[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 53 (Tuesday, April 12, 2011)]
[House]
[Pages H2589-H2593]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
{time} 1920
THE U.S. CONSTITUTION
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Runyan). Under the Speaker's announced
policy of January 5, 2011, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Broun) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. BROUN of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, America is facing some very
perilous times because of the joblessness, because of the poor economy,
because of the outrageous spending that's been going on for the last 2
years through the last Congress.
I come tonight, Mr. Speaker, to discuss something that I think is
critically important for the American people to understand, because
we've gotten away from what the Constitution says and what the original
intent of the Constitution might be.
I've seen Member after Member, Mr. Speaker, hold up a copy of the
Constitution. I carry a copy in my pocket. And they'll hold up a copy
of the Constitution and talk about this being a living and breathing
document. Nothing could be further from the truth in the philosophy of
our Founding Fathers.
In fact, our Founding Fathers meant this to be a very solid
foundation. The Declaration of Independence expresses the philosophy of
liberty in America, and the Constitution is an embodiment of those
principles into a governing document.
Mr. Speaker, if we don't have a solid foundation upon which to build
all of our laws, all of our society, then we're building our society
and laws on shifting sand. You can ask a 6-year-old, if you build a
house or a building on shifting sand, what's going to happen? It's
going to fall, it's going to fail. That's exactly what's happening in
our country today, because we've gotten away from the original intent
of the Constitution.
In Hosea 4:6, God says, ``My people are destroyed for a lack of
knowledge.'' We have a tremendous lack of knowledge about the
foundational principles, what our Founding Fathers meant for government
to be. We have a tremendous lack of knowledge in this Nation even in
Federal jurists, even in jurists sitting on the U.S. Supreme Court,
about the Constitution.
In fact, I was very shocked--as I got interested in politics, I
started talking to lawyers who had gone to law schools all over this
country. The majority of lawyers that I've spoken with--law schools,
public and private all across this country, they all have a course
called constitutional law. But the American public would be absolutely
shocked to understand that lawyers, even when they take constitutional
law--and in a lot of law schools it's an elective even--when they take
constitutional law, they don't study the Constitution. All they study
is case law, what the Federal court system has said about the
Constitution.
And we've got Federal jurists all the way up to the Supreme Court,
but in all levels, from Federal district courts to the appellate system
all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, that bring down ruling after
ruling that is not based upon the Constitution in its original intent.
That philosophy leads to tyranny in all possibility.
Our Founding Fathers never meant this. In fact, if people would read
the Constitution and read what our Founding Fathers said about the
Constitution, they would understand that.
There's a great resource that talks about what our Founding Fathers
meant for the Constitution to be. The architect of the Constitution,
James Madison, John Jay, the first U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice,
and Alexander Hamilton, who was an ardent Federalist who believed in a
strong Federal Government, wrote a series of essays. These essays were
printed in the newspapers in New York State. They were written to tell
New Yorkers about what government should be under the Constitution in
its original intent.
They explained in minute detail what government should be not only
then but 200, 400, 600 years later, because they knew very firmly, very
strongly that if we didn't have that original intent and a strong,
solid foundation of government, that we could lose our liberty. That's
the reason they wanted us to stay with their intent in the
Constitution.
They wrote these series of essays. Those essays have been bound
together--this little booklet, ``The Federalist Papers,'' contains
these essays. These essays were written by James Madison, Alexander
Hamilton, and John Jay about the Constitution to explain the
Constitution.
If people will get ``The Federalist Papers'' and read them, they will
see how far off track we have gotten as a Nation. They will see that
our Nation is being destroyed from within, being destroyed by a
philosophy of big government, and this philosophy has been fostered
upon us by Democrats and Republicans alike, by liberals and
conservatives alike. We've got to change that.
Mr. Speaker, the only way that we're going to change governing here
in the United States is not here in Washington, not here in the U.S.
House of Representatives, not over across the way in the U.S. Senate,
not down the street on Pennsylvania Avenue in the White House. The only
way we're going to change the philosophy of governance is if the
grassroots, the good people across this Nation, start demanding a
different kind of governance.
We've got to stop this outrageous spending. We've got to get our
economy back on track. We've got to start creating jobs. What's made
this country so rich, so powerful, so successful as a political
experiment, the greatest political experiment in all of history, in all
of mankind, is right here in the United States based on the
Constitution of the United States in its original intent.
