4 Generations??? 1789 to 1868 is exactly 79 years apart. That's barely 1 generation. The fact is the 14th Amendment has been on the books for over 2/3 of our entire nation's history. Your claim of being it untested is unfounded.
There is only one official place that can intrepretation the Constutition and thats the USSC. That's how we avoid twisting the Constution's meaning, by following their interpretations. And your mistaken about the Founding Fathers as well, the FF believed in a STRONG Federal Government just looks at the Whiskey Rebellion. George Washington had no moral issue in using the Federal Government in squashing individual rights if those rights went against the Constitution. We have always been a country with a strong Federal Government, which absolutely has the right in certain cases to infringe upon individual freedom. That is neither new nor shocking.
What you are arguing is decentralized Government, but you forget that we already tried that in the Articles of Confederation it lasted 6 years before it collapsed in a total mess. We are not going to start replacing a system that's proven to work with a system that doesn't.
If we did things the way you suggest, segregation and Jim Crow would still be legal in the South.
I see that you are what L. Neil Smith (Google him) calls a HAMILTONIAN. On the other hand, I am definitely a LIBERTARIAN. Since you pulled in George Washington, I feel free to pull in Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, whose views represent the other side of the coin. The founding fathers though united in their love of freedom, had different ways of expressing that love, some of which were rather more Authoritarian than others.
On the topic of generations, the commonly accepted definition is one generation per twenty years or so, which for 79 years makes four generations. The fact that the 14th has been twisted beyond the intent of the framers is revealed simply by the word "state" rather than "federal". The intent was clearly to prevent states from passing discriminatory laws rather than to prevent individuals from discriminating. In the case of the photographers, their rights under the 1st and 9th were clearly violated, with the possibility of dragging in the 10th "or to the people" as well. So far as testing Constitutionality goes, can you really rely upon a SCOTUS (you incorrectly said USSC) which is packed with persons who despise the notion of strict construction rather than conservatives to defend the Constitution? The answer is obviously no! Judges are not the Pope with guaranteed infallibility. They often have political axes to grind in favor of the political party which got them appointed.
Notice that there is a gap of 61 years between Amendments 12 and 13, while only five years passed between 13 and 15. Then 43 years passed until 16 in 1913. The infamous 18 was passed in 1919 and repealed in 1933 by popular demand.
Since you implied that I am prejudiced by dragging in "segregation and Jim Crow", I feel compelled to say that I am NOT particularly prejudiced, but I AM discriminatory. This is not to say that I despise people based upon race, which I call in the name of an engineer from Africa named Segun Thomas with whom I worked at JSC as an example of an interracial friendship. Racial prejudice is not restricted to whites alone, nor is class prejudice restricted to the wealthy. There is no need to point out that religious prejudice is rampant - just try changing religions and hear comments about coming to your senses to confirm that. As an engineer I of course regard all lawyers, politicians etc. as beneath contempt, an example of occupational prejudice. You cannot change behaviors ingrained in society by passing laws - all that accomplishes is to make lawyers fat.
I am strongly for a decentralized government because the behemoth federal government is eating the nation out of house and home. It needs to be starved back to 10% or less of GDP as soon as possible. Advances in technology (particularly computers) make that possible. When the next President takes office, he (or she) can look forward to a rough ride!:tank:
Lonnie Courtney Clay
http://www.now.org/issues/constitution/index.html
Litmus test on equality for women, to be taken by prejudiced men.