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THE RICH KEEP GETTING RICHER! WHY? Maybe you should take a
closer look at the Constitution of the United States? This morning's newspaper said the Census Bureau has reported that in the last two decades the wealthiest 20 percent of households jumped from 44 percent to 50 percent of the total U.S. income, while everyone else's fell. Earlier this week, a morning newspaper included a commentary about the Electoral College that, in essence, claimed there is something wrong with a system that treats the popular vote of the people as irrelevant, allowing their second choice to win the election and the Presidency. The author makes the further comment that "they—the framers of our Constitution—had no real clue what they were doing" when they created the College. of course the "framers" knew what they were doing. These men always knew what they were doing. The growing discrepancy between the incomes of rich and working Americans is a direct result of the Electoral College and the Constitution of the United States, which together have created a mechanism that for more than two hundred years has thwarted the ability of working Americans to influence political decisions affecting their lives. Did you know the delegates to the Constitutional Convention were all wealthy and influential men? Are you aware that few small farmers or craftsmen even knew about the meeting? It was the typical sneaky behavior of men who don't want others to know the nasty things they were planning. It's the way of the Bush Administration today. How many of the current generations of Americans know that these wealthy men feared sharing political power with the poorer classes and that the Constitutional Convention of 1787 in Philadelphia was the first step in their rebellion against common working Americans? How many know the constitution, itself, is an illegal document? The Articles of Confederation, the republic's first constitution, states:
The Articles further state:
Yet, the U.S. constitution is both a confederation and an alliance between the leading wealthy citizens of each state and it was ratified by special state conventions, and not by the congress of the United States nor the legislatures of every state. What should these illegal acts that changed the course of American history tell today's working Americans about the validity of their constitution and economic conditions today? Most Amricans believe our constitution is a document that promotes justice and equality for all, showing no favoritism for any class of citizen. But this isn't true. The genius of the constitution is that it doesn't appear to be a class-biased document. Its words are cold and clinical—until the document and the state constitutions of those times are analyzed. You might also want to read the personal correspondence between many of that meeting's most prominent men, and, possibly, study a series of essays written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay called The Federalist Papers designed to persuade wealthy Americans of New York state to vote for their proposed constitution. Only then do the true intentions and prejudices of the convention delegates become apparent. If you were to read The Federalist Papers, you would know exactly what the framers had in mind when they created the Electoral College—and why some of the Constitution's language is ambiguous, although written by masters of the English language. Yes, a prime purpose of the convention was to resolve the problems of the republic's commerce, but even after they had satisfactorily structured the outline of their document to accomodate this problem, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention of 1787 faced three distinct, but related, issues to resolve. First: was how to retain the delicate balance between the three branches of government, for they didn't believe the division of government into three separate departments would be enough to do the job. Second: was how to restrict state legislatures that favored paper money and leniency for debtors. Third: was, probably, the most urgent: how to ensure that the masses of common Americans could never gain the political power to jeopardize the wealth and wealth-making opportunities of the republic's privileged citizens. The first issue was largely solved by having House members chosen by the people directly for a period of two years, Senate members chosen by the privileged men of state legislatures for a period of six years, and privileged men of state legislatures chose the electors of the college who chose the President and Vice-President for a period of four years. Electors were originally chosen by the privileged men of state legislatures. This device not only guaranteed the sovereignty of each department, it guaranteed that common Americans couldn't seize control of all three departments in a single election. The second issue was solved by Article One Section Ten of their new constitution, which states:
The third issue was a little more difficult to solve. Privileged Americans didn't have an army to fight their battles, as the King of England possessed, so they certainly didn't want to antagonize common Americans. But angry commoners are exactly what they would have faced had their intentions been known by the masses. According to Madison, in the Federalist Paper No 10, the prime function of government is to regulate the country's "various and interfering interests" of which "the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property." Madison goes on to describe how this condition produces different "classes" of people: creditors and debtors, a landed interest, a manufacturing interest, a mercantile interest, a money interest and many lesser interests. He points out that legislatures inherently reflect these various interests. The biggest danger, claimed Madison would be the fusion of the landless and moneyless interests into the majority that would threaten the rights and wealth of the minority. By minority, Madison meant the wealthy privileged, for in 1787, and for thousands of years prior, the label "minority" referred only to the comparatively few wealthy families of a society, as opposed to the majority of its impoverished citizens. What was Madison's advice to his privileged countrymen?
