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The WallBuilders Show
Engaging Christians in Politics: Understanding the U.S. Government and Voting with Purpose
Ready to deepen your understanding of the American Constitutional Republic? Discover the crucial role that elections play in shaping our nation's future and why it's vital for Christians to engage in the political process. We'll explore the election process and the structure of the U.S. government through a biblical, historical, and constitutional perspective. By grasping these concepts, you can more effectively influence the election process and ensure our government upholds the Constitution and defends the inalienable rights granted by God.
In our discussion, we break down the three branches of government and the critical role each plays in maintaining the balance of power. Hear how the Founding Fathers envisioned a government where the legislative branch, accountable directly to the people, holds paramount importance. The Constitution and the Federalist Papers offer valuable insights into the separation of powers and the necessity of adhering to this balance to protect our freedoms and liberties.
We also emphasize the need for informed and active citizens, particularly within the Christian community, to participate in the electoral process. This empowers you to elect leaders who respect the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, ensuring that individual rights and responsibilities are upheld. Tune in to learn how you can vote with purpose and steward our nation responsibly, safeguarding the God-given rights fundamental to our republic.
Rick Green
Welcome to the Intersection of Faith and Culture. This is the WallBuilders Show, where we take on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. I'm Rick Green, America’s Constitution Coach, here with David and Tim Barton, and we're going to jump back into the election special programming that David and Tim did. This is good stuff to share too, folks. We're just a few weeks out from this huge election. Take today's program, share it with as many friends and family as you possibly can. Let's jump in. Here's David and Tim Barton, with our election special programming.
David Barton
Elections are a core foundation of our American government. In the early days, political debates were held in theaters and lecture halls across America, like this one, drawing large crowds from every corner of society. Now we engage with the candidates through TV screens and Twitter feeds, watching as the elections unfold.
Tim Barton
The spotlight may be on the top contenders, but it's really about the people. Today, we're going to talk about our role in this important election process.
David Barton
By understanding where elections came from and how they work, you can help determine who will be in the room when our nation's most important decisions are being made. Today's lawmakers are tomorrow's history shapers. I'm David Barton.
Tim Barton
I'm Tim Barton. And this is Elections.
We're going to talk about elections, but before we really can even get there, we have to ask the question does government really work? Because we know in America we have three branches of government, but are they really co-equal or is one more powerful? Can the president just make laws as executive orders, or does the US Supreme Court really get to determine whatever is legal or not legal in America? The reason it matters that we understand how this works is as Christians, if we're going to make a difference in this country, we need to know how the process works so we can get involved in the process.
David Barton
Yeah, knowing the process really is important, as you even go back in the scriptures and Timothy talks about that a runner who runs in a race. He really wants to win the prize, but it says but you have to run according to the rules to get the crown, to get the prize. And so in our constitutional republic that we have, if you don't know how it operates, if you don't know the rules, you can't be effective. And we want to have an influence on the leaders we choose and the policies they make. And, by the way, we are a constitutional republic. So, right off the bat, we're not a democracy, which is a really good thing. We're not a democracy. We're not even a republic, and our republic's okay. But in republic you elect leaders and they make the top policies. We're a constitutional republic, so we elect leaders to uphold the top policy, which is our constitution, and under the constitution they get to make laws. So we really have the best of all systems of human government that's available in the world.
Tim Barton
Yeah, and this is something that we remember. Looking back, the founding fathers outlined in the declaration that there was fixed moral laws. God's already told us what's right and wrong, and below that, we acknowledge that he created us all equal, and so this level of the way we treat people and there's not classes, there's not systems. We all are equal under the law and really equal in God's eyes too, and God has given us rights and government's job is to protect those rights. This is what we see as the primary function and role of government and, as you're mentioning, we're a constitutional republic. That's really what the Constitution upholds. Is this notion that we're going to protect the rights of the individuals In fact, not only from the Constitution?
