9/12 Project Book Reports

The Old "New Deal" Redux

2010-04-09T08:38:00.011-04:00

Franklin D. Roosevelt became President as the Great Depression was already in full swing. He had a plan however and nothing was going to keep him from implementing his New Deal with American society. People wrote letters decrying their circumstances with the expectation that he and his administration would elevate the country and bring it out of the financial morass it was mired in. He believed that his New Deal was the only solution. Many people were simply trying to survive and either couldn't or didn't have the available time it takes to express their opinions. It was the Depression after all and people were consumed with living from day to day. Today's current technology, the advance of private computing, the connectivity and availability of the Internet into a majority of households, has lent itself to providing a more robust forum of supporting and opposing views for a vast majority of people. FDR also used modern technology to his advantage as well and in that arena, during that time, he held all the cards. His preferred delivery method for communicating to the masses was the radio.

While FDR had really struggled to complete his education, he was certainly a person with the ability to speak to peoples' hearts and minds. It was this natural talent for public speaking that overcame his own shortcomings since he had no business acumen, nor had he been able to graduate from law school. His mastery of public speaking produced in many Americans a guarded believability of his intentions. Many regular folk listened to his promises with rapt attention during his Fireside Chats and were uplifted simply by his choice of words and inflections of tone and pitch. To his complete advantage, radio was one-way communication. Having this technical advantage allowed him to promote his "New Deal" directly to the people. To further his "New Deal" agenda, he instituted a group of professors from Columbia University that he called "The Brains Trust". This group was comprised of academic people who had proven their loyalty to his agenda, much like the group of "czars" that are currently advising President Obama. FDR needed these people to express his rhetoric into persuasive language that average Americans would then accept at face value and even support. These intellectual ideas, although completely hypothetical, were touted as fact. Roosevelt held firm to the belief, ignorant though it was, that to attain economic stability and social equality, only the intervention of the federal government into the private sector would succeed. Roosevelt believed it so firmly, he set out to prove it over the course of his four Presidential terms. Even though after two terms his own Treasury Secretary, Henry Morgantheau - who was also a close confidant - testified to the Ways and Means Committee in 1939 that "We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work", Roosevelt forged ahead. Decades later, upon reviewing the history of his actions in simple cause and effect rationality, his agenda failed to accomplish its goal of creating a more "just society".

The premise of FDR's "New Deal" was to provide relief for the needy, economic recovery, and financial reform. These are certainly erstwhile endeavors and they are no different at all from the progressive rhetoric Americans are hearing again today from modern Progressive politicians of both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. During those harsh, depressive times in the 1930s, there were many people who were truly in need; the economy had tanked, financial institutions had engaged in nefarious business practices and many people were completely destitute. Progressives jumped at the opportunity to correct what they believed were errors in the Constitution. As Roosevelt implemented his "New Deal", Americans garnered hope for the future. However, his policy did very little, if anything, to truly help Americans across the country. Much of the federal assistance was closely tied to states, districts, and cities that fully supported FDR and the progressive, "government knows best" Democratic Party. Far too many American tax dollars were distributed through his use of "patronage", thereby he was able to silence most of the real and valid opposition against his social engineering experiment. Times were hard, this cannot be denied, however many Americans at that time were also simply unaware of how one-sided the distribution of federal assistance truly was. Historical review of monetary distribution of funds reveals that most of the federal aid went directly to those areas that fully supported FDR and the Democratic Party.

The New Deal was full of snappy catch-phrases and laudable arguments that spoke directly to the emotions of many Americans. This same tactic has been and is being used once again on the American public. The recent Democratic Presidential campaign utilized our modern-day equivalent of radio; the Internet. It worked quite well for them, just as the radio worked for FDR and his New Deal. Progressives, just like FDR, fully believe that the federal government is entitled, not limited, and has the rights beyond the Constitution that enables the government to legislate in all areas of job creation, education, the economy and now ultimately, health-care. However, this is completely contradictory to the simple but profound wording of our U.S. Constitution and dismisses the Bill of Rights. These two founding documents of the United States were drafted and written in direct response to the insidious pervasiveness of a non-representative government mandating to each individual what types of taxes they must pay, to which religion was sanctioned by the government, to how justice would be derived and to whom would govern the Colonies through appointments rather than votes. These very real issues have now risen again only they have now come from within our United States branches of government and not from a monarchical government reigning from across an ocean.

The Internet, for now, is neutral, as was the radio when it was the new method of communicating with the multitudes. The World Wide Web was utilized to its fullest potential in our most recent Presidential election. It worked and worked well. Now, however, those who are principled in the fundamentals of freedom are the very people who have taken to the Internet, the radio, the newspapers and to their neighbors to have their voice be heard, not ignored. FDR was able to ignore dissent by silencing his critics in ways that simply cannot be accomplished in our now modern times. Today, many politicians ignore, dismiss and even vilify those Americans who believe in these personal fundamental rights. They do so at the peril of losing their political positions because the "Sleeping Giant" is now fully awake. For those who are still dreaming of a government-mandated Utopian society, be forewarned; life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are fundamental rights, not civil rights and Americans can recognize the differences. Americans do not want a New Deal Redux!

Intolerable Acts 2008-2009

2010-02-11T08:46:00.006-05:00

The Coercive/Intolerable Acts - Then and Now

Prior to the American Revolution, Britain's Parliament enacted sweeping legislation that was intended to not only restore order and function to the Massachusetts colony after the Boston Tea Party, but to also reinforce Britain's jurisdiction and rule of law over the rebellious American colonies. English governance believed that these acts, although criticized by some, would dampen the defiance of the colonies. The actions of these British laws caused the Port of Boston to be closed until payment was rendered to the East India Trading Company. This act was designed to compensate this shipping company for the tea they lost when the Bostonians threw it into the Harbor. The Quartering Act required regular folks to house and feed British soldiers whenever and where-ever the soldiers desired, even by force. The Administration of Justice Act allowed British who were governing or enforcing the law in the Colonies, to be given a change of venue if they were accused of crimes by the colonists (i.e., the regular folks). The Massachusetts Act further enraged the colonists by declaring that government officials would be appointed, rather than elected, by either the governor or by the King. All four of these acts were expected to bring the colonists into submission to the total rule of Great Britain. No longer was England going to leave the riches America had to offer to those who lived there, the colonists, nor were they going to allow the colonists to behave as if the Crown didn't exist. These acts, often called the Intolerable Acts, were the final blow to the colonists and thus, the First Continental Congress was formed and eventually led to the American Revolution. The result of the American Revolution was freedom from taxation without representation, the freedom to govern themselves and liberty for all.

Intolerable Acts 2008-2010

In November 2008, the US Congress passed the following legislation Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 commonly referred to as TARP:

"An Act To provide authority for the Federal Government to purchase and insure certain types of troubled assets for the purposes of providing stability to and preventing disruption in the economy and financial system and protecting taxpayers, to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide incentives for energy production and conservation, to extend certain expiring provisions, to provide individual income tax relief, and for other purposes."

This act is commonly referred to as the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act 2008 and was passed under the Bush Administration. This act led to further implementation of funding into a program designed to slow or halt foreclosures of mortgages. This additional funding is called TARP or Troubled Asset Relief Program.
Citizens were told by their elected officials that this Stimulus Act would ensure that financial institutions that were "too big to fail" would be able to secure their "troubled assets" with a government loan from the US Treasury and that credit would once again begin to flow. Within this act, additional legislation allowed for tax credits for energy and energy improvement. The energy referred to in this division of the TARP act applies only to renewable energy and electric hybrid vehicles. This act basically provides to some consumers an incentive to purchase these types of vehicles, while other consumers receive no benefits from this part of the legislation. This same act also allowed for approximately 20 million middle-class families to be kept from being hit by the Alternative Minimum Tax, a secondary tax code implemented in 1970. The AMT was originally passed in order to tax persons of such higher-income in the 1960's that under the regular tax code they were able to avoid paying any taxes. The secondary program called TARP allowed the US Treasury to purchase troubled or toxic assets (generally defined as any asset that has lost enough monetary value as to be deemed unrecoverable by any accounting principle - i.e., worthless), these assets being held in mortgage loans by banks and other financial institutions, in an effort to prevent these institutions from experiencing huge losses on their balance sheets. Once the trading of these toxic assets begins again, the Treasury expects that profits will be realized not only by these institutions and banks, but also the federal government itself.
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act 2009

This legislation is too vast to break down into a simple statement as to its full purpose. Its expected intention was to flood the economy with money for shovel-ready projects, extend unemployment benefits, reduce COBRA payments for the unemployed, create or save millions of jobs, provide tax credits to name a few of the anticipated and expected results of this legislation. Total funding for this particular bill when enacted was set at 787 billion dollars which has now been calculated to actually cost approx. 80 billion dollars more than original estimates for a total of 860 billion dollars. At the end of fiscal year 2009, approx. 20% of the total amount has been used. Additional claims of success include statements that anywhere from “thousands of jobs created or saved” and “1.5 million jobs created or saved” were made as recently as mid-January 2010. The TARP program is included within this legislative act as well as within the original stimulus act of 2008. This stimulus act provided the federal government with the funds to be able to purchase General Motors as well as Chrysler in order to prevent those manufacturers from losing more money in bankruptcy court. Close to 60 billion dollars was used for this effort with hopes that the 60% stake the federal government now holds in GM will be sold when GM regains profitability.

Cash for Clunkers Bill

This additional stimulus program was intended for car owners to receive 3500 - 4500 in credit towards the purchase of more fuel-efficient vehicles. The 1 billion dollar program was so successful that it was extended and more money was infused for a total cost of 3 billion dollars. The funds for this program were pulled from the Stimulus 2009 legislation. This bill specifically allowed those car-owners who could afford to purchase new automobiles the ability to trade in and purchase these vehicles far below asking price. Those left out of the bill were the first time buyers of these more fuel-efficient vehicles as well as those whose vehicles did not meet the requirements set forth by this legislation to qualify for the credit. In addition, the vehicles that were traded in under this bill could not be recycled for any use in repairing the vehicles still left on the road due to the lack of qualifying under this bill but must be destroyed.
Within the time span of one year, from November 2008 to November 2009, the federal government authorized the use of over 800 billion dollars to fund legislation that was expected to turn the American economy around by increasing employment rolls and creating the financial environment whereby the banks and financial institutions will begin lending again not only to small business, but across the board to perspective home-buyers, small-business owners and entrepreneurs.

Aren't these modern legislative Acts just as intolerable and coercive as those that brought about the revolution that freed us from British rule? Do we no longer live and learn from our mistakes or has history become so irrelevant that we now dismiss it at having no bearing on current events?

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America" was written in direct response to those intolerable and coercive acts the government that was once in power over the colonies and the federal government as the entity it is needs to be reminded that the power belongs to The People.

RfR: Of Means and Ends

2009-12-23T16:09:00.003-05:00

This chapter comprises a list of "rules pertaining to the ethics of means and ends" and uses examples from history instead of hypothetical situations to try to validate the rules. The following is the list and a couple of quotes from this chapter. I think it best you read the list and discuss with your book club(s) the pros/cons of each rule. Also try to determine whether the examples used to validate the rules is appropriate.

"To say that corrupt means corrupt the ends is to believe in the immaculate conception of ends and principles."

Ethics of means and ends:
1. One's concern with the ethics of means and ends varies inversely with one's personal interest in the issue.
2. The judgment of the ethics of means is dependent upon the political position of those sitting in judgment.
3. In war the end justifies almost any means.
4. Judgment must be made in the context of the times in which the action occurred and not from any other chronological vantage point.
5. Concern with ethics increases with the number of means available and vice versa.
6. The less important the end to be desired, the more one can afford to engage in ethical evaluations of means.
7. Generally success or failure is a mighty determinant of ethics.
8. The morality of a means depends upon whether the means is being employed at a time of imminent defeat or imminent victory.
9. Any effective means is automatically judged by the opposition as being unethical.
10. You do what you can with what you have and clothe it with moral garments.
11. Goals must be phrased in general terms like "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity," "Of the Common Welfare," "Pursuit of Happiness," or "Bread and Peace."

"[I]n action, one does not always enjoy the luxury of a decision that is consistent both with one's individual conscience and the good of mankind. The choice must always be for the latter."

RfR: The Purpose

2009-12-21T19:38:00.012-05:00

Science of Revolution

Alinsky claims there are few revolutionary writings which the Radicals "desperately" seek. They must turn to the writings of "communists, both red and yellow," instead. It's too bad there are no more copies of what our Founding Fathers read. You know, books from authors like Sir William Blackstone, John Locke or Thomas Hobbes, Adam Smith, Frederic Bastiat or Montesquieu, Polybius or Plutarch. Nor even could those poor "Have-Nots" find anything to read from those revolutionaries themselves. Well except for this, this and this. And this, this, and this, and this, and this, and this, or just get out your 5000 Year Leap book and turn to the bibliography.

He laments that revolution is synonymous with communism. (Too bad for him, he's not around in 2009 when communism seems to have lost its stigma.) Also, revolution is associated with war, but he wants to create a revolution between the "Haves" and "Have-Nots". Since the "Haves" um, have, all the power and guns I assume war is not possible in the Radical's revolution.

The Ideology of Change

The main reason why it is impossible to argue with a Statist schooled in the Alinsky program is because a Statist has no root principles. S.A. says an organizer "does not have a fixed truth - truth to him is relative and changing." Also to make the simple complex, S.A. believes that no action can have a determinate result, therefore it is unnecessary to assume that any action is good or bad: "It frees one from the myth that one approach is positive and another negative." Otherwise known as the "judge by intentions not consequences" law. This is how he can put Moses, Thomas Jefferson and Gandhi in the same class of "great world leaders" as Lenin, Castro, and Mao.

Class Distinctions: The Trinity

"A major revolution to be won in the immediate future is the dissipation of man's illusion that his own welfare can be separate from that of all others."

Remember S.A. says truth is relative, but believe him when he classifies the absolute truth of classes (the "Haves", "Have-Nots", and "Have-a-Little, Want Mores") and their roles in society, you know, because he's a realist. The class S.A. seems to disdain more than the "Haves" are the "Do-Nothings." It is his philosophy to constantly move toward the goal. One of those goals is to enlighten man that "interdependence of man [is] his major strength" and "man is his brother's keeper."

"The moral life is the only road to survival." However, it is the philosophy that we are our brother's keeper that S.A. finds to be the moral way to live. If we live by this maxim than the Statist concludes everyone will be "Haves." Never mind history shows that social-justice is just the predecessor of social-destruction. Read the true story of Thanksgiving.

RfR: Prologue

2009-12-21T18:30:00.001-05:00

The way to change our world

Alinsky claims there were few who survived the "McCarthy holocaust" though I say any number of Marxists/Communists who remains is too many.

A.D.D. Moment:
We conservatives may consider ourselves radical because we feel we're in the minority. However, any instance of the word radical in this book is a euphemism for Statist.