We have a tremendous lack of knowledge.
Now, ``The Federalist Papers'' in the old language, it's a bit
difficult to read. Their style of writing, their style of English was a
bit different from ours.
We've got another resource that I highly recommend, which is ``The
Federalist Papers in Modern Language.'' A person can buy this off
Amazon, they can get this in Barnes and Noble bookstores around the
country. If they don't have it in stock, it can be ordered.
The editor, Mary Webster, got some folks to transliterate ``The
Federalist Papers'' from old-style English into modern English. What
``transliterate'' means is to change one word in the old style to
another word in the new style. This is not an editorialization of ``The
Federalist Papers,'' it is not a commentary on ``The Federalist
Papers.''
[[Page H2590]]
It's strictly a transliteration. In other words, it's changed from old-
style English into new-style English. And that's all it's done.
People can go and read either ``The Federalist Papers'' in its
original English form or ``The Federalist Papers in Modern Language,''
and can become knowledgeable.
We've got to light grassfires all across this country to demand a
different kind of governance or we're going to destroy everything that
our Founding Fathers have given us.
This Nation was built on personal responsibility and accountability.
It was based on freedom and liberty. I use those words separately.
Let me explain ``liberty'' for you, give you a definition. I don't
know if this is my original definition or not. I don't remember ever
reading it anywhere. I haven't seen it when I've gone to look it up.
I'm not claiming it as my own, though I don't know who wrote it, if
someone did: Liberty. Liberty is freedom bridled by morality.
{time} 1930
Liberty is freedom bridled by morality. You see, a wild bear is free.
All the wild bear's constrained by is the instincts that our Creator
put in a wild bear. It can go anywhere it wants to. A male wild bear
will even kill its own cubs just to try to get to the sow, to breed
her. He doesn't care about anybody else but himself. That sow will
protect her cubs, but other than that she's free, and she chooses to do
so by her instinct.
But absolute freedom is anarchy. It's anarchy. You see, if I am
totally free, if I don't like somebody, I can just kill them. In fact,
we see that by dictators around the world, historically as well as in
present times. But you see, freedom bridled by morality, liberty, means
that my freedom stops where another person's freedom starts. And we can
come together and work in concert for the greater good, for the greater
good of our families, our communities, our cities, our States, as well
as our Nation.
This country was founded upon liberty, personal responsibility, and
accountability. It's been so successful economically because it's been
based on the free enterprise system. Free enterprise. Free enterprise
is the engine that pulls along the train of economic prosperity here in
America. But we're destroying that.
Our President has a philosophy that I believe is totally against free
enterprise. A lot of my colleagues, Democrat and Republican alike,
believe the Federal Government ought to control virtually every aspect
of our lives. George W. Bush was a big-spending, big-government
President. He gave us No Child Left Behind, which has been a disaster.
I call it Leave No Teacher Unshackled. We've got to get the shackles
off teachers, let the local school boards run the education system, not
by a Federal Department of Education, or I don't even think by a State
Department of Education. But the States have the right to do that
constitutionally.
The most powerful political force in America today is embodied in the
first three words of the U.S. Constitution: ``We the people.'' And if
we the people will become knowledgeable about the Constitution and
about the Founding Fathers' philosophy of government, the philosophy of
liberty and freedom, the philosophy of a free enterprise system, a
philosophy of individual responsibility and individual accountability,
then we can put this country back on the right course by the American
people demanding their freedom back. We've lost a lot of it. A
tremendous amount of freedom has been lost. We're losing our liberty,
and we have a government that has taken away our freedoms.
The Preamble to the Constitution of the United States: ``We the
people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union,
establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide the common
defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of
liberty to ourselves and our prosperity, do ordain and establish this
Constitution of the United States.''
Tonight I am going to talk about one little phrase in this Preamble.
It's also in another place in the Constitution. I'm going to talk about
the general welfare clause. We'll come back on another night, and I am
going to talk about the commerce clause. And then we'll talk also about
the elastic clause, and the Bill of Rights, and other parts of the
Constitution.
