The Supreme Court on June 30th, 2026 struck down President Donald Trump’s executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship – the legal concept underlying the ruling was based on the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which the Court understands to confer citizenship on anyone “born … in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” It does not matter if the parents are in the country illegally or not. Any child born within U.S. territory is a citizen, so says the majority of justices on the U.S. Supreme Court.
Needless to say, American patriots went absolutely ballistic. Both Amy Coney Barrett and Chief Justice Roberts drew massive criticism as “traitors” to the Republican Party and the American nation. The reaction to Amy Coney Barrett has been so visceral that some commentators, even female ones, have demanded no more women on the Supreme Court. Some women went even further and called for the repeal of the 19th Amendment to end female suffrage entirely.
Roberts was a Bush appointee, from whom MAGA always expected little. Barrett, however, was Trump’s idea. MAGA had pinned high hopes on a Trump Court delivering wins on their signature issues such as curbing illegal immigration and the closely related problem of “anchor babies.” Barrett, aside from her vote on overturning Roe, has largely been a disappointment to MAGA. Even so, this latest ruling really sticks in the MAGA craw, as it is widely seen as the ultimate betrayal of one of the main reasons many Americans voted for Trump in the first place.
All this hysterical ire is completely understandable. Unfortunately, it is also completely misplaced. The problem is not Amy Coney Barrett. Not really. She is a symptom of a larger systemic disease which is the Supreme Court itself – and the constitutionally established Federal Government in which it operates.
Let me explain.
All the recent ruling actually did was reaffirm the precedent established by the Court itself in United States v. Wong Kim Ark in 1898. Wong Kim Ark was born in San Francisco to parents of Chinese descent. When he returned to the United States from a visit to China in 1895, immigration officials would not allow him to enter the country on the grounds that he was not a U.S. citizen. A 6-2 majority of the Supreme Court determined that Wong was a U.S. citizen. Writing for the majority, Justice Horace Gray explained that although the “main purpose” of the 14th Amendment had been to establish the citizenship of Black people, including former enslaved persons, born in the United States, the amendment applies more broadly and is not restricted “by color or race.”
In 1895, all nine members of the U.S. Supreme Court were white men. Eight justices were Protestant, and one was Roman Catholic. The 19th Amendment granting women the right to vote was not ratified until 1920. Yet, on the basis of a 6-2 majority, the Court established the clear precedent of “birthright citizenship.”
The 14th Amendment, on which the holding was based, was actually ratified to overturn the Supreme Court’s earlier Dred Scott decision. The central holding of that case had been that people of African descent, whether enslaved or free, were not citizens of the United States. That case had a hand in precipitating the War Between the States. Justice Gray knew the history of the Court’s disastrous Dred Scott decision, knew the purpose of the 14th Amendment, and still proceeded to apply it to the child of Chinese immigrants. Until Trump came along over 100 years later, everyone just accepted what the Court had done.
Dred Scott and Wong Kim Ark are just two examples of the U.S. Supreme Court imposing its interpretation of law on what is supposed to be, in theory anyway, a compact of free and independent states. I would also point out Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) in which the U.S. Supreme Court by a 5-4 vote mandated “same-sex marriage” in all 50 states. Additionally egregious cases I could cite:
- Wickard v. Filburn (1942): This landmark ruling vastly expanded federal power under the Constitution’s Commerce Clause. It ruled that Congress could regulate a farmer’s personal, non-commercial production of wheat for his own animals, allowing the federal government to reach deeply into local economic affairs.
- Roe v. Wade (1973): For decades, conservatives heavily criticized Roe for fabricating a constitutional “right to privacy” that secured a nationwide right to abortion. Critics argued this bypassed the democratic process and removed the issue from the states.
- Kelo v. City of New London (2005): In a heavily criticized 5-4 decision, the Court ruled that the government could seize private property and transfer it to a private developer for economic development. Conservatives and property rights advocates viewed this as a devastating erosion of the Fifth Amendment’s “Takings Clause,” which requires that private property only be taken for “public use.”
- Griswold v. Connecticut (1965): This decision struck down a state ban on the use of contraceptives, establishing a broad “right to privacy” that was not explicitly anchored in the text of the Constitution. Conservatives often view this as a primary example of judges creating constitutional rights out of whole cloth.
- National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius (2012): This decision upheld the Affordable Care Act’s “individual mandate,” conservatives were deeply critical of Chief Justice John Roberts’ reasoning, which ultimately allowed the government’s penalty for not buying health insurance to be categorized and upheld as a “tax.”
There are enough examples of bad social, legal, economic, and political engineering by Supreme Court justices to fill massive printed volumes. Notice the dates of the cases on the above list? Amy Coney Barrett joined the Court in October 2020. She is not a bad apple who “betrayed” her benefactor Donald Trump. She is just one more rotten apple in a filthy cesspit.