The main thesis of this book is change. And just like the '08 campaign rhetoric, there is no substance. It is change for the sake of change. How is this change to transpire? By working within the system and making the system appear broken and corrupt (see The Cloward-Piven Strategy). "[R]evolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change." Change is to happen by organizing. But the youth only, please. The older generations are out of touch and too stupid to understand. But as the devil understands, it takes time "to build a powerful organization," so patience is the key. Communication and keeping the pressure on are other key tactics to promote change.

The Statist's democratic ideal

"[T]he greatest enemy of individual freedom is the individual." There are seemingly innumerable evil phrases in this book. Try this one: "People cannot be free unless they are willing to sacrifice some of their interests to guarantee the freedom of others." Also, try out this next one where S.A. used de Tocqueville to prop up his words to warn citizens to remain active in self-government: "Citizen participation is the animating spirit and force in a society predicated on voluntarism." However, voluntary assumes an individual's choice, which is not the agenda of the Statist.

Change is the means. But what is the end game? What is the result of the Radicals' revolution of change? We conservatives know our end game, but hadn't until recently discovered the means or the strategy. So we organize and turn these strategies on the enemies of liberty.

Enjoy this inspiring message from Congressional Candidate Lieutenant Colonel Allen West

Cloward-Piven Strategy:
American Daughter
Discover The Networks.org
Check out this archived article on Required Volenteerism
and this one on a made-up holiday.

Free Will

2009-10-27T10:08:00.011-04:00

I believe in God and He is the Center of my Life.

As a Christian (of no particular denomination), I have been taught not to hate. But, I have to say that there are a couple of things that I actually hate. For instance, lying. I hate liars and lies and anything else evil. What else do I believe is evil? Communism. Why is Communism evil? Let's look at this from one of the political philosophers I turn to most (from my NIV Study Bible):

"This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him."
Deut 30:19-20

This is God pleading to his followers as they enter the promised land to remain devoted to his commandments. However, the followers are not coerced or forced to listen to the commandments of the Lord. This is the governance of the divine of which our founding fathers based the Constitution and was initially pronounced in the Declaration of Independence, that all men are created equal and free.

The political philosophy of our founders and the conservatives with whom it is still estimable, is in direct converse to Marx's philosophy. In fact communists would consider God (if they were to believe in Him) the ultimate oppressor in the hierarchy of social status. For the communist, it is the duty of every man to live for the benefit of everyone else, putting the self second. "I am my brother's keeper" and all of that. Now, doesn't that sound Christian in a sense? Or maybe it's been bred in us to sound Christian. Yet, I'm not sure the "brother's keeper" line is ever a statement in the bible. I am sure of this line, from Jesus in reference to Deuteronomy 6:13, "Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only" Matthew 4:10

I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable.

Communism stifles the individual and the choices he was designed to freely make. Where Christian service is an individual choice, the slaves under communist rule are forced to serve.

I am reminded of a quote from Ayn Rand,

"I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."

Can you imagine that an official or advisor of the White House of any preceding administration would ever make this statement:

We know that from reading The Forgotten Man that there were advisors with the President's attention that believed in communism, but would never have the audacity to publicly announce it.

Reagan's "Evil Empire" speech

Those of you in the National Association of Evangelicals are known for you spiritual and humanitarian work. And I would be especially remiss if I didn't discharge right now one personal debt of gratitude. Thank you for your prayers. Nancy and I have felt their presence many times in many years. And believe me, for us they've made all the difference.

The other day in the East Room of the White House at a meeting there, someone asked me whether I was aware of all the people out there who were praying for the President. And I had to say, "Yes, I am. I've felt it. I believe in intercessionary prayer." But I couldn't help but say to that questioner after he'd asked the question that - or at least say to them that if sometimes when he was praying he got a busy signal, it was just me in there ahead of him. I think I understand how Abraham Lincoln felt when he said, "I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go." From the joy and the good feeling of this conference, I go to a political reception. Now, I don't know why, but that bit of scheduling reminds me of a story - - which I'll share with you.

An evangelical minister and a politician arrived at Heaven's gate one day together. And St. Peter, after doing all the necessary formalities, took them in hand to show them where their quarters would be. And he took them to a small, single room with a bed, a chair, and a table and said this was for the clergyman. And the politician was a little worried about what might be in store for him. And he couldn't believe it then when St. Peter stopped in front of a beautiful mansion with lovely grounds, many servants, and told him that these would be his quarters.

And he couldn't help but ask, he said, "But wait, how-there's something wrong - how do I get this mansion while that good and holy man only gets a single room?" And St. Peter said, "You have to understand how things are up here. We've got thousands and thousands of clergy. You're the first politician who ever made it."

But I don't want to contribute to a stereotype. So I tell you there are a great many God-fearing, dedicated, noble men and women in public life, present company included. And yes, we need your help to keep us ever mindful of the ideas and the principles that brought us into the public arena in the first place. The basis of those ideals and principles is a commitment to freedom and personal liberty that, itself, is grounded in the much deeper realization that freedom prospers only where the blessings of God are avidly sought and humbly accepted.

The American experiment in democracy rests on this insight. Its discovery was the great triumph of our Founding Fathers, voiced by William Penn when he said: "If we will not be governed by God, we must be governed by tyrants." Explaining the inalienable rights of men, Jefferson said, "The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time." And it was George Washington who said that "of all the disposition and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supporters."

And finally, that shrewdest of all observers of American democracy, Alexis de Tocqueville, put it eloquently after he had gone on a search for the secret of America's greatness and genius - and he said: "Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits aflame with righteousness did I understand the greatness and the genius of America . . . America is good. And if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great."

Well, I'm pleased to be here today with you who are keeping America great by keeping her good. Only through your work and prayers and those of millions of others cans we hope to survive this perilous century and keep alive this experiment in liberty, this last, best hope of man.

I want you to know that this administration is motivated by a political philosophy that sees the greatness of America in you, here people, and in your families, churches, neighborhoods, communities - the institutions that foster and nourish values like concern for others and respect for the rule of law under God.

Now, I don't have to tell you that this puts us in opposition to, or at least out of step with, a prevailing attitude of many who have turned to a modern-day secularism, discarding the tried and time-tested values upon which our very civilization is based. No matter how well intentioned, their value system is radically different from that of most Americans. And while they proclaim that they're freeing us from superstitions of the past, they've taken upon themselves the job of superintending us by government rule and regulation. Sometimes their voices are louder than ours, but they are not yet a majority.

An example of that vocal superiority is evident in a controversy now going on in Washington. And since I'm involved I've been waiting to hear from the parents of young America. How far are they willing to go in giving to government their prerogatives as parents?

Let me state the case as briefly and simply as I can. An organization of citizens, sincerely motivated and deeply concerned about the increase in illegitimate births and abortions involving girls well below the age of consent, some time ago established a nationwide network of clinics to offer help to these girls and, hopefully, alleviate this situation. Now, again, let me say, I do not fault their intent. However, in their well-intentioned effort, these clinics have decided to provide advice and birth control drugs and devices to underage girls without the knowledge of their parents.

For some years now, the federal government has helped with funds to subsidize these clinics. In providing for this, the Congress decreed that every effort would be made to maximize parental participation. Nevertheless, the drugs and devices are prescribed without getting parental consent or giving notification after they've done so. Girls termed "sexually active" - and that has replaced the word "promiscuous" - are given this help in order to prevent illegitimate birth or abortion.

Well, we have ordered clinics receiving federal funds to notify the parents such help has been given. One of the nation's leading newspapers has created the term "squeal rule" in editorializing against us for doing this, and we're being criticized for violating the privacy of young people. A judge has recently granted an injunction against an enforcement of our rule. I've watched TV panel shows discuss the issue, seen columnists pontificating on our error, but no one seems to mention morality as playing a part in the subject of sex.

Is all of Judeo-Christian tradition wrong? Are we to believe that something so sacred can be looked upon as a purely physical thing with no potential for emotional and psychological harm? And isn't it the parents' right to give counsel and advice to keep their children from making mistakes that may affect their entire lives?

Many of us in government would like to know what parents think about this intrusion in their family by government. We're going to fight in the courts. The right of parents and the rights of family take precedence over those of Washington-based bureaucrats and social engineers.

But the fight against parental notification is really only one example of many attempts to water down traditional values and even abrogate the original terms of American democracy. Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant and the rule of law under God is acknowledged. When our Founding Fathers passed the First Amendment, they sought to protect churches from government interference. They never intended to construct a wall of hostility between government and the concept of religious belief itself.

The evidence of this permeates our history and our government. The Declaration of Independence mentions the Supreme Being no less than four times. "In God We Trust" is engraved on our coinage. The Supreme Court opens its proceedings with a religious invocation. And the members of Congress open their sessions with a prayer. I just happen to believe the schoolchildren of the United States are entitled to the same privileges as Supreme Court justices and congressmen.

Last year, I sent the Congress a constitutional amendment to restore prayer to public schools. Already this session, there's growing bipartisan support for the amendment, and I am calling on the Congress to act speedily to pass it and to let our children pray.

Perhaps some of you read recently about the Lubbock school case, where a judge actually ruled that it was unconstitutional for a school district to give equal treatment to religious and nonreligious student groups, even when the group meetings were being held during the students' own time. The First Amendment never intended to require government to discriminate against religious speech.

Senators Denton and Hatfield have proposed legislation in the Congress on the whole question of prohibiting discrimination against religious forms of student speech. Such legislation could go far to restore freedom of religious speech for public school students. And I hope the Congress considers these bills quickly. And with you help, I think it's possible we could also get the constitutional amendment through the Congress this year.

More than a decade ago, a Supreme Court decision literally wiped off the books of fifty states statutes protecting the rights of unborn children. Abortion on demand now takes the lives of up to one and a half million unborn children a year. Human life legislation ending this tragedy will someday pass the Congress, and you and I must never rest until it does. Unless and until it can be proven that the unborn child is not a living entity, then its right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness must be protected.

You may remember that when abortion on demand began, many, and indeed, I'm sure many of you, warned that the practice would lead to a decline in respect for human life, that the philosophical premises used to justify abortion on demand would ultimately be used to justify other attacks on the sacredness of human life - infanticide or mercy killing. Tragically enough, those warnings proved all too true. Only last year a court permitted the death by starvation of a handicapped infant.

I have directed the Health and Human Services Department to make clear to every health care facility in the United States that the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 protects all handicapped persons against discrimination based on handicaps, including infants. And we have taken the further step of requiring that each and every recipient of federal funds who provides health care services to infants must post and keep posted in a conspicuous place a notice stating that "discriminatory failure to feed and care for handicapped infants in this facility is prohibited by federal law." It also lists a twenty-four-hour, toll-free number so that nurses and others may report violations in time to save the infant's life.

In addition, recent legislation introduced in the Congress by Representative Henry Hyde of Illinois not only increases restrictions on publicly financed abortions, it also addresses this whole problem of infanticide. I urge the Congress to begin hearings and to adopt legislation that will protect the right of life to all children, including the disabled or handicapped.

Now, I'm sure that you must get discouraged at times, but you've done better than you know, perhaps. There's a great spiritual awakening in America, a renewal of the traditional values that have been the bedrock of America's goodness and greatness.

One recent survey by a Washington-based research council concluded that Americans were far more religious than the people of other nations; 95 percent of those surveyed expressed a belief in God and a huge majority believed the Ten Commandments had real meaning in their lives. And another study has found that an overwhelming majority of Americans disapprove of adultery, teenage sex, pornography, abortion, and hard drugs. And this same study showed a deep reverence for the importance of family ties and religious belief.

I think the items that we've discussed here today must be a key part of the nation's political agenda. For the first time the Congress is openly and seriously debating and dealing with the prayer and abortion issues&150;and that's enormous progress right there. I repeat: America is in the midst of a spiritual awakening and a moral renewal. And with your biblical keynote, I say today, "Yes, let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream."

Now, obviously, much of this new political and social consensus I've talked about is based on a positive view of American history, one that takes pride in our country's accomplishments and record. But we must never forget that no government schemes are going to perfect man. We know that living in this world means dealing with what philosophers would call the phenomenology of evil or, as theologians would put it, the doctrine of sin.

There is sin and evil in the world, and we're enjoined by Scripture and the Lord Jesus to oppose it with all our might. Our nation, too, has a legacy of evil with which it must deal. The glory of this land has been its capacity for transcending the moral evils of our past. For example, the long struggle of minority citizens for equal rights, once a source of disunity and civil war, is now a point of pride for all Americans. We must never go back. There is no room for racism, anti-Semitism, or other forms of ethnic and racial hatred in this country.

I know that you've been horrified, as have I, by the resurgence of some hate groups preaching bigotry and prejudice. Use the mighty voice of your pulpits and the powerful standing of your churches to denounce and isolate these hate groups in our midst. The commandment given us is clear and simple: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."

But whatever sad episodes exist in our past, any objective observer must hold a positive view of American history, a history that has been the story of hopes fulfilled and dreams made into reality. Especially in this century, America has kept alight the torch of freedom, but not just for ourselves but for millions of others around the world.

And this brings me to my final point today. During my first press conference as president, in answer to a direct question, I point out that, as good Marxist-Leninists, the Soviet leaders have openly and publicly declared that the only morality they recognize is that which will further their cause, which is world revolution. I think I should point out I was only quoting Lenin, their guiding spirit, who said in 1920 that they repudiate all morality that proceeds from supernatural ideas - that's their name for religion - or ideas that are outside class conceptions. Morality is entirely subordinate to the interests of class war. And everything is moral that is necessary for the annihilation of the old, exploiting social order and for uniting the proletariat.

Well, I think the refusal of many influential people to accept this elementary fact of Soviet doctrine illustrates a historical reluctance to see totalitarian powers for what they are. We saw this phenomenon in the 1930s. We see it too often today.

This doesn't mean we should isolate ourselves and refuse to seek an understanding with them. I intend to do everything I can to persuade them of our peaceful intent, to remind them that it was the West that refused to use its nuclear monopoly in the forties and fifties for territorial gain and which now proposes a 50-percent cut in strategic ballistic missiles and the elimination of an entire class of land-based, intermediate-range nuclear missiles.

At the same time, however, they must be made to understand we will never compromise our principles and standards. We will never give away our freedom. We will never abandon our belief in God. And we will never stop searching for a genuine peace. But we can assure none of these things America stands for through the so-called nuclear freeze solutions proposed by some.

The truth is that a freeze now would be a very dangerous fraud, for that is merely the illusion of peace. The reality is that we must find peace through strength.

I would agree to freeze if only we could freeze the Soviets' global desires. A freeze at current levels of weapons would remove any incentive for the Soviets to negotiate seriously in Geneva and virtually end our chances to achieve the major arms reductions which we have proposed. Instead, they would achieve their objectives through the freeze.

A freeze would reward the Soviet Union for its enormous and unparalleled military buildup. It would prevent the essential and long overdue modernization of United States and allied defenses and would leave our aging forces increasingly vulnerable. And an honest freeze would require extensive prior negotiations on the systems and numbers to be limited and on the measures to ensure effective verification and compliance. And the kind of a freeze that has been suggested would be virtually impossible to verify. Such a major effort would divert us completely from our current negotiations on achieving substantial reductions.

