WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - Constitution Corner: Article 4- Star Wars, Coal Wars, and Timelessness?

Episode Date: October 27, 2024

Star Wars, Coal Wars, and Timelessness... what??? Join Mattingly Watson as she finds the answer exploring Article 4 in a fun and interactive episode of the Constitution Corner!

This is Constitution Corner on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM, where we explore the vivacious history of our Constitution, simplifying a seemingly complex document so we can all understand one of our nation's most impactful pieces of history. I am your host, Mattingly Watson, And today we will be discussing Article 4 in the United States Constitution. Last week, we explored some crazy stories about treason, learned about SCOTUS, and listened to Olivia Rodrigo. And today it is Article 4's time to shine. Now, today is a sad day in Constitution Cornerland. It is time for us to move on past the three branches of government.

But no worries, no worries. Article 1 is not the last time we'll be seeing the legislative branch. Article 2 isn't the last time we see the executive branch. In Article 3, certainly isn't the last time we'll be seeing the judicial branch. Even though their time to shine in their respective articles has come to. past, their relevance is just as important as ever. In fact, one of the clauses of Article 4 that we're going to look at today directly involves the judicial branch. So if you were feeling a little sad that we were leaving them behind in Article 3, no worries, because the judicial branch will

stick with us for a little bit in Article 4 as well. So actually, the section we're looking at today is Article 4, Section 1, First Clause, the Full Faith and Credit Clause. Now, what does that even mean? So what it says is, full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state. And the Congress may be general laws prescribe the manner in which acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved and the effect thereof. Now, if you're anything like me the first time I read that, I was just as confused as before I read it. So let's break it down a little bit. So a big purpose of this clause is to make sure that different courts will honor the different judgments and proceedings of those other courts without

trying to retry whatever is happening. So it is establishing a sense of unity amongst our judicial system. Now, do you guys remember the other day? We kind of talked about this a little bit in Article 3, talking about how the Articles of Confederation, our governing document before the Constitution, set up a little bit too loose and broken up of a judicial system. And so when we were establishing it, both in Article 3 and now we're adding on a little bit in Article 4, the founders wanted to make sure that we had a sense of unity, a sense of harmony even amongst our court systems. Obviously, things are going to look a little bit different in each state, and we want to make sure that the people have their freedom. The government is not exercising too much power.

But they did find it necessary to have that unity because it just would not work otherwise, as we saw under the Articles of Confederation. Now, the second clause I'd like to talk to you guys about today actually jumps all the way to the end of the Fourth Amendment. And that is the guarantee clause. And this is actually in section four of Article 4. And I'm not going to lie, guys, this might be one of my favorite clauses of the Constitution. I know, kind of nerdy that I have a favorite clause of the, of the Constitution. But if you stick around all the way through all of the articles and amendments, maybe you will too. Maybe you'll join me and we can compare favorite clauses of the Constitution.

So this one, like I said, called the guarantee clause. And it says, the United States shall guarantee to every state in this union, a Republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion and on application of the legislature. or of the executive, when the legislature cannot be convened, against domestic violence. Now, there's a lot of different things we can dive into on this clause. Starting off with that first phrase, the United States shall guarantee to every state in this union, a Republican form of government. I first learned about this phrase when I was in high school. I did something called the American Legion oratorical contest.

It was one of the most difficult but rewarding things I have ever done. I absolutely love public speaking. If you can't tell by the fact that I sit here and yap to you guys about the Constitution every week. But I absolutely love it. So the way this competition worked is I made a 10-minute speech on the Constitution, memorized it, And then I also wrote four, five minutes speeches on specific amendments in the Constitution, and I had to memorize those as well. And you presented these for judges, and you worked your way up from the local level to the state level to the national level. And I was very blessed to get to go and compete at the national level.

And that was such a wonderful experience. But part of what I talked about in my speech was this clause. the United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a Republican form of government. Now, in what I learned about Article 4, Section 4, I learned that the Constitution has a pretty big emphasis on citizen involvement. And maybe I'll bring this up later on as we traverse the constitution, but this guarantee of a Republican form of government that we see here in Article 4, guys, that is a promise to each and every one of us that not only at the federal level, but also on the state level.

