THIS UNNAMED GEOLOGICAL formation is the likely result of wind, rain and time eroading away surface material to expose what at one time would have lava (magma) that had cooled and solidified. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
COMING INTO OR out of the Chisos Mountains, this is the northwest view and is several miles south of Panther Junction and the headquarters for Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THE CLARET CUP is covered in barbed spines and blooms a reddish, cup-shaped flower from about April to June or July in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THIS VIEW FROM a formation called, “The Window,” looks out from the westside of the Chisos Mountains in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
INDIAN HEAD MOUNTAIN and its southern region offers this “leaning” wall of geology at the western boundary of Big Bend National Park. The rocks of the foreground are boulders ranging from man-sized on up. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
MASSIVE AND TOWERING, this wall of the geology is at least a couple of hundrend feet high and situated in the Indian Head area of Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
WIDE-OPEN PANORAMAS and mountainous terrain such as this are routine along roadside in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THE SOUTHWEST SIDE of the Chisos Mountains, also known as the Chisos Mountain Basin and home to the lodge in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2011 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A FALLEN TREE is an impassable barrier in an otherwise debris-free dry riverbed in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
INDIGENOUS TO TEXAS, New Mexico and Arizona, Javelinas in Big Bend National Park genetically differ from swine. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
LOST MINE TRAIL in Big Bend National Park, looking southward over Juniper Canyon, the Chisos Mountain’s Northeast Rim and into Mexico. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A TREE SILHOUETTED against the night sky as seen from Chisos Basin in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
THIS VIEW EAST of a volcano is an illusion of the setting sun streaming through the Chisos Basin area behind Casa Grande Peak in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
WRIGHT MOUNTAIN in background at Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A VIEW WESTWARD after sundown from the Indian Head area of Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved.
A CAMERA COMPENSATION for the limited light after sundown provides this view westward from the Indian Head area of Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson/Camera One. All Rights Reserved.
SANTA ELENA CANYON after sunset, as seen from the Chimneys in Big Bend National Park. Copyright © 2010 by DL Tolleson/Camera One. All Rights Reserved.

DL Tolleson.com

Author, Photographer, Researcher, Artist, Adventurer and Buccaneer Extraordinaire

“Or at least that’s the plan each morning after coffee.”

Publication History: The Power of the States—Part II. Copyright © 2013, 2019 by DL Tolleson. All Rights Reserved. Excerpts from this work are permissible if author attribution is included. However, beyond this no part of this material may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission from the author.

Tolleson, DL. “The Power of the States—Part II.”
DLTolleson.com, 2013.
http://www.dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates02.php.

Tolleson, DL. “The Power of the States—Part II.”
TheLighthousePress.com, 2016.
http://www.thelighthousepress.com/dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates01.php.

Description: Commentary » Political » Constitutional Matters—1,401 words.

This article footnotes to References containing parallel cites. A parallel cite sources two Uniform Resource Locators (URLs), the second of which is rendered in this differing font color. Each parallel cite will source either a first URL that resolves to the second URL, or source a dead URL that necessitates sourcing the second URL for the same or similar content.

Commentary: This is a revision and update of an article originally appearing as an October 6, 2013 entry in The Great American Novel Blog on this web site under the heading, The Constitution Is The Answer. The original entry remains available in the 2013 Archive of this site via the Compendium.

The original article linked to an interview of Mark Levin, a nationally syndicated talk-radio host, president of Landmark Legal Foundation, former chief of staff to the attorney general of the United States, deputy solicitor at the Department of the Interior, deputy assistant secretary at the Department of Education and associate director of Presidential Personal. Levin also authored numerous books, one of which—The Liberty Amendments—focused on Article V of the U.S. Constitution and the reaason for the aforementioned interview.

The interview at the URL cited in the original article has since vanished and inexplicably only the headline and reader responses remain. In the Recommended Reading that follows the article below, I have appended the original cite to include a URL preserving the interview by the Internet Archive at web.archive.org.

—DL Tolleson

THE POWER Of The STATES—PART II
DL Tolleson

Some years ago, following the passage of the Affordable Care Act (AKA Obamacare), it became apparent—even to the “average” American—that Obamacare was not only unconstitutional but also an economic train wreck.

By 2013 the deleterious economic impact was already underway. To avoid government imposed health insurance costs many companies reduced employee hours to less than 30, which was just below the hourly threshold requiring company-provided health insurance. And since Obamacare was imposed only on companies employing 50 or more employees…That’s right, you guessed it; many companies at or just above that threshold scaled back employment.

The impact didn’t stop there. Insurance companies saw a drop in new polices and dramatic increases in the financial burden of overly-extensive coverages mandated by Obamacare. To offset rising costs insurance companies ramped-up their rates. Or rather, some of them did this. Other insurance companies just threw in the towel and got out of the healthcare business altogether.

The IRS, already despised by practically everyone, hired additional agents to handle the workload brought about by healthcare fines and regulation. This translated into involving IRS agents in your healthcare—or rather the new cost of refusing healthcare.

Were people concerned? Yes. Were they concerned enough to seek change? The short answer is yes, but that concern was confounded by a mainstream media complicit in characterizing Obamacare as the best thing since sliced bread. After all, the media was only too happy to quote President Obama’s routine lie that “If you like your plan you can keep your plan.” That lie did not address healthcare coverage made unaffordable by rising costs or insurance companies eliminating healthcare policies.

Obamacare wasn’t the only problem facing the nation and there is a laundry list of “passes” that the media gave Obama that weren’t granted to his successor.

Amid the collapsing economy of the Obama era, jobless numbers climbed. We were told that some jobs simply were “not coming back,” and we witnessed government energy policies reducing the number of energy companies, less energy production and rising costs. On the cultural front things weren’t much better. In short, America was in a state of managed decline carefully attended by our elected representatives.