A number of years ago, I heard a young father, a very prominent young man in the entertainment world, addressing a tremendous gathering in California. It was during the time of the cold war, and communism and our own way of life were very much on people's minds. And he was speaking to that subject. And suddenly, though, I heard him saying, "I love my little girls more than anything -" And I said to myself, "Oh, no, don't. You can't - don't say that." But I had underestimated him. He went on: "I would rather see my little girls die now, still believing in God, than have them grow up under communism and one day die no longer believing in God."

There were thousands of young people in that audience. They came to their feet with shouts of joy. They had instantly recognized the profound truth in what he had said, with regard to the physical and the soul and what was truly important.

Yes, let us pray for the salvation of all of those who live in that totalitarian darkness - pray they will discover the joy of knowing God. But until they do, let us be aware that while they preach the supremacy of the state, declare its omnipotence over individual man, and predict its eventual domination of all peoples on the earth, they are the focus of evil in the modern world.

It was C.S. Lewis who, in his unforgettable Screwtape Letters, wrote: "The greatest evil is not done now in those sordid 'dens of rime' that Dickens loved to paint. It is not even done in concentration camps and labor camps. In those we see its final result. But it is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do no need to raise their voice."

Well, because these "quiet men" do no "raise their voices," because they sometimes speak in soothing tones of brotherhood and peace, because, like other dictators before them, they're always making "their final territorial demand," some would have us accept them as their word and accommodate ourselves to their aggressive impulses. But if history teaches anything, it teaches that simpleminded appeasement or wishful thinking about our adversaries is folly. It means the betrayal of our past, the squandering of our freedom.

So, I urge you to speak our against those who would place the United States in a position of military and moral inferiority. You know, I've always believed that old Screwtape reserved his best efforts for those of you in the church. So, in your discussions of the nuclear freeze proposals, I urge you to beware the temptation of pride - the temptation of blithely declaring yourselves above it all and label both sides equally at fault, to ignore the facts of history and the aggressive impulses of an evil empire, to simply call the arms race a giant misunderstanding and thereby remove yourself from the struggle between right and wrong and good and evil.

I ask you to resist the attempts of those who would have you withhold your support for our efforts, this administration's efforts, to keep America strong and free, while we negotiate real and verifiable reductions in the world's nuclear arsenals and one day, with God's help, their total elimination.

While America's military strength is important, let me add here that I've always maintained that the struggle now going on for the world will never be decided by bombs or rockets, by armies or military might. The real crisis we face today is a spiritual one; at root, it is a test of moral will and faith.

Whittaker Chambers, the man whose own religious conversation made him a witness to one of the terrible traumas of our time, the Hiss-Chambers case, wrote that the crisis of the Western world exists to the degree in which the West is indifferent to God, the degree to which it collaborates in communism's attempt to make man stand alone without God. And then he said, for Marxism-Leninism is actually the second-oldest faith, first proclaimed in the Garden of Eden with the words of temptation, "Ye shall be as gods."

The Western world can answer this challenge, he wrote, "but only provided that its faith in God and the freedom He enjoins is as great as communism's faith in Man."

I believe we shall rise to the challenge. I believe that communism is another sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose last pages even now are being written. I believe this because the source of our strength in the quest for human freedom is not material, but spiritual. And because it knows no limitation, it must terrify and ultimately triumph over those who would enslave their fellow man. For in the words of Isaiah: "He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might He increased strength . . . But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary . . . "

Yes, change your world. One of our Founding Fathers, Thomas Paine, said, "We have it within our power to begin the world over again." We can do it, doing together what no one church could do by itself.

God bless you, and thank you very much.

On Rumour - How Rumour Ruined America

2009-10-13T10:13:00.000-04:00

Recently, Cass R. Sunstein, a noted Harvard College graduate in the fields of constitutional law, administrative law, environmental law and behavioural economics, wrote this book “On Rumors – How Falsehoods Spread, Why We Believe Them, What Can Be Done”. This poor man must believe everything he sees reads and hears because he sure isn’t living in reality. What is truly astounding is that this individual is also Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. This information on its own may not seem very threatening, until the facts of this person are revealed. Facts are simply NOT rumours.

Mr. Sunstein begins his book explaining about rumours and how long they have been around historically. Almost everyone knows what rumour is and why it spreads. The definition of rumour is quickly learned by most people. Clear-thinking people want to know what facts are or what theory is. Rumour is a statement based on a perception, and then spoken to another individual who then explains that same statement, but in their own words. This result is then that person’s perception of the original statement. The premise behind the rumour is twisted and warped by the time it reaches the end of the chain. The last individual in the chain may then have a completely different perspective of that original statement. This perspective is then completely in error. For the most part, the results will be circular reasoning. Circular reasoning is simply another phrase for rumour.

Since Cass Sunstein references many tipping points in his book, he is correct that tipping points with rumours are reached. His fear is that a tipping point is near, but his assumptions are not based in reality, but the rumours that have spread for far too long in America.

The Original Statement

Our Constitution is the statement. For several years, this statement stood as truth after the American Revolution.

The Rumour

At some point in Americas’ history, this statement was read by an individual who must not have understood the simple words that are clearly evident to most Americans who love this country as much as they love their families. Once that individual began his campaign to convince others that his perception was correct and that the Constitution contained errors, the rumour began to spread. Others were convinced and began using this rumour to convince others they were also correct in their assumptions. Based in part on the ability to create Amendments, our Congress and Senate (our government) applied these perceptions and enacted legislation that was based in circular reasoning (rumour). For decades, Amendments have been upheld by Supreme Court justices, many of whom based their decisions on this circular reasoning.

The Results of Rumour

The most recent, objectionable ruling was the Supreme Court in April, 2009 who upheld that the Environmental Protection Agency had the right to utilize cost-benefit-analysis when making environmental decisions. Since the rumour began many, many years ago, the federal government believed it had the right to shut off water to the farmers in the San Joaquin Valley to save a little minnow. This minnow was saved by the water being turned off, yet this little minnow simply swims through the river to reach its destination, the ocean. There, this little minnow dies. This was the purpose of the minnow swimming down the river in the first place. To reach the ocean so it could die in the ocean. America, we paid for this little fish to reach the ocean to die.

The Results of the Rumour

In this instance, the solution is so very evident. Turn the water back on.

Yet, this appears to be impossible. Instead of using simple, factual logic, the government adheres to the Supreme Court decision. This decision is not based in logic, but based on man-made legislation. This then is the conundrum. Does our government uphold the law that is now harming people in California? By upholding this law these farmers are watching their crops turn to dust and wither away, unemployment is around 40% in that area. Additionally, since California’s crops produce close to 12% of Americas’ produce (fruits and vegetables) other people in America will be suffering very soon. Lack of produce and when there is produce, it will be extremely expensive. How valuable is the American dollar today?

It cannot be understood by a hard-working, intelligent American who loves their families, believes in individual choice, how America has arrived at this scenario. The agency in charge of watching the environment has turned into the manager of the environment. No agency, no government can ever “manage” the environment. Nor can cost-benefit-analysis be used in making decisions of that magnitude. God and Nature manage that, even if humanity ignores its own progress.

Ultimately, the tipping point is being reached quicker and quicker as each day passes. The absurdity of the reports of news is impacting all Americans. Decisions cannot be made quickly because we’ve become a nation of “Law and Order”. The Constitutional Confusion is reigning supreme and the rumours that began a long time ago in our nation are becoming evident. Clear-thinking Americans MUST realize this, recognize where the Amendments were made in error and correct this enormous mistake. Our Constitution, our faith, our principles and values demand it be corrected.

If we want to remain free people.

Liberty vs Tyranny

2009-10-11T14:34:00.000-04:00

Have I been shirking my responsibility in writing about Liberty & Tyranny? Ummm Yep. And I'm sorry for that. But I have a few things I would like to get off my chest.

Here is my thesis:
It has become increasingly evident that conservatism wins in the arena of ideas.

Does it bother you that you are labeled as Nazis and racists? Should it bother you? Well, somewhere deep inside of me screams "Yes!" I feel I must defend myself.

Why do conservatives have to keep defending themselves?

I am NOT a racist!

But consider why we are called bigots of every variety. It's because we have the winning argument. By calling us racists, the Statists are in essence on the one hand ceding the point, on the other merely projecting.

The Statist will claim conservatives have no constructive argument of our own, but nothing can be further from the truth. For us the answers are simple, because the answers are rooted in deep principled beliefs. However, here is the crux. Where conservatives' ideas are "simple" we have to work hard to formulate them, because we use history and experience as our guide and logic and knowledge as our tools. Antithesis to this method, the Statist uses his feelings and "good intentions" to promote ideas.

Consider the "stimulus" package, the troop withdrawal from Iraq, the release of prisoners from Gitmo, and the Cap-and-Trade and Health-care proposals. All these are devises of the Statist and have certain things in common. All are plans without thought to consequences and all are an attempt to unmake the reasons why this country has always prospered and led on the world stage. In their world, results don't matter. So damn the consequences and damn the USA. It's about power and that's it. These elitists think of us in the non-political class as ignorant and too stupid to run our own lives.

So when we, the silent majority begin to speak up, they 1. aren't used to it and don't know how to react and 2. react in the only way someone without principles and reason can react. Call us RAAAAACISTS.

Here are some more RAAAAACISTS!!!
h/t Other McCain for the nomenclature of racism
Another Black Conservative
Magic Negro Watch
Mary Baker
Booker Rising
My Voice on the Wings of Change
Star Parker
Joseph C. Phillips
Zo Rachel
Truth From A Non-Hyphenated American
Wait... those are Conservative, Black <gasp!> bloggers and writers!

Assault on Intelligence and The Constitution

2009-09-22T07:38:00.015-04:00

While learning of Americas' history, most children and young people were given The Constitution to read and then write about what they had then read. The essays were the simple method the teacher used to determine whether students read and understood what the words meant to each of us. The majority of the students understood exactly what The Constitution was intended for. It was a document for future generations of Americans to read, understand and adhere to for our freedoms to remain intact.

We are intelligent people. We listen to the news reports from the press. People hear news on television broadcasts, cable channels or radio broadcasts. We also read newspapers and magazines. We look at the headlines on the New York Times, or other major papers. Most of us read the first pages, or watch and listen to the top stories. Those top stories are what the editors believe is the most important news for the people. That is the nature of news - information someone else believes is the most important news for the people. Yet, our intelligence is continually assaulted by what we hear and read because our American press has forgotten we are still here. This insult is enhanced further when the Internet, the major mass communication vehicle, is also used by not only the press, but those who believe the press. There is little regard to maintaining the human aspect when words are bereft of human intellect and only presented with human emotions. This is, by it's very nature, how the Internet operates. It is impersonal by its very nature. Unless the facts can speak for themselves, the meanings of the written words are overcome by the writers who allow their own personal feelings to creep into the articles or dialogues. So what mechanism to we turn to to find out what is taking place in the world around us? People are turning to other people who share common sense, positive human emotions and the human instinct of the search for truthful information, also called knowledge.

Throughout the last several years, even longer, we've been receiving more fiction than fact from our press. This is the reason so many news outlets are failing. It is also the reason we no longer pick up the major newspapers in any attempt to read the news stories. We simply want the facts presented to us so that we may form our own, intelligent decision about the information being presented as news that is happening around us. We know what misinformation is and this is misinformation.

At what time in America did this happen when the news is no longer the news, but opinions of the facts being presented as news? It’s been a slow, yet inevitable progression that has finally reached its pinnacle.

Our President made the rounds of the Sunday morning commentary shows. He was on more than 5 different channels, which ones they were really do not matter. Yet he declined an interview with Fox News. Why would he, our President, avoid answering questions by a man, respected by many people, who simply had questions to ask of our President? Could it be that President Obama may realize he isn’t going to convince clear-thinking, logical people that any proposed healthcare reform legislation is unacceptable? It appears he is unwilling to talk to those who pay taxes and are responsible adults. During his Sunday morning interviews, the President mentions the 30-47 million souls whom are either not insured or are underinsured, whether by choice or financial reasons. He tries to explain that it is all due to the rising costs of healthcare. Why are they rising? Would it possibly have anything to do with government legislation that has stifled our free market? Rising costs are due to government control of our wealth, not our taxes. It’s the nature of our economics and no force of government can truly stop that engine. The exception would be the fundamental transformation of our country we call America. Change we are expected to believe in.

We should be spending time with our families and friends, but we can no longer afford the time to devote it wholly to our families. Not when our lives, the lives of our children and the lives of future generations are truly at stake. We are simple, but highly intelligent people. We love and honor our freedom, what little we have left of it. This is what we give ourselves as Americans. No government, not even America, ever gives freedom to its people. Our government, from the time our Founding Fathers wrote our Constitution, has failed its people by slowly eradicating the meaning of the words that are the very basis of our government. This is a living document; however, it's words live in our hearts, minds and finally, as we have matured as humanity, our instincts. How could this document ever change if we the people haven’t changed in our pursuit of life, liberty and happiness?

The Question That Isn't Being Answered

2009-09-17T07:26:00.014-04:00

From the time we are able to form sounds into words (language) as infants growing into children, questions are always asked by human beings. That is our nature. It is the answers to these questions that allow a child to begin filtering those responses into meaningful knowledge. This knowledge is more than just knowledge, it must be passed on from child to child, generation to generation. As this process transpires, language is built, knowledge is enhanced and common sense (the collective wisdom of humanity) grows. The baby-talk reaches our ears from that childs' voice and we are happy to be hearing these noises. But when an actual word is heard, we are amazed, pleased and proud. We finally recognize with our mind and sense of hearing that this child is learning language. We then brace ourselves for what comes next - the all-encompassing question......Why?
When the child asks this, the parents' minds begin to sift through the knowledge they have in attempts to answer that question. As we begin to answer Why? for the child, we realize that there is always more than one answer for Why?

How does the simple question of asking Why? ever change for the child? The natural curiousity all humans experience from birth is inherent to our nature, whether young or old. Does that natural curiousity get dampened by nature or nurture? Or is it from outside influences (society) that have convinced people that society (by definition today it has been created by our government) knows what is better for the child? The results of all this external influence on the family and children is that now, people who are asking Why? are not receiving the answers that satisfy the nature of the question, Why?

Most of the time, a single response to the question Why? simply doesn't satisfy the curiousity of the child. If the child receives an answer that doesn't resolve the question in the childs' mind, that question is asked over and over and over again. This is true up to the point the child either gives up because the question is not answered to that childs' satisfaction (human instinct) or the parents give up on the attempt to answer. The child perceives this and the natural curiousity is dampened. If numerous answers are provided to the question, Why?, the child will then reflect on all those different responses and begin questioning Why? all through life.

All clear-thinking people never stop asking Why? and are now wondering "How did our government arrive at this time in history where our elected politicians provide simple one-statement responses to our questions of Why?"

Why must we pay for healthcare for all?

Why must we pay for companies too big to fail?

Why must we accept the idealogy of one political party or the other?