When you go forward after the Constitution, when the first Congress is formed, one of their jobs was to write a Bill of Rights, and when they wrote the Bill of Rights, it's interesting the way they wrote it, because they wrote the Bill of Rights as a list of negative liberties, if you will, in the sense that these are things the government can never touch. They didn't say these are the rights that people have and these are the only rights. They said these are specific rights the government can never violate and can never take away. So it was a listing of things. The government can never step on rights that the people have.
David Barton
Yeah, the Bill of Rights was actually a listing or a recognition of many of our God-given and inalienable rights, because the founders said these are rights that come from god, therefore they can't be regulated by government. So in the bill of rights, the first amendment recognizes five God-given and inalienable rights. Now, the first one is the right of religion, and then we've got press and speech and assembly and petition. But the first one is religion and it's not that. It says government, you get to allow people to have religious expression. It's no, the people get to have religious expression in government. You can't interfere with that. You can't say, for example, the churches are not essential services. The constitution's already said they are.
The second amendment gives us two rights that government can't touch. We have the right to defend ourselves individually and collectively. The third amendment says government can't set up shop in your home. Your home is your place. And then the fourth through the eighth amendments are what we call due process amendments.
That deals with justice, and the Bible is all about justice, and so the right to confront your accuser. I mean this is something we take back to Proverbs 18 and John 8. This is the reason we get to hear the other side of the story when someone makes a charge. All of these things in the Bill of Rights were recognition of rights that God gave to the people and the government saying, all right, since God gave you that, we're not messing with it. That belongs to you and you need to elect leaders who understand that. If leaders think that they give rights, then they're going to try to regulate the rights that God gave you. If you understand that, I need leaders who already know that these are God-given rights and they can't touch them, that's a huge difference in understanding the process and electing people who will uphold that process.
Tim Barton
Yeah, and in looking at the fact that we acknowledge in America, you have God-given rights, government cannot violate those rights, it's interesting when you start looking even at our form of government, because that's kind of philosophy. Our philosophy is you have rights, government can't violate those rights. But the form of government even has its roots in some Biblical thoughts from Isaiah that says that the Lord is our lawgiver, he's our judge, he's our king. Well, there were three different, distinct functions that Isaiah recognized. God has different capacities. He does it's very different in different areas.
Well, in America we said, okay, we're going to have a president, the executive branch. We're going to have a Congress, the lawgivers, a legislative branch, and we're going to have the judicial branch where our judges are going to be. And this was the way our system too was set up. And even looking at the system, knowing it comes from almost this Bible idea, it's interesting today we hear so often that there are co-equal branches and this is what seemingly everybody says, except if you look at the Constitution. It doesn't really seem like they're co-equal in the Constitution.
David Barton
No, it's not. And the Constitution is very good about telling each branch what it can do. And so Article 1 of the Constitution says OK, Congress, here's your stuff, here's what you can address, here's what you can pass laws on. And the second article is Mr. President, here's what you get to do. And the third article is judges, here's what the federal judiciary does. So the Constitution makes very clear three silos, if you will. These are distinct areas, and this is what you get to do and you don't get to do the other stuff. So judges don't get to make law. Not only do judges not get to make law, the president doesn't get to make law. He can issue executive orders, but it can't be laws that he issues. He can say all right, under the law, this is how we apply it, but only Congress gets to make laws,
Tim Barton
And specifically so under executive orders, there are things he can say we're going to do this, but he can only make laws, so to speak, of what falls under his distinct jurisdiction. And so when you look at the executive branch, or the ones that execute the law, the ones that enforce the laws, so he actually can say this is how we're going to enforce the law. And you might argue well, he just passed a law. Well, he can pass it if it's in his sphere of jurisdiction, but not when it comes to president can't dictate what the speed limit's going to be. That's out of his jurisdiction. That is what the legislative branch would do.