The worst part is that all of this was readily foreseen by one of America’s greatest patriots – Patrick Henry. Most Americans know Henry as the man who shouted, “Give me liberty or give me death!” Henry uttered these words, which became the war cry of the American Revolution, at the conclusion of his great speech on the Rights of the Colonies, before the Virginia Assembly, convened at Richmond, March 23rd, 1775.
Unfortunately, most Americans lose track of him after that. Which is why few know that this man, a hero of the Revolution and a lawyer of some renown, was a bitter critic of the proposed U.S. Constitution drafted in Philadelphia in 1787. Henry was a devout Christian (Anglican) who did not belong to the Freemasons, and was acknowledged as one of America’s greatest orators. Henry’s speech in opposition to the proposed Constitution at the 1788 Virginia Convention should be required reading for all Americans. Particularly for those Americans who believe if we could “just get back to the Constitution” all would be well again in America.
As Henry foresaw, such sentiments are completely erroneous. Under the U.S. Constitution, individual liberty and sound government were doomed from the start, with the new federal judiciary always destined to play a role in their destruction.
Below are some excerpts from Henry’s speech:
Here is a revolution as radical as that which separated us from Great Britain. It is as radical, if in this transition, our rights and privileges are endangered, and the sovereignty of the States be relinquished: And cannot we plainly see, that this is actually the case? The rights of conscience, trial by jury, liberty of the press, all your immunities and franchises, all pretensions to human rights and privileges, are rendered insecure, if not lost, by this change so loudly talked of by some, and inconsiderately by others. Is this tame relinquishment of rights worthy of freemen?
My great objection to this Government is, that it does not leave us the means of defending our rights; or, of waging war against tyrants: It is urged by some Gentlemen, that this new plan will bring us an acquisition of strength, an army, and the militia of the States: This is an idea extremely ridiculous: Gentlemen cannot be in earnest. This acquisition will trample on your fallen liberty: Let my beloved Americans guard against that fatal lethargy that has pervaded the universe: Have we the means of resisting disciplined armies, when our only defence, the militia is put into the hands of Congress?
A trifling minority may reject the most salutary amendments. Is this an easy mode of securing the public liberty? It is, Sir, a most fearful situation, when the most contemptible minority can prevent the alteration of the most oppressive Government; for it may in many respects prove to be such: Is this the spirit of republicanism? What, Sir, is the genius of democracy? Let me read that clause of the Bill of Rights of Virginia, which relates to this: 3d cl. “That Government is or ought to be instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security of the people, nation, or community: Of all the various modes and forms of Government, that is best which is capable of producing the greatest degree of happiness and safety, and is most effectually secured against the danger of mal-administration, and that whenever any Government shall be found inadequate, or contrary to these purposes, a majority of the community hath, an undubitable, unalienable and indefeasible right to reform, alter, or abolish it, in such manner as shall be judged most conducive to the public weal.” This, Sir, is the language of democracy; that a majority of the community have a right to alter their Government when found to be oppressive: But how different is the genius of your new Constitution from this? How different from the sentiments of freemen, that a contemptible minority can prevent the good of the majority?
The Honorable Gentleman who presides [Edmund Pendleton], told us, that to prevent abuses in our Government, we will assemble in Convention, recall our delegated powers, and punish our servants for abusing the trust reposed in them. Oh, Sir, we should have fine times indeed, if to punish tyrants, it were only sufficient to assemble the people. Your arms wherewith you could defend yourselves, are gone; and you have no longer an aristocratical; no longer a democratical spirit. Did you ever read of any revolution in any nation, brought about by the punishment of those in power, inflicted by those who had no power at all?
When the American spirit was in its youth, the language of America was different: Liberty, Sir, was then the primary object. We are descended from a people whose Government was founded on liberty: Our glorious forefathers of Great-Britain, made liberty the foundation of every thing. That country is become a great, mighty, and splendid nation; not because their Government is strong and energetic; but, Sir, because liberty is its direct end and foundation: We drew the spirit of liberty from our British ancestors; by that spirit we have triumphed over every difficulty: But now, Sir, the American spirit, assisted by the ropes and chains of consolidation, is about to convert this country ⟨in⟩to a powerful and mighty empire: If you make the citizens of this country agree to become the subjects of one great consolidated empire of America, your Government will not have sufficient energy to keep them together: Such a Government is incompatible with the genius of republicanism: There will be no checks, no real balances, in this Government: What can avail your specious imaginary balances, your rope-dancing, chain-rattling, ridiculous ideal checks and contrivances?
The Honorable Gentleman [Edmund Pendleton] has told us these powers given to Congress, are accompanied by a Judiciary which will correct all: On examination you will find this very Judiciary oppressively constructed; your jury trial destroyed, and the Judges dependent on Congress.
