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Due Process, Equal Protection with Privileges or Immunities…John Bingham’s invaluable Gift to Americans
He was appointed to sit as an Assistant Judge Advocate General for the President Lincoln assassination trial, a prosecutor for the Andrew Johnson impeachment trials and an ex-member of the Opposition party (those opposed to the expansion of slavery) finally becoming a Republican Senator for the state of Ohio. I’m speaking of John Bingham, whom left his legacy in the history annals United States of America’s Constitution and is known as the framer for the 14th amendment and its key clauses for equality. The Amendment that has some of the most significant clauses relating to civil rights and addressing control laws, three of which are the Due Process clause, the Equal Protection clause and the Privileges and Immunities clause.
The Due Process clause:
prohibits state and local governments from depriving persons of life, liberty, or property without certain steps being taken to make sure fairness.
The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment serves three distinct functions in modern constitutional doctrine: “First, it incorporates [against the States] specific protections defined in the Bill of Rights….Second, it has a substantive component, sometimes called ‘substantive due process.’…Third, it is a guarantee of fair procedure, sometimes called ‘procedural due process.
The Equal Protection Clause was specifically added for states that had black codes.
Black codes were, many laws enacted in the states of the former Confederacy after the American Civil War, in 1865 and 1866. These laws were designed to replace the social controls of slavery that had been removed by the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, and were thus intended to assure continuance of white supremacy. Tennessee Democrat Andrew Johnson, was president during this time and his southern sensibilities allowed a leniency towards the southern states feeling comfortable and well within their right to enact such blatantly discriminating laws.
The Equal Protection Clause as John Bingham clarified it’s meaning was:
The Magna Charta “gave the protection of the laws only to freemen” while the Fifth Amendment used “more comprehensive words, ‘no person’” shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law. And thus,“the people by their Constitution declared the equality of all men, and by the express limitation forbade the Government of the United States from making any discrimination.”
Privileges and Immunities Clause in Article Four of the original unamended Constitution was the inspiration of Bingham’s to drafted the Privileges or Immunities Clause, which reads:
The Congress shall have power to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper to secure to the citizens of each state all privileges and Immunities of citizens in the several states…..
or in other words:No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or Immunities of citizens of the United States….
on April 28 of 1866, the Joint Committee of Fifteen voted in favor of a second draft proposed by Congressman Bingham, which would ultimately be adopted into the Constitution, along with the rest of the Fourteenth Amendment, this clause became part of the Constitution on July 9, 1868.
John Bingham’s contribution to the Constitution for the United States of America is so invaluable that you would think his name would be one of common knowledge, it isn’t, at least outside of legal circles, but his legacy lives on and still holds strong, as the 14th Amendment is cited in more litigation than any other amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Correlate this very brief delving into the history of the 14th Amendment with the present outcry for a quick solution to crimes committed by criminals with guns, and you can see why there is such a large outcry put forth by pro-second amendment advocates raised up in voices to defend the right to bear arms and stop the oppression of gun control legislation. It would behoove all Americans to be more aware of their history on gun control and it’s relation to civil rights, only then perhaps, one may see the value of this freedom, which can protect even the other freedoms.
I should also mention that one of the most significant uses of the 14th amendment’s Privileges or Immunities clause was by Justice Clarence Thomas in the McDonald v Chicago case, stating in his written opinion:
“In my view, the record makes plain that the Framers of the Privileges or Immunities Clause and the ratifying-era public understood — just as the Framers of the Second Amendment did — that the right to keep and bear arms was essential to the preservation of liberty,” Thomas wrote. “The record makes equally plain that they deemed this right necessary to include in the minimum baseline of federal rights that the Privileges or Immunities Clause established in the wake of the War over slavery.”
Friend, Foe and Patriotism….The true enemy within.
The Black man is its own worse enemy, for all their talk of “selling out” they will sell out their own. Send them to the brimming fire pits of hell while applauding, listen to those of that they claim do them no justice ie: the White media, while applauding the same black TOKEN hero they literally bashed themselves through so-called leader-representation of the Hollywood actors and so-called civil rights activists. Those same activist that claimed, “he doesn’t sound black enough”, “he needs some more hood in him” “Barack where are the jobs”. Hispanics too. Lest you forget:
Let us not forget either what it really boils down to, since one of their own exalted kind spoke these words:
“I voted for Barack because he was black. ‘Cuz that’s why other folks vote for other people — because they look like them … That’s American politics, pure and simple. [Obama's] message didn’t mean sh*t to me.” ”When it comes down to it, they wouldn’t have elected a n*gga. Because, what’s a n*gga? A [bleep] is scary. Obama ain’t scary at all. n*gga don’t have beers at the White House. n*gga don’t let some white dude, while you in the middle of a speech, call [him] a liar. A n*gga would have stopped the meeting right there and said, ‘Who the n*gga said that?’ I hope Obama gets scary in the next four years, ‘cuz he ain’t gotta worry about getting re-elected.”~Samuel L Jackson interview Ebony Magazine. 2012
The divisiveness doesn’t have to come from white vs. black, black vs. Hispanic, Hispanic vs. black, it comes more so from within each race! The truth is a historically, biblical leaning towards one fraction of a populations race trying to over take and rule the others within that ethnic group. Hearing, seeing and believing the true state of anything with those that seek their own agendas is a futile endeavor. They want to believe that you are trying to sell them an agenda, instead of trying to show them the ineptness, and lack of due diligence their leader really is.
A nation can survive it’s fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive it’s treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within fre
ely, his sly whispers rustling through the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself.
For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in the accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of a city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.-Marcus Tullius Cicero
Roman orator, statesman 42 B.C.
Man will always have those that seek power within its own group instead of working together and bowing down to the true ONE, the Alpha, and the Omega that holds the true power. It is far easier to create a platform of false idol-ship if you attack your own core base, divide and conquer, yet those conquering for their own selfish needs, forgets that they are the easiest to defeat, because their battle plans are weak, as weak as the foundation they are built upon. True warriors and patriots want a solid foundation of freedom, not to be standing upon a footing built upon fear, cheap trinkets of appeasement, and weak leadership. Strong leaders always rise back to the top, time is the only matter and reason, in due time all good things come to those that not only wait but FIGHT and WORK for what they believe in.
Meanwhile on the ground in this great nation we have boots on the ground that are aiding and assisting their fellow-man through disasters regardless of political affiliation, race, creed, nationality, and sexual orientation. These same freedom fighting guardians of our nation’s freedoms have boots on the ground overseas, in foreign lands that many of those whom don’t advocate for their freedoms benefit from. That is the true spirit of Patriotism, the will, desire, and courage to fight on.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government…~The Declaration of Independence (selected statement by author) see full context at: http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/
“True leadership must be for the benefit of the followers, not to enrich the leader.” –John C. Maxwell
Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets: She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying, How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge? ~Proverbs 1:20-22
Peace be with you.
Remembering and honoring our veterans tomorrow:
