How SCOTUS perverted the “equal protection” clause of Sec. 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment.

By Publius Huldah

1. Harvard Professor Raoul Berger’s meticulously documented book, Government by Judiciary: The Transformation of the Fourteenth Amendment, proves by means of  thousands of quotes from the Congressional Debates, that the purpose of Sec. 1 of  the 14^th Amendment was to extend citizenship to freed slaves and to provide constitutional authority for the Civil Rights Act of 1866 which protected the freed slaves from  southern Black Codes which denied them their God given Rights.

2. The “equal protection” clause within Sec. 1 of the 14th Amendment says:

No State shall “…deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

In Ch.10 of his book, [go to page 222 of this pdf ed],  Prof. Berger shows the true meaning of the “equal protection” clause:  The “equal protection” was limited to the rights enumerated in The Civil Rights Act of 1866.  Section 1 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 says:

“Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America …
That all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States; and such citizens, of every race and color, without regard to any previous condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall have the same right, in every State and Territory in the United States, to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evidence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal property, and to full and equal benefit of all laws and proceedings for the security of person and property, as is enjoyed by white citizens, and shall be subject to like punishment, pains, and penalties, and to none other, any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, to the contrary notwithstanding.”

This 1866 Act thus secured to blacks the same right to contract, to hold property, and to sue, as whites enjoyed, and the equal benefit of all laws for security of person and property.  “Political rights” were excluded [Remember, the 14th Amendment did not give freed slaves the right to vote]. But respecting the rights listed in the Act, States were now required to treat blacks the same as whites. THAT is what the “equal protection” clause in the 14th Amendment means.

3.  So, the “equal protection” clause is not a carte blanche invitation for federal judges to thereafter prohibit States from making any “distinctions” or “classifications” on any subject whatsoever in any of their State Laws or State Constitutions which five (5) judges on the US Supreme Court don’t agree with!

But that is what federal judges have been doing.  And they have decided that, respecting marriage, “classifications” and “distinctions” based on male and female genders are unconstitutional as in violation of the equal protection clause.

What unadulterated RUBBISH emanates from the fetid recesses of the minds of the federal judges in this Country.

Will these judges next say that State Statutes which prohibit close relatives from marrying make “distinctions” and “classifications” which violate the equal protection clause?

4. To my fellow Citizens, I say: For Heaven’s Sake, People! Use your heads! God gave you a brain – use it!

5. To my fellow lawyers, I say: Watch The Matrix, Part I. Pay close attention to the passage where Morpheus is offering the blue pill and the red pill to Neo. Morpheus later says, “I am trying to free your mind, but I can only show you the door. You are the one who has to walk through.” Note the descriptions of the Matrix thereafter and of the people who are still plugged in. What you have been told, beginning with your first year in law school, is a lie.  Lawyers who accept the lies are plugged in to the Matrix. The red pill signifies opening your eyes.  I offer you the red pill.  Open your eyes.

Sept. 12, 2015; revised Oct 30, 2018

 

Searching for “Marriage” in the Fourteenth Amendment

By Publius Huldah.

During April 2015, the US Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Obergefell v Hodges and consolidated cases. The questions presented for the Court to decide are: ¹

1. Does the Fourteenth Amendment require a State to license a marriage of two people of the same sex?

2. Does the Fourteenth Amendment require a state to recognize a marriage of two people of the same sex when their marriage was lawfully licensed and performed out of state? ²

Section 1 of the 14^th Amendment says:

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the law.” [emphasis mine] ³

Obviously, §1 says nothing about “marriage” or “homosexuality”. So how can it be said to authorize the supreme Court to FORCE States to accept same sex marriage?

Simple! All they have to do is redefine “liberty” in §1 to get it to mean whatever they need it to mean in order to get the result they want in the cases before them.

And that is precisely what the supreme Court has been doing. In Roe v. Wade (1973), they looked at the word, “liberty”, in §1 and said it means “privacy”, and “privacy” means you can kill your baby. The Court said under Part VIII of their Opinion:

“…This right of privacy, whether it be founded in the Fourteenth Amendment’s concept of personal liberty and restrictions upon state action, as we feel it is … is broad enough to encompass a woman’s decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy…”

In Lawrence v. Texas (2003), they looked at the word, “liberty”, in §1 and said it means “consulting adults have the right to engage in private acts of homosexual sodomy”:

“We conclude the case should be resolved by determining whether the petitioners were free as adults to engage in the private conduct in the exercise of their liberty under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment…” (1^st para under II)

“…The case does involve two adults who, with full and mutual consent from each other, engaged in sexual practices common to a homosexual lifestyle. The petitioners are entitled to respect for their private lives. The State cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime. Their right to liberty under the Due Process Clause gives them the full right to engage in their conduct …” (3^rd para up from end) [emphasis mine]

Do you see? The supreme Court uses the word, “liberty”, in §1 of the 14^th Amendment to justify practices they approve of and want to force everybody else to accept. ⁴

And by claiming that these practices constitute “liberty rights” which arise under §1 of the 14^th Amendment, they evade the constitutional limits on their judicial power.

I’ll show you.

The Judicial Power of the Federal Courts is Strictly Limited by The Constitution!

 The Constitution does not permit federal courts to hear any case the Judges want to hear. Instead, a case must fall within one of a few categories before federal courts have jurisdiction to hear it.

Article III, §2, clause 1, lists the cases federal courts have the delegated authority to hear. They may hear only cases:

1. Arising under the Constitution, or the Laws of the United States, or Treaties made under the Authority of the United States [“federal question” jurisdiction];

2. Affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers & Consuls; cases of admiralty & maritime Jurisdiction; or cases in which the U.S. is a Party [“status of the parties” jurisdiction]; and

3. Cases between two or more States; between Citizens of different States; between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States; and certain cases between a State and Citizens of another State or Citizens or Subjects of a foreign State [“diversity” jurisdiction].

