‘We the people’ to open next Congress
When Speaker Pelosi hands over her gavel to GOP leader John Boehner the 112th Congress of the United States will open with a reading of the US Constitution, a document often ignored by the far left extremists of the current Obama-Pelosi regime.
112th Congress = Republican Party – 242 members Democrat Party 193 members
Washington Times
The Constitution frequently gets lip service in Congress, but House Republicans next year will make sure it gets a lot more than that – the new rules the incoming majority party proposed this week call for a full reading of the country’s founding document on the floor of the House on Jan. 6.
The goal, backers said, is to underscore the limited-government rules the Founders imposed on Congress – and to try to bring some of those principles back into everyday legislating.
“It stems from the debate that we’ve had for the last two years about things like the exercise of authority in a whole host of different areas by the EPA, we’ve had this debate in relation to the health care bill, the cap-and-trade legislation,” said Rep. Robert W. Goodlatte, Virginia Republican, who proposed the reading. “This Congress has been very aggressive in expanding the power of the federal government, and there’s been a big backlash to that.”
Setting aside time at the beginning of the congressional session for the reading is just one of the changes to House rules that Republicans say are designed to open up the legislative process. They say the new rules also will try to bring some restraints to lawmaking after decades in which both Republican and Democratic leaders whittled away opportunities for real legislative give-and-take.
The biggest changes would make it easier to cut spending and harder to create entitlement programs, while imposing restrictions that could keep leaders from jamming massive bills onto the House floor before lawmakers have had a chance to digest them.
“To begin to restore trust with the American people, Republicans have pledged to operate Congress differently: with real transparency, greater accountability and a renewed focus on the Constitution,” said Rep. Greg Walden of Oregon, who led the GOP’s transition team. “The sweeping reforms offered in this package make clear we intend to keep that promise.”
For example, the word “unconstitutional” was used 408 times in congressional debates during the 111th Congress, according to a search of the Congressional Record. That was up from 283 in the 110th Congress and is the most since the immediate aftermath of the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress.
Even before that, the presidential campaign of Rep. Ron Paul, Texas Republican, seemed to tap a nerve with voters looking for more discussion about the founding document, the core of the blossoming “tea party” movements.
“If it was up to me, they could spend the whole congressional session reading the Constitution and nothing else, and they wouldn’t do as much damage as the last Congress did,” said Chip Tarbutton, president of the Roanoke Tea Party in Roanoke, Va., which is in Mr. Goodlatte’s district.
He said the key test for lawmakers such as Mr. Goodlatte is whether they treat the constitutional reading as “window dressing” or whether it sparks the kinds of discussions that could lead to a major re-evaluation of the role of the federal government.
“If they follow through on it, it’ll create some very difficult conversations, because what they’ll end up doing is finding a lot of things already in place are unconstitutional,” Mr. Tarbutton said.
Mr. Goodlatte credited Virginia Attorney General Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, a Republican, with coming up with the idea of a public reading of the Constitution. Mr. Cuccinelli brought suit against the federal health care law and won the judge’s ruling that part of the law is unconstitutional.
Mr. Goodlatte said it’s too early to tell exactly how the reading will go, though he expects many members to take part.
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Wild Thing’s comment……..
This is soooo needed and I am thrilled they are going to do this. I hope everyone of them will be present and that they LISTEN when it is read and the FOLLOW it!!
It’ll be good to see a fresh start. The 111th left such a train wreck, especially at the end. Good riddance to that cabal of communists.
Actually they should read the Declaration of Independence, AND the Constitution!!
HALLELUJIA!!!!!!
And the, (redundancy here), liberal/progressive/democrats will not object, interfere, or otherwise complain? Nah, not them, they believe in the Constitution even when it goes against their agenda, NOT!
People, we of the Tea Party movement caused a lot of change in the makeup of Congress. We are not done, and we cannot wait for 2012. Hold their feet to the fire, write, snail mail letters, (e-mails are easily deleted by staff), and do not let up. THEY work for US!!! THEY are our SERVANTS!!!
Have a great 2011, Y’all!
I hope this conservative movement is more true to the course and lasts longer than the 1994 Republican movement. Now we have the Tea Party to act as watchdog over all of our elected govt., not just Dems. Let’s also hope that there will be a reversing of some of the recent legislation. Sadly we can’t recall most of the money that has been spent, but we can for sure limit further spending.
They can recall alot of that stimulus that hasn’t been spent yet though. Lets just hope they start by getting rid of the dream act and any form of amnesty.
Back to basics…of the Constitution..then keep us safe and get us the h e double l out of this massive deficit on our backs.
Jan,I agree,this news really made for a nice Christmas.
Southern Class, Ditto all you said.
Tom, I sure hope so too. The left seems to have endless energy to get their goals accompolished and they tend to wear people down in doing so. Especially when the left does so many things wrong at the same time. ON the bright side, I can imagine our Founding Fathers cheering on all trying to protect America and take it back from the progressives.
Mark, that would be wonderful.