THE CONSTITUTIONAL CASE

(From MAGIC HARBOR by Don Berry)

 

 

 

I lost a Constitutional case in Eagle Harbor the other day. Humiliatingly. Unconditionally. Not only was there the ignominy of losing, the financial damage was devastating. The affair cost me ten bucks out of pocket which, in my present delicate c ondition, I can ill afford. On the other hand, if I could afford it, there wouldn't be much of a story, would there?

Actually, it wasn't so much a Constitutional "case" as it was a Constitutional "bet." I choose to call it a "case" because it lends a certain dignity to the proceeding; a dignity which is otherwise almost totally lacking. The episode reflects much d iscredit on me, and I'm trying to salvage whatever personal image I can.

We were having dinner with Rod aboard OPTION, a 42' ferro-cement ketch. Until a few years ago Rod had been a lifelong fisherman in Alaska. Then he noticed that all his friends, all fishermen, were either dead, maimed or prematurely aged by their pro fession. Rod decided his goal in life was to become a healthy centenarian, and quit fishing. Since then he's been cruising with his 12 year old son Sam in OPTION.

Rod is very light in complexion, looking somewhat Nordic. Sam is dark, the heritage of his Indian mother, who divorced Rod some time ago because he wouldn't become a Mormon. This year OPTION is wintering in Puget Sound, part of the time in Eagle Harbor.

Rod had made up a pot of chili with an experimental side dish of cauliflower in shrimp sauce. This wasn't exactly culinary imagination -- it was what showed up in the free food bin at Helpline. As Rod says, "I never mind trying something new, as long as it's free."

The guests at this dinner party were Julia of LEGACY, Dale of OBLIO, and me. Dale and I had been invited previously, and Julia happened to be passing along the dock at dinner time.

I've forgotten what the exact conversation was, but Dale commented that the Vice-President of the country was originally intended to be the guy who got the second largest number of votes. It said so in the Constitution.

"The hell it does," I said.

"Care to make a bet on it?" Dale said. He was looking at me with an odd expression. I now realize it was only pity, perhaps with a touch of avarice.

"How much?" I said.

Dale leaned forward with his arms on the saloon table. A tendril of smoke rose from his pipe. In honor of the social occasion he was wearing his teeth and he grinned a little grin, an unaccustomed glint of white in the middle of his beard. "I'll be t you the title to your goddam boat."

To my credit, I was at least too smart for that. To my discredit, I waffled in confusion. "Well, I'll bet you ten bucks," I said.

"Done," Dale said, leaning back contentedly. He then paraphrased the Constitution to the effect that each member of the Electoral college was to vote for two people. The first choice was President, the second choice was Vice-President and, more impo rtantly, the President of the Senate. The idea, Dale said, was that the two most popular candidates have the two most powerful jobs, President of the Senate being then considered a counterbalance to the Executive office.

"I don't believe it," I said. "The President chooses the Vice-President at the Convention."

"Oh, it was amended," Dale said. "Twelfth, I think. But the body of the Constitution says what I said."

You must understand that, even as I scaled down to the ten buck bet, I already knew I had lost. I was completely out of my league. I know nothing about the Constitution, I had no evidence whatever, in fact I had absolutely nothing in my mind that wo uld justify risking even a penny in debate with Dale.

Dale of OBLIO is an Absolute Anarchist, the only one I've ever met. It is his conviction that the only proper government is no government whatever. No taxes, no coercion, no services, no national security, no politicians, no goddam nothing. He uncompromisingly rejects the idea of all groups, all systems of action, all organizations. For Dale the only acceptable form of government is absolute dictatorship -- each person is at once the State and the sole citizen of that State.

In this ideal, anarchic world, individuals are totally responsible for their own freedom and their own welfare. It is what attracted Dale to the life of a water rat in the first place. "It is the closest thing I know to liberty," he says. "If I kne w anything closer I'd be there instead."

Dale does not hold this absolutist position merely out of some rebellious emotional preference. In rejecting all forms of government, he has also subjected the forms of government to careful scrutiny. He knows the Constitution backwards and forwards . On the table in OBLIO'S cabin there is always a yellowed, dog-eared copy of The Federalist Papers, liberally sprouting page markers "for the juicy parts." Sometimes even in the middle of the poker game he will grab the book and declaim some absolute p rinciple of freedom to which he subscribes absolutely.

Ultimately Dale has faith only in principles, and none whatever in people. "Principles are forever," he says, "but people are mostly rotten."

Sufis speak of some individuals as Qutub, The Pole. I don't understand what the Sufis mean by that designation, but it reminds me of Dale, somehow. His profound anarchy represents an extreme pole, an absolute position against which all others can be measured. It defines one end of a spectrum of possible human freedom.

It doesn't really matter whether this is a practical position or not. Practicality has nothing to do with it. The principle of freedom is an Absolute Truth, incorruptible as gold, in a conditional world where every freedom, every truth, and every pr inciple is corrupted even as it is born.

As to the role of The Pole, the Qutub: Perhaps no Truth can exist in this mundane world as a mere abstract idea. Perhaps for an Absolute Truth to take root in the relative world, there must be at least one individual who adheres to the Absolute and lives it unconditionally; a Qutub. Perhaps.

This is clearly not the kind of person you want to bet against, particularly where they have detailed knowledge and you are utterly ignorant. Nevertheless, I did. What is worse, Dale offered me the chance to back out of the bet after I'd thought abo ut it, and I refused. Feebly, I demanded proof.

I knew perfectly well I was going to lose. I knew it was going to cost me ten bucks I needed desperately, and still I persisted in my folly merely because I was already headed in that direction.

I wonder how much of the rest of my life has been so determined; plowing ahead into folly just because that's the direction I find myself going. What is most humiliating is the knowledge that I have sailed for sixty years aboard this planet and still don't have sense enough to back out of a sucker bet.

Oh, yes. The Constitution. Article II, Section 1, Paragraph 3:

"The Electors shall meet in their respective States and vote by Ballot for two persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves. ...In every Case, after the Choice of the President, the Person having the great est Number of Votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President."

Dale took the ten bucks and bought a pork roast and a jug of wine. People may be rotten, but what the hell. You can live by Principle, but you can't have one over to the boat for dinner. We ate the roast the next evening aboard OBLIO, while we argued on into the night about some damn thing or other. Probably principles, or freedom, or truth. Something like that.

 

 

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The Constitutional Case
Copyright ©1995 Don Berry