Why have we accepted the lesser of the two evils when electing a person whom we expect will guide us through the next four years? Did his words convince all of us? Or was it due to the fact that he was provided with enough money to spread his word? That his message was full of hope and change which convinced some people that only he knew how to solve their life problems of water, food and shelter?

Why has our government reached the point where it believes it must always DO SOMETHING rather than leave us, we the people, alone to simply live our lives as we were intended by nature to do? Do laws allow us to live? Or must we constantly wonder which law we break each and everyday in our attempts to provide ourselves with our basic needs? Are we truly a nation of "Law and Order" where we now dampen our human instincts, yet promote the fallibility of human emotion so that now we only know how to live by rule of laws?

There are many, many questions that over the decades have never been answered satisfactorily to the people. Our time in history has proven this statement to be accurate and true.
Isn't it time to start asking the real question, Why? When this question can be answered, to the satisfaction of the majority of people, the time will be that we will move forward, as a nation, and our country will be ours again. By the people, for the people.

The Tipping Point is Now

2009-09-07T17:31:00.015-04:00

Malcolm Gladwell has described a Tipping Point as “How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference”. Author of the book titled The Tipping Point, his example of a tipping point is based on the use of the word, epidemic. That much can be seen today with the current named influenza virus called H1N1 (formerly called swine flu...).

This influenza is a real epidemic; it has spread too quickly for anyone to believe otherwise. The moment we realized it was being carried on the wind quicker than we hoped, this is when epidemic status was attained. It must be noted, however, this influenza strain has not yet proved itself to be as fatal as the annual ritual of our influenza season.

Justice is another basis for an example of a tipping point. The Scales of Justice are balanced by Opposition and Support usually held in Lady Justices’ left hand. Her other hand holds the sword that is symbolic of Reason and Justice. These concepts that lead to what we know is Justice have lasted, throughout civilizations around the world, from the time of the Gods through today. The true balance of these scales has not been altered, simply our perception of Justice.

We haven’t yet realized this.
The scales are accurate; however, the weight is distributed unevenly on both sides.

Justice, as we all know, is also blind, not just a balance. Justice cannot see skin color, it cannot see human emotion, and Justice can only hear the arguments being presented by both the Opposition and the Supporter. The loss of the one sense, sight, limits Justice to using only what she can hear as well as all the wisdom she has gained over history. Our government, from decades ago till today, has tipped her scales in their favour, not ours, we the people. Reason and Justice are warped and this is evident if we truly admit this to ourselves. We can admit this only when we see for ourselves, with open eyes, the situation we as people, in this lifetime, find ourselves in.

We’ve simply reached our tipping point in America and must realize this.

We’re wrapped up once more with the progressive nature of humanity, tethered to those who believe themselves to be representative of us. They are failing us once more and we know this. Some are holding to their firm convictions that the administration they believe they placed into power, are working to (change) restore our country. These convictions are simply ideals and are empty of humanity. Our values and principles are the force behind our humanity. This is the true will of the people. Most of us are busy about our lives, which is as it should be. Yet we are also aware that something is tipping, something is off balance. It didn’t happen overnight, although it feels as if it did. It’s simply escalated in the last 9 months, although it’s been happening all of our lives.

We must be paying closer attention before we ask ourselves, what happened? Our tipping point is here. Reason and Justice must prevail again before only Opposition and Support become the basis for our free will – the direction the scales are tipping towards in September 2009, A.D. (A.C.E)

Common Sense and Human Instinct

2009-09-01T15:06:00.004-04:00

Thomas Paine wrote about Common Sense many years ago – so long ago in fact, that we do not know of any one who was there at the time. The basic premise is that Common Sense applied appropriately by clear-thinking people will provide us by its very nature, the freest and best life possible. Thomas Paine understood what Common Sense truly is and wrote Common Sense. Our Founding Fathers understood his writings and wrote the Constitution. We as people lost much of our common sense somewhere in the course of our history. Now, we are all fighting for our very lives. But, we were warned.

We ask, "How did this happen to us?"

It was one law and one only, personal income tax. How does Common Sense apply to this American law?

No government that is by the people, for the people can ever place a monetary value on the work that any person or persons either can or can’t perform. The person sets that value and either accepts the offer of financial gains for the work performed and never the other way around. Common Sense and Human Instinct tells us this.
People have become so frustrated with their lives, never having time for what they know is important in life, but feeling helpless because they constantly feel like they cannot reach their goals. Generations past allowed our government to take a portion of our earnings, which we know is our time, called it a temporary tax and convinced the people that they were going to use it for our “general welfare”. I’m sure it all sounded pretty good to them. Common Sense simply didn't prevail. Those generations believed their politicians. We today are all now paying the price for that folly. We’re fighting for our very lives now that our government believes it can provide the best life (healthcare) to us.
Thomas Paine recognized Common Sense as the intellectual thread that binds humanity; our Founding Fathers used that Common Sense. They wrote our Constitution.
Thomas Paine understood the deep value of what that little phrase means – Common Sense. It’s a sense we all have and we share it as Americans. We’ve realized that instead of them doing what we tell them we want them to do, they are telling us what we need and that only they (our government) can give it to us. They are, however, just politicians and no one special. They have no inherent birthright. Education is simply knowledge and does not reflect wisdom. They may speak well to people, but they don’t speak for the people. We listen to them with great confidence at times and great trepidation at times. A few of us now believe their last hope has arrived and must rely for their very lives on our government. These few who are so confused, their lives are just a mess; they just want someone to help because they do need help. Instead of relying on family, friend, neighbour and community, they foolishly believe they can elect someone to give them that help. That’s very sad since it reflects lack of Common Sense.

However, we were warned by Thomas Paine even before our Constitution was written.

Liberal Fascism - It's really here

2009-08-31T20:28:00.011-04:00

Education… Just the word invokes thoughts of reading, writing, and of course, arithmetic. Not so long ago, children in school would have also included thoughts of play time as well. Now, most children do not exhibit positive enthusiasm when they are informed it’s time for “Back to School”. That enthusiasm is also lacking with the parents, although they stoically push that nagging feeling to the back of their minds and still continue to place their children, their trust, into our public school system.

Liberal Fascism…Sufficient to say, this term has actually been around a very, very long time, but not as the phrase we read today. Jonah Goldberg references that H.G. Wells was the first person in “modern” history to coin that particular phrase. Wells must have struggled with his life growing up. He suffered in pain over a broken leg at the young age of 8 (1874) as well as having parents who could not agree to disagree, being only human and having emotions as we all do. Once his parents were no longer together in life, Wells drifted here and there. A job here, an odd job there, but all of those jobs seem to be a form of manual-skilled labor. Wells, being the thinker he was yearned for an education. But, his education had already begun. He’d learned how to read when he had his broken leg. From that point in his life, he never stopped reading. In fact, his love for reading is what led to the great books he did write. His imaginations, fictions and other musings were based in solid life experiences. His perceptions were developed throughout his life as we all do as human beings.

His words (thoughts) played so well together, they flowed onto the pages. His writings were then read down through generations. Yet, instead of reading the thoughts of a brilliantly self-educated man, his words were no longer taken at face value. They were picked apart, piece by piece in a vain attempt at defining what was being read instead of the simple understanding that words are words. It only takes the human mind to interpret those words. But, the human mind tends to focus more on the meaning of the word, rather than the word itself. This limitation is the sole reason humans have common sense.

Common sense is the sum of knowledge gained by humanity over long periods of time.

Liberal fascism occurs when a person truly has no education.

Education is simply not just facts, numbers and additional information; it is what the mind does with all that knowledge. Too much knowledge without introspective human thought is total lack of wisdom. Knowledge is only gained when the age of reasoning occurs, but reason only prevails with knowledge. If the two do not balance, we have a lot of people that will speak and reference others writings (thoughts) as having total validity and will live their own lives based on those assumptions. Yet, even those without what we now call education, they tend to live simpler, self-sufficient lives without all the added information that they simply cannot fit in their own lives.

First, we must understand education. Can it be measured by whether a child retains certain dates and times of historic events? Is it how that child learns the method to solve some mathematical equation? Or is it the child learning to apply that knowledge of dates and time when a past event transpired, which then allows that child to understand it in the context of the present? If that is education, then how can we say that we haven’t been failing our young children for a very long time?

My parents, other family members all taught me what a family is, what it means to have friends and to keep those you love in your life. It was my mother, who loved me, that taught me to read before I ever attended 1st grade in a public school back in 1966. From the time I grasped what the written words could tell me, I never looked back at any point in my life and told myself, I’ve failed. Not by my standards, ever.
That is the true quality of a good, solid and well-rounded education. Once those values are taught to children, they will never lose this for the rest of their lives. It never left me, no matter what I was able to do, or not do in my life.
Can these values and knowledge truly be taught in a liberal fascist society? Of course not. That requires a free society that allows its parents to be parents. A free society will be able to exactly pinpoint a fault in the education system. That fault could then be resolved, without legislation that attempts to promote, but fails. If our children are being educated in a free society, how is it that there are more and more children who are truly failing, then falling through the cracks in our society? Liberal fascism?

What is it our children are being taught then through the public school system? Do we want them to gain knowledge that allows us as humans to understand other people, communicate with other people and to discuss the very words we read? Or, do we leave even more of them behind to languish in the environment they live in because well-intentioned people (liberal fascists/progressives) believe they have the solution to poverty? Yes, a good education results in success.
Poverty levels, a governments’ measure of success or failure, have only been increased by our very own government. I’ve lived below “the poverty line” a few times in my life, but never, ever felt like I was in poverty. Did Wells? Lack of adequate finances is simply not poverty. The working poor-class becomes poverty-stricken when there is no hope of overcoming the frustration and despair of living in America without real education. Liberal fascism, anyone?

These principles simply cannot ever be taught by anyone other than family, friends and community. If we must ask that basic question regarding our childrens’ education, this is the only question that must be asked and answered. The government has made its futile attempts at solutions, but is failing and will continue miserably in its attempts to accomplish those goals. The reason is simple and truthful. The government may be made up of people, but it’s been far too long that it hasn’t been a government by the people, for the people. The liberal fascism that has bubbled below the surface for literally decades is now being revealed. That fact is as true as knowing the air I breathe keeps me alive. Impossible standards now apply since those standards do not address the variance of the individual as they attempt to learn through the current “liberally fascistic” teaching process. The result will be catastrophic. This lack of educated people will actually escalate due in large part to the legislation called “No Child Left Behind”. It’s been made to all sound very good and necessary for America, but values and principles simply cannot be legislated. The birth of liberal fascism begins at some point in any free society and our version of fascism is already getting older.

Jonah Goldberg made this statement recently in response to some of the “Nazi” rhetoric swirling in the media currently. He was referring to liberal fascism:

“That sort of system could seduce Americans into becoming chestless subjects of the State in exchange for bottomless self-gratification and liberation from the necessity of adult decision-making.”
Link

How can any person with common sense and human instinct, not truly understand that liberal fascism has already gained control of the education of our young peoples’ minds?

“I will never let my schooling interfere with my education” – Mark Twain

Federalist Paper #1

2009-08-27T11:05:00.005-04:00

Alexander Hamilton, under the pen name “Publius” begins the Federalist Papers by discussing the topics which will be covered within the articles while also warning Americans about allowing other individuals to influence their judgment and thoughts on the Constitution.

Publius begins by asking Americans to consider the newly written constitution from the convention in Philadelphia. After the experience of an ineffectual and inefficient federal government under the Articles of Confederation, Publius calls on his audience to necessarily consider this new constitution for the preservation of the Union. It is left to the people of the Nation, as it has always been, to deliberate this new government which the Convention had placed before them. “…it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country…to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force.”[1] The question of the ratification of the new constitution lay before the people of America, and if America were to make the wrong choice, it may be seen as “the general misfortune of mankind.”[2]

Publius warns Americans that there may be individuals who are opposed to the new constitution because they are in positions of power, and do not wish to limit their existing power, or those who wish to see a weak central government. He calls on Americans to deliberate and weigh this new document with unbiased reasoning for the common good and for the preservation of the Union. He also warns that “a torrent of angry malignant passions will be let loose.”[3] Much of this passion may come from a love for America, from errors within their understanding of the Constitution, as well as a fear of beginning anew. “It will be equally forgotten that the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty” and that “History will teach us that [dangerous ambition] has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than [a zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government], and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants.”[4]

After warning of those who speak against the new Constitution and warning them about what may occur if it is not passed, Publius then tells his audience truthfully that he believes that they ought to adopt this new constitution, He openly tells the audience that he truly feels this is the right path for America. He openly says this, adding that he will be straightforward about his feelings from the start and that anyone who disagrees will be able to critique his arguments. “My arguments will be open to all and may be judged by all. They shall at least be offered in a spirit which will not disgrace the cause of truth.”[5]

Publius then outlines the topics of the articles that he will write:
- The utility of the Union to your political prosperity.
- The insufficiency of the present Confederation to preserve that Union.
- The necessity of a government at least equally energetic with the one proposed, to the attainment of this object.
- The conformity of the proposed Constitution to the true principles of republican government.
- Its analogy to your own State constitution.
- The additional security which its adoption will afford to the preservation of that species of government, to liberty, and to property.[6]
Publius also states that along with the points he outlined, the articles will also cover arguments from those opposed to the new constitution along the way.

Hamilton or “Publius” ends this first article by discussing the rumor that there is no way one federal government can form a Union among these States and varied regions of America. So, the first argument to be addressed is the necessity of a Union of States “for nothing can be more evident to those who are able to make an enlarged view of the subject than the alternative of an adoption of the new Constitution or a dismemberment of the Union.”[7] It is with this subject that Publius begins article two.

[1] Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay. The Federalist Papers. Ed. Rossiter, Clinton and Intro. Kesler, Charles R (New York: Signet Classic, 1999), p. 27.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid, p. 29.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid, p. 30.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Ibid, p. 31.

Common Sense: Appendix

2009-08-25T16:10:00.004-04:00

"What is strangely astonishing, perfect Independence contending for dependence."

At the time of the Revolution, America was held together by a weak Continental Congress with little authority. You can picture Thomas Paine reflecting on how surreal it was to live in a completely free society, without law, or government. Yet this was testimony to the fact that man can live in a society with unbridled freedom. Why was this a surreal opportunity? "The instance is without precedent; the case never existed before ... We have every opportunity and every encouragement before us, to form the noblest purest constitution on the face of the earth." Because of the sacrifice of the men and women who endured and those who died in the American Revolution we have a system more noble than any ever created on earth.

"We have it in our power to begin the world over again."

This section contains many great quotable passages. Here is another one: "We neither mean to set up nor to put down, neither to make nor to unmake, but to have nothing to do with them." Who/What is the "them" that we want nothing to do with in our current situation?

Full Text...

SINCE the publication of the first edition of this pamphlet, or rather, on the same day on which it came out, the king's speech made its appearance in this city. Had the spirit of prophecy directed the birth of this production, it could not have brought it forth at a more seasonable juncture, or at a more necessary time. The bloody-mindedness of the one, shows the necessity of pursuing the doctrine of the other. Men read by way of revenge. And the speech, instead of terrifying, prepared a way for the manly principles of independence.

