From Woodrow Wilson: Godfather of Liberalism by Ronald Pestritto at Heritage.org:
Progressivism—certainly as expounded by Wilson—understood itself as presenting a rationale for moving beyond the political thinking of the American Founding. A prerequisite for national progress, Wilson believed, was that the Founding be understood in its proper historical context. Its principles, in spite of their timeless claims, were intended to deal with the unique circumstances of that day.
This interpretation of the Founding ran up against the Founders’ own self-understanding, as Wilson well knew. This is why much of his scholarship is devoted to a radical reinterpretation and critique of the political theory of the Founding. Wilson understood that the limits placed upon the power of the national government by the Constitution—limits that Progressives wanted to see relaxed if not removed—were grounded in the natural-rights principles of the Declaration of Independence. This meant, for Wilson, that both the Declaration and the Constitution had to be understood anew through a Progressive lens.
Wilson therefore sought a reinterpretation of the Founding—a reinterpretation grounded in historical contingency. To the Founding’s ahistorical notion that government is rooted in an understanding of unchanging human nature, Wilson opposed the historical argument that the ends, scope, and role of just government must be defined by the different principles of different epochs and that, therefore, it is impossible to speak of a single form of just government for all ages.
(My emphasis.) If this is true, and I have no doubt that it is and that it remains true for modern-day “progressives,” then when any self-described “progressive” politician takes an oath of office and declares,
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.
that politician is willfully and deliberately lying; is, in fact, a domestic enemy of the Constution and should be removed from office.
Here’s where we should start: The Congressional Progressive Caucus.
And no, I’m not kidding. The oath is there for a reason. Our officials don’t declare an oath to support and defend the state, nor do they swear an oath to a leader – they swear an oath to support and defend the founding principles of this nation, not to try to diminish, circumvent, fold, spindle and mutilate them.
Awhile back Randy Barnett wrote a book entitled Restoring the Lost Constitution: The Presumption of Liberty. If we hadn’t had a hundred years of “progressive” destruction of that document, he wouldn’t have needed to.
