Hey, Professor Eastman, Shalom!
(See: The Presidency and the Three Enduring Centers of the American Union Republic)
Thank you again for your earlier encouragement and thoughtful observations concerning my work on the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the unfinished constitutional work of Reconstruction. Your willingness to consider my research has been both encouraging and deeply appreciated.
As this project has continued to develop, I have concluded that a different strategy may better serve both the work itself and its intended audience.
Rather than waiting until the completion of the comprehensive constitutional memorandum, I have begun preparing a series of concise constitutional essays. Each essay examines one significant aspect of the larger Reconstruction framework while remaining connected to a single constitutional narrative. Together, they will ultimately serve as companion pieces to the larger attorney-ready memorandum presently in preparation for the President of the United States and his constitutional team.
My hope is that this approach will permit careful consideration of each constitutional component individually while the larger work continues to mature.
The essays proceed chronologically through what I believe is a continuous constitutional progression:
The Confiscation Acts.
The Emancipation Proclamation.
The Civil Rights Act of 1866. The Reconstruction Amendments.
The Enforcement Acts. The later Civil Rights legislation.
The constitutional legacy of Lincoln, the Reconstruction Congress, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Each essay explores one stage of that constitutional progression while asking whether the Reconstruction settlement, viewed as an integrated body of federal law, continues to inform the President’s Article II responsibility to faithfully execute the laws of the United States.
One concept has become increasingly clear to me as this work has progressed.
The comprehensive memorandum has become, in effect, the research foundation from which these essays are drawn. It serves as the constitutional repository containing the historical sources, statutory analysis, constitutional reasoning, and documentary support. The essays, by contrast, are intended to present those ideas in a form that can be read individually, discussed independently, and eventually assembled into a coherent constitutional series.
As time permits, I would be honored if you would read these essays as I forward them to you. Any observations, criticism, corrections, or recommendations you may wish to provide would be sincerely welcomed. My objective is not simply to defend an idea, but to refine it wherever the historical record and constitutional text require.
Ultimately, my hope remains unchanged.
I respectfully seek an opportunity to present this constitutional framework to President Trump, White House Counsel, the Attorney General, the Department of Justice, and the President’s broader constitutional and national security team.
The perspective from which I write is that of a descendant of American chattel slavery and a citizen who has spent decades studying the constitutional consequences of Reconstruction. My thesis is that the Reconstruction settlement—including the Emancipation Proclamation, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, the Reconstruction Amendments, and the Enforcement Acts—deserves renewed executive examination as an integrated constitutional framework rather than as isolated historical enactments.
Whether my conclusions ultimately prove persuasive or not, I hope the work contributes to a serious constitutional discussion concerning the faithful execution of the Reconstruction laws, the responsibilities entrusted to the Presidency under Article II, and the continuing constitutional stewardship of the American Republic.
Thank you again for your generosity, your scholarship, and your willingness to consider this work. I remain grateful for your encouragement and hope these essays will prove worthy of your time and thoughtful review.
Attached is the first essay in this series, which is:
With great respect,
Ted Hayes
aka Mr. Citizen Patriot
Founder, Justiceville
Agape-Shalom!