There are two ways to reverse such declines. One is in voting for Constitutionally-minded representatives and Presidents who favor prosperity over managing decline. This is a path we have taken in the past, most notably during the years of President Ronald Reagan. It is a choice that for years kept us out of the red (both financially and politically). This is also what led to the election of President Donald Trump, a man who was probably not constitutionally astute but nonetheless an intuitive Constitutional adherent predisposed to economic growth. The Trump Presidency, like the Reagan Presidency, was a fundament correction in the direction of the United States.

And like the Reagan Presidency, The Trump Presidency will not be enough in the long run. Those who are repelled by our Constitutional Republic are not limited to occasional individuals or passing fads. They never rest and they never quit. Even amidst any temporary halting of the downward spiral of freedoms there has—and always will be—efforts undertaken to destroy us from within. Such efforts are insidious by virtue of using our own system of government against us.

Which brings us to the second way to reverse course and preserve the Republic.

The framers of our Constitution foresaw a problem with Congress. In fact, George Mason wouldn’t even sign on to a ratification of the Constitution so long as it was only the federal government empowered to amend the Constitution. He is recorded as having made note that Congress would never vote to limit its own power.

And so it was that a second amendment process was included in the Constitution. In Article V of the Constitution, there is a provision for two thirds of the States’ legislatures to call for a convention to propose amendments to the Constitution: Other than providing a “secretarial” role (so to speak), the federal government has NO authority or input in the regulation of this process. Once the States have convened, they are to come up with amendments. The amendments then would need to be voted on by three fourths of the States Legislatures or Conventions in said States.

The actual Constitutional text reads as follows…

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress...


The key points are rendered in italic and such amendments could fix all that has gone wrong before. They could trim away the fat that has been added to federal government and then further define the enumerated powers that have been unconstitutionally expanded or misapplied. Proposed State amendments could further limit federal spending by imposing budget requirements, changes to and for the Supreme Court and even changes for Congress and our representatives. The amendments can address and correct unconstitutional intrusions on State and personal freedoms as well as our inherent rights.

For example: When the Supreme Court ruled that the dirt under the feet of a baby born in America made that baby an American citizen, that was in violation of the Constitution indicating that citizens were people, “subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.” In other words, a baby born to an illegal alien is no more subject to the jurisdiction of the United States for purposes of citizenship than is a baby born to a couple vacationing here from Mexico, Europe, Russia, Australia or any country. Or at least that was the way citizenship was intended to be.

Likewise, when Justice Black used the words of Thomas Jefferson to the Danbury Baptists that there must be a wall separating the church and state, Black knowingly misapplied the meaning. In Jefferson’s letter he clearly explained that ANY law for or against the free expression of religion in the public, private or government sectors, would violate the Constitutional protection for freedom of (rather than from) religion. The Constitution does not bar the mention, discourse or appearance of religion and God in government. Rather, it is worded to prevent the government from mandating, as well as excluding, discourse about religion and the presence of God in government. That was the wall to which Jefferson referred. There is no Constitutional language that establishes a separation of church and state; but there is language that prevents the passage of laws prohibiting the free exercise of religion.

The Constitution is likewise silent about abortion. I suppose that if anything a Constitutional argument could be made to bar abortion based on the preservation of life. But beyond this the Constitution does not speak to abortion per se. We are supposed to live under federalism: A federal government with specific enumerated powers and every other power not enumerated for the federal government, reserved to the States and their citizens. Abortion is not an enumerated power and if the argument isn’t being made to protect life under the Constitution, then the argument defaults to the matter belonging in the purview of each state.

In this way—and as it is the case with so many differing State laws—we each have a place to which to move if and when we cannot change or tolerate where we now live. Such a freedom cannot be found elsewhere in the world and if we do not take back Constitutional control of our government that is a freedom that will come to no longer exist in America.

So, in short then, the ONLY possible means to reverse all that has been done to tear down our county is Article V of the Constitution...

It is the solution that the 50 united States (and not the Federal government) have as the most devastating weapon in our arsenal. With this one Constitutional clause we could legally, peacefully and Constitutionally turn our country back into the Republic from which it has strayed.

Sources, Notes and Rcommended Reading

To read the interview giving rise to the above article, please see the first source cited below. As noted in the Commentary atop the page, the original (and first) URL now contains only the headline and reader responses (the interview was apparently removed). However, the interview has been archived and is available at the second URL that I appended to the cite in 2019.

Sources 2 through 4 refer to other articles in The Power of the States series.

1 “Breitbart News Interview: Mark Levin and The Liberty Amendments.” Breitbart.com, 12 Aug. 2013, http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/08/12/Interview-Mark-Levin-Liberty-Amendments-Breitbart-News, (Retrieved 2013). https://web.archive.org/web/20130815063447/http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/08/12/Interview-Mark-Levin-Liberty-Amendments-Breitbart-News, (Retrieved 2019).

2 “The Power of the States—Part I.” DLTolleson.com, 12 Jul. 2013, http://www.dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates01.php, (Retrieved 2013). http://www.thelighthousepress.com/dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates01.php, (Retrieved 2016).

3 “The Power of the States—Part III.” DLTolleson.com, 13 Dec. 2013, http://www.dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates03.php, (Retrieved 2013). http://www.thelighthousepress.com/dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates03.php, (Retrieved 2016).

4 “The Power of the States—Part IV.” DLTolleson.com, 29 Dec. 2014, http://www.dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates04.php, (Retrieved 2014). http://www.thelighthousepress.com/dltolleson.com/commentary/powerofstates04.php, (Retrieved 2016).