Tag: ninth

The Ninth Amendment? What is that?

Well, do you know? Most people don’t, and if you were to poll Joe-and-suzy average on the street, you would find that just about no-one has ever heard of it. Yet, it is THE most important amendment to the United States Constitution. In fact, I would argue that the United States is what it is today due to ignoring this amendment.

Yes… yes… yes…

We all know that the Bill of Rights functionally no longer exists. It doesn’t, and it hasn’t existed for over a hundred years. I’m not going to insult the reader with the facts, it has long since been documented time and time again…

• The sole purpose of the ATF is infringe on the Second Amendment.
• The Utah Data Collection Center would not exist if the Fourth Amendment was being enforced.
• Judicial “Plea Bargains” circumvented both the Sixth and Seventh Amendment Protections.
• The DHS and TSA has severely degraded Fifth Amendment protections.
• The Tenth Amendment was eviscerated when the Southern States lost the American Civil War.
• The Preamble to the Bill of Rights is ignored.

The facts are there, plain as day. There is no need to parse individual details. Those doing so are either [1] Living in an Ivory Tower bubble, [2] Mentally retarded, or [3] Shrills for the Oligarchy. There is no other excuse.

I argue here, that just about everything related to the “War on Drugs”, the “War on Poverty”, regulations for “Climate Change”, and just about every single liberal progressive social engineering effort (from cake baking, to LGBT bathrooms), would be stopped dead in it’s tracks, if the Ninth Amendment were being followed.

We now inhabit a world that demonizes Thomas Jefferson and elevates  Frederica Wilson. Is there any way out of this mess that doesn’t involve  a spaceship? 

- From the editors, at Taki's Magazine 

What is the Ninth Amendment?

The Ninth Amendment

The ninth amendment states that though only some rights are specifically listed in the Constitution, those rights not specifically listed are not denied to the people. 

It was designed to further protect the rights of the people by preventing the government from creating restrictions on unlisted rights.

-Wikipedia

I like that sentence…

“It was designed to … prevent the government from creating restrictions … on citizens.”

The exact text reads:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. 
 

Ah, it’s pretty clear, don’t ya think. Just because the Constitution list the freedom to speak as a Right, this amendment says that there are many, many other Rights that Americans have.

The Ninth Amendment was James Madison’s attempt to ensure that the Bill of Rights  was not seen as granting to the people of the United States only the  specific rights it addressed.  

In recent years, some have interpreted it  as affirming the existence of such “unenumerated” rights outside those expressly protected by the Bill of Rights. 

-Legal Information Institute

The FDA example.

For instance… consider this RIGHT that is not enumerated within the Constitution;

The RIGHT to eat and drink whatever you want.

Or, in other words, the RIGHT to take what ever medicine or substance and ingest it. If you want to drink alcohol, then the government should not get involved. If you want to smoke crazy-weed, it’s none of the government’s business. I you wanted to take a large dosage of vitamin “D”, go ahead.

That’s what freedom is all about.

A person living in freedom, as delineated by the Ninth Amendment would not have to contend with…

• Regulations on “Obama-School-Lunch” composition.
• All FDA restrictions, and drug schedules.
• Regulations on the manufacture of home-made moonshine.
• Regulations on “Magic Mushrooms”, “demon weed”, and “tobacco”.
• Even, regulations on eating Tide Pod’s.

Freedom, real freedom, is the ability to enjoy or even harm yourself unencumbered by laws, regulation, or the busybody next door.

Thus, I argue, that the Ninth Amendment clearly says that the RIGHT to eat and drink what you want shall not be restricted, infringed or forbidden by the government.

Thus, the enormous federal bureaucracy (the FDA) that restricts access to food, drugs, and drinks DOES NOT CONSTITUTIONALLY HAVE THE POWER to ban, restrict or reduce access to anything. The only power that they have is advisory.

Or, are you going to use the twisted logic that banning access to local plants falls under the “commerce clause” in the Constitution?

Ah. I can hear the squeals from the busybodies in the audience! Look over there… Jeff Sessions is really going to clamp down on that “demon weed”, and look over there…! Nancy Pelosi is all hot and bothered…”what about the children?”!!!!

Today, we need the Ninth Amendment more than ever before. With larger and larger number of Radical Muslims taking seats in Congress, it won’t be long until pork products will be banned in America, and Islamic food preparation methods will be mandated across the land.

People, the government is NOT our parents.

The United States government was intended to be a mechanism of government, a machine that we the people controlled. Why in Heaven’s name would we create a government that would hurt, harm or restrict our Rights? Hum?

Another Example, the EPA…

Today, most Americans have no idea what the concept of “property” means. They think it is a house. A house that you make mortgage payments to a bank, and yearly tax checks to the government. A house that when you die, your heirs must fight the government to determine how of of “your” property you get to keep in the family.

Nonsense!

Property is anything that you own that no-one can tax, regulate, inspect, investigate, or seize.

Under that definition, most Americans don’t have any property.

It’s true, and I don’t want to rub your face in the doggie-do-do, but that’s a fact. Everything that you “own” can today be seized, inspected, or taxed by the all powerful United States government. Including your very own body. Everything.

And, since you don’t own anything, the government can tell you what you can or cannot do with it. People, if you actually owned property, no one could tell you what to do with it, nor could they tax it either.

