Authority over every issue not enumerated, or assigned to Congress, is reserved for the individual states.
“Have you ever wondered who’s pulling the strings? … Anything we touch is a weapon. We can deceive, persuade, change, influence, inspire. We come in many forms. We are everywhere.”— U.S. Army Psychological Operations recruitment video
The U.S. government is waging psychological warfare on the American people.
No, this is not a conspiracy theory.
Continue reading “Everything Is a Weapon: The U.S. Government Is Waging Psychological Warfare on the Nation”
Generally, Americans treat the Ninth Amendment like the Bill of Rights’ unwanted stepchild. They mostly ignore it, and when they do talk about it, they often misunderstand it.
In reality, the Ninth Amendment serves a very simple but crucial purpose. It expands the limits on the federal government – at least in a manner of speaking. More accurately, it makes the implied limits on federal authority explicit.
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
Technically speaking, the Ninth and Tenth Amendments serve as “rules of construction.” They tell us how to “construe” the powers delegated to the federal government. They add nothing at all to the Constitution, and they don’t take anything away. They merely tell readers how to read the document.
Together the Ninth and Tenth Amendments affirm what was already understood and implicit in the Constitution – the federal government may only exercise the powers that were expressly delegated to it.
Many of the states ratified the Constitution on the condition of amendments. They thought a bill of rights was necessary to secure essential liberties and to ensure the federal government operated in the limited way promised by supporters. The New York ratifying document spelled out the understanding of that state’s ratifiers and the conditions under which the state would enter the Union.
Every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the government thereof, remains to the people of the several states, or to their respective state governments, to whom they may have granted the same; and that those clauses in the said Constitution, which declare that Congress shall not have or exercise certain powers, do not imply that Congress is entitled to any powers not given by the said Constitution; but such clauses are to be construed either as exceptions to certain specified powers, or as inserted merely for greater caution.“ [Emphasis added]
Several other states included similar provisions along with other proposed amendments. They ultimately formed the foundation for what would become the Bill of Rights. The highlighted phrase above was the genesis of the Ninth Amendment.
In simplest terms, the Bill of Rights sprung from fears that the federal government would act outside of its delegated powers and trample the people’s rights and privileges. The Ninth Amendment was a response to concerns that listing certain rights in a bill of rights would imply the federal government had the power to violate other rights not listed.
James Madison initially submitted proposals for amendments to Congress on June 8, 1789. His proposed verbiage was altered and generally shortened during the legislative process, but looking at the original language helps clarify the intent of the amendments. Madison’s proposal for what became the Ninth Amendment makes clear the intent was to amplify and make explicit the limits of federal power – specifically to ensure the enumeration of certain rights was not taken to imply the federal government could violate rights that were not mentioned.
The exceptions here or elsewhere in the constitution, made in favor of particular rights, shall not be so construed as to diminish the importance of other rights retained by the people; or as to enlarge the powers delegated by the constitution; but rather as actual limitations of such powers, or as inserted merely for greater caution.”
Some supporters argued a bill of rights wasn’t even necessary because the very nature of the Constitution precluded the federal government from taking actions that would violate rights like freedom of the press and religion. Theophilus Parsons advanced this line of thinking during the Massachusetts ratifying convention.
Mr. Parsons demonstrated the impracticability of forming a bill, in a national constitution, for securing individual rights, and showed the inutility of the measure, from the ideas, that no power was given to Congress to infringe on any one of the natural rights of the people by this Constitution, and, should they attempt it without constitutional authority, the act would be a nullity, and could not be enforced.” [1]
This dovetails with the more general assertion made by supporters of the Constitution that any action taken by the federal government beyond its prescribed power would be void. Alexander Hamilton encapsulated this view in Federalist #78.
There is no position which depends on clearer principles, than that every act of a delegated authority contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the constitution, can be valid.”
Nevertheless, many felt a bill of rights was vital, and agreed to ratification of the Constitution only on the condition of amendments. But that still left a glaring question unanswered: would the enumeration of rights in a bill or rights imply the federal government possessed the power to infringe on other rights not mentioned? After all, legal rule of construction dictates the “designation of one is the exclusion of the other.” So readers could logically interpret an enumeration of certain rights to exclude those not listed.”
James Wilson of Pennsylvania provided perhaps the most succinct explanation of the problem.
In all societies, there are many powers and rights which cannot be particularly enumerated. A bill of rights annexed to a constitution is an enumeration of the powers reserved [to the people]. If we attempt an enumeration, every thing that is not enumerated is presumed to be given. The consequence is, that an imperfect enumeration would throw all implied power into the scale of the government, and the rights of the people would be rendered incomplete.”
James Iredell of North Carolina made the same argument in the North Carolina ratifying convention, emphasizing that the Constitution, as written, already limited the federal government only to the powers delegated, and that the exercise of any powers beyond those given would constitute usurpation.
