gun control

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Fri May 21 14:59:45 PDT 1999


Catherine Driscoll wrote:


>Does being in the Consitution of the United
>States (the wording is probably disordered) make it intrinsically good,
>ethical, virtuous, valuable, right, fair, just, and so on.

You've touched on one of the founding myths of the U.S. - the weird fetishized sacredness of the Constitution and the wisdom of its Framers. Arguments from the Supreme Court on down to barstools are typically made by appeal to its authority. Conservatives will say "federal aid to education is wrong because constitutionally it's a state and local responsibility." Liberals will say "Abortion should be legal because of constitutional guarantees of the right to privacy." It serves a unifying function similar to myths of blood and nation in other countries. To become a "naturalized" citizen or president you swear loyalty to the text. I think the Mormons treat the U.S. Constitution as literally scriptural. Most Americans do, but not so explicitly.

Doug



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