David Barton
And so when you look at the three branches, it's interesting in the constitution the legislative branch, which makes law, it's the longest part of the Constitution by far. The precedent is the next longest portion, but the shortest part by far is about federal judges, because we don't elect federal judges. Now, some states elect their judges, but the federal judges we don't elect, so they get the least amount of power, the least amount of influence over our lives because they're not directly accountable to us. And so understanding that helps us when we choose our leaders. They're not directly accountable to us and. If we choose a president or senator or congressman, we need to know that we need to choose people who are not going to defer to the judges and say well, whatever the judge says, that's the law of the land. No, that's not the way the system is designed, and that's really important for us to understand when we go into elections.
Tim Barton
Yeah, and knowing there's three branches, we recognize that that's because there was going to be a separation of powers. The founding fathers knew, because sin exists, then then we cannot give too much power to one group, to one organization, because they might have sinful hearts, they might do bad things. So they wanted there to be checks and balances. So they intentionally divided up those branches to make sure there would be that separation of power. So one branch couldn't tell everybody in the whole United States of America what to do. But in the midst of we really need to do a little deeper dive into the three branches of government and let's figure out well, are they really co-equal and which one really is more powerful?
Rick Green
Quick break everybody. We'll be right back. You're listening to the Wall Builder Show.
Break
Rick Green
Welcome back to the WallBuilders Show, diving right back in with David and Tim Barton on today's election special.
Speaker
How do the three branches of the US government work together? The government of the United States is made up of three branches the legislative, the executive and the judicial. Each branch has a unique responsibility in the lawmaking process. This separation of powers was created in order to keep all the control from being in the hands of any one person or group. The legislative branch makes the laws. This branch is made up of the Congress, which includes the Senate and the House of Representatives, whose members are elected by the people. In this branch, the congressional members introduce bills, which are ideas for new laws.
The executive branch carries out the laws. This branch includes the president and the vice president, who are elected by the people and cabinet that he appoints. A bill cannot become a law until it has passed through the executive branch, where it is either vetoed or approved. This branch enforces the laws. The judicial branch interprets application of the law. This branch is made up of the Supreme Court and other federal courts and their judges, which the president appoints. They ensure that the laws are applied. According to the Constitution, each branch has specific functions, but the branches elected by the people were created to have the most power. This was to ensure a safe balance of power between the people and the government balance of power between the people and the government.
Tim Barton
The three branches are not co-equal and, ironically, today it seems that we've completely reversed the order of power where, according to the founding fathers, in the constitution, the most power was given to the legislative body, after the legislative body was the president and the weakest branch was the judicial branch. And today it seems that no, we've come to learn over recent years that the president has a lot of power because he has a pen and a phone and he can pass whatever laws he wants and the US Supreme Court gets to determine if it's actually legal or not. And they have so much power and authority. How did we get to the place where we have completely reversed the order of where power should be?
David Barton
Well, this goes back to us not knowing our rule book, and we talked about that earlier. You can't compete effectively if you don't know the rules. How can you have a football game if you don't know the rules of the game?
The rules were given us in the Constitution, so heads up the legislative. Really big section, the president, smaller section and the smallest section of all was given to the judges. Now, that should tell us something. But in case that's not enough, the guys who actually wrote the Constitution gave us a commentary on the rules, if you will. So the federalist papers were written by alexander Hamilton, signer of the constitution, and James Madison, signed with the constitution, and john jay, the original chief justice, us supreme court. And in the commentary they said the judiciary is, beyond comparison, the weakest of the three branches. Well, I was told they were all co-equal. That's what we've been hearing in years, and the judges especially like to tell us they're co-equal. That's not the way it was set up. And so when you look at the federalist papers, they said that the legislative is by far the strongest and they designed it that way because we have more direct accountability with the legislature than we do with judges, so we give them little power. We give the legislature big power.
Tim Barton
So, even though judges are, according to the federalist papers, beyond comparison, the weakest branch today, it seems that they're the only ones who are able to determine what's constitutional. And that would even seem contradictory to this notion of three co-equal branches, because if there's three branches and they're all living according to the constitution, it would seem that all three branches should have the ability to determine the levels of constitutionality.
