Interview With an Actual Journalist
December, 2022 Meet Quin Hillyer, an actual journalist, who currently writes for the Washington Examiner as a senior commentary writer and editor. He has worked at the American Spectator as executive editor, the Washington Times as senior editorial writer, and as contributing editor at National Review Online. Hillyer’s articles have appeared in many national publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, National Review, the New Republic, the (UK) Guardian, and Investor’s Business Daily. Quin grew up in New Orleans, Louisiana, where he remembers being inspired at age 12 as nearly a year-long Bicentennial celebration, in 1976, of the Declaration of Independence, enveloped the country. “It made a huge impression on me,” Hillyer expressed, as he saw the entire country caught-up in the commemoration of the document that was the mission statement for our Constitution. He said that in 1976, “there was none of this breast-beating of how awful we are” as a nation. It was there that Quin began a lifetime of respect and admiration for all things American, with a thirst to learn more about our founding and the Constitution. He graduated from the Isidore Newman School in 1982 and went on to acquire an A.B. in government and theology in 1986 from Georgetown University. Hillyer speaks fondly of his experience at Georgetown as a freshman in his honors government program which was taught by renowned Constitutional scholars. He says after Georgetown, because of his keen interest in both disciplines, that he “hopped around between both the political world and journalism for a while, like you’re not supposed to do.” To begin his career after graduation, Quin returned home to New Orleans and became a correspondent at the Times-Picayune. He cut his journalistic teeth while covering sports. Because of his love of our founding documents, Hillyer was a Reagan appointee to Public Affairs in late 1986, however, his real experience in politics was launched in 1987, while serving as research and issues director for U. S. Representative Bob Livingston’s gubernatorial campaign. Following his calling once again, Hillyer felt he “was meant for journalism” which led him in 1989 to become managing editor of Gambit Weekly, a newsmagazine in the New Orleans area where he gained notoriety “doing investigative pieces on the rise of David Duke and pointing out (Duke’s) neo-Nazi ties.” Quin boomeranged back into politics for 5 years, serving as press secretary for Congressman Bob Livingston. But, by 1996, he realized he missed writing again. With the battle between his two passions raging, Hillyer told me that columnist Fred Barnes “advised me to go make a name for myself away from D. C. and make my way back.” That’s when Pulitzer-Prize winner Paul Greenberg at the Arkansas Democrat Gazette hired him to join the editorial staff. Quin says he “did not particularly enjoy the circumstances of the job.” He was hired as lead editorial writer at the Mobile Register in 1998, where he earned the Carmage Walls Commentary Award and the Green Eyeshade Award, making good on the suggestion by his colleague, Fred Barnes. Hillyer was ready to return to Washington in 2006 to navigate covering the political scene once again as executive editor with The American Spectator before assuming the post of Associate Editorial Page Editor at The Washington Examiner in 2008. Today, Quin resides in Alabama and writes furiously and brilliantly on the matters plaguing the nation. I asked Hillyer why journalism has become more of an activist profession rather than what it was originally intended to be, a watchdog over the government for the people protected by the First Amendment. Hillyer responded that “very few (journalists) try to be neutral or watchdogs.” He reminds us that at the turn of the 20th century, the “rise of the objective neutral media was a good thing,” however, today, that neutrality “has disappeared.” “For the left, everything is politics,” lamented Quin. “So many writers are covering things they know nothing about.” According to Quin, media-types mostly consider ideology when hiring writers these days, unless they are conservative media employers who mainly look for skill and talent. When I asked how many writers in the country know the Constitution and what the law means, he responded, “less than 10%.” That explains a lot about the establishment media. As an actual journalist, Hillyer digs for the facts. One of his latest investigative reporting projects for the Washington Examiner centers around the controversy at James Madison’s Montpelier and the “hostile takeover” of the property, as well as at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. Hillyer further characterizes the takeover from his article, “Woke Montpelier leaders envision massive land grab in Virginia” in this way: “. . . the wholly untrustworthy “trusts” that operate James Madison’s Montpelier and Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello — the homes of the two most influential thinkers who laid the foundation of this nation’s grand experiment of liberty — are on a malevolent mission to trash the reputations of those two great founders.” This is personal for Quin and to those of us who value the truth and the legacy of our brilliant founders. In 2000, Quin penned a column asking Congress to establish a commission of scholars to commemorate James Madison’s 250 birthday in 2001 and use it as an occasion for civic education. He said the commission “should sponsor or encourage high school essay contests about the Constitution, that the scholars should meet together at least once, and a few other things.” Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) “saw the column and turned it into a bill.” Quin writes of the event on March 16, 2001: “The scholars were appointed; they held a symposium in an ornate room in the Library of Congress on March 16, 2001, with me as the only reporter present for the private part of the session; and they promulgated a call for civic education. There was a grand dinner that night at a banquet hall in the Library of Congress honoring Madison, with Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Sessions presiding and Justice Antonin Scalia among the numerous public officials in attendance. By happenstance, I rode the elevator with Scalia, but I couldn’t think of anything intelligent to say.” In his Washington Examiner commentary, “The woke assault on James Madison feels personal, but everyone should care,” from July 20, 2022, Hillyer continued to recall that day, “For me, it capped a day in which I had driven the 95 miles out to Montpelier, then only in the early phases of its restoration from what the DuPont family had done to alter it radically, and I enjoyed a fascinating private tour of all they were planning. The curators said the law creating the commission and the commemoration had hugely helped draw attention to Montpelier’s mission of celebrating the life and thought of the Father of the Constitution.” The Montpelier Foundation, formed in 1998, has been busy for two decades restoring the estate of James Madison, accurately preserving his legacy while also telling the critical story of slavery and its impact on the history of the plantation. After all, one of the first acts of the Foundation was to locate descendants of Montpelier’s slave population to honor their stories in the exhibits on the property. Archaeologist, Matthew Reeves, was hired by the Foundation Board in 2000 to oversee the rigorous endeavor to uncover details about the lives and work of Montpelier’s enslaved. Quin reports, ”In 2001, shortly after Madison’s 250th birthday celebration, Montpelier organized a three-day Slave Commemoration Gathering , and over the next 15 years, it received numerous national awards for permanent and prominent exhibits on slavery’s role there.” I should note here that Reeves was fired from his Director of Archaeology and Landscape Restoration position this year. Quin visited Montpelier several years after 2001 for another private tour, then again 5 years later, when the “restoration” was almost complete. He said that by that time, “the foundation was well into its efforts to excavate evidence of the lives of the slaves who lived there.” In context, that undertaking was appropriate and wise. Little did I know that almost all context would be thrown aside, with slavery essentially becoming Montpelier’s predominant focus.” Incrementally, monied leftists and radical organizations have successfully orchestrated a coup upon the Boards and the Trusts tasked with operating both Monticello and Montpelier. Mary Alexander, an authentic and verifiable descendent of Madison’s manservant, Paul Jennings, has said that Montpelier is now “a black history and black rights organization that couldn’t care less about James Madison and his legacy.” Acknowledging that slavery was “an unjust and horrible system,” she nonetheless said that Montpelier has a unique mission (to honor Madison). “There were hundreds of thousands of slaveowners but not hundreds of thousands who wrote the Constitution,” as Alexander so precisely asserted the obvious as documented by Quin Hillyer in “The ideals – and homes – of Madison and Jefferson are worth defending from the leftists.” In his September 9, 2022, “James Madison’s Foundation, destroyed from within,” Hillyer determines, “. . . self-proclaimed “termites,” aided by a sympathetic media and discredited organizations such as the Southern Poverty Law Center, have driven the foundation, put its financial health at great risk, and even flirted with a United Nations-aided land grab of the region around James Madison’s Montpelier by designating it one large UNESCO heritage site,” explains Hillyer. Enter stage left, the National Trust for Historic Preservation at Montpelier. “In 2017, the