Ceremony, and even silence, from whatever motives they may arise, have a hurtful tendency when they give the least degree of countenance to base and wicked performances, wherefore, if this maxim be admitted, it naturally follows, that the king's speech, IS being a piece of finished villany, deserved and still deserves, a general execration, both by the Congress and the people.

Yet, as the domestic tranquillity of a nation, depends greatly on the chastity of what might properly be called NATIONAL MANNERS, it is often better to pass some things over in silent disdain, than to make use of such new methods of dislike, as might introduce the least innovation on that guardian of our peace and safety. And, perhaps, it is chiefly owing to this prudent delicacy, that the king's speech hath not before now suffered a public execution. The speech, if it may be called one, is nothing better than a wilful audacious libel against the truth, the common good, and the existence of mankind; and is a formal and pompous method of offering up human sacrifices to the pride of tyrants.

But this general massacre of mankind, is one of the privileges and the certain consequences of kings, for as nature knows them not, they know not her, and although they are beings of our own creating, they know not us, and are become the gods of their creators. The speech hath one good quality, which is, that it is not calculated to deceive, neither can we, even if we would, be deceived by it. Brutality and tyranny appear on the face of it. It leaves us at no loss: And every line convinces, even in the moment of reading, that he who hunts the woods for prey, the naked and untutored Indian, is less savage than the king of Britain. Sir John Dalrymple, the putative father of a whining jesuitical piece, fallaciously called, "The address of the people of England to the inhabitants of America," hath perhaps from a vain supposition that the people here were to be frightened at the pomp and description of a king, given (though very unwisely on his part) the real character of the present one: "But," says this writer, "if you are inclined to pay compliments to an administration, which we do not complain of (meaning the Marquis of Rockingham's at the repeal of the Stamp Act) it is very unfair in you to withhold them from that prince, by whose NOD ALONE they were permitted to do any thing." This is toryism with a witness! Here is idolatry even without a mask: And he who can calmly hear and digest such doctrine, hath forfeited his claim to rationality an apostate from the order of manhood and ought to be considered as one who hath not only given up the proper dignity of man, but sunk himself beneath the rank of animals, and contemptibly crawls through the world like a worm.

However, it matters very little now what the king of England either says or does; he hath wickedly broken through every moral and human obligation, trampled nature and conscience beneath his feet, and by a steady and constitutional spirit of insolence and cruelty procured for himself an universal hatred. It is now the interest of America to provide for herself. She hath already a large and young family, whom it is more her duty to take care of, than to be granting away her property to support a power who is become a reproach to the names of men and christians, whose office it is to watch the morals of a nation, of whatsoever sect or denomination ye are of, as well as ye who are more immediately the guardians of the public liberty, if ye wish to preserve your native country uncontaminated by European corruption, ye must in secret wish a separation. But leaving the moral part to private reflection, I shall chiefly confine my further remarks to the following heads:

First, That it is the interest of America to be separated from Britain.

Secondly, Which is the easiest and most practicable plan, RECONCILIATION or INDEPENDENCE? with some occasional remarks.

In support of the first, I could, if I judged it proper, produce the opinion of some of the ablest and most experienced men on this continent: and whose sentiments on that head, are not yet publicly known. It is in reality a self-evident position: for no nation in a state of foreign dependence, limited in its commerce, and cramped and fettered in its legislative powers, can ever arrive at any material eminence. America doth not yet know what opulence is; and although the progress which she hath made stands unparalleled in the history of other nations, it is but childhood compared with what she would be capable of arriving at, had she, as she ought to have, the legislative powers in her own hands. England is at this time proudly coveting what would do her no good were she to accomplish it; and the continent hesitating on a matter which will be her final ruin if neglected. It is the commerce and not the conquest of America by which England is to be benefited, and that would in a great measure continue, were the countries as independent of each other as France and Spain; because the specious errors of those who speak without reflecting. And among the many which I have heard, the following seems the most general, viz. that had this rupture happened forty or fifty years hence, instead of now, the continent would have been more able to have shaken off the dependence. To which I reply, that our military ability, at this time, arises from the experience gained in the last war, and which in forty or fifty years' time, would be totally extinct. The continent would not, by that time, have a quitrent reserved thereon will always lessen, and in time will wholly support, the yearly expense of government. It matters not how long the debt is in paying, so that the lands when sold be applied to the discharge of it, and for the execution of which the Congress for the time being will be the continental trustees.

I proceed now to the second head, viz. Which is the easiest and most practicable plan, reconciliation or independence; with some occasional remarks.

He who takes nature for his guide, is not easily beaten out of his argument, and on that ground, I answer generally that independence being a single simple line, contained within ourselves; and reconciliation, a matter exceedingly perplexed and complicated, and in which a treacherous capricious court is to interfere, gives the answer without a doubt.

The present state of America is truly alarming to every man who is capable of reflection. Without law, without government, without any other mode of power than what is founded on, and granted by, courtesy. Held together by an unexampled occurrence of sentiment, which is nevertheless subject to change, and which every secret enemy is endeavoring to dissolve. Our present condition is, Legislation without law; wisdom without a plan; a constitution without a name; and, what is strangely astonishing, perfect independence contending for dependence. The instance is without a precedent, the case never existed before, and who can tell what may be the event? The property of no man is secure in the present un-braced system of things. The mind of the multitude is left at random, and seeing no fixed object before them, they pursue such as fancy or opinion presents. Nothing is criminal; there is no such thing as treason, wherefore, every one thinks himself at liberty to act as he pleases. The Tories would not have dared to assemble offensively, had they known that their lives, by that act, were forfeited to the laws of the state. A line of distinction should be drawn between English soldiers taken in battle, and inhabitants of America taken in arms. The first are prisoners, but the latter traitors. The one forfeits his liberty, the other his head.

Notwithstanding our wisdom, there is a visible feebleness in some of our proceedings which gives encouragement to dissensions. The continental belt is too loosely buckled: And if something is not done in time, it will be too late to do any thing, and we shall fall into a state, in which neither reconciliation nor independence will be practicable. The king and his worthless adherents are got at their old game of dividing the continent, and there are not wanting among us printers who will be busy in spreading specious falsehoods. The artful and hypocritical letter which appeared a few months ago in two of the New York papers, and likewise in two others, is an evidence that there are men who want both judgment and honesty.

It is easy getting into holes and corners, and talking of reconciliation: But do such men seriously consider how difficult the task is, and how dangerous it may prove, should the continent divide thereon? Do they take within their view all the various orders of men whose situation and circumstances, as well as their own, are to be considered therein? Do they put themselves in the place of the sufferer whose all is already gone, and of the soldier, who hath quitted all for the defence of his country? If their ill-judged moderation be suited to their own private situations only, regardless of others, the event will convince them that "they are reckoning without their host."

Put us, say some, on the footing we were in the year 1763: To which I answer, the request is not now in the power of Britain to comply with, neither will she propose it; but if it were, and even should be granted, I ask, as a reasonable question, By what means is such a corrupt and faithless court to be kept to its engagements? Another parliament, nay, even the present, may hereafter repeal the obligation, on the pretence of its being violently obtained, or not wisely granted; and, in that case, Where is our redress? No going to law with nations; cannon are the barristers of crowns; and the sword, not of justice, but of war, decides the suit. To be on the footing of 1763, it is not sufficient, that the laws only be put in the same state, but, that our circumstances likewise be put in the same state; our burnt and destroyed towns repaired or built up, our private losses made good, our public debts (contracted for defence) discharged; otherwise we shall be millions worse than we were at that enviable period. Such a request, had it been complied with a year ago, would have won the heart and soul of the continent, but now it is too late. "The Rubicon is passed." Besides, the taking up arms, merely to enforce the repeal of a pecuniary law, seems as unwarrantable by the divine law, and as repugnant to human feelings, as the taking up arms to enforce obedience thereto. The object, on either side, doth not justify the means; for the lives of men are too valuable to be cast away on such trifles. It is the violence which is done and threatened to our persons; the destruction of our property by an armed force; the invasion of our country by fire and sword, which conscientiously qualifies the use of arms: and the instant in which such mode of defence became necessary, all subjection to Britain ought to have ceased; and the independence of America should have been considered as dating its era from, and published by, the first musket that was fired against her. This line is a line of consistency; neither drawn by caprice, nor extended by ambition; but produced by a chain of events, of which the colonies were not the authors.

I shall conclude these remarks, with the following timely and well-intended hints. We ought to reflect, that there are three different ways by which an independency may hereafter be effected, and that one of those three, will, one day or other, be the fate of America, viz. By the legal voice of the people in Congress; by a military power, or by a mob: It may not always happen that our soldiers are citizens, and the multitude a body of reasonable men; virtue, as I have already remarked, is not hereditary, neither is it perpetual. Should an independency be brought about by the first of those means, we have every opportunity and every encouragement before us, to form the noblest, purest constitution on the face of the earth. We have it in our power to begin the world over again. A situation, similar to the present, hath not happened since the days of Noah until now.

The birthday of a new world is at hand, and a race of men, perhaps as numerous as all Europe contains, are to receive their portion of freedom from the events of a few months. The reflection is awful, and in this point of view, how trifling, how ridiculous, do the little paltry cavilings of a few weak or interested men appear, when weighed against the business of a world.

Should we neglect the present favorable and inviting period, and independence be hereafter effected by any other means, we must charge the consequence to ourselves, or to those rather whose narrow and prejudiced souls are habitually opposing the measure, without either inquiring or reflecting. There are reasons to be given in support of independence which men should rather privately think of, than be publicly told of. We ought not now to be debating whether we shall be independent or not, but anxious to accomplish it on a firm, secure, and honorable basis, and uneasy rather that it is not yet began upon. Every day convinces us of its necessity. Even the Tories (if such beings yet remain among us) should, of all men, be the most solicitous to promote it; for as the appointment of committees at first protected them from popular rage, so, a wise and well established form of government will be the only certain means of continuing it securely to them. Wherefore, if they have not virtue enough to be WHIGS, they ought to have prudence enough to wish for independence.

In short, independence is the only bond that tie and keep us together. We shall then see our object, and our ears will be legally shut against the schemes of an intriguing, as well as cruel, enemy. We shall then, too, be on a proper footing to treat with Britain; for there is reason to conclude, that the pride of that court will be less hurt by treating with the American States for terms of peace, than with those, whom she denominates "rebellious subjects," for terms of accommodation. It is our delaying in that, encourages her to hope for conquest, and our backwardness tends only to prolong the war. As we have, without any good effect therefrom, withheld our trade to obtain a redress of our grievances, let us now try the alternative, by independently redressing them ourselves, and then offering to open the trade. The mercantile and reasonable part of England, will be still with us; because, peace, with trade, is preferable to war without it. And if this offer be not accepted, other courts may be applied to.

On these grounds I rest the matter. And as no offer hath yet been made to refute the doctrine contained in the former editions of this pamphlet, it is a negative proof, that either the doctrine cannot be refuted, or, that the party in favor of it are too numerous to be opposed. WHEREFORE, instead of gazing at each other with suspicious or doubtful curiosity, let each of us hold out to his neighbor the hearty hand of friendship, and unite in drawing a line, which, like an act of oblivion, shall bury in forgetfulness every former dissension. Let the names of Whig and Tory be extinct; and let none other be heard among us, than those of a good citizen, an open and resolute friend, and a virtuous supporter of the RIGHTS of MANKIND, and of the FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES OF AMERICA.

Common Sense: Part 4

2009-08-25T14:44:00.007-04:00

of the present ability of america, with some miscellaneous reflexions

The preceding post deals with America's willingness to embark upon the Revolution for Independence. This part covers America's ability to endure the conflict.

"It is not in number, but in unity, that our great strength lies."

Paine notes two abilities that America affords to withstand the Revolution. One is the ability of America to pay for the war effort, the other is Americas natural and human resources.

Paine says, "no nation ought to be without debt." We find this isn't our trouble at all. We've incurred debt at a rate we can not in reality ever pay off. As far as utilizing our natural resources, due to restrictions imposed by government, we have not tapped but a small portion of all this country's material source of wealth. As for human resources, the welfare state has well decimated these poor slaves of government promises.

As Paine would say, we established this country "at the right end." Our constitution was formed first then men were delegated to execute and uphold it after.

With great foresight, Paine wanted an official declaration of separation from Britain. However, today we are slowly suffering under another form of tyranny from which it would be beneficial to declare independence. What is the tyranny you may ask? I'll wait for your answer...

Full Text...

I HAVE never met with a man, either in England or America, who hath not confessed his opinion, that a separation between the countries would take place one time or other: And there is no instance in which we have shown less judgment, than in endeavoring to describe, what we call, the ripeness or fitness of the continent for independence.

As all men allow the measure, and vary only in their opinion of the time, let us, in order to remove mistakes, take a general survey of things, and endeavor if possible to find out the VERY time. But I need not go far, the inquiry ceases at once, for the TIME HATH FOUND US. The general concurrence, the glorious union of all things, proves the fact.

'Tis not in numbers but in unity that our great strength lies: yet our present numbers are sufficient to repel the force of all the world. The Continent hath at this time the largest body of armed and disciplined men of any power under Heaven: and is just arrived at that pitch of strength, in which no single colony is able to support itself, and the whole, when united, is able to do any thing. Our land force is more than sufficient, and as to Naval affairs, we cannot be insensible that Britain would never suffer an American man of war to be built, while the Continent remained in her hands. Wherefore, we should be no forwarder an hundred years hence in that branch than we are now; but the truth is, we should be less so, because the timber of the Country is every day diminishing, and that which will remain at last, will be far off or difficult to procure.

Were the Continent crowded with inhabitants, her sufferings under the present circumstances would be intolerable. The more seaport-towns we had, the more should we have both to defend and to lose. Our present numbers are so happily proportioned to our wants, that no man need be idle. The diminution of trade affords an army, and the necessities of an army create a new trade.

Debts we have none: and whatever we may contract on this account will serve as a glorious memento of our virtue. Can we but leave posterity with a settled form of government, an independent constitution of its own, the purchase at any price will be cheap. But to expend millions for the sake of getting a few vile acts repealed, and routing the present ministry only, is unworthy the charge, and is using posterity with the utmost cruelty; because it is leaving them the great work to do, and a debt upon their backs from which they derive no advantage. Such a thought's unworthy a man of honour, and is the true characteristic of a narrow heart and a piddling politician.

The debt we may contract doth not deserve our regard if the work be but accomplished. No nation ought to be without a debt. A national debt is a national bond; and when it bears no interest, is in no case a grievance. Britain is oppressed with a debt of upwards of one hundred and forty millions sterling, for which she pays upwards of four millions interest. And as a compensation for her debt, she has a large navy; America is without a debt, and without a navy; yet for the twentieth part of the English national debt, could have a navy as large again. The navy of England is not worth at this time more than three millions and a half sterling.

The first and second editions of this pamphlet were published without the following calculations, which are now given as a proof that the above estimation of the navy is a just one. See Entic's "Naval History," Intro., p. 56.

