American Legion Strider-Teskey Post 86, in conjunction with the Stone Bridge Lion's Club are currently meeting and developing plans to upgrade the Susquehanna Veteran's Service Board. The current board has been in place for over twenty years and our organizations hope to include any new eligible veterans and any veterans that were inadvertently overlooked in the past. In the past, and currently, every effort is made to honor all area veterans by including them on the Service Board. The inclusion process involves the veteran, relative of the veteran or someone who is aware of the veteran's wartime service to fill out an application and provide proof of service per the veteran's DD214. Applications are available at the post, or can be mailed upon request.

Sincerely,

Gene Stewart, Commander American Legion Post 86

When I was a boy, there was a game called King of the Hill, a rough and tumble contest. Now there will be a battle royal fought by the big boys to see who will be King of the Hill, on The Hill. The protagonists marshal their forces.

On the Left the liberals: Ginsberg, Sotomayor, Kazan, and Breyer. The opposing forces on the Right are Gorsuch, Roberts, Thomas, and Alito. The odd man in the middle, Kennedy, is now the odd man out.

Rumors that Kennedy planned to retire became fact when he announced that he would step down. His replacement will swing the Court's majority, Left or Right. It will be a judicial Gettysburg.

It's a sad turn of events that whoever claims victory, the loser will be our constitutional republic: it has no place for either of the warring parties. Here's why.

The liberals.

Liberal are persons advocating and implementing social reform. They are willing to discard traditional values and replacing them with norms that they consider more just and fair. This is especially so in regards to promoting equality between blacks and whites.

Since the 1954 Supreme Court decision Brown v. The Board of Education, liberals have been at the helm. During those 64 years, every vestige of Christian culture has been uprooted and supplanted with secular ideals, chief among them was the Brown decision outlawing enforced segregation and replacing it with enforced integration.

However, not one societal change was brought about through the ballot box, but by judicial fiat. That is not democracy; it's kritarchy, government by judges.

Looking back on those six decades one asks: Has enforced justice and fairness brought about better relations between blacks and whites, or have racial tensions increased? One has only to read the headlines to see the answer.

The conservatives.

Conservatives are persons who are averse to change and hold to traditional values and attitudes, especially in politics.

Conservatives like Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, urges his compatriots to do battle against their instinctive rivals, the liberals. Said Huckabee, "We have had an executive branch that has emasculated itself by constantly surrendering to the idea that once the Court says something, that's it, it's the law of the land." It was a call to arms.

Sounds good, but society is always in a state of flux. For good or ill, the morality of today, the conventions of normal sexuality, what is acceptable behavior in speech or dress has changed drastically. The conservative of today could pass for the liberal of yesterday.

Conservatism, like liberalism, is a house built on shifting sand.

But there is a third way: constitutional originalism.

An originalist interpretation of the Constitution is based on what reasonable persons, living at the time of its adoption, would have understood the Constitution.

Originalism limits judicial discretion. Justice Scalia argued, "If words and history do not bind judges, they will inevitably exceed the limits of their judicial authority and make the Constitution say whatever they want."

Events have proved Scalia to be correct. Interpretation of the Constitution has become an exercise of the imagination, to wit: same-sex marriage. Nowhere in the founding document is marriage mentioned, let along same-sex marriage. But seek, and ye shall find.

Hidden in the Fourteenth Amendment for centuries it was finally discovered by the Supremes in 2015. The Court ruled by a 5 to 4 vote that same-sex marriage was, after all constitutional. Justice Kennedy---the swing vote and constitutional adventurer---cast the tie-breaking aye. Think about that: a single vote decided the issue for 320 million citizens.

It's the same for the Court ruling to legalize abortion in 1973 by a vote of 7 to 2. Three votes decided the abortion issue for the entire nation. That, too, was found tucked away in the Fourteenth Amendment. Suppose for a painful minute that Roe v. Wade was repealed. Is it really so bad to let the people decide the issue, not nine unelected grandees?

An originalist' interpretation would eliminate social warriors, judicial tyrants, egalitarians, and stuck-in-mud conservatives. It would return power to the people. Heaven help us! No, it's not the Age of Aquarius. There will be divisions among originalists.

What exactly is the identifiable original intent? What were the intentions of the authors? And, What were the expectations of the founding fathers? These are questions bound to cause disagreements, but not unbridgeable chasms.

And there will be friction between the Left and the Right. That's a given.

The unnerving distinction of our species is its uniqueness. There is not nor ever will be another person with whom you will find total agreement. We are islands unto ourselves and must make peace, as best we can with each other as best we can.

Sincerely,

Bob Scroggins, New Milford, PA