Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W. Va.) inserted an amendment into an appropriations bill late last year mandating that all schools and colleges receiving federal funds teach about the Constitution on September 17.

Now, you can read all about how the Democrats think this is a good thing and the Republicans have their reservations.

In Tennessee next week, Vanderbilt University plans a forum on whether lawmakers have violated free speech with their edict. “I’m surprised that the Congress and the president would choose to honor the Constitution by violating it,” said Law School dean Edward Rubin. — FOX News

Oh, but it’s not! Schools don’t have to follow this requirement, but if they don’t, the government can yank all of their federal funding. College students could lose their federal financial aid.

Anyway, teaching some basics about the Constitution can only help. Most Americans have no idea what’s in it, why it’s important, or they think it doesn’t apply in a modern age.

WRONG!

The Constitution is more important than ever. It laid a simple framework to try to limit the federal government from establishing a tyranny over the people. And from the day it was signed, the federal government has been looking for ways to get around it.

One of the most effective ways the fedreal government circumvents the Constitution is to give lots of money to the states, with strings attached. For instance, states must collect social security numbers from driver license applicants, or risk losing federal highway funding. And states must follow a federal standardized school testing program or risk losing federal education funding.

Another effective way to circumvent the Constitution is simply to have the Supreme Court blatantly ignore and misinterpret what it says. This happens frequently in DUI cases, for instance, where the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial has been gutted. Justices saw the word “all” and interpreted it to mean “some.” Because U.S. law is based on precedent as much as what’s actually written in the laws, this sort of thing is extremely dangerous and threatens the liberty most of us take for granted.

It’s absolutely vital that every American understand the Constitution and the rights that he possesses and it protects. Or tries to. The protections of civil rights afforded by the Constitution are under attack from all branches — executive, legislative and judicial. Without the protection of rights for which our forefathers fought and died, the U.S. is little better than a third world dictatorship.

One more thing to think about. The rights enumerated in the Constitution are not granted by the Constitution. The founders understood these rights to be inherent in man as rights of birth. They are, rather, secured by the Constitution. But even that is not enough. Even the former Soviet Union had a constitution which supposedly guaranteed freedom of speech. But if you tried to exercise that right, you might quickly find yourself in a gulag, or dead.

And your homework assignment is to answer this question: How do you secure your rights against a government hellbent on subverting and destroying them?