We hold these truths to be self-evident—that all men are created equal, endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

We all know these words. We take for granted that they reflect our inherent value as human beings, and the untouchability of our fundamental freedoms.

What we need to do better is to understand how these words are manifested in written law, in the Constitution itself, and what that means for our expectations of those we elect to serve in high office.

First: “unalienable” means that essential human rights cannot be made separate from any human being. They are rights because we exist; nothing can alter that. Human rights are universal, transcendent, beyond the reach of any tyrant, no matter how cunning or sinister he might be.

If the clear declaration of universal equality before the law clashes with some of our history—and it does—then the overcoming of those injustices is inherent in our national purpose, both because of the laws that make the republic and because of the universal transcendence of human rights.

The Constitution manifests the hallowed words at the top by recognizing that government must be structured to avoid tyranny. Congress is the Article I branch of government, because power resides with the people. Our lawmakers are our representatives, sent to Washington to make laws and allocate money, to weigh the wisdom of appointments to high office and of treaties, in our name.

Presidential authority is extremely limited; we need to re-learn that.

Many of the powers we attribute to the President are actually outlined as Congressional powers, in Article I, section 8—one of the most under appreciated sections of the Constitution, essential for the exercise and defense of democracy.

• The President does not have tariff authority; only Congress does.
• The President does not fund, organize, or regulate the Armed Forces; Congress does.
• The President does not regulate the terms of foreign trade; Congress does.
• The President cannot take the nation to war; only Congress can do that.
• The President does not set border and immigration policy; only Congress can do that.
• The President does not decide how federal grants support science and research; Congress must do that.
• The staffing of federal agencies is not a Presidential authority; Congress may grant the President that power in select cases.

When we talk about “our system of checks and balances”, we are evoking a fierce core principle of the American Revolution—that no person and no faction could ever rule at their own whim. American government must work through hard-won consensus and compromise. Executive actions are not lawful unless they strictly adhere to the laws that ensure executive authority is narrowly construed. In addition to Congress, the independent judiciary (Article III) has power to stop any executive action that is not clearly outlined as lawful in written law.

And yet, it was clear at the founding that this was not enough. The Bill of Rights was needed, to ensure everyone understood that power can never engage in certain kinds of abuse. Some of the unalienable rights needed to be spoken crisply and clearly by the law, so tyrants could be identified and stopped from eroding or ending democracy.

No Presidential argument can justify reducing anyone’s human rights.

The Bill of Rights made free speech an absolute and irreducible right of all people. No law can be made saying otherwise; no court can hold that punishment for speech is lawful. No President can take any action lawfully that would retaliate against anyone for their criticism or opposition.

The people would not be alone in holding this right, however:

• We would be protected in our right to think and speak critical thoughts, but also to organize in preferred religious or peaceable associations.
• The press would also be recognized as free and untouchable. Power could not lawfully seek to punish the press for criticizing officeholders or revealing evidence of criminality.
• Free associations would become such a bedrock of American democracy that Alexis de Tocqueville, in writing about what made the new republic different and gave it vibrancy and durability, would identify free civil associations, local charities, and advocacy groups, as essential.
• Our right to organize local governments, to establish and charter towns and counties, to create lawful bodies of self-government, to hold lawmakers and state governments to account for whether they represent us or bend to the will of a lawless leader, all of that would flow from this guarantee.
• The Tenth Amendment would recognize that powers not specifically assigned to or exercised by federal authorities would be retained by the States, or by the People.
• The Ninth Amendment would remind all officeholders and future generations that transcendent, unalienable, irreducible human rights need not be written down to enjoy full protection of the Constitution.
• The Fifth Amendment would make it illegal for any American official ever to engage in summary execution, summary sentencing of any kind, or arbitrary detention, regardless of the excuse they would make.
• The Fourth Amendment bars any search not authorized by a judge.
• The Third implies that military occupation of American communities is never permissible for any reason—given the Revolution was fought to end such tyrannical menacing of civilians.
• The Eighth Amendment outlaws cruelty, absolutely and with no caveats.

We have a right to science; it is written into the Constitution itself. Article I, section 8 requires Congress work to advance science “and the useful arts”; the Executive branch has no lawful authority to impede, suppress, or counter the reporting of scientific fact, or to seize investments made by the people’s representatives for the advancement of science, evidence, and their benefits for human health and wellbeing.

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, would all be insecure without these absolute and universal prohibitions against arbitrarily ending them, or even against enforcing “proper ideology” or acting cruelly toward anyone. Contravening these standards betrays the national purpose.

So, in 2025 and 2026, we face this crisis of national conscience. We know what unalienable means. We know the Bill of Rights exists to place strict and incontrovertible limits on the exercise of power by high-ranking officials. We know that no person can ever be arbitrarily searched, seized, detained or murdered by the state. Yet we are watching all of these happen, and on a scale that could scarcely be imagined as the outcome of any American election.

The right to zero criminality in government is real, and irreducible.

The Constitution is structured to ensure there will never be a mafia-style protection racket in the halls of power. Any President or aide who seeks to create one subverts and contravenes the Constitution, as does any person who aids them. Bribery is unconstitutional; no official, including the President, can receive any “emolument” (or special reimbursement) for using office to do favors. Paying into a protection racket is complicity.

Crimes against the Constitution have no statute of limitations. Racketeering activity linked to those crimes cannot be used to change that or to create special zones of impunity. A pardon, for instance, that would be issued to help put co-conspirators beyond the reach of the law, would be a non-event, with no legal effect.

Presidential actions can only be lawful… if they are lawful. There is no immunity for unlawful acts.

So, as we enter a new year, and we reflect on the grievous deviations from Constitutional governance we have witnessed in 2025, we should recall that fifth freedom of the First Amendment—that the right to legal redress can never be abridged. All who serve have a binding legal duty never to countenance or advance any corrupt activity, period. No person may be abused, by anyone, for any reason; impunity cannot exist; plots to subvert the Constitution must be prosecuted, without interference from any political official.