Has Mr. Bush Read the Constition? 7
Mr. Bush said:
Ann Woolner on Bloomberg.com opines
To quell a revolt from the religious right, Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove assured at least one religious leader “that Harriet Miers is an evangelical Christian, that she is from a very conservative church, which is almost universally pro-life,” James Dobson recounted on his radio show this week.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan confirms that presidential strategist Karl Rove called evangelical broadcaster James Dobson to seek his support for Harriet Miers’ nomination to the Supreme Court before it was announced. In that call, Rove assured Dobson that Miers is an evangelical Christian.
The Constitution of the United States of America says, in Article IV:
Clause 3: The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
The current Federal Administration does not seem to know what the Fundamental Law of the United States of America mandates.
No. That’s not quite right.
Let me rephrase that. I will attempt to speak circumspectly.
The current Federal Administration has consistently and cynically violated the trust of the citizens of the United States of America, of the Founders who risked lives and fortunes to bring forth this country, and of those who have fought on the field of battle, on the field of law, on the field of politics, on all the fields where such battles are fought, to protect, preserve, and nurture this nation.
The current Federal Administration dishonors this country.
October 16, 2005 at 10:39 pm
Will the defense in the impeachment trial argue that Miers’ Christianity was touted as a qualification but not required as one?
October 17, 2005 at 5:52 am
That would be an arguable position. It might even be an arguable position against my opinion.
Impeachment? No support for it here. We’ll have to see whether the Loyal Opposition can come with an idea, even one tiny little idea, come next November.
Howsomever, speaking hypothetically, and looking at the track record of the current administration, I’d be more inclined to expect them to claim they never said it. And then to start some kind of scurrilous rumor about the prosecution.
That would be pretty much consistent with their actions in the past.
October 17, 2005 at 8:14 pm
I was thinking about this off and on all day.
I realized what really bothers me about the way the Federal Administration is handling this is the “nudge, nudge, wink, wink” conduct of the Bush Administration about Harriett Miers’s qualifications.
October 17, 2005 at 10:17 pm
Well this section you have quoted in the constitution has intrigued me today, and about 11 AM something hit me… what do you think violates the spirit of this clause more: Bush’s selling of Harriet Miers, or Dick Durbin’s questioning of John Roberts?
October 18, 2005 at 6:26 pm
I think the whole charade has been reprehensible throughout both nominations.
I think the Democrats’ shameful performance on the nomination of Mr. Roberts was sparked by (what I consider) a well-founded suspicion of the current Federal Administration and almost all its works, while the Administration’s “nudge nudge, wink wink” on Miers is sparked by a realization that they do not have the mandate they claim, that Mr. Bush has squandered whatever “political capital” he thought he had, and that the social agenda of the more right-wing politically-active fundamentalist Christian groups is not supported by the majority of the American people.
[TIRADE MODE ON]
I do feel it necessary to say “right-wing politically-active fundamentalist Christian groups” to distinguish between them and other fundamentalist Christian groups that are not attempting to advance their religious beliefs through political action, and between them and fundamentalist Christian groups who do not equate a political position with religious faith.
It is definitely wrong to consider that all fundamentalist or all evangelical (and fundamentalist and evangelical do certainly overlap, but they are not the same, and I resent those who think they are) agree on political issues.
Just as an example: I attend a United Methodist Church. It is certainly evangelical. It is certainly not taking political positions, at least not at the level of my local church.
[TIRADE MODE OFF]
October 18, 2005 at 11:15 pm
In thinking about some of these issues we’ve discussed lately, I’ve encountered a quirky contradiction in my own thinking:
It ticks me off that the government threatens to revoke the tax exempt status of churches that endorse political candidates. I don’t think it’s any of the government’s business what gets said inside a church, unless they can show probable cause that a crime is being plotted or committed.
But… at the same time, I would never belong to a church that chose to be that blantantly political. I don’t think it’s the church’s mission.
October 20, 2005 at 5:16 pm
I’m not familiar with the law here, so I did a little looking. I found two links of substance fairly quickly:
http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=576373
http://www.thechurchreport.com/content/view/369/32/
Apparently, the key is whether pronouncements are seen as “official pronouncements of the church or church officials speaking for the church” (that’s my wording).
Darn it, Steve, stop asking such good questions!
This is another of those shades of gray questions. Recent events have made it quite clear that persons who want to speak as if a certain political position is the position of (the/a) church will find a way to do so. I think setting the IRS on them, unless the church in question is nothing more than a front for a political movement, is probably not right. I remember when Mr. Nixon tried to use the IRS as a political weapon; that is a dangerous road to take.
Moral positions will necessarily lead to political action; what troubles me is when people stop saying, “I’m trying to be on the side of God” and start saying, “God is on my side.”
Frankly, I wouldn’t want my church or Pastor telling me how to vote, either.