"No Titular Nobility"
by James Glaser
December 9, 2009

This is one of my rant and rave columns. Today, while listening to NPR on the way home, they had Senator Dick Durban on talking about President Obama going to Capital Hill on Sunday to push the Health Care bill. Durban described how the President had praised the Democrat Senators for making the sacrifice of working on the weekend. Then he said that people in public office will sacrifice their weekends for the public good.

That is probably when I started yelling at the radio. Give me a break! Senators actually work about 4 months a year, and they make who knows how much money above and below the table more than the average American.

On top of that, politicians become the titled nobility of America. You serve one term in Washington, and you are called Senator or Congressman, or Mr. President or Mr. Vice-president for the rest of your life. It doesn't matter that the Constitution specifically says there should be "No title of nobility."

If you are some sort of fat cat and give a lot of money to the Republicans or Democrats, the Party in power will reward you with an Ambassadorship to some country like maybe Granada, Haiti, or South Africa. Then for the rest of your life you have the title of Mr. or Madam Ambassador.

Here is a definition for Titular, followed by two quotes from our Constitution about Titles and Nobility.

Main Entry: tit•u•lar
Pronunciation: \'ti-chə-lər, 'tich-lər\
Function: adjective
Etymology: Latin titulus title
Date: 1611

1 a : existing in title only; especially : bearing a title derived from a defunct ecclesiastical jurisdiction (as an episcopal see) <a titular bishop> b : having the title and usually the honors belonging to an office or dignity without the duties, functions, or responsibilities <the titular head of a political party>
2 : bearing a title : titled
3 : of, relating to, or constituting a title <the titular hero of the play>

No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States: And no person holding any office or profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, or foreign state.

The above quotation comes from the constitution of the United States, but somehow we have ignored this part of Article 1 Section 9 for a long time now. The thought of our founding fathers that no American should be given a title was so important that they said it twice. Section 9 of the Constitution starts out with this paragraph:

Provision as to migration or importation of certain persons. Habeas Corpus, Bills of attainder, etc. Taxes, how apportioned. No export duty. No commercial preference. Money, how drawn from Treasury, etc. No titular nobility. Officers not to receive presents, etc.

In the past I have written about how we ignore so much the Constitution, I guess shouldn't expect that we would follow this part.

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