ascendant liberal leadership of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, which owns Montpelier but by charter is not supposed to “have authority over either management or board governance,” created an African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, dedicated not just to the preservation of sites related to “significant African American history” but also to a “social justice … movement that uses preservation as a force for enacting positive social change … to realize equity-driven outcomes.” In other words politics, not history. Even on September, 17, 2022, Constitution Day, the ideological overthrowers decided to ignore the facts again. Hillyer writes, “amid staff disruptions and swirling questions about its finances, the foundation created to honor the “Father of the Constitution” is scrambling to mark Constitution Day on Saturday with two woke, anti-Constitution panel discussions.” Read “Saturday is Anti-Constitution Day at James Madison’s house.” The latest on how Montpelier’s National Trust is faring, or not, read Hillyer’s “National Trust must worry about finances of Madison’s Montpelier,” and “National Trust CEO steps down amid unrest at James Madison’s Montpelier.” “The plan is to establish Montpelier as a beachhead for radical reinterpretations of history. To a somewhat lesser extent, leftists have succeeded in doing the same at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.” No, James Madison is not alone. Meanwhile, back over at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, Quin continued his reporting on the matter this year by encapsulating Jeffery Tucker’s demoralizing excursion to Monticello on the Fourth of July. From the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, to the exhibits and the tour guides, our beloved author of the Declaration of Independence is being besmirched and defamed in his own home. Affluent Democrat donors to social justice organizations populate the Board of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, so they can have their way with how history is rewritten at Monticello. Books by Ibram X. Kendi and fans of critical race theory occupy the gift shop. You can read “How and Why the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Trashes its own Namesake” here. As the actual journalist, Quin Hillyer notes, “. . . but suffice it to say that the Sage of Monticello did more for human liberty and expansion of human knowledge than all but a handful of individuals in human history. The Left’s obsessive attempts to destroy his [Jefferson’s] reputation are both malicious and historically and contextually ignorant.” Ultimately, Quin wisely chose writing over politics. When asked why, he said, “I could have my own voice, rather than promoting someone else's interests/agenda. Plus, I really detested many parts of politics – and, I like to write.” We need more actual journalists like Quin Hillyer who dig for the truth, gather facts and report them so the people can decide. Quin is that watchdog for the people on a quest to protect our heritage so future generations can know the truth.
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I recently answered a question on Quora.com which read: “In the 10th Amendment, what does "to the people" mean?” The requestor was, of course, referring to these words:
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." Here’s how I answered the question (note: I get a half-dozen requests on Quora each day. I don’t take them all, but even when I do I tend to write short, succinct answers): "The People are Sovereign…(A)t the Revolution, the sovereignty devolved on the People and they are truly the sovereigns of the country…the Citizens of America are equal as fellow Citizens and as joint Tenants in the sovereignty." (Chief Justice John Jay, writing in Chisholm v. Georgia, 1793) Basically, the 10th Amendment implies that all political power not given up, through constitutions, to either the state or federal governments, remains (theoretically at least) in the hands of the ultimate sovereigns: the people. Unfortunately, the 10th Amendment is largely a “dead letter” today, the Supreme Court long ago having given Congress plenary power not found in the Constitution. Today, Congress can spend money on anything its little heart desires, whether that object is found in the Constitution or not (see U.S. v. Butler, 1936 and Helvering v Davis, 1937). Congress can borrow money without limit, and tax us without limit. They can delegate their legislative power to the Executive Branch whenever they want (see Mistretta v. U.S., 1989). Today, nearly all political power lies with the federal or state governments, not with the people. The people appear to retain, for the time being, simply the power to elect their representatives and change those representatives when the previous choice reveals itself to have been wrong. "It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising their sovereignty. Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. The people themselves become the willing instruments of their own debasement and ruin. Let us, then, look to the great cause, and endeavor to preserve it in full force. Let us by all wise and constitutional measures promote intelligence among the people as the best means of preserving our liberties.” (James Madison, First Inaugural Address, 1809) There is a lot more to the 10th Amendment than my short answer covers. For instance, while I claimed the 10th as a “dead letter,” implying it was devoid of meaning, the Supreme Court’s official stance, expressed in United States v Darby Lumber Co., was that “The amendment states but a truism that all is retained which has not been surrendered” In other words, the court agreed with the basic premise that the Constitution is one of limited powers, which is essentially what the 10th says, and thus the 10th adds nothing new to our understanding of the Constitution. “Its purpose was … to allay fears that the new national government might seek to exercise powers not granted, and that the states might not be able to exercise fully their reserved powers.” There had been a similar statement in the Articles of Confederation (Article II), which read: “Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” Note that mention of “the people” was added in the 10th Amendment. So, to summarize: All political power originates in the sovereignty of the people. They give up some sovereign to the national government through the U.S. Constitution and some to their state government through the state constitution; the rest they retain or reserve to themselves. If “we the people” would only remember that. The Supreme Court has often ruled that certain powers are reserved to the states simply because they are not found in the U.S. Constitution; but what I find lacking in the Court’s logic is an acknowledgement that the state don’t have every power not given in the U.S. Constitution, they have only those powers given them in their respective stateconstitutions. The court seems to conveniently forget “the people.” (Of course, “the people” know none of this is going on because “the people” don’t usually read SCOTUS rulings -- except a few Breakfast Clubbers). The Court occasionally rules that the national government simply lacks the power it is trying to implement, not necessarily that it is a reserved power of the states. An example: the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 mandated a "gun-free zone" on and around public school campuses across the country. In United States v. Lopez (1995), the federal government claimed the gun-prohibiting power was to be found in the Constitution’s Commerce Clause. Without specifically mentioning the Tenth Amendment, the Supreme Court ruled that there was no clause in the Constitution authorizing such a power. And so, the GFSZA was struck down, replaced two years later by a new law that did the same thing, claiming a different origin for the power. If “the people” could ever figure out how to speak with one voice, I think they could be more powerful than even Joe Biden’s “we’ve got nukes” federal government. Granted, that’s a big “if,” but I can dream, can’t I? Prepared by: Gary R. Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative, Inc., for The Breakfast Club. "Censorship, cancel culture, political correctness, woke-ism, hate speech, intolerance: whatever label you assign to this overzealous drive to sanitize the culture of anything that might be deemed offensive or disturbing or challenging, be assured they are sign posts on a one-way road to graver dangers marked by “suppression, persecution, expulsion and the massacring of people.” Read the article here.
"In 1776, the Declaration of Independence proclaimed that everyone is endowed with “unalienable Rights.” Years later, the Bill of Rights elaborated on those rights. But the word “rights” has long since been hijacked by enemies of the original idea of rights." Read article here.
"How would the people be able to tell the difference between insightful leaders and charlatans if they were ignorant of virtue or ignorant in general?" Read article here.
"The Constitution requires that the federal government protect the states from invasion (Article 4, Section 4). It also permits states to act without permission of the federal government when states are under imminent threat (Article 1, Section 10)." Read more here.
“When the government controls the information, then it also controls the people and therefore, the electoral processes,” said Federalist Executive Editor Joy Pullmann during an interview on OANN." Watch the interview here.
For nearly 90 years after the Constitution was ratified the federal government stayed out of regulating federal elections in any significant way. Finally, after ratification of the 15th Amendment, Congress was forced to act.