The charge of building a ship of each rate, and furnishing her with masts, yards, sails, and rigging, together with a proportion of eight months boatswain's and carpenter's sea-stores, as calculated by Mr. Burchett, Secretary to the navy.

For a ship of 100 guns, ...... 35,553 £
               90 " .......... 29,886
               80 " .......... 23,638
               70 " .......... 17,785
               60 " .......... 14,197
               50 " .......... 10,606
               40 " .......... 7,558
               30 " .......... 5,846
               20 " .......... 3,710

And hence it is easy to sum up the value, or cost, rather, of the whole British navy, which, in the year 1757, when it was at its greatest glory, consisted of the following ships and guns.


   Ships  Guns     Cost of One   Cost of All 
    6 ... 100 .... 35,553 £ .... 213,318 £
   12 ... 90 ..... 29,886 ...... 358,632
   12 ... 80 ..... 23,638 ...... 283,656
   43 ... 70 ..... 17,785 ...... 764,755
   35 ... 60 ..... 14,197 ...... 496,895
   40 ... 50 ..... 10,605 ...... 424,240
   45 ... 40 ...... 7,558 ...... 340,110
   58 ... 20 ...... 3,710 ...... 215,180

85 sloops, bombs, and fireships, 
   one with another at 2,000 ... 170,000 
                   Cost, ..... 3,266,786 £
       Remains for guns, ....... 233,214
                  Total, ..... 3,500,000 £

No country on the globe is so happily situated, or so internally capable of raising a fleet as America. Tar, timber, iron, and cordage are her natural produce. We need go abroad for nothing. Whereas the Dutch, who make large profits by hiring out their ships of war to the Spaniards and Portuguese, are obliged to import most of the materials they use. We ought to view the building a fleet as an article of commerce, it being the natural manufactory of this country. 'Tis the best money we can lay out. A navy when finished is worth more than it cost: And is that nice point in national policy, in which commerce and protection are united. Let us build; if we want them not, we can sell; and by that means replace our paper currency with ready gold and silver.

In point of manning a fleet, people in general run into great errors; it is not necessary that one-fourth part should be sailors. The Terrible privateer, captain Death, stood the hottest engagement of any ship last war, yet had not twenty sailors on board, though her complement of men was upwards of two hundred. A few able and social sailors will soon instruct a sufficient number of active landsmen in the common work of a ship. Wherefore we never can be more capable of beginning on maritime matters than now, while our timber is standing, our fisheries blocked up, and our sailors and shipwrights out of employ. Men of war, of seventy and eighty guns, were built forty years ago in New England, and why not the same now? Ship building is America's greatest pride, and in which she will, in time, excel the whole world. The great empires of the east are mainly inland, and consequently excluded from the possibility of rivalling her. Africa is in a state of barbarism; and no power in Europe hath either such an extent of coast, or such an internal supply of materials. Where nature hath given the one, she hath withheld the other; to America only hath she been liberal to both. The vast empire of Russia is almost shut out from the sea; wherefore her boundless forests, her tar, iron and cordage are only articles of commerce.

In point of safety, ought we to be without a fleet? We are not the little people now which we were sixty years ago; at that time we might have trusted our property in the streets, or fields rather, and slept securely without locks or bolts to our doors and windows. The case is now altered, and our methods of defence ought to improve with our increase of property. A common pirate, twelve months ago, might have come up the Delaware, and laid the city of Philadelphia under contribution for what sum he pleased; and the same might have happened to other places. Nay, any daring fellow, in a brig of fourteen or sixteen guns, might have robbed the whole Continent, and carried off half a million of money. These are circumstances which demand our attention, and point out the necessity of naval protection.

Some perhaps will say, that after we have made it up with Britain, she will protect us. Can they be so unwise as to mean that she will keep a navy in our harbors for that purpose? Common sense will tell us that the power which hath endeavoured to subdue us, is of all others the most improper to defend us. Conquest may be effected under the pretence of friendship; and ourselves, after a long and brave resistance, be at last cheated into slavery. And if her ships are not to be admitted into our harbours, I would ask, how is she going to protect us? A navy three or four thousand miles off can be of little use, and on sudden emergencies, none at all. Wherefore if we must hereafter protect ourselves, why not do it for ourselves? Why do it for another?

The English list of ships of war is long and formidable, but not a tenth part of them are at any time fit for service, numbers of them are not in being; yet their names are pompously continued in the list; if only a plank be left of the ship; and not a fifth part of such as are fit for service can be spared on any one station at one time. The East and West Indies, Mediterranean, Africa, and other parts, over which Britain extends her claim, make large demands upon her navy. From a mixture of prejudice and inattention we have contracted a false notion respecting the navy of England, and have talked as if we should have the whole of it to encounter at once, and for that reason supposed that we must have one as large; which not being instantly practicable, has been made use of by a set of disguised Tories to discourage our beginning thereon. Nothing can be further from truth than this; for if America had only a twentieth part of the naval force of Britain, she would be by far an over-match for her; because, as we neither have, nor claim any foreign dominion, our whole force would be employed on our own coast, where we should, in the long run, have two to one the advantage of those who had three or four thousand miles to sail over before they could attack us, and the same distance to return in order to refit and recruit. And although Britain, by her fleet, hath a check over our trade to Europe, we have as large a one over her trade to the West Indies, which, by laying in the neighborhood of the Continent, lies entirely at its mercy.

Some method might be fallen on to keep up a naval force in time of peace, if we should judge it necessary to support a constant navy. If premiums were to be given to merchants to build and employ in their service ships mounted with twenty, thirty, forty, or fifty guns (the premiums to be in proportion to the loss of bulk to the merchant), fifty or sixty of those ships, with a few guardships on constant duty, would keep up a sufficient navy, and that without burdening ourselves with the evil so loudly complained of in England, of suffering their fleet in time of peace to lie rotting in the docks. To unite the sinews of commerce and defence is sound policy; for when our strength and our riches play into each other's hand, we need fear no external enemy.

In almost every article of defence we abound. Hemp flourishes even to rankness so that we need not want cordage. Our iron is superior to that of other countries. Our small arms equal to any in the world. Cannon we can cast at pleasure. Saltpetre and gunpowder we are every day producing. Our knowledge is hourly improving. Resolution is our inherent character, and courage hath never yet forsaken us. Wherefore, what is it that we want? Why is it that we hesitate? From Britain we can expect nothing but ruin. If she is once admitted to the government of America again, this Continent will not be worth living in. Jealousies will be always arising; insurrections will be constantly happening; and who will go forth to quell them? Who will venture his life to reduce his own countrymen to a foreign obedience? The difference between Pennsylvania and Connecticut, respecting some unlocated lands, shows the insignificance of a British government, and fully proves that nothing but Continental authority can regulate Continental matters.

Another reason why the present time is preferable to all others is, that the fewer our numbers are, the more land there is yet unoccupied, which, instead of being lavished by the king on his worthless dependents, may be hereafter applied, not only to the discharge of the present debt, but to the constant support of government. No nation under Heaven hath such an advantage as this.

The infant state of the Colonies, as it is called, so far from being against, is an argument in favour of independence. We are sufficiently numerous, and were we more so we might be less united. 'Tis a matter worthy of observation that the more a country is peopled, the smaller their armies are. In military numbers, the ancients far exceeded the moderns; and the reason is evident, for trade being the consequence of population, men became too much absorbed thereby to attend to anything else. Commerce diminishes the spirit both of patriotism and military defence. And history sufficiently informs us that the bravest achievements were always accomplished in the non-age of a nation. With the increase of commerce England hath lost its spirit. The city of London, notwithstanding its numbers, submits to continued insults with the patience of a coward. The more men have to lose, the less willing are they to venture. The rich are in general slaves to fear, and submit to courtly power with the trembling duplicity of a spaniel.

Youth is the seed-time of good habits as well in nations as in individuals. It might be difficult, if not impossible, to form the Continent into one government half a century hence. The vast variety of interests, occasioned by an increase of trade and population, would create confusion. Colony would be against colony. Each being able would scorn each other's assistance; and while the proud and foolish gloried in their little distinctions the wise would lament that the union had not been formed before. Wherefore the present time is the true time for establishing it. The intimacy which is contracted in infancy, and the friendship which is formed in misfortune, are of all others the most lasting and unalterable. Our present union is marked with both these characters; we are young, and we have been distressed; but our concord hath withstood our troubles, and fixes a memorable era for posterity to glory in.

The present time, likewise, is that peculiar time which never happens to a nation but once, viz., the time of forming itself into a government. Most nations have let slip the opportunity, and by that means have been compelled to receive laws from their conquerors, instead of making laws for themselves. First, they had a king, and then a form of government; whereas the articles or charter of government should be formed first, and men delegated to execute them afterwards; but from the errors of other nations let us learn wisdom, and lay hold of the present opportunity — TO BEGIN GOVERNMENT AT THE RIGHT END.

When William the Conqueror subdued England, he gave them law at the point of the sword; and, until we consent that the seat of government in America be legally and authoritatively occupied, we shall be in danger of having it filled by some fortunate ruffian, who may treat us in the same manner, and then, where will be our freedom? Where our property?

As to religion, I hold it to be the indispensable duty of government to protect all conscientious professors thereof, and I know of no other business which government hath to do therewith. Let a man throw aside that narrowness of soul, that selfishness of principle, which the niggards of all professions are so unwilling to part with, and he will be at once delivered of his fears on that head. Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society. For myself, I fully and conscientiously believe that it is the will of the Almighty that there should be a diversity of religious opinions among us. It affords a larger field for our Christian kindness; were we all of one way of thinking, our religious dispositions would want matter for probation; and on this liberal principle I look on the various denominations among us to be like children of the same family, differing only in what is called their Christian names.

In page [97] I threw out a few thoughts on the propriety of a Continental Charter (for I only presume to offer hints, not plans) and in this place I take the liberty of re-mentioning the subject, by observing that a charter is to be understood as a bond of solemn obligation, which the whole enters into, to support the right of every separate part, whether of religion, professional freedom, or property. A firm bargain and a right reckoning make long friends.

I have heretofore likewise mentioned the necessity of a large and equal representation; and there is no political matter which more deserves our attention. A small number of electors, or a small number of representatives, are equally dangerous. But if the number of the representatives be not only small, but unequal, the danger is increased. As an instance of this, I mention the following: when the petition of the associators was before the House of Assembly of Pennsylvania, twenty-eight members only were present; all the Bucks county members, being eight, voted against it, and had seven of the Chester members done the same, this whole province had been governed by two counties only; and this danger it is always exposed to. The unwarrantable stretch likewise, which that house made in their last sitting, to gain an undue authority over the delegates of that province, ought to warn the people at large how they trust power out of their own hands. A set of instructions for their delegates were put together, which in point of sense and business would have dishonoured a school-boy, and after being approved by a few, a very few, without doors, were carried into the house, and there passed IN BEHALF OF THE WHOLE COLONY; whereas, did the whole colony know with what ill will that house had entered on some necessary public measures, they would not hesitate a moment to think them unworthy of such a trust.

Immediate necessity makes many things convenient, which if continued would grow into oppressions. Expedience and right are different things. When the calamities of America required a consultation, there was no method so ready, or at that time so proper, as to appoint persons from the several houses of assembly for that purpose; and the wisdom with which they have proceeded hath preserved this Continent from ruin. But as it is more than probable that we shall never be without a CONGRESS, every well wisher to good order must own that the mode for choosing members of that body deserves consideration. And I put it as a question to those who make a study of mankind, whether representation and election is not too great a power for one and the same body of men to possess? When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary.

It is from our enemies that we often gain excellent maxims, and are frequently surprised into reason by their mistakes. Mr. Cornwall (one of the Lords of the Treasury) treated the petition of the New York Assembly with contempt, because THAT house, he said, consisted but of twenty-six members, which trifling number, he argued, could not with decency be put for the whole. We thank him for his involuntary honesty.

To CONCLUDE, however strange it may appear to some, or however unwilling they may be to think so, matters not, but many strong and striking reasons may be given to show that nothing can settle our affairs so expeditiously as an open and determined declaration for independence. Some of which are,

First. — It is the custom of Nations, when any two are at war, for some other powers, not engaged in the quarrel, to step in as mediators, and bring about the preliminaries of a peace; But while America calls herself the subject of Great Britain, no power, however well disposed she may be, can offer her mediation. Wherefore, in our present state we may quarrel on for ever.

Secondly. — It is unreasonable to suppose that France or Spain will give us any kind of assistance, if we mean only to make use of that assistance for the purpose of repairing the breach, and strengthening the connection between Britain and America; because, those powers would be sufferers by the consequences.

Thirdly. — While we profess ourselves the subjects of Britain, we must, in the eyes of foreign nations, be considered as Rebels. The precedent is somewhat dangerous to their peace, for men to be in arms under the name of subjects; we, on the spot, can solve the paradox; but to unite resistance and subjection requires an idea much too refined for common understanding.

Fourthly. — Were a manifesto to be published, and despatched to foreign Courts, setting forth the miseries we have endured, and the peaceful methods which we have ineffectually used for redress; declaring at the same time that not being able longer to live happily or safely under the cruel disposition of the British Court, we had been driven to the necessity of breaking off all connections with her; at the same time, assuring all such Courts of our peaceable disposition towards them, and of our desire of entering into trade with them; such a memorial would produce more good effects to this Continent than if a ship were freighted with petitions to Britain.

Under our present denomination of British subjects, we can neither be received nor heard abroad; the custom of all Courts is against us, and will be so, until by an independence we take rank with other nations.

These proceedings may at first seem strange and difficult, but like all other steps which we have already passed over, will in a little time become familiar and agreeable; and until an independence is declared, the Continent will feel itself like a man who continues putting off some unpleasant business from day to day, yet knows it must be done, hates to set about it, wishes it over, and is continually haunted with the thoughts of its necessity.

Common Sense: Part 3

2009-08-25T08:49:00.000-04:00

Thoughts on the present state of American affairs

All Argument is over at the time Paine writes this pamphlet and the conflict will now be decided on the battlefield.

"Now is the seed time of continental union, faith and honor."

Up to this point, Britain has involved America in several conflicts and the appeals of the people of America regarding oppressive laws and taxes had been constantly ignored and undermined. Let me draw a few parallels between the continuous infighting between political parties in our time to Britain's involvement in wars with other countries and the Indians. Because of Britain's actions, America continues to suffer. From Britain's perspective this is intentional, as America is dependent upon their military and financial support. America, by its dependence and connection to Britain is handicapped in resolving and mending relations with neighboring nations and more importantly in creating relationships between the colonies themselves. It's the dependence upon another presumed authority that is the similarity to our political parties. These parties who have convinced us that they represent a certain ideology and if we vote for them they will in turn represent us based on our trust. All the while they disenfranchise and pine the electorate against each other creating a divide that appears to have no source of reconciliation. However, our situation can be easily resolved without resorting to military conflict. Our forefathers already shed their blood in the American Revolution and the consequences allowed us to set up a system that gives us the power and not as it may appear the political parties.

