Exactly OP. If we were following the Constitution, we wouldn´t be in the mess we are in right now.

The sloppiest line in the Constitution is better than the most erudite legislation coming out of the Congress today.

I will never give up on the Constitution. If we were following it, we won´t be in the mess we are.

For starters, the Usurper Barry Soetoro (aka Obama) wouldn´t be in the White House. Since his Dad was British, he is forever barred by the US Constitution from being President. Barry is NOT a Natural Born Citizen!

So America doesn´t have a President currently. We shouldn´t recognize him as President.

If we were following the Constitution, Jughead wouldn´t be President.

Maybe we could get someone smart like Chavez to run things. Moron.

And this is what passes as enlightened thought.

He is a fascist and a disgrace to Georgetown.

No doubt this guy is a moron. But we need to understand this is the thinking of millions including the current occupier in the White House and his administration.

Progressives have always found the Constitution an impediment to "getting things done." Which is exactly why we need it.

...does this mean Texas can secede now?

I find his commentary not as screwy as it would seem from the headline, but desparately flawed in this particular:

His point is to show where we have deviated from the "parchment" yet endured as a country. From the article:

What has preserved our political stability is not a poetic piece of parchment, but entrenched institutions and habits of thought and, most important, the sense that we are one nation and must work out our differences.

If the writer is unaware how intense the assault on this melting pot unity has been, he should take a sabbatical and read up on current events. At least, though, it sounds like he´s prepared to admit how deleterious the corrosion of such national unity can be.

A economic collapse put these clowns in the majority. Still I believe that an even more devastaing collapose is the only prescription that will pluck the tailfeathers out of these cuckoos.

Does this mean that conservative politicians and interest groups can now sue the britches off the NY Times for negligent reporting because NY Times v. Sullivan would no longer provide the press with a special exception to traditional libel law?

If I am ever able(again)to start that gets big enough to hire lots of people, I will have in the charter not to hire anyone from the ivy league schools or any northeastern university. This guy is a prime example of the quality of learning coming out of these schools. CA. schools also included.

He is absolutely correct - Did not Mussolini make the trains run on time?

Right OP . The liberals and their socialist kin began their assault when Woody began hs presidency . And your authorship ??. look who is a prof none other than Robert Reich . He´d burn the Constitution on tv if he could .

Yeah, the NYT would have us give up on the Constitution--all except the part in the 1st Amendment about freedom of the press--because journalists and reporters are just so ELITE, doncha know?
I don´t know about you folks, but journalist majors were among the dumbest people you could meet in college. One step below Hotel Admin, and one step above Phys Ed.
Yet, these fools who could not function in a real job deem themselves superior and ELITE.

Thanks "professor" for showing us what we already see: the liberal hatred of the Constitution. I can imagine the chatter of the drones after class--"the prof is so new-edge!" Fascism and totalitarianism ain´t new-edge, chillun.

NEVER!

It sure is nice when your enemy broadcasts his intentions. If you think this scarey, I suggest you check out your local school and find out what is being taught to your children and grandchildren.
He is right about one thing, our Constitution is indeed in tatters, but not for the reasons he puts forth. We the People gave up on this great document years ago, simply by being apathetic and letting George do it.
I would bet $10 real dollars that the majority of those on this site, just like the rest of the country, could not pass a simple Constitutional quiz. And worse yet, the majority won,t take the time to learn.

When you give up believing in the Constitution, then anything is possible.

"foreign and Domestic."

Well, maybe we could suspend it long enough to shoot his stupid ass.

Dear #7, Seidman may be a fascist, but he most certainly is not a disgrace to Georgetown where, more than likely, most of his colleagues agree with him.

Let´s don´t

I can´t call the writer what he should be called..

Seidman ignores the fact that the Constitution can be changed. It, too, is a product of democracy. But it is, of course, harder to change than an ordinary statute. Isn´t that the way it should be? Does he really want the right to free speech be subject to modification by a simple majority vote in Congress? Seidman is of the realist school, which says that the Constitution bends depending on the political circumstances or perceived necessity--for instance, the internment of Japanese citizens during WWII. Well, judges are fallible, it is true. But does that mean that the solution is to get rid of the Constitution altogher? No, it means we must continue to strive, however imperfectly, to hew to the ideals it represents.

Whew no wonder we are in such trouble. This guy helps educate our elite. No wonder we have descended into chaos and disfunction as a form of govt. The founders started with the idea that govt is at best a dangerous servant at its worst a brutalizing tyranny. Govt must be constrained for our freedom and liberty to exist.