Every citizen's voice will be heard. They will always be represented. And guys, furthermore, their representatives will be regular citizens like themselves. It's so cool because you may have heard the phrase from Abraham Lincoln, a government of the people by the people for the people. And to have this government that's run by the people, guys, we've got to step up and be involved and fulfill those duties and obligations to citizens to our fellow citizens. to our fellow citizens and, you know, as citizens of the United States, during my research, I came across this quote from Dr. Bernard Dobsky. He is a visiting fellow to the Heritage Foundation in 2020,

and he's associate professor of political science at Assumption College. And he stated, quote, those concerned with defending America's Republican character and the liberties it makes possible can take some solace in the fact that many of the resources necessary to defend our political institutions are already at our disposal. So Dr. Dobbsky goes on afterwards to identify some of these different resources, participating in local civic organizations and things like that. But what's important is that he's addressing a very necessary connection between the guarantee of a Republican form of government and civic duty. And, you know,

we'll see lots of certain themes like that. And throughout the Constitution, we talked a couple of weeks ago, what even a republic is, how, you know, honestly, not many of us even know what that means. We hear the word democracy thrown around so much these days because we have had a lot of influences of democracy, you know, influence our current society and a lot of the things we see are like that. But I think what's important here is the founders were very intentional not to establish a pure democracy. The founders very intentionally established and guaranteed even at the state level that everyone will have a Republican form of government. Because what guys, what they were wanting to found this on was on principles of virtue and

protecting. They didn't want a mob mentality to take over or factions to dominate and a Republican form of government that guarantees that everyone's voice is going to be heard because sometimes what the founders were worried about with a pure democracy was that the majority would, like I said, develop his mob mentality and all of a sudden the minority would have no voice. They wouldn't be the minority. They'd be the zero. They'd be nothing. And so I think it's cool that we focus on this part here because I believe it has been just kind of pushed to the side

in lieu of this magical word we like to put on a pedestal that is democracy. So that's why I wanted to point that part out to you guys. Like I said, I kind of came across that in my sense. studies in high school and I if you can tell by how passionately I am talking about it, it is definitely one of my favorite parts. All righty guys. So today we actually have a really cool example of how Article 4, Section 4, Clause 2 has been used throughout history. Now, you notice that I said Article 4 section 4, but we're not talking about Clause 1 where it discusses a Republican form of government. Instead, let's shift our attention to Clause 1.

too, which discusses protection from invasion and domestic violence. So a really cool example of this provision being invoked was in 1914 by Colorado Governor Elias M. Ammons during the Colfield War, the Colorado Colfield War. And when he invoked this provision, President Woodrow Wilson sent in some troops to the state. Now, what exactly is the Colorado Colfield War? So the Colorado Coalfield War was a violent labor conflict in the early 20th century. And it was primarily between miners and mining companies in Colorado. And like I said, the peak of this was right there between 1913 and 1914.

And how this started were the workers, the miners in Colorado, were under some harsh working conditions. They believed that they were getting too low of wages and that they were getting denied workers. rights. So as a result, they staged some strikes and protests. Now, unfortunately, this demonstration escalated. It escalated into significant violence beyond just simply strikes and protests. One of these notably was the Ludlow massacre in April 1914 and a conflict between state militia and a colony of striking minors happened. And there were numerous deaths. including some women and children. And so national attention grew to this scene

and people had to be called in to help, you know, draw order into the place. So the aftermath of this actually did see some attention to what the minors, the conditions that they were under, and those got improved in some way. But it really is interesting because this is when the governor called in those troops. And so as we all know, it all turned out, okay,

everyone's everyone is by now a hundred some hundred odd years later but this is a really cool example of how article four section four you know has been applied over the years so i don't know guys i personally think it's so cool that something that was written in 1787 the 18th century came back and protected people in the 20th century and now here we are in the 21st century talking about it i mean think about all that time that has spanned. And I think this is a really good moment to just, like, showcase that part of our Constitution. When our founders wrote this, I think a great, the reason that we've been able to stick

true to just, you know, these seven articles in these amendments that, you know, that number does change depending on, but not, not, like, incredibly often. The reason we be able to stick true to these and, you know, still be protected by them is the way in which the founders wrote them. They didn't write them to. specifically address super specific problems of their time. I mean, there obviously were problems in their time that were being addressed through it, but the problems that they were addressing were ones that, yes, they were impacting them, but they were impacting people 100 years later, 200 years