David Barton
Well, when someone takes an oath of office and that's whether it's at the local, county, state or federal level they take an oath first of all to uphold the constitution of the united states. They don't take an oath to uphold the opinions of the judges in the us supreme court. That's not it. Each one of them is tasked with reading the constitution themselves and upholding what that rule book says. It's not what the others say, it's what that rule book says, and so that, not what the others say, it's what that rule book says, and so that's why we do that, and just as we've gotten away from understanding the Constitution. And it is such an easy document to read it might take 15 to 20 minutes if you're a slow reader,
Tim Barton
maybe 25 or 30. He's giving a little more credit, right, but either way it's not that big of a document.
David Barton
It's not hard. The Constitution really is a simple document.
Tim Barton
Yeah. So to understand America's government, we have to start with the Constitution, written over 200 years ago when the nation was first being established out of 13 colonies. The document was an important blueprint for growing a new country. It's seven sections, or seven articles, detailed important principles for governing the people. Take a look.
Sapeaker
What's in the Constitution of the United States of America? The best way to find out is to read it, but here's an overview. The Constitution starts with a preamble, which tells us the reason the Constitution was written. It establishes the why of the Constitution. Importantly, in it, our founders declare that everything that follows is for the people and by the people, both for those in their day as well as those today and in future generations. Next up are the seven major sections, known as Articles. Let's break it down.
Article 1 covers the Legislative Branch, including the qualifications, length of term and duties of our federal legislators. Comprised of the House of Representatives and the Senate, this branch makes the laws and national policies. No other branch can do this. It also has the power to check and balance the other two branches. This article has nine sections and is by far the longest of the seven articles in the Constitution, because Congress is the most powerful of the three branches. Article 2 focuses on the executive branch of our government, that's, the President, his Cabinet and officials. The executive branch has power, but not as much as Congress, and its powers are described in only four sections. The president can sign or veto laws passed by Congress and he is to make sure that the laws passed by Congress are carried out. He also manages the everyday operations of our government through federal entities like the Department of State, department of Treasury and Department of Defense. Article 3 details the role of the judicial branch. Here we see how the federal court system works and how it relies heavily on both the Congress and the President. This article has only three sections and is by far the shortest for the three branches, for it has the least power. The President selects and the Senate confirms the judges for federal courts, and Congress sets the boundaries for federal courts below the Supreme Court, including the size, scope and even what issues can come before the court. That brings us to Article 4.
Article 4 covers the important relationship between the states and the federal government. Here the Constitution outlines rights and responsibilities of the states, as well as guaranteeing a Republican form of government in each state. Article 5 focuses on the rules for amending the Constitution. Now, the Founders wisely understood that things can change over time. So Article 5 of the Constitution tells both the states and Congress how to amend the Constitution. To date there have been 27 amendments, such as those eliminating slavery, giving women the right to vote and limiting a president to only two terms in office. Those are some pretty good amendments.
Then you get to Article 6, which covers issues like debts and oaths. It also covers the rule of federal law over state law for issues relating directly to the Constitution. And finally, article 7 focuses on the ratification of the Constitution. It's followed by the names of the 39 framers who signed it, listed with the states they represented. So that covers the seven articles. But here's a really interesting fact the average length of any constitution in the history of the world is only 17 years. But the American Constitution has now surpassed 230 years, making America the longest ongoing and most successful constitutional republic in the history of the world. And that's an overview of the Constitution of the United States of America.
Tim Barton
Knowing these constitutional principles and the roles and responsibilities that our elected officials or appointed officials have helps us be able to keep them accountable, and we can't forget the importance of the role that we play in the checks and balance.
David Barton
But just as we are kind of ignoring the rule book on the three branches, we also ignore the separation of powers horizontally, because you've got this vertical separation of powers between the three branches.