It is wonderful to have such modern day wise men to be able to explain and rationalize what parts of the constitution we should follow and what we should ignore. Of course there are other wise men who would have us pick and choose other parts that they feel we should follow or ignore. That is the problem of situational ethics or morals or religion. There´s a passage in the Old Testament that talks of how every man did good in his own sight.

The constitution and adherence to it provides the proper boundaries and reins in the tyrannical tendencies of our government. Clowns like this bozo, and our current crop of leaders in Washington love the idea that their political philosophy should rule the roost.

Seidman has publicly embraced his Weimar-Hitler moment.

"Brown shirts, form to the left... march!"

This is serious. This is the only the latest in a series of trial balloons related to the Constitution (remember Lawrence from the Bronx on C-Span a couple of days ago? Remember Congressman Jose Serrano, D-New York of course, submitting HJ Res 5 to abolish the 22nd Amendment even before scumbama took office, and then resubmitting it as HJ Res 17 in January 2011? Remember scumbama´s fondness for executive orders? Remember gun control and that pesky 2nd Amendment? Repealing the Constitution is the wave of the leftist future -- if not all at once, then piece by piece.

I took an oath to defend the constitution from vermin like this. What about you guys?

Who needs a Constitution anyway? Hitler built a good car for the people. Mao and Pol Pot reeducated a lot of their citizens who they deemed spent too much time in the cities and not enough time working on farms in the countryside.

If he wishes us to give up on the Constitution, then I say we cling (bitterly) to the Declaration of Independence.

Particularly that portion that reads ´for one people to dissolve the political bands that have connected them to another´.

If we give up on the Constitution, you will find innocent people in concentration camps within a decade.

I´m not a Constitutional professor, nor am I a lawyer. But even I know that the overarching theme of the Constitution was/is to RESTRAIN what the federal government can do to it´s citizens. Yes, it created a government, but doing so, it points out what each of branch of the government CAN do, and more importantly, what it CAN NOT do. Sadly, over time, that part about what it cannot do has been lost or forgotten or both.

Hey, Lou! And I say this most respectfully, if that´s what you truly believe, find another line of work.

If his desire were fulfilled, we would no longer have to recognized the federal government, any of its agencies (including the EPA and the IRS), nor any of its elected officials, including the Messiah.

Wonder how he FEELS about that?

Our government was created by the People as a democratic republic constrained by our Constitution. This form of government is anathema to Fascists, who favor concentrating all State power in the executive branch.

Fascists have been railing against our Constitution for the last 100-plus years (Teddy Roosevelt wasn´t a fan).

And he´s a professor at Georgetown....what a brilliant example of the blind leading the blind.

On the contrary,Siedman, the constitution is the only thing that holds this country together in the face of your idiot prescriptions.

At first I thought this article was satire. I could not take seriously what I was reading. My head began to swim when I read: "Nor, finally should we have an all-powerful president free to do whatever he wants. Even without constitutional fealty, the president would still be checked by Congress and by the states." HOW? That statement is nonsense.

Actually, the Constitution is a gentlemen´s agreement. Gentlemen agree to be bound by it. But, Obama is no gentleman.

There are other agreements. Once upon a time the citizens were agreeable to supporting the costs of government by willingly paying their income tax and not cheating. That was a gentlemen´s agreement. It no longer exists, fraud is running rampant aided and abetted by many Congressmen and by the President. The President has, himself,rewarded his contributors, in one instance he has required the IRS to refund money by issuing gift cards instead of checks, which cards are incidentally manufactured by an Obama supporter.

Yikes. Full moon?

Let´s just shoot it out, clean up and start over. Get it over with.

Perhaps Seidman should take a sabbatical and spend a few months in one of those countries which don´t have constitutions. I hear that North Korea is an especially good example this time of year.

How about for the NFL playoffs and the super bowl, we allow the football rules be changed as the games are being changed?

I´m holding on to the 2nd amendment as all else is in vain without it.

Once again, the NYTwits´ mask slips.

Finally, said out loud. Thank you, Mr. Seidman, for being honest.

Trash the Constitution -
This is what every liberal thinks, but won´t admit.
This is what every "progressive" thinks, but won´t admit.
This is what every Democrat thinks, but won´t admit.
This is what every Obama-worshipping MSM "journalist" thinks, but won´t admit.
This is what every left-leaning school teacher thinks, but won´t admit.
This is what every communist and socialist thinks, and outside of America´s borders they admit it.

