Within hours of pledging allegiance to the U.S. Constitution, the newly sworn-in 47th President of the United States of America broke his oath. Exercising his power to pardon, he paid tribute to the Oath-Keepers, Proud Boys, and others who raided the U.S. Capitol to stop the peaceful transfer of power January 6, 2021.
Taking the Oath with One Hand
Taking the oath with one hand.
Does Nothing Mean Anything Anymore?
By pardoning seditionists who had pled guilty, and had been sentenced for their crimes, President Donald Trump wiped clean his own crime of sedition. Whether he did not understand the oath he had taken (again), or was lying when he raised his right hand and kept his left hand at his side without touching the Bibles the First Lady was holding, or was disingenuous when said “So help me God,” or was not quite sane, as in criminally insane – “not guilty by reason of insanity” – is an urgent matter for discussion before nothing means anything anymore, and the democratic Constitutional republic crumbles into the madhouse.
Gordon C. Stewart, public theologian, Presbyterian Pastor, host of Views from the Edge, author of Be Still! Departure from Collective Madness (2017 Wipf and Stock), Brooklyn Part, MN, January 23, 2025.
On January 20, the Constitutional duty of administering the presidential oath of office fell again to the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. The Chief Justice holds his position by virtue of his own oath to the Constitution.
Supreme Court Justice Oath of Office
I, ___________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge all the duties incumbent upon me as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court under the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; and that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.
Supreme Court Justice oath of office, Curator of the Supreme Court
Question
Does a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court violate his Constitutional Oath of Office by fulfilling his constitutional duty to preside over the administration of a President-elect’s oath-taking when the Court is in possession of evidence that the oath-taking was, and again will be, disingenuous, and for purpose of evasion?
Rhetorical or Serious?
The question seems rhetorical. It’s not. It’s serious. On January 20, 2025, the former president who violated election law by silencing a porn star, burying the story in a deal with a gossip tabloid; refused to honor the Constitutional peaceful transfer of power in 2021 and rallied the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, and his supporters in a violent insurrection that threatened his own Vice President‘s life; promised to pardon the January 6 insurrectionists; mastered the five principles of effective propaganda outlined by Third Reich Minister of Propaganda and Enlightenment Josef Goebbels; maneuvered the rule of law to evade trial; denounced the American justice system, courts, judges, prosecutors and court personnel as “rigged” against him; refused to surrender top secret national security documents after leaving office; and who continues to mock the juries that convicted him, and to use the powers of the presidency to exact retribution–– courts-marshal, imprisonment, or execution for treason––stood before Chief Justice John Roberts, ‘forgot’ to place his hand on two Bibles, raised the other hand, and “solemnly swore” the oath he had given no reason to trust.
Subversion by any other name is still subversion
A jury unanimously found the president-elect guilty on all 34 felony counts. Mr. Trump had already broken the presidential oath he took in 2017, but shrewd maneuvering through the state and federal court processes, Donald Trump is a convicted felon in the state of New York but has yet to be sentenced, and the more consequential federal indictments have been dropped. When Yogi Berra said “It’s not over til it’s over, “he had in mind the nine innings of a baseball game, but, like many other Yogi-isms, it describes real life beyond baseball.
If perception is nine-tenths of reality, the Supreme Court and the rule of law have lost. So has Congress. Oath-taking has become performative. The rule of law is at the point of implosion. It has been subverted by a well-heeled criminal well-practiced in using the law and judicial procedures to escape accountability under the rule of law. If there is a crack to be found, Donald Trump will find it and crawl through it unscathed.
It happened once. If we’re not careful, it can happen again.
History records moments like this. Ten years after conviction for “high treason” following the Beer Hall Putz, a failed coup attempt, Adolf Hitler rode the wave of public frustration and anger with the Weimar Republic to become Reich Chancellor and Führer. Six months after he took the oath of office, the Constitution was changed. It put Hitler where the Constitution had been. The United States Holocaust Museum tells the story.
Those who do not remember their history are doomed to repeat it
Following the death of President von Hindenburg in August 1934, Adolf Hitler assumed power as Reich Chancellor and Führer. Shortly thereafter, on August 20, 1934, the longstanding oath taken by state officials was changed so that they no longer swore loyalty to the German constitution but rather to Hitler as head of state.
Although in retrospect this change seems to indicate another step in Hitler’s consolidation of power, at the time many would have understood it differently. By replacing “Constitution” with “Hitler,” the oath was meant to convey that Hitler’s will was the same as that of the nation and the people and that his will could not, by definition, contradict the imperative to ‘observe the law and conscientiously fulfill the duties’ of office. In this way, the oath appeared to equate Hitler’s authority with the constitution and to ensure that it would be limited by the primacy of law and duty in public office.”