But when it is evident that the exercise of any power not given up would be a usurpation, it would be not only useless, but dangerous, to enumerate a number of rights which are not intended to be given up; because it would be implying, in the strongest manner, that every right not included in the exception might be impaired by the government without usurpation; and it would be impossible to enumerate every one. Let anyone make what collection or enumeration of rights he pleases, I will immediately mention 20 or 30 more rights not contained in it.” [Emphasis added]
So, supporters of a Bill of Rights faced a dilemma. They believed it was important to add further declaratory and restrictive clauses to the Constitution in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers. But they recognized it was impossible to list all of the rights and privileges the federal government was barred from interfering with.
Madison addressed this concern in a letter to Thomas Jefferson dated Oct. 17, 1788.
My own opinion has always been in favor of a bill of rights; provided it be so framed as not to imply powers not meant to be included in the enumeration.”
The Ninth Amendment provides a solution to this problem. It creates an exception to the accepted rule of construction and explicitly asserts that the federal government may only act within its delegated powers, both in regard to the rights listed in the Bill of Rights and those that were not listed.
[1] The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution by Jonathan Elliot
Michael Maharrey [send him email] is the Communications Director for the Tenth Amendment Center. He is from the original home of the Principles of ’98 – Kentucky and currently resides in northern Florida. See his blog archive here and his article archive here.He is the author of the book, Our Last Hope: Rediscovering the Lost Path to Liberty., and Constitution Owner’s Manual. You can visit his personal website at MichaelMaharrey.com and like him on Facebook HERE
Ronnie R. Gipson Jr., University of Memphis
When police officers kill people without apparent justification, those officers may face both criminal charges – as in the case of Derek Chauvin, convicted of murdering George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020 – and civil lawsuits.
Floyd’s family filed a federal civil rights suit against Chauvin and three other officers, alleging they used “unjustified, excessive, illegal and deadly force” while detaining him. The suit also named the city of Minneapolis, alleging city officials did not have good policies about using force and didn’t train the officers properly. Continue reading “How qualified immunity protects police officers accused of wrongdoing”
The Kazakhstan government shut off the internet nationwide on Jan. 5, 2022, in response to widespread civil unrest in the country. The unrest started on Jan. 2, after the government lifted the price cap on liquid natural gas, which Kazakhs use to fuel their cars. The Kazakhstan town of Zhanaozen, an oil and gas hub, erupted with a protest against sharply rising fuel prices. Continue reading “Kazakhstan’s internet shutdown is the latest episode in an ominous trend: digital authoritarianism”
Protests in Minneapolis over the death of a 22-year-old man during a police raid have reignited debate over the role of so-called “no-knock warrants.”
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey imposed a moratorium on the practice, in which police obtain permission to enter a premises unannounced, and often accompanied by heavily armed SWAT teams. Continue reading “No-knock warrants, a relic of the ‘war on drugs,’ face renewed criticism after Minneapolis death”
They used to say it was vital to a democracy to question authority, to stay suspect of concentrated power. However, generation after generation, the American people have not just stopped questioning those in power, but now some people are willingly defending the same institutions that work against their own individual interests. Continue reading “Abolish the Watchmen”
By Judi McLeod
With their lies, veiled threats and dire predictions of a “dark winter” with coming massive deaths of the unvaccinated, the Democrats, media and unelected health authorities have painted themselves into a corner.
Though there won’t be much media reportage on it, they’re desperately scrambling to regain credibility and gravitas now that the public is aware that they’ve been had. Continue reading “Now That Governments Have Been Trapped In Their Lies, What Horrors Await Us In 2022?”
“All we are saying is give peace a chance.”—John Lennon
How do you give thanks for freedoms that are constantly being eroded?
How do you express gratitude for one’s safety when the perils posed by the American police state grow more treacherous by the day?
How do you come together as a nation in thanksgiving when the powers-that-be continue to polarize and divide us into warring factions?
Every year finds us struggling to reconcile our hope for a better, freer, more just world with the soul-sucking reality of a world in which greed, meanness and war continue to triumph.
Continue reading “Don’t Give Up on the Blessings of Freedom”
By John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead
“Rights aren’t rights if someone can take them away. They’re privileges.”—George Carlin
You think you’ve got rights? Think again.
All of those freedoms we cherish—the ones enshrined in the Constitution, the ones that affirm our right to free speech and assembly, due process, privacy, bodily integrity, the right to not have police seize our property without a warrant, or search and detain us without probable cause—amount to nothing when the government and its agents are allowed to disregard those prohibitions on government overreach at will.
Continue reading “The Police State’s Reign of Terror Continues … With Help from the Supreme Court”
“That was when they suspended the Constitution. They said it would be temporary. There wasn’t even any rioting in the streets. People stayed home at night, watching television, looking for some direction. There wasn’t even an enemy you could put your finger on.”
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
The Constitution of the United States represents the classic solution to one of humankind’s greatest political problems: that is, how does a small group of states combine into a strong union without the states losing their individual powers and surrendering their control over local affairs? Continue reading “Constitution Day 2021: It’s Time to Make America Free Again”
