Huckabee Wants to Rewrite Constitution, Says It's Easier to Change Than "Word of Living God"

Posted by Lindsay Beyerstein, Majikthise at 6:59 AM on January 16, 2008.

Radical cleric and Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee wants to rewrite the constitution:

The United States Constitution never uses the word "God" or makes mention of any religion, drawing its sole authority from "We the People." However, Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee thinks it's time to put an end to that.

"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution," Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view."

When Willie Geist reported Huckabee's opinion on MSNBC's Morning Joe, co-host Mika Brzezinski was almost speechless, and even Joe Scarborough couldn't immediately find much to say beyond calling it "interesting." [Raw Story]

For starters, Huckabee (may have) supported a proposal to rewrite the 14th Amendment to deny citizenship to children born on US soil to undocumented immigrant parents. Huckabee is the only presidential candidate to have called for the elimination of birthright citizenship.

Correction: Earlier I wrote that Huckabee opposed birthright citizenship. Actually, it's more complicated and interesting than that. Huckabee's ally Jim Gilchrist of the Minuteman Project reported on January 8th that Huckabee promised to oppose birthright citizenship, but on January 9th Huckabee contradicted Gilchrist saying he'd made no such promise:

Mike Huckabee yesterday contradicted his own top immigration surrogate, announcing he will not support a constitutional amendment to end birthright citizenship for children born in the United States to illegal aliens.

It was a stark reversal after The Washington Times reported that James Gilchrist, founder of the Minuteman Project, said Mr. Huckabee promised to pursue an amendment to the Constitution.

In an article in yesterday's editions, Mr. Huckabee's spokeswoman did not challenge the former Arkansas governor's statements to Mr. Gilchrist and said the two men shared the same goals on immigration.

But by yesterday afternoon, Mr. Huckabee had backed away from that position."I do not support an amendment to the Constitution that would prevent children born in the U.S. to illegal aliens from automatically becoming American citizens. I have no intention of supporting a constitutional amendment to deny birthright citizenship," Mr. Huckabee said in a statement posted on his campaign Web site. [WT]

I'll leave it to you to decide who's more credible, Jim Gilchrist or Mike Huckabee...

[HT: LGM]

Tagged as: republicans, constitution, religious right, christianity, huckabee

Lindsay Beyerstein a New York writer blogging at Majikthise.