If only we could exercise that power. Are you waking up?

Another parallel is our appeals to our representatives to amend the crises we feel is imminent. We have made the calls, sent the letters, signed the petitions. Our hands are tired and our throats are sore. Yet we know our message is not reaching Washington or our State Houses. Our representatives are out of touch and their media sympathizers ignore us or worse misreport where we stand. This only aggravates us more as we see our efforts are not only ignored but are also undermined.

This chapter of the pamphlet considers the willingness of America's effort to unshackle itself from an insatiable oppressor. Paine says, "it is the true interest of this continent to be [Independent]" and "every thing short of that is mere patchwork." This is where we find ourselves now, though. We are waking up to see that it is mere patchwork covering our Independence. Our leaders have slowly drilled holes in our Liberties and patched it with pieces of socialism and Statist ideals.

Some questions to consider:
What is meant that reconciliation with Britain and ruin are nearly related? And what are the terms of reconciliation?
Where is the King of America? What/Who is the One true authority?

Full Text...

IN the following pages I offer nothing more than simple facts, plain arguments, and common sense: and have no other preliminaries to settle with the reader, than that he will divest himself of prejudice and prepossession, and suffer his reason and his feelings to determine for themselves that he will put on, or rather that he will not put off, the true character of a man, and generously enlarge his views beyond the present day.

Volumes have been written on the subject of the struggle between England and America. Men of all ranks have embarked in the controversy, from different motives, and with various designs; but all have been ineffectual, and the period of debate is closed. Arms as the last resource decide the contest; the appeal was the choice of the King, and the Continent has accepted the challenge.

It hath been reported of the late Mr. Pelham (who tho' an able minister was not without his faults) that on his being attacked in the House of Commons on the score that his measures were only of a temporary kind, replied, "THEY WILL LAST MY TIME." Should a thought so fatal and unmanly possess the Colonies in the present contest, the name of ancestors will be remembered by future generations with detestation.

The Sun never shined on a cause of greater worth. 'Tis not the affair of a City, a County, a Province, or a Kingdom; but of a Continent — of at least one-eighth part of the habitable Globe. 'Tis not the concern of a day, a year, or an age; posterity are virtually involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected even to the end of time, by the proceedings now. Now is the seed-time of Continental union, faith and honour. The least fracture now will be like a name engraved with the point of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak; the wound would enlarge with the tree, and posterity read in it full grown characters.

By referring the matter from argument to arms, a new era for politics is struck — a new method of thinking hath arisen. All plans, proposals, &c. prior to the nineteenth of April, i.e. to the commencement of hostilities, are like the almanacks of the last year; which tho' proper then, are superseded and useless now. Whatever was advanced by the advocates on either side of the question then, terminated in one and the same point, viz. a union with Great Britain; the only difference between the parties was the method of effecting it; the one proposing force, the other friendship; but it hath so far happened that the first hath failed, and the second hath withdrawn her influence.

As much hath been said of the advantages of reconciliation, which, like an agreeable dream, hath passed away and left us as we were, it is but right that we should examine the contrary side of the argument, and enquire into some of the many material injuries which these Colonies sustain, and always will sustain, by being connected with and dependent on Great Britain. To examine that connection and dependence, on the principles of nature and common sense, to see what we have to trust to, if separated, and what we are to expect, if dependent.

I have heard it asserted by some, that as America has flourished under her former connection with Great Britain, the same connection is necessary towards her future happiness, and will always have the same effect. Nothing can be more fallacious than this kind of argument. We may as well assert that because a child has thrived upon milk, that it is never to have meat, or that the first twenty years of our lives is to become a precedent for the next twenty. But even this is admitting more than is true; for I answer roundly that America would have flourished as much, and probably much more, had no European power taken any notice of her. The commerce by which she hath enriched herself are the necessaries of life, and will always have a market while eating is the custom of Europe.

But she has protected us, say some. That she hath engrossed us is true, and defended the Continent at our expense as well as her own, is admitted; and she would have defended Turkey from the same motive, viz. — for the sake of trade and dominion.

Alas! we have been long led away by ancient prejudices and made large sacrifices to superstition. We have boasted the protection of Great Britain, without considering, that her motive was INTEREST not ATTACHMENT; and that she did not protect us from OUR ENEMIES on OUR ACCOUNT; but from HER ENEMIES on HER OWN ACCOUNT, from those who had no quarrel with us on any OTHER ACCOUNT, and who will always be our enemies on the SAME ACCOUNT. Let Britain waive her pretensions to the Continent, or the Continent throw off the dependence, and we should be at peace with France and Spain, were they at war with Britain. The miseries of Hanover last war ought to warn us against connections.

It hath lately been asserted in parliament, that the Colonies have no relation to each other but through the Parent Country, i.e. that Pennsylvania and the Jerseys and so on for the rest, are sister Colonies by the way of England; this is certainly a very roundabout way of proving relationship, but it is the nearest and only true way of proving enmity (or enemyship, if I may so call it.) France and Spain never were, nor perhaps ever will be, our enemies as AMERICANS, but as our being the SUBJECTS OF GREAT BRITAIN.

But Britain is the parent country, say some. Then the more shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young, nor savages make war upon their families. Wherefore, the assertion, if true, turns to her reproach; but it happens not to be true, or only partly so, and the phrase PARENT OR MOTHER COUNTRY hath been jesuitically adopted by the King and his parasites, with a low papistical design of gaining an unfair bias on the credulous weakness of our minds. Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new World hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from EVERY PART of Europe. Hither have they fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still.

In this extensive quarter of the globe, we forget the narrow limits of three hundred and sixty miles (the extent of England) and carry our friendship on a larger scale; we claim brotherhood with every European Christian, and triumph in the generosity of the sentiment.

It is pleasant to observe by what regular gradations we surmount the force of local prejudices, as we enlarge our acquaintance with the World. A man born in any town in England divided into parishes, will naturally associate most with his fellow parishioners (because their interests in many cases will be common) and distinguish him by the name of NEIGHBOR; if he meet him but a few miles from home, he drops the narrow idea of a street, and salutes him by the name of TOWNSMAN; if he travel out of the county and meet him in any other, he forgets the minor divisions of street and town, and calls him COUNTRYMAN, i.e. COUNTYMAN; but if in their foreign excursions they should associate in France, or any other part of EUROPE, their local remembrance would be enlarged into that of ENGLISHMEN. And by a just parity of reasoning, all Europeans meeting in America, or any other quarter of the globe, are COUNTRYMEN; for England, Holland, Germany, or Sweden, when compared with the whole, stand in the same places on the larger scale, which the divisions of street, town, and county do on the smaller ones; Distinctions too limited for Continental minds. Not one third of the inhabitants, even of this province, [Pennsylvania], are of English descent. Wherefore, I reprobate the phrase of Parent or Mother Country applied to England only, as being false, selfish, narrow and ungenerous.

But, admitting that we were all of English descent, what does it amount to? Nothing. Britain, being now an open enemy, extinguishes every other name and title: and to say that reconciliation is our duty, is truly farcical. The first king of England, of the present line (William the Conqueror) was a Frenchman, and half the peers of England are descendants from the same country; wherefore, by the same method of reasoning, England ought to be governed by France.

Much hath been said of the united strength of Britain and the Colonies, that in conjunction they might bid defiance to the world. But this is mere presumption; the fate of war is uncertain, neither do the expressions mean anything; for this continent would never suffer itself to be drained of inhabitants, to support the British arms in either Asia, Africa, or Europe.

Besides, what have we to do with setting the world at defiance? Our plan is commerce, and that, well attended to, will secure us the peace and friendship of all Europe; because it is the interest of all Europe to have America a free port. Her trade will always be a protection, and her barrenness of gold and silver secure her from invaders.

I challenge the warmest advocate for reconciliation to show a single advantage that this continent can reap by being connected with Great Britain. I repeat the challenge; not a single advantage is derived. Our corn will fetch its price in any market in Europe, and our imported goods must be paid for buy them where we will.

But the injuries and disadvantages which we sustain by that connection, are without number; and our duty to mankind at large, as well as to ourselves, instruct us to renounce the alliance: because, any submission to, or dependence on, Great Britain, tends directly to involve this Continent in European wars and quarrels, and set us at variance with nations who would otherwise seek our friendship, and against whom we have neither anger nor complaint. As Europe is our market for trade, we ought to form no partial connection with any part of it. It is the true interest of America to steer clear of European contentions, which she never can do, while, by her dependence on Britain, she is made the makeweight in the scale of British politics.

Europe is too thickly planted with Kingdoms to be long at peace, and whenever a war breaks out between England and any foreign power, the trade of America goes to ruin, BECAUSE OF HER CONNECTION WITH BRITAIN. The next war may not turn out like the last, and should it not, the advocates for reconciliation now will be wishing for separation then, because neutrality in that case would be a safer convoy than a man of war. Every thing that is right or reasonable pleads for separation. The blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, 'TIS TIME TO PART. Even the distance at which the Almighty hath placed England and America is a strong and natural proof that the authority of the one over the other, was never the design of Heaven. The time likewise at which the Continent was discovered, adds weight to the argument, and the manner in which it was peopled, encreases the force of it. The Reformation was preceded by the discovery of America: As if the Almighty graciously meant to open a sanctuary to the persecuted in future years, when home should afford neither friendship nor safety.

The authority of Great Britain over this continent, is a form of government, which sooner or later must have an end: And a serious mind can draw no true pleasure by looking forward, under the painful and positive conviction that what he calls "the present constitution" is merely temporary. As parents, we can have no joy, knowing that this government is not sufficiently lasting to ensure any thing which we may bequeath to posterity: And by a plain method of argument, as we are running the next generation into debt, we ought to do the work of it, otherwise we use them meanly and pitifully. In order to discover the line of our duty rightly, we should take our children in our hand, and fix our station a few years farther into life; that eminence will present a prospect which a few present fears and prejudices conceal from our sight.

Though I would carefully avoid giving unnecessary offence, yet I am inclined to believe, that all those who espouse the doctrine of reconciliation, may be included within the following descriptions. Interested men, who are not to be trusted, weak men who CANNOT see, prejudiced men who will not see, and a certain set of moderate men who think better of the European world than it deserves; and this last class, by an ill-judged deliberation, will be the cause of more calamities to this Continent than all the other three.

It is the good fortune of many to live distant from the scene of present sorrow; the evil is not sufficiently brought to their doors to make them feel the precariousness with which all American property is possessed. But let our imaginations transport us a few moments to Boston; that seat of wretchedness will teach us wisdom, and instruct us for ever to renounce a power in whom we can have no trust. The inhabitants of that unfortunate city who but a few months ago were in ease and affluence, have now no other alternative than to stay and starve, or turn out to beg. Endangered by the fire of their friends if they continue within the city and plundered by the soldiery if they leave it, in their present situation they are prisoners without the hope of redemption, and in a general attack for their relief they would be exposed to the fury of both armies.

Men of passive tempers look somewhat lightly over the offences of Great Britain, and, still hoping for the best, are apt to call out, "Come, come, we shall be friends again for all this." But examine the passions and feelings of mankind: bring the doctrine of reconciliation to the touchstone of nature, and then tell me whether you can hereafter love, honour, and faithfully serve the power that hath carried fire and sword into your land? If you cannot do all these, then are you only deceiving yourselves, and by your delay bringing ruin upon posterity. Your future connection with Britain, whom you can neither love nor honour, will be forced and unnatural, and being formed only on the plan of present convenience, will in a little time fall into a relapse more wretched than the first. But if you say, you can still pass the violations over, then I ask, hath your house been burnt? Hath your property been destroyed before your face? Are your wife and children destitute of a bed to lie on, or bread to live on? Have you lost a parent or a child by their hands, and yourself the ruined and wretched survivor? If you have not, then are you not a judge of those who have. But if you have, and can still shake hands with the murderers, then are you unworthy the name of husband, father, friend or lover, and whatever may be your rank or title in life, you have the heart of a coward, and the spirit of a sycophant.

This is not inflaming or exaggerating matters, but trying them by those feelings and affections which nature justifies, and without which, we should be incapable of discharging the social duties of life, or enjoying the felicities of it. I mean not to exhibit horror for the purpose of provoking revenge, but to awaken us from fatal and unmanly slumbers, that we may pursue determinately some fixed object. It is not in the power of Britain or of Europe to conquer America, if she do not conquer herself by delay and timidity. The present winter is worth an age if rightly employed, but if lost or neglected, the whole continent will partake of the misfortune; and there is no punishment which that man will not deserve, be he who, or what, or where he will, that may be the means of sacrificing a season so precious and useful.

It is repugnant to reason, to the universal order of things to all examples from former ages, to suppose, that this continent can longer remain subject to any external power. The most sanguine in Britain does not think so. The utmost stretch of human wisdom cannot, at this time, compass a plan short of separation, which can promise the continent even a year's security. Reconciliation is now a falacious dream. Nature hath deserted the connexion, and Art cannot supply her place. For, as Milton wisely expresses, "never can true reconcilement grow where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep."

Every quiet method for peace hath been ineffectual. Our prayers have been rejected with disdain; and only tended to convince us, that nothing flatters vanity, or confirms obstinacy in Kings more than repeated petitioning — and nothing hath contributed more than that very measure to make the Kings of Europe absolute: Witness Denmark and Sweden. Wherefore, since nothing but blows will do, for God's sake, let us come to a final separation, and not leave the next generation to be cutting throats, under the violated unmeaning names of parent and child.

To say, they will never attempt it again is idle and visionary, we thought so at the repeal of the stamp act, yet a year or two undeceived us; as well may we suppose that nations, which have been once defeated, will never renew the quarrel.

As to government matters, it is not in the power of Britain to do this continent justice: The business of it will soon be too weighty, and intricate, to be managed with any tolerable degree of convenience, by a power, so distant from us, and so very ignorant of us; for if they cannot conquer us, they cannot govern us. To be always running three or four thousand miles with a tale or a petition, waiting four or five months for an answer, which when obtained requires five or six more to explain it in, will in a few years be looked upon as folly and childishness — There was a time when it was proper, and there is a proper time for it to cease.

Small islands not capable of protecting themselves, are the proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care; but there is something very absurd, in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island. In no instance hath nature made the satellite larger than its primary planet, and as England and America, with respect to each other, reverses the common order of nature, it is evident they belong to different systems: England to Europe, America to itself.

I am not induced by motives of pride, party, or resentment to espouse the doctrine of separation and independence; I am clearly, positively, and conscientiously persuaded that it is the true interest of this continent to be so; that every thing short of that is mere patchwork, that it can afford no lasting felicity, — that it is leaving the sword to our children, and shrinking back at a time, when, a little more, a little farther, would have rendered this continent the glory of the earth.

As Britain hath not manifested the least inclination towards a compromise, we may be assured that no terms can be obtained worthy the acceptance of the continent, or any ways equal to the expense of blood and treasure we have been already put to.