But three phrases out of the Constitution have been utilized to
pervert the idea behind the Constitution, to destroy its original
intent, to cause us to continue to lose liberty here in America. The
general welfare clause is one of those. You see, Congress has strayed
from the clear-cut path, the certainty and liberty that our Founding
Fathers outlined in the most basic and fundamental document to ever
exist, and that's our Constitution.
The single most important part of this revered document is embodied
in those first three words, because we are supposed to be a government
of the people, by the people, and for the people, as Abraham Lincoln
said. Our government's purpose is to protect and preserve freedom and
liberties of we, the people. Government is supposed to be governing at
the consent of the people, not the people being dealt with at the
consent of the government.
Yet nowadays it seems as though the Federal Government has inserted
itself into almost every aspect of our day-to-day lives, monitoring
what kind of health care we can have, bailing out the automobile
industry, and regulating the education standards. Just a few examples
of the Federal Government's hand's overreach into things where it
should not go.
Mr. Speaker, over time it's become the norm for the Federal
Government to keep expanding in both size and scope by absorbing powers
and rights that were intended for the States and the people. In fact,
in the 10th Amendment of the Constitution, it says if a right is not
specifically given to the Federal Government by the Constitution, in
other words these things that are in article I, section 8, as well as a
few others, but these are the things we can pass laws about, if it's
not prohibited from the States, then those rights are reserved for the
States and the people.
One of my primary goals while serving here in Washington is to send
these powers back to the States and to the people and to ensure that,
do everything that I can to ensure that the Constitution is applied as
the Founding Fathers intended. I will work very hard to try to build
those bridges, to send those powers back to the States and people.
These are the powers created in article I, section 8.
The necessary and proper clause, the so-called elastic clause, allows
Congress to pass laws about these other things; but this is all the
Federal Government, all the House and the Senate is supposed to be
passing laws about. Now, we have some say in the courts, we have some
say with the executive branch, but these are the things that Congress
is supposed to be passing laws about, and nothing else. Nothing else
but these things.
Well, the general welfare clause is one of the most commonly abused
and misapplied powers that the Federal Government has utilized to
expand the size and scope of government and to destroy our liberty.
Article I, section 8 of the U.S. Constitution, clause 1: ``The Congress
shall have the power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and
excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and
general welfare of the United States.'' This is the second place, I
mentioned just a few minutes before, in the Preamble our Founding
Fathers mentioned general welfare.
{time} 1940
Here it is in article I, section 8, clause 1, the general welfare.
This clause generated the most debate during our Founding Fathers'
period because the term ``general welfare'' is vague and leaves much
room for interpretation. Now we hear judges talk about interpreting the
Constitution. Judges shouldn't be interpreting the Constitution. Words
make a difference. And when we use the word ``interpreting,'' that
means somebody can apply their own bias what should and what should not
be constitutional.
Well, you should be utilizing the word, apply the Constitution in its
original intent. I am an original intent constitutionalist, as I just
mentioned. I want to apply the Constitution as our Founding Fathers
meant.
Alexander Hamilton and James Madison famously disagreed about the
meaning of ``general welfare'' and the
[[Page H2591]]
limits to Congress' spending. Madison wanted the clause to be very,
very narrowly interpreted, and Hamilton wanted a bit broader
interpretation.
Now, if Alexander Hamilton were to walk into the doors of this U.S.
House today, he would be absolutely shocked and chagrined at how much
liberty we have lost, because he never, as a Federalist, envisioned the
size and scope of government today. I think if he knew what was going
on today, a little over 200 years since the Constitution was passed,
ratified, he would be arguing just like I am today.
Yet the Founders, as they laid out in the Federalist Papers, neither
Madison nor Hamilton would have agreed with the modern-day view that
there are no limitations whatsoever on Congress' power to spend and
that ``general welfare'' means whatever Congress, the President, and
the Courts say that it means, even though a sort of Federalist would
not agree that we have an open invitation to have whatever kind of
government that we want to have.
Today, no project seems too local or too narrow, which is a big part
of why this country is buried in so much debt--$14.5 trillion. And then
if you look at the finance gap, it's over $200 trillion.
The powers of Congress are not unlimited, which is why we must get
back to the basics of the Constitution, and we are going to talk
tonight about that original intent of the general welfare clause and
highlight just how far we have moved away from it.
