Truth Bomb 2 Part 1

Truth Bomb number 2 is, it is your right to educate your child is protected by the First 

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Amendment. Not someone else's right, you're right as a parent -- is tied to your parental rights. 

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You get to protect, you get to educate your children. Not the government, not the judge,

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you. The Supreme Court has been very explicit in this regard,

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and it's held specifically that -- the right to educate one's children as one

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chooses is made applicable to the states by the force of the First and the Fourteenth Amendments. 

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And education is very simple. It is simply the expression and the reception of fact

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and ideas. And what receives the most protection is your right to teach your child your personal 

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values. Those ideas that come to you as a matter of conscience. Ideas about religion, about life, 

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about our existence in the universe -- why we exist. All of these kind of questions,

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deeply personal questions. It's your job to convey to your child your beliefs. Your

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ex has the same right and the same duty. And then your child is to incorporate all of that into who 

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they are as they grow up and when they become an adult they get to decide for themselves

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what their place in the universe is, and the foundation for that comes from the parents.

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Not from a judge, not from the state, not from the government -- from two fit parents. If the 

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child has two fit parents, married or not, that child has a right to those two parents, and has 

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a right to learn equally from those two parents. No judge has a right to get in the way of this. 

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If you're fit, that judge has no authority to get in between. The First Amendment doesn't allow it. 

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They come up with all kind of excuses, but you need to know, Supreme Court says your right,

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your individual right to educate your child is protected by the First Amendment. And you need 

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to stand up and present that to the Court and require the Court to treat your rights

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with the respect they deserve. So essential to the First Amendment is both the right to speak 

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and the right to receive. The speaker has a right and the receiver has a right, both right

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are protected by the First Amendment. Speaking and receiving go hand and hand. So inherent

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in the intimate association between parent and child is the parent's duty to educate the child 

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in a manner which preferably makes them productive citizens. But at least to a

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degree that keeps them from becoming a burden on others. Hold up, hold up,

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you're state statutes however are making you believe that the judge gets to override

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your values, morals, and teachings. And when he does that he violates your right to be who you 

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choose to be and to share that with your child, and to develop your child in the ways that you 

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decide are right for your child. And the attorney just says the attorney has a right to do this 

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because the statute says he does. And sometimes your rights are expressed in the form of duties 

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and responsibilities. Ron's going to explain. The Supreme Court has expressed

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this duty in the following manner. The duty to prepare the child for additional obligations

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must be read to include the inculcation of moral standards, religious beliefs and

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elements of good citizenship. This affirmative process of teaching, guiding, and inspiring by 

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precept and example is essential to the growth of young people to mature, socially responsible 

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citizens. That's the Supreme Court's words, word for word. That matters. Okay? The Supreme

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Court says it, no state judge can overrule it or say it doesn't matter. We need to put it before 

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these judges and demand that they respect it to the level that the Supreme Court requires. Now, 

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in that statement, the words precept and example are critical elements of the holding.

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The word precept simply means "by guiding rule." You're teaching your children guiding rules for 

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life. Precepts. What's more interesting than precept in the child custody context,

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is the example part of the statement. So how exactly does a parent teach their child

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by example if the state custody judge doesn't let them have any time with their child? Or gives them 

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only a certain kind of time. Any limitation on your time directly affects your child and what 

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they can receive. It limits your ability to comply with your duty to educate your child.

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So, unless there's a way to teach by example without associating with the person you are

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teaching, this reference to example by the Court means you're right to associate with your

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child for the purpose of educating them by example is protected by the First Amendment.

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Children learn by watching what we do. They are always watching. Even when you think they are 

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not watching, they are watching, and they are learning. They are seeing what you do and how

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you respond in all kinds of situations. From the most mundane boring situations in life

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to the most important. They are always watching and they are always learning.

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And they take this to heart even if they don't consciously recognize it. They take it to heart 

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and they will remember these things for the rest of their lives. And they will apply these things 

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they learn in their adult lives in ways they won't even recognize. Nevertheless, they are there and 

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you are building this foundation. So in another case, the Supreme Court explained the reason the 

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First Amendment protects intimate associations, is because it is through these bonds of affection we 

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transmit shared ideals and beliefs from generation to generation. The Court stated it this way, "The 

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Court has long recognized that because the Bill of Rights is designed to secure individual liberty, 

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it must afford the formation and preservation of certain kinds of highly personal relationships 

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a substantial measure of sanctuary from unjustified interference by the state. We have

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noted that certain kinds of personal bonds have played a critical role in culture and traditions 

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of the nation. By cultivating and transmitting shared ideals and beliefs, they thereby foster 

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diversity and act as critical buffers between the individual and the power of the state." 

