The Regressive Amendments, Part 1
The Principle
History has deemed the early part of the 20th century in America as the Progressive Era and the amendments made to the Constitution during that time as the Progressive Amendments. These labels are rubbish. The so-called “Progressive” Era was in fact quite the opposite. Of the four amendments of the Progressive Era, only one, the 19th, which gave women the right to vote represented a decision consistent with the liberty whose creation was the great progressive accomplishment of the creation of this country. The other three represent a regression.
The 16th, 17th, and 18th Amendments take us in spirit back to before the progress made by our Constitution. They deny the liberty on which our nation was founded and remove the institutional safeguards of this liberty. This is no progress! The founding of our nation was a first. We were an example of liberal democracy for the entire world to see. We were a showcase of freedom, and a beautiful institutional model for insuring that freedom would remain. Over the past 200 years, however, we have slowly and methodically begun to destroy every institutional safeguard of freedom we have, abandoning the progress made by our Constitution.
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