The Blessings of Liberty

"We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."- Preamble to the U.S. Constitution

The Constitution of the United States of America is one of the greatest documents in world history. Because of it, a fledgling country, devastated by war with the world's greatest power at the time, was able to become itself a great world power and a beacon of Liberty to people from around the globe. That this fledgling country still has the greatest freedom and productivity among all countries is a remarkable achievement of this Constitution and its writers, who envisioned a land where an indvidual's life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness was a given.

Recently, Yale Law School hosted a conference "bringing together leading figures in American law to catalyze debate among progressives about the Constitution's future". Basically the goal of this conclave was simply to change the Constitution to conform to the agenda of the Left.

John Hinderaker (of Power Line) has a column in the Weekly Standard that discusses what went on in that conference (read the entire piece): "What Liberals Want". Here's an excerpt, but you should read the whole thing if you want to get a flavor of the kind of changes they are aiming for:

The left makes no secret of its intentions where the Constitution is concerned. It wants to change it, in ways that have nothing to do with what the document actually says. It wants the Constitution to enshrine its own policy preferences--thus freeing it from the tiresome necessity of winning elections. And how will the Constitution be changed? Through a constitutional convention, or a vote of two-thirds of the state legislatures? Of course not. The whole problem, from the liberal perspective, is that they can't get democratically elected bodies to enact their agenda. As one of the Yale conference participants said: "We don't have much choice other than to believe deeply in the courts--where else do we turn?" The new, improved Constitution will come about through judicial re-interpretation.

LGF also has some comments on this convention, and points out that it was funded primarily by George Soros. Of course, as you would expect the Leftists at the Daily Kos call the agenda of this a conference "delicious".

How delicious for Leftist ideology it would be if the United States of America didn't exist! If, in its incredible economic and political successes it didn't prove beyond any doubt that Freedom and Capitalism work better than any other system known to humanity; and demonstrate the moral, political and economic bankruptcy of all those "ideal" societies that promise a human paradise, but provide only mass graves.

Clearly they can't make the U.S. go away, so the next best thing is to work to erode the Constitution--or if possible--to make it reflect their own ideology!

If they succeed in doing so, then the blessings of Liberty will no longer be ours, and will surely be absent for our posterity.