Go to the poor man, ask him what he does; he will inform you, that he enjoys the fruits of his labour, under his own fig-tree, with his wife and children around him, in peace and security. Go to every other member of the society, you will find the same tranquil ease and content; you will find no alarms or disturbances⟨!⟩ Why then tell us of dangers to terrify us into an adoption of this new ⟨form of⟩ Government? and yet who knows the dangers that this new system may produce; they are out of the sight of the common people: They cannot foresee latent consequences: I dread the operation of it on the middling and lower class of people.
Besides the expences of maintaining the Senate and other House in as much splendor as they please, there is to be a great and mighty President, with very extensive powers; the powers of a King: He is to be supported in extravagant magnificence: So that the whole of our property may be taken by this American Government, by laying what taxes they please, giving themselves what salaries they please, and suspending our laws at their pleasure.
Your strong holds will be in the hands of your enemies: It is on a supposition that our American Governors shall be honest, that all the good qualities of this Government are founded: But its defective, and imperfect construction, puts it in their power to perpetrate the worst of mischiefs, should they be bad men: And, Sir, would not all the world, from the Eastern to the Western hemisphere, blame our distracted folly in resting our rights upon the contingency of our rulers being good or bad. Shew me that age and country where the rights and liberties of the people were placed on the sole chance of their rulers being good men, without a consequent loss of liberty? I say that the loss of that dearest privilege has ever followed with absolute certainty, every such mad attempt. If your American chief, be a man of ambition, and abilities, how easy is it for him to render himself absolute⟨!⟩ The army is in his hands, and, if he be a man of address, it will be attached to him; and it will be the subject of long meditation with him to seize the first auspicious moment to accomplish his design; and, Sir, will the American spirit solely relieve you when this happens?
Virginia is as large as England. Our proportion of Representatives is but ten men. In England they have 530. The House of Commons in England, numerous as they are, we are told, is bribed, and have bartered away the rights of their constituents: What then shall become of us? Will these few protect our rights? Will they be incorruptible? You say they will be better men than the English Commoners. I say they will be infinitely worse men.
It took time, and a bloody war between North and South, but the imperial government Patrick Henry foresaw in 1787 has fully arrived. The government is in the hands of a powerful, elite minority, against whom average Americans have absolutely no redress. The president can go to war on a whim, even when doing so transparently harms the interests of average Americans. Nine Justices on the Supreme Court can tell us who is, and who is not, an American while stamping out any and all state laws with impunity. The Congress seems incapable of doing anything but looting the country for their own benefit, and that of their donors. Perhaps, as Patrick Henry made clear, a government of saintly men might have done things differently. Unfortunately, few men are saints, and the Constitution gave sinners the unlimited opportunity to enrich themselves at our expense.
Americans have traditionally believed the purpose of the Constitution of 1787 was to preserve the “Spirit of 1776.” A spirit of liberty exercised within a governing framework dedicated to the good of the American people. If ever that was the case in the past, it certainly is not today. A fact our demoralized, angry populace fully understands, even as they sullenly accept whatever fresh outrage our imperial masters deem fit to visit upon them. No one in authority cares about the “middling” folk.
To improve our currently sorry lot, we Americans have to accept some very hard truths. The U.S. Government was always destined, from the beginning, to become what it now is. Had that not been the case, then Patrick Henry could not have prophesied our current state so accurately. The Constitution, as a governing framework of a free people, must rightly be considered a failure. No government, which cares nothing for preserving the health and well-being of its own citizens, could ever be considered a success.
The second hard truth is that Amy Coney Barrett is not the problem. Nor is John Roberts. Nor is Donald Trump. Nor was Biden, or Bush (pick one) or Obama or Clinton. If it were a mere problem of personnel, then one could hope to correct the problem in the future within the Constitutional framework now misgoverning us. But we can’t. As Patrick Henry made clear in his speech opposing the Constitution, “Did you ever read of any revolution in any nation, brought about by the punishment of those in power, inflicted by those who had no power at all?”
That is the crux of the problem. The American people have absolutely no power to punish anyone in Federal authority. They can destroy our nation, squander our resources, ruin our money, rob us blind, and even rape children. Yet….nothing happens. At best we are told to vote harder for the same corrupt politicians who already failed us.
If you want to be furious at something, then it shouldn’t be Amy Coney Barrett. Rather, direct your anger at the system that made Amy Coney Barrett possible to begin with. And at ourselves, the American people, who have repeatedly failed to understand what a Virginia lawyer already knew almost 240 years ago – a centralized government detached from the people it governs leads to the toxic America we are enduring today.
For our 250th Anniversary, we need fewer fireworks and more Patrick Henry – “Give me liberty or give me death!”