We should encourage them to stop the lying, come out of the closet, and admit that between freedom and forced "equality", they choose the latter.

Nailed it, ## 9 and 39.

The fascist Progs don´t want to amend our Constitution; they want to neutralize it. There is a difference.

Ever notice that you only see op-eds. like this slamming the US Constitution when the liberals are in charge in Washington D.C. and when the Constitution is seen by them as a restraining force to their leftist political agenda.

Louie, there are 190 other countries more or less where the US Constitution isn´t in force.

Doesn´t it make more sense for you to move to one of them rather than for you to impose your "ideas" on millions of Americans who want no part of them? Who [unlike you] understand the Constitution, its values and virtues and how its been abused? By people like you?

We apear to be a nation largely made up of domesticated turkeys, sprinkled with vultures. For those who would look up and into the distant sky, they would note, a gathering of eagles.

When one lives in an echo chamber one falls in love with one´s own voice regardless of how much nonsense one mouths.

Oh, the irony of it all. Teaches Constitutional law in an elite law school, and wants to tear it to shreds.

At least they´re coming out of the closet now, and we know who they are.

A Georgetown law professor, he and Sandra Fluke probably talked this over after one of thier numerous "tutoring" sessions...

The Consitution is the practical implementation of our ideals as a Nation, the recipe for achieving that which we declared was most important to us as a people: Individual Freedom and Responsibility.
That is the SPIRIT of the Law of Our Land. The leter of the Law is important of course, bu interpretation of the letter of the Law shoudl always be done within the context of its intetion. If we held to this one simple principle, we would not have strayed so far from our Founding Ideals that we are now irreversibly doomed to let this Great Experiment - the greatest in all of Human History - succumb to the the forces of darkness. And I think obama will go down in history as the final and most powerful agent of destruction of this once Great Nation - Exactly the way he wants to be remembered.

This is one of those people (usually of a liberal mindset) who think they know the way things ought to be run and just don´t want to bother with the established way to make changes. The constitution isn´t fixed. It can be amended in just about any way that meets a consensus of a large majority of the states and citizens. But that takes work, time and persuasion. The whole idea is to make it hard to change so some flash craze doesn´t become the law of the land. That makes it a wise document, much wiser than knee jerk pabulum pushers like this guy.

FTA - This is not to say that we should disobey all constitutional commands. Freedom of speech and religion, equal protection of the laws and protections against governmental deprivation of life, liberty or property are important, whether or not they are in the Constitution. We should continue to follow those requirements out of respect, not obligation.

We follow laws because we are obliged to do so. The government follows laws because it is obliged to do so. Respect for the law is important - when the laws are moral and constitutional. However, has anyone ever known a government that follows laws out of respect for its citizens? If government did there would be no drug war, war on poverty, or any other centralized use of force to deny citizens their life, liberty, and property.

The principles for upholding Life, Liberty and Justice for ALL are secured within the U.S. Constitution. Thus, this unique, ´experiment,´ in governance in all of history has successfully thrived, prospered and is a benevolent benefit to the entire planet of countries. The motto of the USA, ´´E Pluribus Unim,´´ has proved to be possible based upon the core principles secured in the U.S. Constitution.

When will your new constitutional convention begin? It should be interesting to see today´s ´intellectuals´ try to top the beautifully written document on which our country is founded. The founders even provided for their possible errors with a method for correction called the amendment process and another called the Supreme Court, though hey did use the antiquated proposition of religious belief, the antiquated words of some of the world´s greatest thinkers and that flimsy addition of the Bill of Rights to bulk up the rules; how retrograde.

The problem comes from the lawless nature of humanity who will always wish to bend the law, no matter how broadly we would write the ´next constitution´. Could we also say that the bending of the law requires lots of lawyers to circumvent them. Is it possible to write Shakespeare´s advice into the next perfected constitution?

Oy, God save us!

One good thing about the NYT is it´s a whole lot easier to spell them commernism, er, commulism or seditionalism or is that seditionistic or treasonistic or whatever but it means exactly the same thing.

Just what the products of our reading and spelling challenged public school system need.

Ok Luois Michael Seidman, you give up your 1st Amendment right to free speech and the press.

#53, that was really beautiful. The image it brings forth would make a great billboard.

A newspaper that covered up for Stalin... How totally not surprising.