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RealSlimSlavin

Listed below are comments made by RealSlimSlavin between Monday, 16th June 2008 and Monday, 16th June 2008.

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Why politicians hate referendums 07:17am on 16 Jun 2008 I take issue with the assertion that "Most treaties, most diplomatic agreements, and indeed most proposed laws have to be written in complex legal language. They are, by their very nature, difficult for even specialists to understand."

They "have" to be written that way? For those in the late 1700s responsible for drafting and putting to the people agreements between States, writing in such a way that the people might be able to understand wasn't a challenge. In fact, to do so was often an unspoken necessity.

After all, how difficult is it for the ordinary citizen to understand the meaning behind "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."?

How difficult? Not very.

Experts may be needed to extrapolate further on the "hidden" meaning of such legal jargon, but the basic intent, and legal force, of the provision is easily understood.

Where those "federalists" responsible for drafting and campaigning on behalf of EU treaties go wrong is in their ignorance of prior examples - especially because they're probably loathe to admit that America is one.

If former Colonials in the 1780s were able to construct a Constitution for a union of States fiercely concerned over their own independence and power, and translate complex ideas about Government into language a layman, an ordinary citizen, could understand and which would endure, is not the same thing possible in Europe over 220 years later?

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