Category: Congress - TomHoefling.com

Tom Hoefling: Judges, and politicians, behaving badly

2/25/2016

"The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour..."

-- Article III, Section One, U.S. Constitution

Most people think federal judges receive a lifetime appointment to the bench. But the Constitution doesn't say that. It says that they hold their offices "during good Behaviour."

How many of you seriously think that the "Behaviour" of our judges has been "good"?

It's time to elect leaders to Congress who will act correctly, according to the obligations of their oaths, and begin to make the practice of the impeachment and removal of judges who behave badly THE RULE, rather than the exception.

If we don't rein in the courts, and if we continue to elect politicians who think we live in a judicial oligarchy instead of a free constitutional republic with checks and balances, we can't possibly save the country.

-- Tom Hoefling

Personnel IS policy - Boehner tips his cards on amnesty

12/3/2013

New Boehner Hire Supports Path to Citizenship (former McCain Chief of Staff)

*Excerpt*

House Speaker John Boehner's new staffer in charge of immigration policy has significant experience in drafting immigration legislation and pushing for reform. She wouldn't be coming to Boehner's office if House Republicans weren't serious about doing something on the issue. What that is remains to be seen.

Rebecca Tallent, former chief of staff to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., will be coming to the speaker's office from the Bipartisan Policy Center, where she has served as director of immigration policy. Her move "is affirmation of [Boehner's] strong desire to move legislation in 2014," BPC's immigration task force cochairman, former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, said in a statement.

Tallent is a veteran of immigration fights and a big believer in reform, including a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. One of her early endeavors in negotiating legislation was 10 years ago, when she worked as a staffer for former Rep. Jim Kolbe, R-Ariz. Tallent helped draft a major immigration bill sponsored by Kolbe, McCain, and former Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., now a senator and member of the "Gang of Eight" who created the comprehensive immigration bill that passed the Senate in June.

*End excerpt*

Legitimate powers of Congress

11/12/2013

“With respect to the two words ‘general welfare’, I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.” “If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions.” “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined . . . to be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce." "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents."

-- James Madison, the father of the U.S. Constitution, fourth U.S. President

“Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.”

-- Thomas Jefferson, third U.S. President

“Mr. Speaker: I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the suffering of the living, if there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has not the power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member on this floor knows it. We have the right as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right to appropriate a dollar of the public money.”

-- Congressman Davy Crockett

“I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for public charity.”

-- President Franklin Pierce

The 1986 amnesty disaster multiplied: Illegal immigration & the factors of three and ten

5/20/2013

Tom Hoefling

America is about to be overrun by 100,000,000 new illegal aliens, unless We the People put a stop to it

Here's the tried and true formula for amnesty: If they tell you a number, you've got to triple it. And, if granted amnesty, ultimately, ten times as many will come.

In 1986, Congress told President Reagan that they wanted to amnesty one million foreign nationals who had entered our country illegally. After garnering his signature with false promises of future reforms that included the securing of the border, promises that of course afterwards went completely unfulfilled, more than three million illegals actually took advantage of Washington's generosity.

Enter the factors of three and ten.

How many additional illegals have been drawn here since by our largesse? For more than a decade now, the political elites have admitted to at least eleven million. Putting aside for a moment the mystery of how this number has remained static, considering the fact that we know thousands per day on average have continued to flood across our porous southern border, we'll use this number as our baseline. If they tell you eleven million, you can be fairly certain that there are actually at least thirty-three million illegals now in our country. Those who have traveled extensively, especially in our urban centers, almost uniformly agree with the much higher number.

So, be sure, if the current drive to legalize by the Gang of Eight in the Senate succeeds, the borders will not be secured, and the next wave will completely over-run the country, with one hundred million or more coming here in the next few decades, secure in the knowledge that they will be coddled by the politicians, that our laws will not be enforced, and that most likely, they and their children will ultimately receive the reward of their law-breaking: American citizenship.

We must stop this dead in its tracks NOW. The message must be sent NOW to all of our Congressmen and Senators that any support for this invasion will be a career killer. To use a Texas colloquialism: we've got to 'show 'em the rope and point at the branch.'

We've stopped them before. We can stop them again. And we must.

But it's up to you.

Romney Republican-passed CR Funds Planned Parenthood, Obamacare, sterilizations, abortifacients...

9/13/2012

House Republicans Pass Funding for Planned Parenthood, Obamacare and Regulation Forcing Catholics to Act Against Faith

CNS News

The Republican-majority House of Representatives is now set to pass a $1.047 trillion bill funding the federal government through March 2013 that will permit funding for Planned Parenthood and ObamaCare--including the regulation that took effect on Aug. 1 that will require virtually all health plans in the United States to cover, without fees or co-pay, sterilizations and all FDA-approved contraceptives, including those that induce abortions.

The bill would fund the government for six months into the new fiscal year and for almost five months after the November elections.

The Catholic bishops of the United States have unanimously declared the Obamacare sterilization-contraception-abortifacient regulation an "unjust and illegal mandate" that violates the right to free exercise of religion not only of Catholic institutions but also of Catholic business owners and workers.

The bill, a continuing resolution (CR), does not prohibit funding for either ObamaCare programs or Planned Parenthood. Nor does it stop the government from enforcing regulations, such as the mandate from the Health and Human Services Department that nearly all health insurance plans provide contraceptives, sterilizations, and abortion-inducing drugs free of charge.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who supports the CR along with the GOP House leadership, earlier this year described the health insurance mandate as an “unambiguous attack on religious freedom in our country” and a violation of the First Amendment protecting the free exercise of religion.

Read this story at cnsnews.com ...

