Our Misplaced Structure: The Willful Subversion of America’s Founding Doc

The still-unfolding story of America’s Structure is a historical past of heroes and villains—the flawed visionaries who impressed and crafted liberty’s safeguards, and the shortsighted opportunists who defied them. These tales are recognized by few right this moment.

In
Our Misplaced Structure, Senator Mike Lee tells the dramatic, little-known tales behind six of the Structure’s most indispensible provisions. He exhibits their rise. He exhibits their fall. And he makes vividly clear how practically each abuse of federal energy right this moment is rooted in neglect of this Misplaced Structure. For instance:

   • The Origination Clause says that each one payments to lift taxes should originate within the Home of Representatives, however contempt for the clause ensured the passage of Obamacare.

   • The Fourth Modification protects us towards unreasonable searches and seizures, however the NSA now collects our personal knowledge with out a warrant.

   • The Legislative Powers Clause signifies that solely Congress can move legal guidelines, however unelected companies now produce ninety-nine out of each 100 pages of authorized guidelines imposed on the American folks.

Lee’s forged of characters features a former Ku Klux Klansman, who hijacked the Institution Clause to strangle Catholic faculties; the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court docket, who known as the Second Modification a fraud; and the revered president who started his first of 4 phrases by threating to shatter the stability of energy between Congress and the president, and who started his second time period by vowing to do the identical to the Supreme Court docket.

Fortuitously, the Structure has all the time had its defenders. Senator Lee tells the story of how Andrew Jackson, famous for his braveness in duels and politics, stood agency towards the unconstitutional growth of federal powers. He brings to life Ben Franklin’s genius for compromise at a deeply divided constitutional conference. And he tells how in 2008, a few unlikely challengers persuaded the Supreme Court docket to rediscover the Second Modification’s proper to maintain and bear arms.

Sections of the Structure might have been forgotten, but it surely’s not too late to convey them again—if solely we bear in mind why we as soon as demanded them and the way we later misplaced them. Drawing on his expertise working in all three branches of presidency, Senator Lee makes a daring case for resurrecting the Misplaced Structure to revive and defend our basic liberties.