The Fifteenth Amendment stated: “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” Most people overlook Section 2 of the Amendment which states: “The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.” And enforce it they had to. Democrat-controlled Southern states were none too happy about having to extend the franchise to freed slaves. They came up with all sorts of laws and conditions which restricted or essentially prohibited freed-blacks from voting. Poll taxes, poll tests, gerrymandering, and other restrictions were placed in the way. In 1870, Congress had had enough and passed the Civil Rights Act of 1870. Also known as the Enforcement Act or the First Ku Klux Klan Act, the act provided criminal penalties for those attempting to prevent African Americans from voting by using or threatening to use violence or engaging in other tactics, such as making threats to terminate a person’s employment or evict them from their home. Numerous continued violations of the 15th Amendment led to the enactment of the second Enforcement act, which passed in February 1871. The second Enforcement Act added more severe punishments for violations of the first act. Two months later, in April 1871, Congress passed the third and final measure, commonly called the second Ku Klux Klan Act. This outlawed terrorist conspiracies by all racist vigilantes including but not limited to the Ku Klux Klan. It allowed the President to suspend the writ of Habeas Corpus in areas prone to Klan activities. In 1876, one section of the Enforcement Act was ruled unconstitutional in United States v. Reese et al. The Supreme Court decided that the 15th Amendment did not confer a right to vote to freed slaves, it merely prevented denying the vote based on race or previous condition of servitude. This may seem like a distinction without a difference, but in the world of legal terminology the effect was real and served to weaken the 15th Amendment and strengthen state voting laws. An attempt was made to add more voting rights protections for blacks in the Civil Rights Act of 1957 but these provisions were removed in the Senate version under the direction of Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson. The Civil Rights Act of 1960 established federal inspection of local voter registration polls and introduced penalties for anyone who obstructed someone from registering to vote. The landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act devoted the entirety of Title I to Voting Rights. It prohibited unequal application of voter registration requirements. It required that voting rules and procedures be applied equally to all races, but it did not abolish the concept of voter "qualification." This allowed voters continue to have to pass “literacy tests,” which were being widely used to disenfranchise both black voters and poor whites in the South. These were finally eliminated in the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the first legislation devoted exclusively to voting. This act states it is “an act to enforce the fifteenth amendment to the Constitution,” something Congress had ironically been trying to do for 95 years. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was the most significant statutory change in the relationship between the federal and state governments in the area of voting since Reconstruction. It was immediately challenged in the courts. For the next five years, the Supreme Court issued several key decisions upholding the constitutionality of the Act. [South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U.S. 301, 327-28 (1966) and Allen v. State Board of Elections, 393 U.S. 544 (1969)] The Supreme Court struck down the “coverage formula” as unconstitutional in Shelby County v. Holder (2013) which affected voting operations in nine states. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was readopted and strengthened in 1970, 1975, and 1982 and has been amended numerous times since then. Most modern charges of “voter suppression” claim violations of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Other voting-related acts that have addressed narrow and very specific areas of voting, such as: The Voting Accessibility for the Elderly and Handicapped Act of 1984 required polling places be accessible to people with disabilities. Each precinct in VA has a specific voting machine for this purpose. The Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA) of 1986 allowed members of the U.S. armed forces and overseas U.S. voters to register and vote by mail, even by email. The National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) of 1993 (the “Motor Voter Act”) created new ways to register to vote, particularly DMV offices. It also called for states to keep more accurate voter registration lists. The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) of 2002 authorized federal funds for elections. It also created the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). The EAC helps states comply with HAVA to adopt minimum standards on voter education, registration, and ballots. HAVA required that states implement: Provisional Voting, Voting Information, Updated and Upgraded Voting Equipment, Statewide Voter Registration Databases, Voter Identification Procedures and Administrative Complaint Procedures. The Military and Overseas Voting Empowerment (MOVE) Act of 2009 improved access to voting by military and overseas voters. The Freedom to Vote Act, was introduced in the Senate on 14 September 2021. It would enact automatic and same-day registration, establish Election Day as a federal holiday, limit when voters can be removed from voter rolls, require all states have a minimum of two-weeks of early voting, require states to conduct post-election audits of federal elections, prohibit mid-decade redistricting, and clarify that felons can not be denied the vote unless they are serving a conviction for a felony on election day (which seems to imply they would be automatically re-enfranchised upon completing their sentences). On October 20, 2021, Republicans successfully blocked the measure when it failed to win a filibuster- proof vote. Prepared by: Gary R. Porter, Executive Director, Constitution Leadership Initiative, Inc. for The Breakfast Club. "The biggest threat to our constitutional order is . . . the failure to pass to subsequent generations the character, virtue, and knowledge required to protect the constitutional safeguards." Read the article here.
"The U. S. government has become a master of deceit" and has "attempted to brainwash us into believing that we have no rights. . . Well, the government is wrong. We have every right, and you know why? Because, as the Declaration of Independence states, we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights—to life, liberty, property and the pursuit of happiness—that no government can take away from us." Read more here.
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