Thank God we have a Constitutional scholar in the White House.
Not only the White House but in the Oval Office. He’s the President.

4 Americans were sailing on an American flagged vessel in international waters. They were captured by Somali pirates. The 4 of them were executed. It is not known but it can be reasonably suspected that they were tortured or sexually abused.

The Constitution could not be clearer. Many times advocates have to go looking for rights that were not written down – enumerated - by the Founders. The right to privacy is assumed to be there without it being specifically mentioned. Some have to look for “penumbras” and “emanations” to buttress their arguments. Not this time.

Article 1, Section 8, #1 says, in its entirety

The Congress shall have the power

To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal,
And make rules concerning captures on land and water.

In 1805 an American Naval Officer asked a frightened woman if she wanted the protection of the American flag. Saying yes she was embraced in its folds.

A century later Mrs. Perdicaris was kidnapped by Muslim fanatics led by Raizuli, the chief pirate. President Roosevelt said, “Mrs. Perdicaris alive or Raizuli dead”.

Nolo me tangere cum impecunis

“…So it was learned among the heathen hosts
How much a freeborn woman’s favour costs.”

Grover Cleveland, a Democratic President who vetoed a bill
because it violated the contract clause of the Constitution, when told
that there had been casualties when enforcing a court order, said,
“Are you sure you killed enough of them?”

Thank God we have a Constitutional scholar in the Oval Office.

Kevin Smith
2/22/11