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The other night I listened to Senator Sherrod Brown’s “E-Town Hall on Health Insurance Reform”.  I posted earlier about Sen. Brown’s excuse that he’s “clearly not a Constitutional expert” as his reason for thinking that the legislature has authority to force an expanded government controlled healthcare system upon us.

Something else caught my attention during his address, namely Sen. Brown’s response to "Robert of Concord Twp. in Lake County" about 2/3 of the way through he started talking about his understanding of his job as a US Senator. Sen. Brown said:

My goal is to – I took an oath of office when I was sworn in and when you gave me the privilege of representing you in the United States senate back in 2006 I took an oath of office with – from Vice President Cheney

That’s true, you can watch video of Sen. Brown taking the oath of office from Cheney.

Here’s a transcript of the oath administered in the video.

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.
SOURCE: US Senate, Oath of Office

Ok Sen. Brown – now we’re all familiar with the oath.  You were saying?

I pledged to do what I think is best for my – to listen to people in the state and do what I think is best.

Wait a minute – that’s not what you pledged.  You pledged to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic”.  So if people from Ohio wish to undermine the Constitution, you’ve pledged not to “do what you think is best”, but to follow those instructions in Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution.

For any politician who wants to last, you’ll need to listen to the people of Ohio and do what you think is best *within the confines of your oath of office*.  You can still make it your mission to reform healthcare, but there’s a right (constitutional) way and a wrong (unconstitutional) way to go about it.

If the people of Ohio demand a change to the Constitution then by all means, put that before the legislature, but don’t undermine your oath, your constituents, and your nation.

Brown went on to summarize:

Um, and I think – I want – I want a good bill. I want a bill that works for all Ohio. And I – and even people who disagree with me here – I know some of them are going to get pre-existing conditions and they are gonna lose their health insurance and I want to help them as much as I want to help people who agree with this bill. Uh – That’s what my job is.

Not even close.

UPDATE: Added direct YouTube links to quotes.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 12th, 2009 at 4:01 pm and is filed under Civil Liberties, OH-15. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.