Sometimes what I don’t realize astounds me. I have taught Constitutional Law, lectured on the 14th Amendment, and read it many times. I always concentrated on Section I. That’s the part that deals with “privileges and immunities” and “due process” and citizenship and has been used by the Supreme Court to apply most of the Bill of Rights to the states. (If you want a 50 minute lecture on this, contact me.)
I always thought the rest of it was Civil War stuff and not all that relevant. Now I have become aware that Section 4 contains this language: “The validity of the public debt of United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.”
Debt ceiling legislation? We don’t need no stinking debt ceiling legislation.
No comments:
Post a Comment