Alexander Hamilton writes in Federalist No. 83 (8^th para):

“…the judicial authority of the federal judicatures is declared by the Constitution to comprehend certain cases particularly specified. The expression of those cases marks the precise limits beyond which the federal courts cannot extend their jurisdiction…” [emphasis mine]

If a case does not fit within one of these categories, federal courts may not lawfully hear it.

In Federalist No. 80, Hamilton explains the categories of cases over which federal Courts have jurisdiction.

Since the “right” to same sex marriage is claimed to arise under §1 of the 14^th Amendment, we will focus on Hamilton’s discussion of cases “arising under this Constitution”; or, as Hamilton puts it, cases:

“…which concern the execution of the provisions expressly contained in the articles of Union…” (2^nd para) [emphasis mine]

“Expressly contained”. Hamilton then gives examples of such cases: If a State violates the constitutional provisions which prohibit States from imposing duties on imported articles, or from issuing paper money [Art. I, §10], the federal courts are in the best position to overrule infractions which are “in manifest contravention of the articles of Union. [i.e., Constitution]”

Do you see?

So! Where are provisions addressing marriage and homosexuality “expressly contained” in our Constitution?

The answer any competent 8^th grader should be able to give is, “Nowhere!”

Fabrication of “constitutional rights” in order to Usurp Judicial Power.

So now you see how Justices on the supreme Court evaded the constitutional limits on their judicial Power: They fabricated individual “constitutional rights” which they claimed were to be found in §1 of the 14^th Amendment so that they could then pretend that the cases “arise under the Constitution”!

But power over abortion, homosexuality, and marriage is nowhere in our Constitution delegated to the national government over the Country at Large. ⁵

The supreme Court has usurped power over these objects. Their opinions are void for lack of jurisdiction and are proper objects of nullification. ⁶

It is time for The People and The States to man-up and smack down the supreme Court. Scrape the Court’s barnacles off Our Constitution! State Legislatures must make laws directing all State and local governments and Citizens to ignore such usurpatious opinions of the supreme Court.

Endnotes:

¹ The briefs of the parties are HERE. The Questions Presented are set forth on pages 2 & 3.

² If a same-sex marriage is contracted in one State pursuant to the laws of that State, are other States obligated, under the “full faith and credit clause”, to acknowledge the marriage as valid? Article IV, §1 states:

“Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof.” [boldface mine]

At the time of our Framing, “marriage” does not appear to have been encompassed within “public Act or record”. In Federalist No. 42 (next to last para), Madison comments on the clause in connection with criminal and civil justice. An Act of the First Congress (May 26, 1790) prescribed the mode in which the public Acts, Records, and judicial proceedings in each State, shall be authenticated so as to take effect in every other state.  An amendment to the 1790 Act (March 27, 1804), addresses “records” which may be kept in any public office of the State. But this cannot have included marriage records because a number of the original 13 States recognized common law marriage. And even for States which required formalities (e.g., Virginia), marriages could be accomplished by publication of banns and subsequent recordation in church and parish records – which were not “public records”. Marriage licenses issued by the States were a later development. The meaning of the clause which prevailed when the Constitution was drafted and ratified remains until changed by formal Amendment to the Constitution. So the full faith and credit clause does NOT require States to recognize marriages contracted under the laws of other States.

³ Professor Raoul Berger shows in Government by Judiciary: The Transformation of the Fourteenth Amendment, that the purpose of §1 of the 14^th Amendment was to extend citizenship to freed slaves, and provide constitutional authority for the federal Civil Rights Act of 1966 which protected freed slaves from southern Black Codes which denied them basic rights.

Professor Berger shows in Chapter 11 (page 222 of his book) that “due process” is a term with a “precise technical import” going back to the Magna Charta.  It means that a person’s life, liberty or property can’t be taken away from him except by the judgment of his peers pursuant to a fair trial! Berger stresses that “due process of law” refers only to trials – to judicial proceedings in courts of justice.  It does not involve judicial power to override State Laws!

In short, the due process clause of the 14^th Amendment was to protect freed slaves from being lynched, imprisoned, or having their stuff taken away except pursuant to the judgment of their peers after a fair trial! It had nothing to do with “liberating” the American People from moral laws established thousands of years ago and codified into their own State Codes.

Section 1 of the 14^th Amendment is badly written, uses vague terminology, and violates the “expressly contained” rule. One has to read, as Professor Berger did, the discussions in Congress and the text of the Civil Rights Act of 1866 to know what § 1 is about. But our moral and spiritual decline began in the early 1800s; from there, intellectual collapse quickly follows.

⁴ They even claim the right to keep on redefining “liberty” to include additional practices they might in the future want to force everyone to accept. They said in Lawrence v. Texas:

“Had those who drew and ratified the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth Amendment or the Fourteenth Amendment known the components of liberty in its manifold possibilities, they might have been more specific. They did not presume to have this insight. They knew times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress. As the Constitution endures, persons in every generation can invoke its principles in their own search for greater freedom. (majority opinion, next to last para) [emphasis mine].

⁵ Because Congress has “exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever” over the federal enclaves described at Art. I, §8, next to last clause; Congress may make laws addressing these objects for those limited geographical areas. See also Art. IV, §3, cl 2. And pursuant to Art. I, §8, cl. 14, Congress may make laws addressing these objects for active duty military personnel.

⁶ The short and clear paper HERE proves that nullification of unconstitutional acts of the national government is the remedy advised by our Framers. One cannot honestly dispute this. PH

May 11, 2015