James Madison: The subversion of the very foundations of limited government in America

7/6/2012

"If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress. Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America."

-- James Madison, Speech on the Cod Fishery Bill, Feb. 7, 1792

Joseph Story: The true test of legislation

7/6/2012

"The true test is, whether the object be of a local character, and local use; or, whether it be of general benefit to the states. If it be purely local, congress cannot constitutionally appropriate money for the object. But, if the benefit be general, it matters not, whether in point of locality it be in one state, or several; whether it be of large, or of small extent."

-- Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833

If it's not enumerated, it's not lawful

7/2/2012

Thomas Jefferson: "Lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers"

6/7/2012

"It would reduce the whole instrument to a single phrase, that of instituting a Congress with power to do whatever would be for the good of the United States; and as they would be the sole judges of the good or evil, it would be also a power to do whatever evil they please. Certainly no such universal power was meant to be given them. It [the Constitution] was intended to lace them up straightly within the enumerated powers and those without which, as means, these powers could not be carried into effect."

-- Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on a National Bank, 1791

Debt Up $1.59T Under GOP House—More in 15 Months Than First 97 Congresses Combined

6/3/2012

Provided courtesy of CTMSR.com

CNSNews.com

Terence P. Jeffrey

The Republican-controlled House of Representatives, which took office in January 2011, has enacted federal spending bills under which the national debt has increased more in less than one term of Congress than in the first 97 Congresses combined.

In the fifteen months that the Republican-controlled House of Representatives--led by Speaker John Boehner--has effectively enjoyed a constitutional veto over federal spending, the federal government’s debt has increased by about $1.59 trillion.

Article 1, Section 9, Clause 7 of the Constitution says: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.” A law appropriating money cannot be enacted unless it is approved by the House.

The approximately $1.59 trillion in new debt accumulated since the Republican-controlled House gained a veto over federal spending legislation is more than the total increase in the federal debt between 1789, when the first Congress convened, and October 1984, when the 98th Congress was nearing the end of its second session.

Rep. Frederick Muhlenberg of Pennsylvania served as speaker in the first Congress. Rep. Tip O’Neill of Massachusetts served his third term as speaker in the 98th Congress.

When Boehner became speaker on Jan. 5, 2011, the federal government was operating under a continuing resolution that had been passed on Dec. 21, 2010 by a lame-duck Congress. That CR expired on March 4, 2011.

On March 1, 2011, Boehner agreed to a new short-term spending deal with [Alleged] President Barack Obama and Democratic congressional leaders to keep the government running past the March 4, 2011 expiration of the old CR. Since March 4, 2011, federal expenditures have been carried out under a series of CRs approved by both the Republican-controlled House and the Democrat-controlled Senate and signed into law by [Alleged] President Obama.

At the close of business on March 4, 2011, the total federal debt was $14,182,627,184,881.03, according to the Treasury Department's Bureau of the Public Debt. At the close of business on May 31, 2012, it was 15,770,685,085,364.14. That is an increase of $1,588,057,900,483.11—in just 15 months.

All of the debt accumulated by the federal government throughout the history of the country did not exceed $1.588 trillion until October 1984.

Under the Republican-controlled House, the federal debt has been increasing at an average pace of about $105.9 billion per month.

Frederick Muhlenberg served two non-consecutive terms as speaker--in the first and third Congresses. At the end of the first Congress, in 1791, the total debt of the federal government was about $75.5 million, according to the U.S. Treasury.

Tip O’Neill served as speaker in the 95th through 99th Congresses, from 1977 through 1986.

At the end of September 1984, during the 98th Congress, the total national debt was approximately $1,572,266,000,000.00, according to the Treasury Department’s Monthly Statement of the Public Debt for that month. At the end of October 1984, it was $1,611,537,000,000.00, according to the Monthly Statement of the Public Debt.

Tom Hoefling asks: "Which part of NO LAW do they fail to understand?"

4/21/2012

"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."

-- The First Amendment, the United States Constitution

James Madison: The remedy for annulling the acts of the usurpers

4/10/2012

"What is to be the consequence, in case the Congress shall misconstrue this part [the necessary and proper clause] of the Constitution and exercise powers not warranted by its true meaning, I answer the same as if they should misconstrue or enlarge any other power vested in them...the success of the usurpation will depend on the executive and judiciary departments, which are to expound and give effect to the legislative acts; and in a last resort a remedy must be obtained from the people, who can by the elections of more faithful representatives, annul the acts of the usurpers."

-- James Madison, Federalist No. 44

Abraham Lincoln: "The rightful masters of the Congress and the Courts"

4/6/2012

James Madison: "Annul the acts of the usurpers"

3/13/2012

"What is to be the consequence, in case the Congress shall misconstrue this part [the necessary and proper clause] of the Constitution and exercise powers not warranted by its true meaning, I answer the same as if they should misconstrue or enlarge any other power vested in them ... the success of the usurpation will depend on the executive and judiciary departments, which are to expound and give effect to the legislative acts; and in a last resort a remedy must be obtained from the people, who can by the elections of more faithful representatives, annul the acts of the usurpers."

-- James Madison, Federalist No. 44, 1788

'Our liberties we prize and our rights we will maintain.'

Tom Hoefling on Government:

"Just as 'good fences make for good neighbors,' good government is mainly about knowing where the legitimate boundaries are, and having the courage to defend those borders forcefully. This is true in terms of the defense of our territory, our security, and our national sovereignty, but it also applies to the sworn duty of all of those in government to equally protect the God-given, unalienable rights of each individual person, from their creation onward, their sacred obligation to stay well within the enumerated powers of our constitutions, and of the role legitimate government must play in balancing the competing rights and interests of the people, in order to establish justice."