above the law; indeed, that God Himself is bound to observe the laws of the Torah (Jerusalem Talmud, Rosh Hashana 1:3a). That idea moves government from being a weapon to be used against one another to more of a public utility available to the good and evil alike without concern about intended use or possibility of abuse.

Because everyone is subject to the law as if it were a physical principle, we will therefore reject the Latin maxim Princeps legibus solutus est -- the ruler is not bound by the law. The modern state typically exempts itself and their bureaucrats from complying with either law or constitution by carefully defining the legal terms of compliance. Therefore the phrase, shall not infringe, always carries a subtext saying, except by law. Such a law is of course a fraud as Moses would instruct any judge: that the terms of a covenant are not set aside by law once it has been ratified. What the judges have done is to make an assertion of the supremacy of the state above all, and conforms to fascist doctrine.

The American constitution is not a secular document but is written according to ancient ideas about contracts. One ancient provision that the present abusers should consider is that the constitution has no penalty for breaking the terms of the agreement which would restore the relationship of the transgressor. In that regard the constitution is very fragile because there is no inherent continuity of American government once the covenant is broken.

A secular constitution may claim that the land of America belongs to the state, but we have a religious constitution that claims no land. The land is as can be read in the Declaration of Independence, deeded to men as property, not to the state. The modern state tries to persuade us that the state is the final authority in all things no matter what the constitution says.

God has decreed that the Land of Israel belongs exclusively to the Jewish People, to the Nation of Israel, and all other lands are given to others. No political party that betrays these two truths is worthy of any support, direct or indirect.

The State is nothing more than a trustee of the Nation. The State or its government has no right to give away any part of the Land. To deny this is to advocate the evil doctrine of Statism. Western civilization once rejected this doctrine; it recognized a law higher than the laws of the State, as we see in the American Declaration of Independence.

There are no organized bodies in the world today that rejects statism except in the New Jewish Congress inaugurated in Jerusalem in November 2007. A new American Continental Congress should follow suit. It is commonly claimed that Statism rose out of the Protestant Reformation but more accurately it is the product of the Counter Reformationist. The Reformation was a religious rebellion, a civil war, against the tyrant Rome that eventually caused American colonist to form themselves into covenant communities that respected the Law of Moses.

The second point that must be taught; Jewish law will teach us that the individual must never be sacrificed for the sake of the state. We will therefore reject the policy of self-restraint against over reaching tyrannical bureaucrats.

Third, Jewish law will teach us how to promote justice and the common good. We will not tolerate the denial of civil rights so common in present day America--a democratically elected despotism that expels people from their homes, expels industry from their cities, and expelled god from their public lives. Both secular and religious organizations were complicit in these vicious crimes--even more reason for a New Continental Congress to shun members who fail to emphasize the need to change America’s SYSTEM of governance on every public forum.

Fourth, since the foundation of the constitution was laid at Mount Sinai, both the leaders and the electorate must be learned in Jewish history, we will know that Jewish law is not static but dynamic, that Judaism reconciles permanence and change. We will know that Jews survived the vicissitudes of the past because, thanks to their great Rabbis, they learned how to adapt to changing circumstances and still adhere to the Torah, mankind’s first written Constitution. Our Sages were Torah men, not party pragmatists.

Fifth, our statesman will know that only the bible can re-unite the American People, and not simply because of the Torah’s world-inspiring wisdom. The Torah’s many-faceted system of law can harmonize the social and economic relations of people who have diverse ethnic backgrounds by providing them with proven and venerable methods of resolving their differences.

As Professor Menachem Elon, former Vice-President of Israel’s Supreme Court, has written: “it is precisely in all the branches of Jewish law … that it is possible ... to arrive at a common language and understanding among various elements of the people who differ in their religious and social outlook.” Since a vital objective of statesmanship is to promote national unity, our statesman must be sensitive to the potentially unifying influence of Jewish law.

Sixth, Jewish law provides a rational and ethical foundation for representative government. However, to avoid the tendency of doctrinaire democrats who, like the Clintons and Obama, would assimilate Judeo-Christianity to democracy, the statesman will assimilate democracy to Judeo-Christianity. Accordingly, he will derive freedom and equality, democracy’s two cardinal principles, from the Torah’s conception of man’s creation in the image of God. This will provide these two indiscriminate principles of democracy with ethical and rational constraints.

Written to the tune of "Needed: Jewish Statesmanship*", by Prof. Paul Eidelberg
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