Divide the masses of common citizens into so many groups with different political agendas, he said, and they will not be capable of mustering the greater political force. Isn't that the way our political history has evolved? Haven't we common working citizens always been easily manipulated and divided by interests of race, religion, economic, geographic, and educational status? And even by generations? Hasn't our political strength always been diluted by our differences? Wouldn't life have been different in the U.S. for those of us on the bottom rungs of the economic ladder, if we had ignored our artificial differences and united politically as "common working Americans?" And just in case commoners did fuse the greater political force, Alexander Hamilton suggested:
This is the true basis of our two house Congress. The smaller house, the Senate, was originally comprised of wealthy men, which to this very day, is openly acknowledged as a "country club" of millionaires. And, as we all know, these men have little compassion for the needs and wants of working Americans. So, although the House may pass tax bills or bills favorable to working families, the Senate has amendment powers over all House bills. It means Senators were given the final word on revenue bills affecting their wealth and wealth-making opportunities, and also the power over bills that attempt to improve the lives of working citizens, such as the minimum wage. Furthermore, to thwart any possible takeover of the Senate by common Americans, the reelection of Senators was staggered—one-third of the seats every two years. The noble reason given was it always assures experienced leadership. The true reason is staggered elections make it more difficult for commoners to gain control of the Senate. The delegates knew that passionate causes have short lives and that to win majority control of the Senate, commoners must sustain an effort of four, and possibly six years. Most delegates, however, believed uneducated commoners incapable, or too stupid, to sustain such an effort. In addition, all amendments to the Constitution demanded a two-thirds vote in each of the two houses of Congress and the approval of three-fourths of the states. This, in itself, was a formidable barrier to popular will. Finally, the delegates delivered the coup de grâce. Judges of the Supreme Court and all federal judges were to be chosen by the president and, presumably, obligated to the president. As only a lawyer could be appointed a judge, and most lawyers in 1787 were from privileged families, and as Supreme Court judges were to be appointed for life and hold the power to determine the "constitutionality" of laws, and as all federal judges could be removed from office only by impeachment, it meant that, along with the legislative and executive departments, privileged Americans of 1787 expected also to control the judicial department of their proposed new government. The primacy of obligation by Federal judges to the political powers that appoint them has been verified by the illegal act of the Supreme Court in stopping the Florida recount in the 2000 election and giving George W. Bush the presidency he hadn't won. Should, by chance, a man of the people win the presidency and try to select judges, the privileged men of the Senate were given the power to reject his choices. One more bit of information concerning the Constitution of the United States. Americans are always reminded that it is the c that gives them their freedoms over which they must always guard. But this isn't true. It is the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the document which define our freedoms from the tyrannical action of rulers. But as originally submitted to the states for ratification, the Constitution didn't have a Bill of Rights, clearly showing the true intent of the delegates. The absolute truth is wealthy Americans designed the constitution to give themselves almost total control over the proposed new government. This which makes it a class-biased document. Under these circumstances, what else should be expected other than a great disparity between rich and poor—except, perhaps, a return to monarchy or dictatorship as many of the delegates preferred, and in a direction the Bush Administration seems to be taking us. I have long advocated a change in our representative democracy to a Direct Democracy. I claim Direct Democracy is the only political system that holds the potential of a better life for working Americans—and for working commoners the globe over. Be aware, however, that such a transformation of a political system will change the very basis of life. It's too late to make a difference in the 2004 election. We can only hope that Kerry wins and that he won't be any worse than Bill Clinton was for working Americans. We are in time for 2008 so, why don't we put aside our differences and unite as common working citizens, dump the useless Democratic Party, form a brand new Direct Democracy Party, and establish a society in which we make the laws that mold our country; laws that will tell the world who we really are, and what we really stand for. Let's do it! And may the Greater-Force be with us, always!
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