James Madison, number 41, in the Federalist Papers, wrote this:
``Some, who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation,
have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution''--well, it
sounds like that today, doesn't it--``on the language in which it is
defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power `to lay and
collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and
provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United
States' ''--
We just showed you that. That is in article 1, section 8, clause 1 of
the Constitution.
As he goes on, ``amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every
power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or
general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under
which these writers labor for objections than their stooping to such a
misconstruction.''
Now, that's that old kind of language. Basically, he was saying that
it is inane to think that the general welfare clause, this clause, can
allow the Congress to pass laws about anything, collect taxes, et
cetera, collect anything. No stronger proof could be given.
Under the distress, that means under the problems that are going to
arise, under which these writers labor, the Supreme Court today, the
President today, the last President, Republican and Democratic
Presidents for the last many decades, labor for objections, and they
are stooping to such a misconstruction.
He was very, very clear. We do not have the power to do so. We don't
have the power to do so.
James Madison, Federalist 45:
``The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal
Government are few and defined.'' They are defined. Article 1, section
8, other articles, strictly interpreted, strictly defined, strictly
according to what it says, not of broadening of those powers, few and
defined, ``to be exercised principally on external objects, as war,
peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce.''
James Madison in Federalist 45 was saying basically right here what
the primary purpose of the Federal Government is: It's national
defense, national security, foreign affairs. And also in the
Constitution we have the rights to postal roads, post offices, things
like that, to establish a currency to make this one Nation.
But the principal purpose of the Federal Government and the original
intent of the Constitution is national defense, national security, and
foreign affairs. The American people need to understand that firmly.
That's foreign commerce.
We see over and over again the Courts defining general welfare in a
different manner, much different manner. In fact, the Courts have held
that anything that has to do with anybody's welfare, an individual's
welfare, is okay under the Constitution, but that's not the original
intent. The original intent was the general welfare, the general
welfare of the Nation, not welfare of individuals.
We have developed this big welfare system in this country. It all
started in earnest with Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Delano
Roosevelt. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt just exploded the size
and scope of government through his New Deal--both Progressives; both
had socialist beliefs.
In fact, Franklin Delano Roosevelt sent his advisers, his closely
held friends, his Cabinet people, to go visit with Stalin in Communist
Russia to study what he was doing, what Stalin was doing there so that
FDR could replicate it here in the United States, and he did everything
that he possibly could to do so. He packed the Courts because the
Courts originally said the welfare clause, commerce clause, could not
be expanded to include all this size and scope of government.
Thomas Jefferson: ``Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for
the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.'' Back to
article I, section 8.
When my colleagues, Republican and Democrat alike, vote for things
that are not enumerated in the original intent, they are violating
their oath of office. Every single one of us has stood up here and has
taken an oath of office.
The first I time I did that was when I was sworn in the Marine Corps,
1964; when I came to Congress in a special election in 2007, and then
again in 2009, and then again this year. I stood right here in this
Chamber and I held up my hand, and I swore to uphold the Constitution
against powers both foreign and domestic. One of the greatest domestic
powers that is anti-Constitution resides right in this House, right in
this House, because we are destroying our liberty.
{time} 1950
We are destroying it by the philosophy of big government. Thomas
Jefferson said, ``They are not to do anything they please.''
Seventy years ago, in a court case called United States v. Butler, we
started moving into this loosey-goosey idea about the Constitution
being anything that a court says that it is, anything that a President
says that it is, and anything that the Congress says that it is. And we
have seen just recently where Congress passed the McCain-Feingold law.
President Bush said, we will let the Supreme Court tell us whether it
is constitutional or not. Well, the Supreme Court is not the final
arbiter of what is constitutional. Neither is the President. Neither is
Congress. We all have something to say about that, certainly. So do the
States.
We the people are actually the final arbiter. We the people need to
demand original intent of the Constitution by becoming knowledgeable
about it. The final arbiter of what is constitutional or not is what is
in the Constitution and what our Founding Fathers said about it, not
what some Supreme Court ruling has said about it, because most Supreme
Court justices have no clue what the original intent is and don't care.
They just don't care I don't think.
United States v. Butler 70 years ago dismissed Madison's and
Jefferson's narrow view of the Constitution, the original intent of the
Constitution, and the Supreme Court held that the power to tax and
spend is an independent power, and the general welfare clause gives
Congress the power it might not derive elsewhere.
