Thread: Democrats Pushing Constitutional Amendment to Change Bill of Rights

What They’re Not Telling You: Democrats Pushing Constitutional Amendment to Change Bill of Rights

June 4, 2014 By Greg Campbell


While the nation, quite understandably, focuses their collective attention on the continual stream of scandals that spill out of the White House, too many remain unaware of the assault occurring on our Bill of Rights in the Senate.

Senate Resolution 19, a resolution that calls for fundamentally changing the First Amendment, is being hailed by Democrats as a necessary measure to limit political influence in elections.

It sounds dire- and it is. The proposed constitutional amendment is designed to give Congress the authority to limit fundraising and spending on elections as well as independent political activity. Though political expression is protected by the First Amendment, Senate Democrats are hoping to squash it, un-coincidentally carving out a narrow exemption for media outlets who, by-and-large, lean heavily-left.

“So The New York Times is protected, but it doesn’t say the same thing about the freedom of speech,” Sen. Ted Cruz stated in May. “It doesn’t say the same thing about religious liberty; what it says it that politicians in Washington have unlimited constitutional authority to muzzle each and every one of you if you’re saying things the government finds inconvenient.”

The resolution has the support of an astounding 41 Democrats, including vulnerable Democrats Sens. Mark Begich, Mark Udall, Al Franken, Kay Hagen and Jeanne Shaheen. It’s also being championed by such liberal stalwarts as Sens. Chuck Schumer, Patrick Leahy and, of course, Harry Reid- the Senate Majority Leader who has dedicated himself to an obnoxious campaign against the Koch Brothers, private citizens who engage in the political process by supporting candidates.

So who will fight for free speech? For our Bill of Rights? Several Senate Republicans have joined the fight and are pushing back against the Democrats’ nefarious push.

Republican Senator Chuck Grassley outlined the consequence of the proposed amendment to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, saying,

“The proposed constitutional amendment would enable government to limit funds contributed to candidates and funds spent by or in support of candidates. That would give the government the ability to limit speech. The amendment would allow the government to set the limit at zero. There could be no contributions. There could be no election spending. There could be no public debate on who should be elected. Incumbents would find that outcome to be acceptable. They would know that no challenger could run an effective campaign against them. Rationing of speech at low limits would produce similar results.”

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell declared before the Senate Judiciary Committee,

“Benjamin Franklin noted that ‘whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.’ The First Amendment is the constitutional guarantee of that freedom, and it has never been amended.”

Poignantly speaking of the value of the First Amendment, Sen. McConnell reminded the committee, “I understand that no politician likes to be criticized — and some of us are criticized more often than others. But the recourse to being criticized is not to shut up our fellow citizens. It’s to defend your ideas more ably in the political marketplace, to paraphrase Justice Holmes. Or it’s simply to come up with better ideas.”

As we near the midterm elections, Democrats led by Sen. Harry Reid have worked tirelessly to try and distract voters from the numerous scandals and failures plaguing the liberal party, most notably, of course, has been the now-conspicuous failures of Obamacare.

To help redirect the media narrative, Sen. Reid has ranted and raved ad nauseum against the Koch Brothers, ignoring the hundreds of millions of dollars coming from liberal benefactors such as Tom Steyer, George Soros and the large financier of Democrat candidates: unions.

Nearly half the Senate now supports this crusade against the First Amendment, pretending to champion the measure as a means of “leveling the playing field.” The aim is to undercut not only the Bill of Rights, but also to undercut the 2010 Supreme Court ruling that determined that political spending is a form of protected political expression, the famed Citizens United decision that held that “it is our law and our tradition that more speech, not less, is the governing rule.”

The Democrats’ effort selectively carves-out which parts of the First Amendment serves their purposes and which do not. Leaving MSNBC and CNN free rein to carry their messages, Democrats seek to squash the efforts of big and small donors alike- people like Shaun McCutcheon, the plaintiff in the recent Supreme Court case that served as a big win for free speech proponents, McCutcheon vs. FEC.

Dan Backer, who brought the McCutcheon case, spoke with TPNN on the issue, saying,

“A government that can deny one iota of political speech from its critics can suppress all political speech by its critics. John Adams tried this in the 1790’s with the Alien & Sedition Act, which granted the government the power to throw its critics in jail. It was un-American then and it’s un-American now.”

Backer incredulously questioned, “Who in their right mind would trust this administration – or any government – with the power to decide who gets to speak and who doesn’t?”

“A government that can deny one iota of political speech from its critics can suppress all political speech by its critics. John Adams tried this in the 1790’s with the Alien & Sedition Act, which granted the government the power to throw its critics in jail. It was un-American then and it’s un-American now.”