Supreme Court discovers amazing new free speech right

March 3, 6:16 PMDallas Libertarian ExaminerGarry Reed

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The Venerable Black-Robed Wise Ones of the U.S. Supreme Court have rummaged around in their Constitutional grab bag and suddenly discovered that, Lo and Behold, concepts, not just people but concepts, are living, breathing entities who can talk and have rights.

This has been coming on for years, lead by ideological Leftward Leaners who like to describe the Constitution as a “Living Document,” which is their way of explaining that the Constitution should mean anything that they would like it to mean whenever they would like it to mean something different than what it used to mean.

Comic genius George Carlin, one step ahead of us all as usual, once pointed out that, at least according to the news media, architecture was doing a lot of talking. Speaking in his officially authoritarian news radio voice he intoned, “the White House announced today” … “The Pentagon declared this morning” … “City Hall stated late this afternoon” …

But at least these were “things” rather than “concepts” doing all the chatting. We can all suspend disbelief and envision humanized cartoon objects like The Little Engine That Could or SpongeBob SquarePants singing and whistling and yakking merrily away. We may even have seen a building rhythmically swaying back and forth in a 1930s black and white hand drawn animated film, it’s big window eyes blinking merrily while its little doorway mouth pronounced the syllables of human speech.

Apparently, this is where those Leftward Leaners got their idea for the “living Constitution.” Think of a rolled up parchment fancied up in Old English script, dancing about in spats with straw hat and cane. That would be a living Constitution.

What’s really difficult to do is to conjure up an image of a concept exhibiting humanlike qualities. For example, try imagining what a “dentistry” would look like. Not a dentist, or a dentist’s office, or a smiley tooth, but the concept of dentistry. Or sit down and draw a picture of theology. No churches or crosses or holy men allowed. Those are things. And don’t try slathering murky oil paint on a canvas. That might represent the “feeling” or “essence” or “spirituality” of theology, but your task is to depict the concept of theology itself, not just its evocations.

The city of Pleasant Grove, Utah, placed a Ten Commandments monument in a public park. People of the Summum religion filed suit demanding that the city must also allow them to erect their own Seven Aphorisms monument next to it because, by its actions, the city had “created a public forum” which should be open to all. The city, perhaps speaking with flashing window eyes and flapping door mouth, said no.

This is where those Black-Robed judges come in. They told the Summum folks that their rights hadn’t been violated so their monuments needn’t be displayed.

An article from The Christian Science Monitor (one of those “news media” George Carlin was citing) stated that “The US Supreme Court has ruled …” (in another example of talking architecture) “…when a government entity decides to place a privately donated monument on public land, the display represents the government’s own speech…”

That’s right, “the government’s own speech.”

Noted speakers of Goventmentese are, from left to right, New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer,
Idaho Sen. Larry Craig, former Florida Rep. Mark Foley (AP Photos) and Government Itself. 
 

So naturally your mission now, should you choose to accept it, is to explain exactly how a concept like “government” attained the gift of gab.

Does “government” even have a mouth? A tongue? Larynx? Lungs? Diaphragm? We all know that “governmentese” is the language government people speak, but has anyone ever heard an actual “government” speak it?

The ruling didn’t say that the display represented the mayor’s own speech, or the councilwoman’s own speech, or the public water and sewer district commissioner’s own speech. Those are people, or at least as close as politicians come to being people, and they may represent government, but they aren’t “government.”

This is a fascinating development. If you’re ever hit by a car you won’t be able to sue the driver. “Traffic did it,” the driver’s mouthpiece will say. “Sue Traffic.”

If you injure yourself falling in your bathtub your insurance won’t cover your hospital bills. “It was an act of bathing,” your agent will tell you. “Bathing must pay your bills.”

Which means that the Constitutional Left Leaners now have the precedent they want. The next time anyone shoots anyone they can cry, “the shooter didn’t do it! The gun didn’t do it. Gun Ownership did it! Abolish the concept of Gun Ownership.”

And gun owners should go right ahead and agree with them. Gun rights advocates and freedom activists and the entire libertarian community will be happily entertained as they watch a legion of Left Leaners busily scurrying about with their "Living Document" in hand trying to identify and subpoena and apprehend and arrest and prosecute and convict and incarcerate “Gun Ownership.”

And who knows, some Libertarian Leaner might even step in and protect the poor silly ninnies from coming to harm at the hands of that esoteric concept we call “criminal activity.”

Assuming, of course, that “criminal activity” even has hands.