HANDING DOWN THE SENTENCE

Unless you're talking about the legal system, a sentence is a group of words that form one complete thought.

The rule of thumb in English is: One sentence, one thought.

Nowadays, sentences are punctuated with strange, unrelated words such as "like."

"Like" is the introduction to a simile, but in todays conversations it has come to mean someone has not though his/her sentence through well enough to complete it and must buy some time to think of his/her next word.

The framers of the Constitution of the United States of Americ knew full well how to construct intelligible sentences in such a way as to complete their thought accurately.  They also knew how to write and speak coherently, something sorely lacking in today's conversation and writning.

Let us consider an example one of their wonderfully complete and inspiring sentences.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

That is one sentence and expresses one complete thought. It puts forth a principle that demonstrates that the government is not and must not be all powerful.

The sentence begins with the word, "Congress."

Congress is the law making body of the federal government. It is the second branch of government and is charged with the responsibility of writing laws and verifying or rejecting laws proposed by the executive branch, that is, the president. Their law-making is supposed to affect all Americans throughout the country.

This obligation to law making is found in the words "shall make," which constitutes the verb of the sentence.

Congress is divided into two parts: the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Before a law can be enacted, these two parts, called "houses" must come to an agreement as to how the law should be written and what it should say.

"Congress" is the subject of the sentence that comprises the First Amendment. The subject is restricted to the federal government and has no bearing on the laws that can or cannot be made by other entities, such the head of a household in his/her own house.

There are certain laws the congress cannot write, and those are enumerated in the First Amendment to the Constitution. Those laws are prohibited by the word "no" in the sentence.


The word "respecting" is used to indicate "having anything to do with."

The next words, "an establishment," have caused controversy over the years because people do not know how the English language is constructed and have twisted it to mean "the establishment."

"An establishment" is a place.

For instance, I own an establishment that provides legal services to people (I don't, really. That is only an example).

"The establishment" is what I did to bring my legal practice into existance.

"An establishment" is a noun (with its adjective/article, "an").

"The establishment" is a verb (with its adjective/article, "the").

The whole sentence that comprises the First Amendment, without its definitive phrases and/or objects, is: "Congress shall make no law respecting, prohibiting or abridging."

Thus, Congress cannot make a law that affects a place (an establishment) where religion is practiced (whether Christian, Muslim, Baptist, Catholic or whatever) or prohibiting the free exercise of that religion.

Neither can Congress pass a law that "abridges" (which means to change or to shorten or curtail) freedom of speech or peaceful assembly for the purpose of expressing greviences against the federal government.

The Supreme Court (charged with the responsibility of ensuring that laws passed by Congress do not violate the rest of the Constitution and with seeing to it that decisions of the lower courts conform to the Constitution) has made several rulings about the meaning of the First Amendment.

Moreover, they have inserted themselves into areas that are not their responsibility, such as abortion, the subject of which is not found anywhere in the Constitution.

"Roe vs Wade" needs to be overturned, not because of its moral stance, or lack thereof, but because it is unconstitutional.

Since the Supreme Court has spoken on the issue, it must be right to proclaim abortion to be legal. We know that the Supreme Court is always right...right?

Yeah, and they were right on Dred/Scott, too.

The importance of the First Amendment cannot be overstated. It is the recognition that religion, speech, the press and assembly are "sacred" rights of the people and they cannot be trampled on by the federal government.

But trample they do.

And almost all liberals love it!

Liberals love the free speech part, as long as it means they can swear and curse and be vulgar in their speech. But when it comes to the speech of prayer, suddenly they don't like it so much.

They love the freedom of the press, so long as it does not comprise blogs that disagree with their warpped point of vies.

They also love the freedom of assembly part, so long as it is not the Tea Party doing the assemblying.

Typically, most liberals cannot see far enough into the future or anticipate the unintended consequences of certain decisions and actions.

The future does not matter to them because they are self-centered and do not care what happens to their posterity.

They willingly engage in decisions and actions that financially bind future generations in hopeless debt.

That attitude found its beginning in the twisting and revising of the First Amendment to mean what they want it to mean instead of what it actually means.

Isn't it time to return to one of the most important sentences in American history?