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This is not the first time the Court had something to say about the role of intimate family

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associations in sharing values across generations. Some years earlier, the Court stated it this way, 

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"Our decisions establish that the constitution protects the sanctity of the family precisely 

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because the institution of the family is deeply rooted in this nation's history and tradition. 

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It is through the family that we inculcate and pass down many of our most cherished values,

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moral and cultural. Ours is by no means limited to the tradition of the respect on uniting the 

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members of a nuclear family." So, here they are saying that this is core to our nations 

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history and tradition, the respect that we give families -- parent-child associations.

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And the Court is also saying it is not limited to the nuclear family. The Court protects

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association pairs. The smallest nuclear family in existence is actually a collection of three 

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protected family units. There is the marital association between husband and wife. That

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is a protected family unit whether or not they have children. When they have a child, they add 

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two more distinctly protected associations. On top of the marital association between the mother 

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and the father, they now have a parent-child association between the mother and the child

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and a parent-child association between the father and the child. These three individually separately 

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protected family units combined establish the nuclear family. And it is only through these

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individual associations that the nuclear family can receive any kind of constitutional protection. 

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And that's because our constitution protects individual rights. Not group rights. Not

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large membership rights. Even when you're talking about your right to associate with a,

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a political party with numbers in the millions, it's not the group that receives protection, 

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it's each individual in the group that receives the protection.

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Now it may be worded in terms of group to make it easier to understand. But when you get down to 

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nuts and tacks, it is each individual association that gets the protection. So, the smallest, 

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when we talk about equal protection of large groups, what we're really talking about is each 

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individual. It may be a member of a particular group, has a right to be treated the same.

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So the smallest group the equal protection clause protects is the individual. It always protects the 

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individual. Some years later, the Supreme Court had some more to say about association rights of 

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natural parents and their children. And the Court said it this way, "Choices about marriage, family 

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life, and the upbringing of children, are among the associational rights this Court has ranked 

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as a basic importance in our society. Rights sheltered by the Fourteenth Amendment against

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the state's unwarranted usurpation disregard or disrespect a parent's desire for and right to 

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the companionship, care, custody, and management of his or her children is an important interest. 

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One that undeniably warrants deference. And absent a powerful, countervailing interest, protection. 

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The interest of parents and their relationship with their children is sufficiently fundamental 

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to come within the finite class of liberty interests protected by the Fourteenth Amendment.

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So, here, the reference to the Fourteenth Amendment is not a denial that the protected

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rights are protected by the First Amendment, but instead is a statement that the First Amendment 

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protected rights are protected from the action of states because it is the Fourteenth Amendment 

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which applies constitutional limitations to the states. 

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Before the Fourteenth Amendment, the federal constitution simply didn't limit the states.

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The Fourteenth Amendment was put in place to compel the states to comply

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with our federal constitution. So, in the 50s, 60s, and 70s, when the black civil rights movement 

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was really changing our nation, they faced two significant problems:

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One was black people in general didn't really believe they had rights they could fight for;

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and, two, there weren't any significant number of court opinions or case law that would support 

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the idea that black people had rights. So they had to do two things. First, people

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like Martin Luther King, Jr. and churches, black churches all over the country started talking to 

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black people and telling them they had rights, and teaching them they had rights, and getting them 

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willing to fight for their rights. And then people like Thurgood Marshall,

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who was a civil rights attorney, and who later became a Supreme Court justice -- the first black 

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Supreme Court justice we've ever had. He was fighting the legal battles, and he was winning

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small case after small case in the appellate courts. So, when he finally did get to the Supreme 

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Court, on the big civil rights question for black people, he was able to win because he had that 

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wide support of underlying small case law that all led up to that big win in the courts.

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And that's what we need to do in family rights and parental rights. We need to convince more 

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parents that they should stand up and fight for their rights in the courts. And we need to get a 

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lot of these small wins in the appellate courts that support the fact that we have civil rights 

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that deserve to be protected. And then we need to push it all the way to the Supreme Court,

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if necessary, to get that sea change and understanding in our nation that says parents

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have rights, they're individual rights, they don't depend on marriage, and the courts cannot 

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deprive them of their rights simply because they get divorced or choose never to marry.