I’ve explored the tyranny of the minority – the moneyed classes that buy politicians and favoritism with every twist and turn of their checking accounts; but it’s also time to look at the greatest fear that underpins the Constitution of the United States of America: fear of the tyranny of the majority. Our forefathers witnessed persecution of religious minorities, unpopular political fringes, British soldiers bursting into homes without notice and ransacking residences in search of God knows what in the name of fighting sedition. They’d called it the “Church of England,” an official state religion in a nation with a powerful history of killing and persecuting Catholics. Indeed, that self-same Church of England was founded to allow King Henry the VIII to have his own religious freedom – being able to divorce without beheading, a practice with which he was all too familiar.
Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, James Madison, John Quincy Adams, Benjamin Franklin… well we all know the list… fought for a nation where minorities would be safe from persecution, where speaking your mind wouldn’t get you thrown in a dank prison, where practicing your faith wouldn’t lead you to the pillory, stocks and bondage… perhaps a flaming and bitter end for not agreeing with the Protestant fundamentalists known for witch trials and flaming punishments. The earliest Americans fought and died for those principals, further embodied after the Revolution in the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to our Constitution.
When I hear folks tell me that protesters – right and left – need to be silenced and jailed even when they are not preaching violence, or when people tell me that America is a Christian country and I have to watch the faces of my Jewish or Buddhist friends as they hear these words, very contrary to the promises there were made by the very nature of our government… I cringe. I am a lawyer in love… in love with that magical document called the Constitution. When I listen to those who decry allowing certain religious temples to be built, where Christian rules and ethos must be taught, where minorities are not to be accorded with the same rights as the majority… and who make claims that to think otherwise is un-American… well… I wonder why virtually burning the Constitution and vilifying its essence is considered to be pro-American? Is it patriotic to condemn free speech, decry true equality among people and limit the practice of any particular well-recognized religious sect?
We are no better than the toughest cases of intolerance that tempt us. We become our bigoted and zealous enemies when we adopt their rules of exclusion and rigid adherence to extreme religious credos. The building of a mosque at Ground Zero may rub many the wrong way… or it may be seen as an obvious defensive prophylactic against another attack a la 9/11… but it is what so many Americans died for when they defended this nation – defined by its Constitution – across a spectrum of wars over the centuries. I have most certainly excoriated President Obama’s policies in Iraq and Afghanistan among other political choices, but his position supporting the right of Muslims to build a mosque at Ground Zero is not only legally correct; it is the moral American high ground. Either you believe in the First Amendment or you don’t. Whether you believe in Islam or not, the right to practice that faith in the United States is protected!
On August 3rd, New York’s Republican Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, said it best, as the New York Times on that date wrote: “With the Statue of Liberty as his backdrop, the mayor pleaded with New Yorkers to reject suspicions about the planned 13-story complex, to be located two blocks north of the World Trade Center site, saying that ‘we would betray our values if we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else.’” The Washington Post added: “‘We do not honor their lives by denying the very Constitutional rights they died protecting,’ Bloomberg said of the firefighters and police officers who died on Sept. 11, in language he proposed. ‘We honor their lives by defending those rights -- and the freedoms that the terrorists attacked.’”
But other voices cry to stop the process. Whether those who have elected to build this religious building as such a sensitive spot are correct or incorrect begs the question. Are we hypocrites – suspending our moral and legal imperatives when we choose – or do we really have American values that transcend our personal preferences? Senate Majority leader, Harry Reid (D-Nevada), tried to mumble his way out of a tough spot in a tougher reelection campaign by suggesting that the mosque should be built "somewhere else." But some have voiced greater concerns with stronger language: “‘The decision to build this mosque so close to Ground Zero is deeply troubling, as is the president’s decision to endorse it,’ said House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio). ‘This is not an issue of law, whether religious freedom or local zoning. This is a basic issue of respect for a tragic moment in our history.’” The August 14th Washington Post.
Aside from the fact that the President didn’t endorse the mosque itself, only the Constitutional right to build it, I’m sorry Mr. Boehner, it is precisely an issue of law – the very essence of being an American… what separates us from the malevolent states that seek to do us harm. It’s easy to support the Constitution in unchallenging cases, but it takes a real believer in the United States and what it stands for to make that choice when it is truly difficult. What’s the problem, Congressman, you don’t believe the United States has room for that form of tolerance? You think we are weak and unable to stand strong while allowing unpopular minorities the rights guaranteed to them by the very Constitution you swore to uphold when you took federal office? Good to know Mama Grizzly is on your side!
I’m not sure how many of you have ever walked through a military cemetery… particularly the Arlington National Cemetery… where many of this nation’s heroes – from two U.S. Presidents William Taft and John Kennedy) to winners of the Congressional Medal of Honor – are buried. But the honored soldiers mostly died to support that Constitution… not a piece of paper with “not really” loopholes… but the rock upon which America was founded, was defined and which sustains her life. Respect that, John Boehner, and understand why all those proud Americans perished in her honor.
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