Tuesday, July 16, 1985
Page 4
The Nebraskan
Remember the
POWMIA 's
The official flag of the POW-MLVs
was raised Monday at the State
Capitol to mark the beginning of
Prisoner of WarMissing in Action
Recognition Week, July 15 to 20. The
flags will fly all week over offices and
homes.
A state-wide moment of silence will
be observed at 11:59 a.m. Friday, July
19th, in honor of the Nebraska POW
MLVs who have not yet returned home.
The State of Nebraska has 401 men
still listed as prisoner of war or missing
in action from major conflicts the Uni
ted States has been involved in, accord
ing to J. Gonzales, Jr., Director of the
State Department of Veterans Affairs
and acting coordinator for an ad hoc
committee composed of several repre
sentatives from state and federal agen
cies and other interested groups,
Gonzales and his committee are ask
ing the citizens of Nebraska to observe
the moment of silence, 11:59 a.m. Fri
day, and to participate in POW-MIA
Recognition Week activities across the
state.
All Nebraskans are urged to partici
pate in POW-MIA Recognition Week,
even if only by considering what has
gone before and to remember, with
respect, the sacrifice the POW-MIA's
made for their country.
This year marks the tenth anniver
sary of the end of our involvement in
the Vietnam War. Gov. Kerrey said ten
years is a long time, especially when we
consider those Americans, 28 of them
Nebraskans, who did not return at the
end of our involvement.
Some groups in the state believe
that some of these men may still be
alive.
Steve Durbin, Executive Director of
the Vietnam Veterans MIA Task Force
in Grand Island said it is possible that
individuals are still being held captive
in Southeast Asia. Durbin said he
believes the Vietnamese are still hold
ing these men as pawns to be used in
negotiations to receive more aid from
the United States.
Terry Montgomery, coordinator for
VFW Post 10617 said, "No matter how
the memory of Vietnam may pain peo
ple, they must see that some of our
servicemen are still in physical pain
and being held captive by the Vietna
mese." The very least Nebraskans can do is
to recognize that these men are still
missing.
... In an effort to raise public con
sciousness of the war and related
issues, a portion of American History
classes should be devoted to the study
and understanding of the Vietnam ex
perience. This idea was recommended by the
Nebraska State Legislature in Legisla
tive Resolution 250, passed earlier this
year. The resolution also calls for flying
the official POW-MIA flag and for the
Unicameral to consider a special com
mendation of Nebraska POWs in yp
tivity for five years or longer, and ol
those Nebraskans who remain listed
ML.
Another thing that can be done to
show America's respect for its military
is to call for an accounting of those
missing.
"This is an issue of importance to
every American. If the American public
does not stand up now and demand an
accounting it will happen again," TJ.
Jarecke, State Chairman for the Forget-Me-Not
Association for POW-MIA's said.
Now is the chance for Americans to
foster a deeper understanding and
appreciation of the issues of war, even
if the war is long over. Observing Fri
day's moment of silence and partici
pating in POW-MIA Recognition Week
is one way to show that those who are
out of sight are not out of mind.
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First Amendlmemt misnnsed
Meese says Bill of Rights daesn 't apply to states
Last week in a speech to the Amer
ican Bar Association Attorney
General Edwin Meese struck a
blow for a return to proper constitu
tional interpretation by arguing that
the Supreme Court has consistently
been mistaken over the past sixty years
Si
Jim
Rogers
in applying the U.S. Constitution's Bill
of Rights to state governments. Said
Meese, "the Bill of Rights, as debated,
created and ratified, was designed to
apply only to the national government."
Meese correctly pointed out that the
notion that those rights are good as
against states is only an "intellectually
shaken foundation," and that nowhere
else "has the principle of federalism
been dealt so politically violent and
constitutionally suspect a blow as by
the theory" of the Bill of Rights appli
cation to the states.
W
ell, needless to say, liberal
mudslingers were standing in
lines to attack and distort
Meese's claims. In Nebraska we have
our very own local purveyor of distorted
alarm in the person of George Green,
President of the Board of Directors of
the (mistitled) Nebraska Civil Liber
ties Union. Ignoring any semblance of
reasoned opinion, Green predictably
posited the charge in a NCLU "news"
release that because Meese doesn't
believe the Bill of Rights was incorpo
rated by the Fourteenth Amendment
that "apparently the administration
wants to repeal" that provision. In real
ity, however, the charge is quite over
blown, for such is hardly the logical
consequent of Meese's claim.
The weight of the historical evi
dence supports Meese's claim and
underscores the reactionary nature of
Green's objections. A number of years
ago Stanford law professor Charles
Fairman exhaustively examined and
critiqued the historical evidence
asserted by Supreme Court Justice
Black to indicate that the Fourteenth
Amendment was intended to make the
Bill of Rights applicable to the states.
A federal judge recently summar
ized Professor Fairman's conclu
sion as follows: "The historical
record clearly establishes that when
the Fourteenth Amendment was rati
fied in 1868 that its ratification did not
incorporate the First Amendment
against the states. The debates in Con
gress at the time the Fourteenth Amend
ment was being drafted, the re-election
speeches of the various members of
Congress shortly after the passage by
Congress of the Fourteenth Amend
ment, the contemporaneous newspaper
stories reporting the effect and sub
stance of the Fourteenth Amendment,
and the legislative debates in the var
ious state legislatures when they con
sidered ratification of the Fourteenth
Amendment indicates that the amend
ment was not intended to apply the
establishment clause (of the First
Amendment) against the states be
cause the Fourteenth Amendment was
not intended to incorporate the federal
Bill of Rights (the first eight amend
ments) against the states." Other scho
larly analysis concur.
The tone and intention of Green's
tirade is almost frightening from a
jurisprudential perspective. He seems
unwilling (or unable) to provide histor
ical refutation of Meese's claim, relying
in the stead upon wild charges that the
administration desires to repeal the
entire Fourteenth Amendment rather
than, more accurately, viewing Meese's
claim as simply an attempt to return it
to its proper province.
By implication of his argument, the
NCLU's Green rejects the basis for
reasonable policy-making and adjudi
cating. Constitutional interpretation
ought not to be based upon some small,
select group of individual's interpreta
tion of how the times have changed
since a provision's enactment for
that is ultimately a foot in the door for
the potential tyrant or despot. But
instead, constitutional interpretation
should be based upon the common
sense idea, as articulated by Meese,
that "only the sense in which that Con
stitution was accepted and ratified by
the nation and only the sense m wmcn
laws were drafted and passed provide a
solid foundation for adjudciation." The
absurd vituperations of the NCLU indi
cate that, in this instance at least, the
administration has the superior histo
ricalinterpretive support.
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Every war is a national misfortune.
Helmuth Von Moltke
Nebraskan
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