Rodent Regatta

My dead parrot and our constitutional republic

By Craig J. Cantoni

(For Internet publication)

”I have a dead parrot hanging from my neck. Or at least I must have one, judging from the looks of shock and disgust that I get from people.

Carl, a conservative Republican, gave me the look the other day over coffee. He was praising President Bush for getting tough on public schools through his ”Leave no child behind” federal mandates.

I responded, ’As a conservative, shouldn’t you be opposed to the mandates, because they’re unconstitutional and counter to everything that the Founders said about states’ rights and enumerated powers?’”

”In a flash, a look of disgust came over Carl’s face as if he was thinking, ’Yuk, Cantoni has a dead parrot around his neck.’

After the look slowly receded from his face, he asked, ”Do you want the teacher union and public schools to continue to shortchange our kids?”

”Of course not, Carl,” I said. ”But I believe the fundamental problem with government schools is that they are coercive. In the face of all of the bureaucracy, incompetence and politics associated with government schools, they continue to have a monopoly over K-12 classroom thought, only because they force people to pay school taxes even if they don’t use the schools. In our constitutional republic, the solution to coercion should not be unconstitutional coercion.”

Carl slid his chair back as if the parrot had developed a bad odor. Saying he was late for an appointment, he shook my hand and said good-bye, while looking around furtively to see if any of the other patrons had noticed that he was with a guy with a rotting, stinking parrot around his neck.

A similar situation occurred with Sue, a liberal acquaintance. Sue gave me the dead-parrot look during a conversation in which she was speaking enthusiastically about a light-rail line planned for Phoenix. I triggered the look by saying, ”The light-rail line is unconstitutional, because some of the funding comes from the federal government, which has no constitutional authority to fund a line that has nothing to do with interstate commerce or with the general welfare of the country. Incidentally, light rail doesn’t do anything to reduce traffic and pollution, and it is so uneconomic that it depends on non-riders to subsidize riders to the tune of about eight dollars per ride.”

To Sue, I not only had a dead parrot around my neck, but I had also morphed into a right-wing extremist wearing jack boots and a swastika. I had instantly become a more disgusting version of Himmler, a narrow-minded reactionary who was against all progress and, to top it off, had a deceased feathered friend hanging on his chest.

Funny thing, but I saw Sue as the extremist, along with Carl. Like most Americans, Sue and Carl put efficacy before the law. Carl believes that centralizing education authority at the federal level will fix the problems in local school districts. To him, constitutional issues are irrelevant if federal mandates are effective. Similarly, Sue believes that light rail will reduce traffic and pollution. To her, constitutional issues are irrelevant if light rail is effective.

The Supreme Court feels the same way about racial preferences. If the preferences are effective at furthering diversity, whatever that means, the preferences do not violate the Constitution, although they do violate the Constitution. Such intellectual contortions have not been seen since the Supreme Court caved in to FDR’s threats over the New Deal.

Carl and Sue do not care if the Constitution is violated in those instances where the Supreme Law of the Land is unambiguous, such as federal control of education. But, paradoxically, they do care deeply about issues where the Supreme Law of the Land is ambiguous, such as abortion.

Carl would not think that I had a dead parrot around my neck if I said that abortion is unconstitutional. And Sue would not think that I had a dead parrot around my neck if I said that it was constitutional. But both of them would think that I had a dead parrot around my neck if I said that since the Constitution is not clear on the issue, state legislatures, not the judiciary, should decide the matter.

The troubling fact is that the three branches of government and the majority of citizens now act as if the nation is a majority-rule democracy and not a constitutional republic. If a majority wants President Bush to fix the problems in their local school, then that is what he should do. If a majority wants the federal government to fund a light-rail line, then that is what it should do. If a majority wants legislators to defer their constitutional duty to the Supreme Court on the abortion issue, then that is what they should do. And if the majority wants the government to take money from the minority for themselves, then that is what it should do—and does through the progressive tax code.

Meanwhile, the establishment media goes along with mob rule. I have sent scores of e-mails to scores of reporters and editors, asking them why they never raise constitutional questions in their coverage of such issues as federal education mandates and federal funding of light rail. Silence. No doubt, they think that I’m a fruitcake with a dead parrot around my neck.

My only solace is that I know that if the Founders were alive, they’d all have dead parrots around their necks.”

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Mr. Cantoni is an author, columnist and founder of Honest Americans Against Legal Theft (HAALT). He and his dead parrot can be reached at ccan2@aol.com.