later, and protecting them in that way. I think it's why it's so important to look back on this, you know, there's just agreement whether the Constitution, there's the living Constitution view that the words change, the meaning of the words changes, therefore the meaning of the articles change. And there's also the originalist viewpoint. Personally, I lean more towards the originalist viewpoint. I think that they vote, they, those, those founding fathers wrote what they wrote on purpose and we should abide by what they intended with those words. But I think the reason that that is so beautiful and the reason that that works is because they wrote the constitution in line with our natural rights as human beings. They aligned it with humanity,

not society, not subjective this or that, but objective morality and just objectively what are natural rights and how are we going to protect those. And so it's cool to see how, you know, they wrote that in the 18th century and now here we are, 21st century, talking about how it has continued to protect the people of the United States over the years, and, you know, it's still there, still protecting us in case anything would happen. And I just think that Article 4, Section 4, Clause 2 is such a great example of that, just seeing how it has protected us over the years. But you know what?

That actually is a perfect segue into our pop culture segment. And excuse me, guys, I've got to stop. have a way first. I think I'm hearing something. I don't. Do you all hear? Yes, that was, in fact, the Star Wars soundtrack. And you're probably wondering, Mattingly, what in the world does Star Wars have to do with Article 4 of the United States Constitution? It's not even about a true story or anything. And, um, fun fact, guys, if you've seen Star Wars, which I know so many people have, then you actually already have a little bit of familiarity with what we were just talking about

with Article 4, Section 4. Because one of the big political entities in the Star Wars universe is the Republic, or technically the Galactic Republic, but everyone refers to it as the Republic. and that is a huge, huge part of the Star Wars franchise. And so that's maybe where you heard the word before. But it's cool because we have this example of a Democratic Republic. So similar to United States, obviously there's a lot of differences between the Galactic Republic and the United States. but there are also a lot of similarities.

We see their legislative branch is the Galactic Senate. We see that they have the Jedi Order who's protecting everyone. And so it's a little bit sometimes you wouldn't make that connection, even though it's literally in the name of the Republic. But they were creating Star Wars. they found these principles of a Democratic Republic, and that's how they created their political entity here. So if you guys are Star Wars fans,

then you already know more about the Constitution than you thought you knew about the Constitution. Because, guys, even though we guarantee the states this Republican form of government article 4, and we talked about it a couple weeks ago as well, every part of the Constitution comes back to this Republican form of government in a way. So that's a reference for you. Not only do you have a song, the Star Wars main theme, but we also have just, you know, Star Wars as a whole. So that is a

fun little way that pop culture ties into Article 4. Who would have thought that Star Wars, this huge franchise, would have some sort of tie into Article 4, Section 4 of the United States, Constitution, a document that was written so many years ago, you know, so long ago. And here we have it. There's all these crazy ways that you would not even think they tied in. So the Galactic Republican Star Wars is a good example of a place to look if you are wanting to learn a little bit more about a Democratic Republic, but also want the crazy fictional story that goes on with that in space as well. They have tons of movies. There's the three original, then the three edition. So sometimes the whole six originals, what they're called, and then we have the next three

movies, and then we have all of the different shows and things like that. So it is an entire franchise that has more than an off-screen time to watch. All righty, and now it is time for the moment everybody has been waiting for our pop quiz. Okay, who has been paying attention today? So let's start off pretty easy. What section of Article 4 guarantees every state in the union a Republican form of government? And you guessed section four, then you would be correct. Give yourselves a pat on the back.

That's correct, guys. Today we talked about how Article 4, Section 4 protects every state's right to a Republican form of government. Now, on the topic of Article 4, Section 4, what is the name of the war that Article 4, Section 4, the war that Article 4, Section 4, Clause 2 ended up having to be invoked in. Correct, that is the Colorado Whole Field War. You guys are on a roll. Congratulations, I can tell that you were listening today. And now, finally, for question three of our pop quiz section.

What popular movie franchise is an example of, a Democratic Republic. Yes, that is Star Wars. Good job, guys. That was a pretty good record. Keep up that listening next week and you'll be on an absolute role. Yep, that's it. We talked about Star Wars today. And what an interesting conversation that was. So, hey, that's always an option. That's always an option to go look at and learn more about a Democratic Republican. I'm not sure how many straight facts they'll have, but it is a cool example of how this system that we've set up is found in pop culture today. All righty, guys, that brings us to a conclusion. It has been a leisure exploring the quirks of Article 4 with y'all today.

Make sure to tune back in next week for our highlight of Article 5. And make sure to check us out on Instagram at Constitution Corner. and listen anywhere you get your podcasts. I am your host, Maddingley Watson, and this has been Constitution Corner on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM.