Words on paper don’t stop tyranny.
Never did. Never will.
In other words, we can’t expect governments to follow limits on their own power just because we write them out.
As the founders told us, it’s ultimately up to the people to enforce those limits.
In Federalist #48, James Madison pointed out that most of the state constitutions drafted before the U.S. Constitution relied on getting the words right – “marking with precision the boundaries of these departments in the Constitution of the government” and “trusting these parchment barriers against the encroaching spirit of power.”
He insisted this wasn’t an adequate defense. He based his argument on experience, calling the efficacy of parchment barriers “greatly over-rated,” arguing that “Some more adequate defence is indispensibly necessary for the more feeble, against the more powerful members of the government.”
Simply put, “A mere demarcation on parchment of the constitutional limits of the several departments, is not a sufficient guard against those encroachments which lead to a tyrannical concentration of all the powers of government in the same hands.”
In Fabius IV, John Dickinson summed up the limits of any constitution. It may set the stage for “good government,” but it doesn’t guarantee it.
“A good constitution promotes, but not always produces a good administration.”
The problem is that government is made up of people, and government people rarely have our best interests at heart. As Lysander Spooner warned, when they decide to act against the people, all the words in the world won’t stop them.
“For when did a parchment ever have power adequately to restrain a government, that had either cunning to evade its requirements, or strength to overcome those who attempted its defence?”
As should be obvious by now, Madison, Dickinson and Spooner called it.
Here at the Tenth Amendment Center, we are interested in preserving all of our rights. We don’t rely on parchment barriers and work tirelessly to teach people how to enforce those limits. But we can’t do it alone. We need your help.
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Roger Sherman also warned of the limits of parchment barriers. Writing in Countryman II, he observed the same about a bill of rights – it’s still words on paper.
“No bill of rights ever yet bound the supreme power longer than the honeymoon of a new married couple.”
He went on to argue that the only way parchment barriers could effectively restrain government is if “the rulers were interested in preserving the rights.”
It is ultimately up to the people to put muscle behind the words to make sure that the rulers are “interested” in following them.
Dickinson emphasized that this isn’t just the people’s right. It is their duty.
“IT IS THEIR DUTY TO WATCH, AND THEIR RIGHT TO TAKE CARE, THAT THE CONSTITUTION BE PRESERVED; Or in the Roman phrase on perilous occasions—TO PROVIDE, THAT THE REPUBLIC RECEIVE NO DAMAGE.”
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