In Helvering v. Davis, the Supreme Court interpreted the clause even
more expansively, conferring upon Congress a plenary power to impose
taxes and to spend money for the general welfare subject almost
entirely to its own discretion, our own discretion. Even more recently,
the Court has included the power to indirectly coerce the States into
adopting national standards by threatening to withhold Federal funds in
South Dakota v. Dole.
Today, the Hamiltonian view predominates in the application of the
general welfare clause, which has led to the expansion of the
government to its $4.5 trillion debt. We spend up here without
considering the repercussions. ObamaCare is a great example. ObamaCare
is a destroyer. It's going to destroy jobs. It's going to destroy
budgets, people's budgets, companies'
[[Page H2592]]
budgets, cities' budgets, States' budgets, and the Federal budget. And
it's going to destroy the quality of health care. And we have no
constitutional authority, as a judge in Florida upheld.
James Madison a little later on in his life wrote a letter to James
Robertson in 1831. In this letter he said, ``With respect to the words
'general welfare,' I have always regarded them as qualified by the
detail of powers connected with them.'' Connected with them. In other
words, those things in article 1, section 8 and the rest of the
Constitution as it was intended. ``To take them in a literal and
unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a
character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its
creators.'' The creators of the Constitution are those folks who wrote
it and those folks who ratified it.
This literal and unlimited interpretation is destroying America. It's
destroying our economy. It's destroying everything that has been good
in this Nation. We need to cut our outrageous spending for the well-
being of our Nation and apply the general welfare clause as James
Madison originally intended.
It's got to stop. Mr. Speaker, when I come to the floor to vote or
when I write legislation, my staff and I write legislation, we have a
four-way test that I apply to every vote I make and everything I do
here. The first question is, ``is it right?'' By that question I mean,
is it morally right? Does it follow the Judeo-Christian biblical
principles that this Nation was founded upon? A lot of liberals across
this country who are watching this will start blogging, and some of the
liberal news media will say that I want to set up a theocracy here in
America. Nothing could be further from the truth. Our Founding Fathers
didn't want a theocracy either. Freedom of religion in the First
Amendment is very dear to me. It's very dear to all of us. But we have
freedom of religion in this country so that Jews, Buddhists, Muslims,
Hindus, atheists, humanists, yes, even Christians, can make a personal
choice of what their religion is and can celebrate and worship in their
religion as long as it doesn't infringe upon somebody else's rights,
because this Nation was founded upon biblical principles, the
principles of freedom and liberty.
We have gotten away from it. I believe so much in these four
questions that I have them printed up. If somebody comes to my office,
they'll see them on the desk of all my legislative people in my
offices. There's a copy on my desk. It's on the home page of both of my
Web sites. I wish every Member of Congress would apply these four
principles. Is it right? Is it constitutional in it original intent?
Not this perverted idea of the Constitution that Presidents,
Congresses, and the Federal court systems operate under. Is it
necessary? And can we afford it? Four simple questions.
You see, we've gotten away from the original intent of the
Constitution. We've created this huge Federal Government that has taken
our freedom away. It's killing our liberty and our Nation. And it's
because of a perverted idea of the general welfare clause, as well as
the commerce clause and the elastic clause, that the courts have
allowed this to happen, the Presidents and the Congresses have allowed
it to happen.
Mr. Speaker, we the people need to stand up and say no to taking our
liberty away. Our Founding Fathers over and over again during the
original period would rush to the floor with this book in hand, the
holy Bible, and they would come to the floor, the House and the Senate,
go to the floor of the Constitutional Convention and say, look what I
found, what our Creator says. Benjamin Franklin proposed prayer in the
Constitutional Convention. We pray today every day that Congress opens
because of that prayer that Benjamin Franklin recommended.
In his speech, and I encourage you to go read it, he said, if our
Creator notices when a bird falls to the ground, how can we build a
nation without the help of Providence, of our God, our Creator?
You see, the Constitution was written on biblical principles. In
fact, our Founding Fathers quoted the holy Bible more than any other
source. David Barton has a ministry in Aledo, Texas, called
WallBuilders. He has more original source documents than probably
anybody. He wrote a book called ``Original Intent: The Courts, the
Constitution, and Religion.'' I highly recommend this, too.