But the founding fathers also said wait a minute. You've got state and local governments as well as the federal government, and we want to make sure the federal government can't take over the state and local. And so what they did in the constitution is that there's 17 areas the federal government is allowed to operate in we call them enumerated powers. Other than those 17 areas, the constitution says everything else belongs to the states and the people, which includes things like education, which is not a federal thing, and transportation, all these things that have become so federal. That's not in the rule book, and so that's why it becomes important for us to know the rules so that we can elect people to office who will uphold the rule book and play by the rules, because America is the most stable nation in the history of the world because we have followed that rule book for so long. But the further we get away from it, the less stable we become.
Tim Barton
Yeah, and the reason, as he mentioned this notion of federalism, that there's a separation between the federal government and state governments. The reason that matters and the reason that so many things the federal government does now they weren't supposed to do, is because it's better to have that at the local level, where there is more accountability, there is more control. If you think about people in Washington DC, how often do you see your congressman or your senator walking down the street or at the local Walmart? Hardly, never, ever, ever. Do you see that? Well then they're not really that accountable to you. If you can't go up and say, hey, what you did, that wasn't right, that wasn't great, they're not going to be as responsive to what the people want.
And so the idea was there should be more things at the local level, at the state level, where there's greater accountability to the people and the people can determine those directions better.
And the idea was and I think Abraham Lincoln was the guy who pointed out that the government should only do for people what they cannot do for themselves. Well, there's a lot of things the federal government is doing now and and they've almost arbitrarily taken that power. That's not really their role. But, as you mentioned, if we don't know what the rule book says, then we can never say, uh, you're not supposed to do that. And this is why it matters that we come to learn what this rule book, so to speak, says, but also that we even understand the distinctions, the jurisdictions. There's three branches, and that's also at the state level and the federal level, but in inside those three branches there's jurisdictions, and then that the states have power that the government doesn't have, and so it does matter that we kind of learn and see those distinctions so that we can have accountability, which is really what our government needs to operate well.
David Barton
Yeah, it needs accountability and actually that rule book one of the things that happened when we added the Bill of Rights, which is a listing of all the specific things government can't touch. Those who wrote that Bill of Rights to take that power away from the government also said the most important part of the Bill of Rights are the Ninth and the Tenth Amendments. The Tenth Amendment says states, federal government. Here's the deal. If we did not in the Constitution specifically say the federal government can do this, then the states get to do it. So everything that's not specifically called out and that's those 17 enumerated powers. So the 10th Amendment says if it's not one of those 17, states get to do it.
And the 9th Amendment says now we've listed a lot of rights here in the Bill of Rights, but we didn't list all of them. We listed religion and petition and speech and assembly and self-defense, but it says there's many more rights that the people retain. In other words, it's their power. They didn't give it to the government. Government can't exercise that. So understanding a limited government is really key. And this is where electing people to office is so important, because people come into office with a philosophy and if their philosophy is you need more government and government can do so much more for you than you can for yourselves and I need to tell you what rights you should exercise, because some are more important than others. If we elect people like that, they will do that and, as a result, we'll get away from the rule book that really has caused us to be the most stable nation in the world.
Tim Barton
Yeah, One of the ideas that has been long explained and defended, supported, promoted in America is that government's primary role is to protect the rights of the individuals.
And what we are seeing now is you have more and more government officials who are being elected who don't seem to understand that your job is to make sure the government never infringes on my God-given rights, and maybe part of the problem is that very few people today really know what those God-given rights are.
That certainly would be an issue, because how do you protect something that you don't know even exists? But also, we've elected far too many people who don't understand the rule book, who don't understand that in the three branches there is a different jurisdiction for each branch and they each have a defined role and there's different power and authority granted to each. And there was a reason, right, we had a separation of powers because we recognize there's a sinful nature in man and we want to make sure we don't give too much authority to somebody who's going to violate and do bad things. But the fundamental principle of America has always been government's job is to protect the rights of the individual, and this is something we're just seeing more and more that rights are being violated rights are being taken away, and it's time that we start thinking more intentionally about who are we electing and how well will they defend and protect our rights?
