But I doubt that Americans would be any more politicized than they are now had the American Revolution not made the Bill of Rights law. The reason individuals (in their everyday life) and organizations (in their political life) often turn to courts rather than political parties, trade unions, etc. is that the latter hardly function as such any longer. If they saw the latter as more effective means to achieve their ends than the former, presumably they would turn to the latter rather than the former. The sad thing is that many individuals and groups sometimes even had to sue what could and should have been their political instruments -- such as trade unions -- for damages that they caused them.
Moreover, the most important amendments in the Bill of Rights are not replacement for politics but what enables politics in less-than- revolutionary times. Minus the freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances, the right to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures, the right to due process of law, the right to a speedy and public trial, etc. politics can only exist as a revolutionary underground activity, the sort of politics for which Americans, even leftist Americans, are generally unprepared.
Yoshie Furuhashi <http://montages.blogspot.com> <http://monthlyreview.org> <http://mrzine.org>
-------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20060116/9e3a6f8e/attachment.htm>