Re: Legal System Not Ruled By Christian Bible

["Dale Courtney" <dmcourtn@moscow.com>]

Tom wrote:
> By my interpretation, the US Constitution is a "living" document.  By
> "living" I mean that the US Constitution is still active, and has been for
> over 200 years.
>
> I believe that the framers intended on making the Constitution flexible so
> that it would endure.  It is true that several courts throughout this
nation
> have interpreted the US Constitution in many varying ways.  The
> "flexibility" of the Constitution ensures its longevity.

That's a nice, current approach. But the following method was suggested by
Thomas Jefferson in 1823 on understanding the meaning of the First
Amendment:
"On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when
the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the
debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text,
or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed."
In other words: the meaning of a word is its historical use, and that's how
it should be interpreted.

Unless you think that Jefferson was wrong about this?

Dale Courtney
Moscow, Idaho