David Barton
Yeah, the Constitution really did a great job of giving a number of checks and balances. We have checks and balances between the branches, between the levels of government checks and balances. We have checks and balances between the branches, between the levels of government. The biggest check and balance is given to the people, with their ability to choose their leaders. We're the best check and balance on all of this, and if we don't exercise that influence to say, hey, you guys are out of bounds, we're putting a new team in there, we're taking you out, we're substituting somebody else. If we don't do that, then we might as well not have a rule book.
Tim Barton
And it's important to remember that, as we choose elected officials, those elected officials, their ideology is going to come out in the way they operate government, and the way government operates is really just a reflection of who voted in the last election, because that's who chose who those elected officials were.
And we get to choose at the local level, we choose at the state level, we choose at the federal level and as we're looking so much now at our government, our nation, we see chaos and frustration. There's so many problems. Well, this is why it's so important that Christians get involved and as we get involved, we have to remember that we need to look now, be very intentional about thinking. We need to look at people who are going to protect our God-given rights, who are going to respect us as individuals, who are not going to come and take more rights away from us or grow the government beyond what it should be really intended to do. That's why we need to go back, read the constitution, let's go back read the federalist papers, learn what the role, the purpose of government is, and then, as Christians, we need to get involved in the process and vote for people who will protect and defend our rights.
Speaker
The civil arena can be an intimidating place, but the more informed you are, the more empowered you will be to get involved. Voting is not just a right, it's a responsibility. As Christians, we are called to steward the nation God has placed us in. But stewardship starts long before you head to the polls. First, remember this Choose principles over party. Look at what the Bible says about education, life, economics, marriage, family, immigration, religious liberty, and then choose the party and the candidates that best mirror those values. Principles over party. Second, it's important to support the good quality candidates running for public office. Although the candidate who stands for godly values may often be bullied, belittled, attacked or ignored by the media, this is not an insurmountable problem. A candidate can overcome the media with a strong grassroots team lifting him up. So when you find a good candidate, get involved. Offer whatever financial support you can, volunteer some of your time, even if it's only an hour or two. Voice and show your support for those candidates in the community. Vote at all primaries and main elections. Call or write his or her office to let them know that you support what they're doing.
Unfortunately, too few Christians communicate directly with those elected to represent them. Politicians are constantly making decisions that will affect your city, state and country, and a well-written letter or email can have more impact than you can imagine. Third, once you have become active as an individual, it may be time to lead community change. Yes, you Gather others who believe as you do and start a local group in your community. Effective change most often comes through well-organized and well-led groups that represent a body of the electorate. Finally, pray. Become active in praying for leaders and officials at all levels, as instructed in 1 Timothy 2, verses 1-4. Pray for elected officials, issues, court cases and potential candidates. There is power in prayer. As a founding father, john Hancock, wisely challenged Christian citizens in his day. I urge you, by all that is dear, by all that is honorable, by all that is sacred, not only that ye pray, but that ye act. Do all four of these action steps and you can shape the future of your city, state and nation. It's time to put your influence to work through election season and beyond.
Tim Barton
A big election is approaching and some major decisions are about to be made. Voting is one of our most important rights and responsibilities as US citizens, and this next election will ultimately determine who makes the calls on all the issues that you and I care the most about. In this upcoming election, your voice and your vote counts.
David Barton
The president who takes office will have the opportunity to make some major decisions this term that will impact generations to come. The one-third of the Senate we vote in office this election will determine just how far that next president can go in making those decisions, and all of the House of Representatives seats will be up for grabs. So this is the year to show up and vote your values.
Tim Barton
We have a chance to shape history, one vote at a time.
Rick Green
Out of time for today, folks, you can get today's program at our website, wallbuilders.show. Also, yesterday's election special is available at our website, wallbuilders.show. Share those with your friends and family. Let's get as many Christians as possible to be good stewards using their voice and their vote. Thanks so much for listening to the WallBuilder Show.