Like…

• Being unable to collect rainwater.
• Not having a wood-burning stove.
• Using incandescent bulbs.
• Having a super-slow dishwasher machine.
• Having a Lo-Flo toilet.
• Not making a pond, cutting down a tree, or growing grass

I argue that the Ninth Amendment protects your RIGHTS to own property.

The RIGHT to own property that cannot be taxed, inspected, regulated or seized by any government agent.

Which brings me to one of the favorite militarized branches of the progressive left; the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Or, are you going to use the twisted logic that telling you what you can do on your property falls under the “commerce clause” in the Constitution?

Rights retained by the people.

The Federalists contended that a bill of rights was unnecessary. They believed that everyone understood that God made man and gave him Rights. Therefore, we could have a kind and just government that did not need to enumerate any Rights given by God. They believed that the government would always protect the Rights of man.

Such fools. Such simpletons!

They argued that if you started to list the Rights given to man by God, that you would have to list every single Right. Or else the government would insist that only those Rights listed would count as Rights.

Well, they were correct. That is how the government works today.

Madison adverted to this argument in presenting his proposed amendments to the House of Representatives. He said…

“It has been objected also  against a bill of rights, that, by enumerating particular exceptions to  the grant of power, it would disparage those rights which were not  placed in that enumeration; and it might follow by implication, that  those rights which were not singled out, were intended to be assigned  into the hands of the General Government, and were consequently  insecure. 

This is one of the most plausible arguments I have ever heard  against the admission of a bill of rights into this system; but, I  conceive, that it may be guarded against. I have attempted it, as  gentlemen may see by turning to the last clause of the fourth  resolution.”

It is clear from its text and from Madison’s statement that the Amendment states are but a rule of construction. He made clear that a Bill of Rights might not by implication be taken to increase the powers of the national government. Whether it was in areas not enumerated, or in any other fashion. Further, the simplicity of the amendment, does not contain within itself any guarantee of a Right or a proscription of an infringement of a Right.

In 1965 the Amendment was construed to be positive affirmation of the existence of rights which are not enumerated but which are nonetheless protected by other provisions.

Justice Goldberg devoted several pages to the Ninth Amendment in one of her rulings…

“The language and history of the Ninth Amendment  reveal that the Framers of the Constitution believed that there are  additional fundamental rights, protected from governmental infringement,  which exist alongside those fundamental rights specifically mentioned  in the first eight constitutional amendments. . . . 

To hold that a right  so basic and fundamental and so deep-rooted in our society as the right  of privacy in marriage may be infringed because that right is not  guaranteed in so many words by the first eight amendments to the  Constitution is to ignore the Ninth Amendment  and to give it no effect whatsoever. 

Moreover, a judicial construction  that this fundamental right is not protected by the Constitution because  it is not mentioned in explicit terms by one of the first eight  amendments or elsewhere in the Constitution would violate the Ninth Amendment. . . . 

Nor do I mean to state that the Ninth Amendment  constitutes an independent source of right protected from infringement  by either the States or the Federal Government. 

Rather, the Ninth Amendment  shows a belief of the Constitution’s authors that fundamental rights  exist that are not expressly enumerated in the first eight amendments  and an intent that the list of rights included there not be deemed  exhaustive.”

- 381 U.S. at 488, 491, 492. Chief Justice Warren  and Justice Brennan  joined this opinion. Justices Harlan and White  concurred, id. at 499,  502, without alluding to the Ninth Amendment,   but instead basing their conclusions on substantive due process,   finding that the state statute “violates basic values implicit in the   concept of ordered liberty” (citing Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319,   325 (1937)). Id. at 500.  

Therefore, although neither Douglas’ nor Goldberg’s opinion sought to make the Ninth Amendment a substantive source of constitutional guarantees. Which is unfortunate. Instead, both read it as indicating a function of the courts to interpose a veto over legislative and executive efforts to abridge other fundamental rights.

Never the less, the text to the Ninth Amendment is quite clear…

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. 

Other Rights that fall under the Ninth Amendment…

Here’s some other Rights that the Ninth Amendment would normally be protecting were it enforced…

• Right to Privacy.
• The Right to exist.
• The Right to own property without infringement.
• The Right to eat and drink freely.
• Right to Internet Freedom.
• Right for the Freedom of Thought.
• The Right of DNA privacy.
• The Freedom to be forgotten.
• The Freedom to be forgiven (Felons).
• The Freedom to have opinions.
• The Rights of those not yet born.
• The Right to be left alone.

All of which were non-enumerated Rights that Americans enjoyed in 1776. Which, unfortunately today, Americans no longer have.

An average citizen here in 1800 would go years, decades even, without  seeing one single minion of the federal government, anywhere, not only  his entire day, but for his entire life. 

- From Aesop at Raconteur Report 

Conclusion

I argue that the Ninth Amendment is severely under-utilized.

I further argue that this amendment would render much of the regulatory agencies in the United States obsolete, as they all operate under the assumption that Americans only have enumerated Rights. Not any non-enumerated Rights no matter what the Ninth Amendment says.

The presence of any regulatory agency presupposes that there are ZERO non-enumerated Rights.

Supreme Court decisions that involve the Ninth Amendment have implied that only the enumerated Rights (in the Bill of Rights) are all that is needed for American citizens to have. Their mention of the Ninth Amendment is only in passing without any substantive effect on governance. Hopefully this will change in the future.

That being said. I’m not going to hold my breath. The swamp is big, enormous and very powerful. The ONLY way that the nation can recover from decades upon decades of abuse is to “nuke it from orbit” and start all over fresh.

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