“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master — that’s all.”
— Lewis Carroll, “Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There”
***
A bill to protect Delaware’s natural resources (House Bill 220) is being considered by the Delaware General Assembly. The bill will change the state constitution and demands that “the people of Delaware have an inherent, indefeasible and inalienable right to a clean and healthy environment, including water, air, soil, flora, fauna, ecosystems and climate, and to the preservation of the natural, cultural, scenic and healthful qualities of the environment.” The provision is proclaimed to be “self-executing and on par with other protected inalienable rights.”
If you think protection of natural resources is a laudable goal, I say that bills rarely define their real intent. When enacted, anything proponents claim will provide environmental quality, save the planet, stop climate change, preserve/enhance clean air or clean water, etc., could become law in Delaware. The important difference is that anything that can be related to “protecting and enhancing the environment” becomes law de facto, without approval of the state legislature, because the state constitution has been changed. We could be told, “We have to … because our state constitution demands it.”
This could go well beyond the environment. For example, “there are too many people” is a phrase used to argue for protecting the environment. Such a bill could be used to stop all pro-life legislation. Bureaucrats in Delaware could have a mandate to create all sorts of rules on myriad topics and provide funding without discussion or vote from representatives of the people. It is the socialist version of Aladdin’s lamp, where all their wishes can come true, making elected officials mere figureheads.
All that is required to change the state constitution is a two-thirds vote in successive assemblies — it will pass this session if just one Republican representative joins with all Democrat senators and representatives.
Compare the language of the proposed bill with Article 18 adopted at the Seventh Session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in the Ninth Convocation in 1977: “In the interests of the present and future generations, the necessary steps are taken in the USSR to protect and make scientific, rational use of the land and its mineral and water resources, and the plant and animal kingdoms, to preserve the purity of air and water, ensure reproduction of natural wealth, and improve the human environment.”
I find little difference between Article 18 of the former Soviet Union and the proposed Delaware constitutional amendment. However, unlike the Soviet-era constitution, where “the land, its minerals, waters, and forests are the exclusive property of the state,” the proposed amendment attempts to avoid a direct comparison by holding rights “in trust” by the state. By doing so, it converts individual rights to collective rights controlled by the state. This is less than one slippery step removed from state ownership of the means of production.
During the last century, millions of people died due to pernicious communist ideology. There is no need to repeat this “experiment” — communism has never worked anywhere it has been implemented. Anyone who believes otherwise is ignorant of history or is willfully blind to the horrors of communism.
Contact your representative and senator to voice opposition to HB 220.
John A. Nichols
Clayton