WallBuilders is a great resource of what the original intent is and
what our Founding Fathers have said about the Constitution.
{time} 2000
But, you see, back to something I mentioned earlier, God says in
Hosea 4:6: My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.
I have heard that beginning line preached a number of times, but very
seldom do I hear a pastor go past that line. The whole verse says, and
remember, this is a promise from a holy, righteous God that can do
nothing else but fulfill the promise. His promise is this when he spoke
through Hosea to the Israelites, he speaks to us today, our Creator
says: My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have
rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being priest for me.
Because you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your
children.
And I get goose bumps and shivers every time I say that, literally,
because it is a promise from a holy, righteous God that can do nothing
else but fulfill that promise.
You see, the future of our Nation depends upon we the people, the
most powerful political force in this Nation becoming knowledgeable,
becoming knowledgeable about the Constitution, getting a copy, looking
at it online. In my district, people can come by my office and get a
copy. We give them away by the hundreds out of my office here in
Washington. Get a copy of the ``Federalist Papers.'' Or if you don't
want to read it in old-style English, get the ``Federalist Papers'' in
modern language, this document.
Read what our Founding Fathers said about the Constitution. Read the
anti-Federalist Papers. Those are the guys who did not want a strong
Federal Government. But you will see in the ``Federalist Papers,''
those who argued for a strong central government, we have enumerated,
very limited and defined powers as James Madison states, Thomas
Jefferson states.
Former U.S. Senator Everett Dirksen once said when he feels the heat,
he sees the light. Members of Congress in the House and the Senate,
need to see the light by feeling the heat of we the people.
You see, in Psalms 11, God asked the question: If the foundations be
destroyed, what are the righteous to do?
God has given us free will. He has given us freedom. He has given us
liberty, unlike any society ever in history has seen, ever experienced;
but we are losing it. And the only way we are going to put it back on
the right course is for people to become knowledgeable about the
foundational principles so that we can put this country back on a solid
foundation so it is not built on shifting sand so that we can change
the course of history.
The direction we are heading today is going to destroy everything
that has been good about this country. It is going to destroy our
liberty. We are not going to have the freedom that we have enjoyed,
even in the past few decades, which is much less freedom than they
experienced in this country 100 years ago.
Look at these questions. I think they are very reasonable. Is it
right? Does it fit the Judeo-Christian principles the Nation was
founded upon? Is it constitutional in its original intent, not this
perverted idea that we are operating on today? Do we need it? And can
we afford it? If we went to these questions, we wouldn't have $14.5
trillion of debt. We wouldn't have all of the unfunded liabilities of
the Federal Government which are tremendous. We wouldn't have the loss
of liberty and freedoms that we see going on here today. We wouldn't
have a lot of the debates that we have here in Congress.
We the people need to start holding every single Member of Congress,
every President, every public official, local, State, as well as
Federal, because they all take that same oath, to defend the
Constitution. The vast, vast majority are violating that oath; and the
only way that we the people are going to change things, the only way we
are going to put this country back on the right course is for we the
people to demand it.
[[Page H2593]]
So please contact your neighbors, your friends, get them to read the
Constitution. Read the ``Federalist Papers.'' Read what our Founding
Fathers said about government. Understand how far we have gotten away
from those original principles, how much we have lost our freedom, how
much we have gotten away from liberty and how close we are to becoming
a socialistic, communistic nation in this country. That is where we are
headed.
The only way it is going to change is if the American people will
stand up and demand something different, start throwing people out of
office that violate their oath of office, and put people in office that
are going to stand firm for freedom, for liberty.
I am going to stand firm for the Constitution as it was intended, and
I am going to continue to fight for the Constitution as it was
intended. There are precious few here in this body that will stand and
even vote that way. The only way we are going to change it, the only
way we are going to save America, is for we the people to stand up and
demand it.
I believe we can; I believe we will. I believe we are at the
beginning right now today of a new dawn in America, a dawn of liberty,
a dawn of freedom, a dawn of limited government, a dawn of strong
national defense and national security, a dawn where our children and
grandchildren are going to grow up in an economically prosperous Nation
where there are going to be jobs in the private sector, where people
are going to be able to operate within their society without all of the
constraints of government.
We have got to demand it. The future of this country depends upon it.
Your children and your grandchildren depend upon it. Join in the fight.
____________________