Oath of Loyalty for All State Officials as of August 14, 1919: “I swear loyalty to the Constitution, obedience to the law, and conscientious fulfillment of the duties of my office, so help me God.” [Translated from Reichsgesetzblatt I, 1919, pp. 1419-1420.]
Oath of Loyalty for All State Officials as of August 20, 1934: “I swear I will be true and obedient to the Führer of the German Reich and people, Adolf Hitler, observe the law, and conscientiously fulfill the duties of my office, so help me God.” [Translated from Reichsgesetzblatt I, 1934, p. 785.
Is one’s word one’s bond? Or is it subterfuge?
The Hierarchy:: Adolf Hitler (L), Joseph Goebbels C), Hermann Goering (R)
The Oath of Office to which President-elect Donald Trump swore for the second time was either what it appeared to be, or it wasn’t. Whether the German felon convicted of “High Treason” authentically swore to be loyal to the Constitution is a question no one can answer. Some oath-takers and their administrators are honest, but their personality disorders contort the language to equate the people’s constitution and the nation with themselves.
This commentary is not the product of the power of positive thinking, but Christ does not call me to be willfully blind. Sharing this commentary, I feel like Sir Alfred Hitchcock driving by a remote church in the Swiss Alps. Seeing a priest standing next to a little boy with his hand on the boy’s shoulder, Sir Alfred rolled down the rear window of his chauffeur-driven Bentley limousine and cried out, “Run, little boy! Run for your life!!!
God help us all!
Gordon C. Stewart, public theologian, Presbyterian Minister (HR), author of Be Still! Departure from Collective Madness (2017, Wipf and Stock), Brooklyn Park, MN, January 13, 2024.
George Stephanopoulos’ Oval Office interview with President Trump is going viral. For the first time in history an American president sees nothing wrong with a candidate for public office accepting a foreign government’s dirt on an opponent.
Oaths of office
Every member of Congress knows that’s illegal. However how wide the chasm between Republicans and Democrats on this president or the Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election (“Mueller Report”), there should be no question about this one. President Trump handed Congress an issue on which its members are sworn to act. Either the President was ignorant of the federal law that protects the integrity of the American electoral system or he was consciously defying the rule of law.
Republicans for the rule of law and the Constitution
Today Republicans for the Rule of Law begins airing “THE OATH” — a TV ad calling on Congress to act. Click HERE for more on THE OATH. Bill Kristol, serves as director of Republicans for the Rule of Law
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It’s no longer a partisan question. It becomes clearer every day. It’s not a strategic question. It’s no longer a question of how much more, or when is enough enough. It’s a constitutional question. It’s an oath of office question, the oath taken by every member of Congress under the U.S. Constitution.
U.S. Constitution Article VI. clause 3
“The Senators and Representatives … and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution . . .”— U.S. Constitution, Article VI, clause 3.
“I, __, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”
The Integrity of Office and Democratic Republic
With every passing day, some who have taken the oath of office side-step the duties of their offices by “purpose of evasion” in the face of the growing constitutional crisis. It is no longer a question of which side of the aisle you are on. Supporting and defending the U.S. Constitution means, at very least, upholding the constitutional checks and balances among executive, congressional, and judicial branches designed to protect a democratic republic from its implosion. Assaults and circumventions around that division of powers are assaults on the Constitution and the rule of law it protects.
Purpose of evasion
EVASION. A subtle device to set aside the truth, or escape the punishment of the law; as if a man should tempt another to strike him first, in order that he might have an opportunity of returning the blow with impunity. He is nevertheless punishable, because he becomes himself the aggressor in such a case. Wishard, 1 H. P. C. 81 Hawk. P. C. c. 31, Sec. 24, 25; Bac. Ab. Fraud,
Loyal Opposition and Loyal Majority
The British idea of “loyal opposition” — loyalty to the nation and to the oath to “support and defend” the Constitution — is a long-standing tradition. The loyalty is to the Constitution. Faithfulness to one’s oath of office, not loyalty to a person. Loyal opposition holds the party in power accountable. Loyal opposition infers loyalty to the Constitution by members of whatever party is the majority.
Patisan stone-walling against the Constitutional duty of Constitutional oversight — whether by a President, the House of Representatives, or the U.S. Senator — constitutes violation of the oath of office by “purpose of evasion”.
The Twinkling of an Eye: No time to blink
Some argue that an impeachment inquiry by the House of Representatives, regardless of its findings, is destined to fail because the majority party in the Senate will exonerate the President of the majority party.
We do well to remember the wisdom of an earlier American President:
Democracy… while it lasts is more bloody than either aristocracy or monarchy. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide.
Some things cannot wait. Some things have time limits. Constitutions, the rule of law, and democratic republics can disappear in the twinkling of an eye.
Views from the Edge 