The object, contended for, ought always to bear some just proportion to the expense. The removal of North, or the whole detestable junto, is a matter unworthy the millions we have expended. A temporary stoppage of trade, was an inconvenience, which would have sufficiently balanced the repeal of all the acts complained of, had such repeals been obtained; but if the whole continent must take up arms, if every man must be a soldier, it is scarcely worth our while to fight against a contemptible ministry only. Dearly, dearly, do we pay for the repeal of the acts, if that is all we fight for; for in a just estimation, it is as great a folly to pay a Bunker-hill price for law, as for land. As I have always considered the independency of this continent, as an event, which sooner or later must arrive, so from the late rapid progress of the continent to maturity, the event could not be far off. Wherefore, on the breaking out of hostilities, it was not worth the while to have disputed a matter, which time would have finally redressed, unless we meant to be in earnest; otherwise, it is like wasting an estate on a suit at law, to regulate the trespasses of a tenant, whose lease is just expiring. No man was a warmer wisher for reconciliation than myself, before the fatal nineteenth of April 1775, but the moment the event of that day was made known, I rejected the hardened, sullen tempered Pharaoh of England for ever; and disdain the wretch, that with the pretended title of FATHER OF HIS PEOPLE, can unfeelingly hear of their slaughter, and composedly sleep with their blood upon his soul.

But admitting that matters were now made up, what would be the event? I answer, the ruin of the continent. And that for several reasons.

First. The powers of governing still remaining in the hands of the king, he will have a negative over the whole legislation of this continent. And as he hath shewn himself such an inveterate enemy to liberty, and discovered such a thirst for arbitrary power; is he, or is he not, a proper man to say to these colonies, "You shall make no laws but what I please." And is there any inhabitant in America so ignorant, as not to know, that according to what is called the present constitution, that this continent can make no laws but what the king gives it leave to; and is there any man so unwise, as not to see, that (considering what has happened) he will suffer no law to be made here, but such as suit his purpose. We may be as effectually enslaved by the want of laws in America, as by submitting to laws made for us in England. After matters are made up (as it is called) can there be any doubt, but the whole power of the crown will be exerted, to keep this continent as low and humble as possible? Instead of going forward we shall go backward, or be perpetually quarrelling or ridiculously petitioning. — We are already greater than the king wishes us to be, and will he not hereafter endeavour to make us less? To bring the matter to one point. Is the power who is jealous of our prosperity, a proper power to govern us? Whoever says No to this question is an independent, for independency means no more, than, whether we shall make our own laws, or, whether the king, the greatest enemy this continent hath, or can have, shall tell us, "there shall be no laws but such as I like."

But the king you will say has a negative in England; the people there can make no laws without his consent. In point of right and good order, there is something very ridiculous, that a youth of twenty-one (which hath often happened) shall say to several millions of people, older and wiser than himself, I forbid this or that act of yours to be law. But in this place I decline this sort of reply, though I will never cease to expose the absurdity of it, and only answer, that England being the King's residence, and America not so, make quite another case. The king's negative here is ten times more dangerous and fatal than it can be in England, for there he will scarcely refuse his consent to a bill for putting England into as strong a state of defence as possible, and in America he would never suffer such a bill to be passed.

America is only a secondary object in the system of British politics, England consults the good of this country, no farther than it answers her own purpose. Wherefore, her own interest leads her to suppress the growth of ours in every case which doth not promote her advantage, or in the least interferes with it. A pretty state we should soon be in under such a second-hand government, considering what has happened! Men do not change from enemies to friends by the alteration of a name: And in order to shew that reconciliation now is a dangerous doctrine, I affirm, that it would be policy in the king at this time, to repeal the acts for the sake of reinstating himself in the government of the provinces; in order that HE MAY ACCOMPLISH BY CRAFT AND SUBTILITY, IN THE LONG RUN, WHAT HE CANNOT DO BY FORCE AND VIOLENCE IN THE SHORT ONE. Reconciliation and ruin are nearly related.

Secondly. That as even the best terms, which we can expect to obtain, can amount to no more than a temporary expedient, or a kind of government by guardianship, which can last no longer than till the colonies come of age, so the general face and state of things, in the interim, will be unsettled and unpromising. Emigrants of property will not choose to come to a country whose form of government hangs but by a thread, and who is every day tottering on the brink of commotion and disturbance; and numbers of the present inhabitants would lay hold of the interval, to dispose of their effects, and quit the continent.

But the most powerful of all arguments, is, that nothing but independence, i. e. a continental form of government, can keep the peace of the continent and preserve it inviolate from civil wars. I dread the event of a reconciliation with Britain now, as it is more than probable, that it will followed by a revolt somewhere or other, the consequences of which may be far more fatal than all the malice of Britain.

Thousands are already ruined by British barbarity; (thousands more will probably suffer the same fate.) Those men have other feelings than us who have nothing suffered. All they now possess is liberty, what they before enjoyed is sacrificed to its service, and having nothing more to lose, they disdain submission. Besides, the general temper of the colonies, towards a British government, will be like that of a youth, who is nearly out of his time; they will care very little about her. And a government which cannot preserve the peace, is no government at all, and in that case we pay our money for nothing; and pray what is it that Britain can do, whose power will be wholly on paper, should a civil tumult break out the very day after reconciliation? I have heard some men say, many of whom I believe spoke without thinking, that they dreaded an independence, fearing that it would produce civil wars. It is but seldom that our first thoughts are truly correct, and that is the case here; for there are ten times more to dread from a patched up connexion than from independence. I make the sufferers case my own, and I protest, that were I driven from house and home, my property destroyed, and my circumstances ruined, that as a man, sensible of injuries, I could never relish the doctrine of reconciliation, or consider myself bound thereby.

The colonies have manifested such a spirit of good order and obedience to continental government, as is sufficient to make every reasonable person easy and happy on that head. No man can assign the least pretence for his fears, on any other grounds, that such as are truly childish and ridiculous, viz. that one colony will be striving for superiority over another.

Where there are no distinctions there can be no superiority, perfect equality affords no temptation. The republics of Europe are all (and we may say always) in peace. Holland and Swisserland are without wars, foreign or domestic: Monarchical governments, it is true, are never long at rest; the crown itself is a temptation to enterprizing ruffians at home; and that degree of pride and insolence ever attendant on regal authority, swells into a rupture with foreign powers, in instances, where a republican government, by being formed on more natural principles, would negotiate the mistake.

If there is any true cause of fear respecting independence, it is because no plan is yet laid down. Men do not see their way out — Wherefore, as an opening into that business, I offer the following hints; at the same time modestly affirming, that I have no other opinion of them myself, than that they may be the means of giving rise to something better. Could the straggling thoughts of individuals be collected, they would frequently form materials for wise and able men to improve into useful matter.

Let the assemblies be annual, with a President only. The representation more equal. Their business wholly domestic, and subject to the authority of a Continental Congress.

Let each colony be divided into six, eight, or ten, convenient districts, each district to send a proper number of delegates to Congress, so that each colony send at least thirty. The whole number in Congress will be least 390. Each Congress to sit and to choose a president by the following method. When the delegates are met, let a colony be taken from the whole thirteen colonies by lot, after which, let the whole Congress choose (by ballot) a president from out of the delegates of that province. In the next Congress, let a colony be taken by lot from twelve only, omitting that colony from which the president was taken in the former Congress, and so proceeding on till the whole thirteen shall have had their proper rotation. And in order that nothing may pass into a law but what is satisfactorily just, not less than three fifths of the Congress to be called a majority. — He that will promote discord, under a government so equally formed as this, would have joined Lucifer in his revolt.

But as there is a peculiar delicacy, from whom, or in what manner, this business must first arise, and as it seems most agreeable and consistent that it should come from some intermediate body between the governed and the governors, that is, between the Congress and the people, let a CONTINENTAL CONFERENCE be held, in the following manner, and for the following purpose.

A committee of twenty-six members of Congress, viz. two for each colony. Two members for each House of Assembly, or Provincial Convention; and five representatives of the people at large, to be chosen in the capital city or town of each province, for, and in behalf of the whole province, by as many qualified voters as shall think proper to attend from all parts of the province for that purpose; or, if more convenient, the representatives may be chosen in two or three of the most populous parts thereof. In this conference, thus assembled, will be united, the two grand principles of business, knowledge and power. The members of Congress, Assemblies, or Conventions, by having had experience in national concerns, will be able and useful counsellors, and the whole, being impowered by the people, will have a truly legal authority.

The conferring members being met, let their business be to frame a CONTINENTAL CHARTER, or Charter of the United Colonies; (answering to what is called the Magna Charta of England) fixing the number and manner of choosing members of Congress, members of Assembly, with their date of sitting, and drawing the line of business and jurisdiction between them: (Always remembering, that our strength is continental, not provincial:) Securing freedom and property to all men, and above all things, the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; with such other matter as is necessary for a charter to contain. Immediately after which, the said Conference to dissolve, and the bodies which shall be chosen comformable to the said charter, to be the legislators and governors of this continent for the time being: Whose peace and happiness, may God preserve, Amen.

Should any body of men be hereafter delegated for this or some similar purpose, I offer them the following extracts from that wise observer on governments Dragonetti. "The science" says he "of the politician consists in fixing the true point of happiness and freedom. Those men would deserve the gratitude of ages, who should discover a mode of government that contained the greatest sum of individual happiness, with the least national expense."

"Dragonetti on virtue and rewards."

But where says some is the King of America? I'll tell you Friend, he reigns above, and doth not make havoc of mankind like the Royal Brute of Britain. Yet that we may not appear to be defective even in earthly honors, let a day be solemnly set apart for proclaiming the charter; let it be brought forth placed on the divine law, the word of God; let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve as monarchy, that in America THE LAW IS KING. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other. But lest any ill use should afterwards arise, let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony be demolished, and scattered among the people whose right it is.

A government of our own is our natural right: And when a man seriously reflects on the precariousness of human affairs, he will become convinced, that it is infinitely wiser and safer, to form a constitution of our own in a cool deliberate manner, while we have it in our power, than to trust such an interesting event to time and chance. If we omit it now, some, Massanello may hereafter arise, who laying hold of popular disquietudes, may collect together the desperate and discontented, and by assuming to themselves the powers of government, may sweep away the liberties of the continent like a deluge. Should the government of America return again into the hands of Britain, the tottering situation of things, will be a temptation for some desperate adventurer to try his fortune; and in such a case, what relief can Britain give? Ere she could hear the news, the fatal business might be done; and ourselves suffering like the wretched Britons under the oppression of the Conqueror. Ye that oppose independence now, ye know not what ye do; ye are opening a door to eternal tyranny, by keeping vacant the seat of government. There are thousands, and tens of thousands, who would think it glorious to expel from the continent, that barbarous and hellish power, which hath stirred up the Indians and Negroes to destroy us, the cruelty hath a double guilt, it is dealing brutally by us, and treacherously by them.

To talk of friendship with those in whom our reason forbids us to have faith, and our affections wounded through a thousand pores instruct us to detest, is madness and folly. Every day wears out the little remains of kindred between us and them, and can there be any reason to hope, that as the relationship expires, the affection will increase, or that we shall agree better, when we have ten times more and greater concerns to quarrel over than ever?

Ye that tell us of harmony and reconciliation, can ye restore to us the time that is past? Can ye give to prostitution its former innocence? Neither can ye reconcile Britain and America. The last cord now is broken, the people of England are presenting addresses against us. There are injuries which nature cannot forgive; she would cease to be nature if she did. As well can the lover forgive the ravisher of his mistress, as the continent forgive the murders of Britain. The Almighty hath implanted in us these unextinguishable feelings for good and wise purposes. They are the guardians of his image in our hearts. They distinguish us from the herd of common animals. The social compact would dissolve, and justice be extirpated from the earth, or have only a casual existence were we callous to the touches of affection. The robber, and the murderer, would often escape unpunished, did not the injuries which our tempers sustain, provoke us into justice.

O ye that love mankind! Ye that dare oppose, not only the tyranny, but the tyrant, stand forth! Every spot of the old world is overrun with oppression. Freedom hath been hunted round the globe. Asia, and Africa, have long expelled her. — Europe regards her like a stranger, and England hath given her warning to depart. O! receive the fugitive, and prepare in time an asylum for mankind.

The Federalist Papers - About the Authors

2009-08-19T12:28:00.008-04:00

James Madison, also called the “Father of the Constitution,” since he was its primary author, is the first president to have served in the US Congress and was a leader in the first US Congress. He is said to have drafted the Bill of Rights as well (based on the Virginia Declaration of Rights) and so is also known as the “Father of the Bill of Rights” as well. Madison was a firm believer in the necessity of checks and balances within the government. He helped to form the Republican Party (or later called the Democrat- Republican Party) with Thomas Jefferson in opposition to federalists especially against Hamilton’s National Bank and the Jay treaty. He also helped to draft the Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions, also with Jefferson, in opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798. Madison then served as Jefferson’s Secretary of State and supervised the Louisiana Purchase. As President, Madison led the nation in the War of 1812 and by 1815 he supported a National Bank, a strong military and high tariffs.

Following his Presidency, he returned to the Virginia Legislature, and in 1829 at seventy-eight, Madison helped Virginia revise its state Constitution where apportionment was the main issue, in questioning how much each slave was worth, and how much apportionment should be given to them in each territory. Some say this question of slavery drove Madison to the edge of despair. Madison lived on until 1836, increasingly ignored by the new leaders of the American polity and died at Montpelier on June 28, the last of the founding fathers to die.

Alexander Hamilton was born in the British West Indies and educated in America. During the Revolutionary War he joined the New York militia, eventually to become an artillery captain. Hamilton soon became a senior advisor to Gen. George Washington and was a main leader in the Battle of Yorktown. Originally elected to the Continental Congress, Hamilton left to practice law and to assist in founding the Bank of New York. He was elected to the New York Legislature and was the only representative from New York to sign the Constitution. During Washington’s Presidency, Hamilton served as Treasury Secretary and was a strong supporter of a strong centralized government. Through his philosophy of “implied powers” given to the federal government within the Constitution, Congress funded national debt, created a National Bank and established taxes and tariffs. Because of his strong Federalist beliefs, parties began to form with Hamilton in the Federalists and Madison and Jefferson in the Democratic—Republican Party. In 1798 Hamilton organized and led a national army against the French. After his party lost the election of 1800 to Jefferson and Aaron Burr, Hamilton founded the New York Post to publicize his Federalist ideas. Hamilton was eventually challenged in a duel by Aaron Burr, in which he lost his life.

John Jay was one of the Founding Fathers and was the first Chief Justice of the United States. During the American Revolution (1775-1783) Jay was the minister to Spain and France and was a key player in the treaty with Great Britain (the “Jay Treaty”). Following the Revolution, Jay was President of the Continental Congress from 1778-9 and 1789-95. Jay returned to New York after the Congress where he served as Governor from 1795-1801 and led the state’s opposition to slavery. His first two endeavors to end slavery in the state were in vain while the third in 1799 was a success. Jay saw the emancipation of all New York slaves before his death in 1829.

The Federalist Papers - A Brief History

2009-08-19T12:20:00.013-04:00

In September of 1787, as the approved Constitution was sent to the states for ratification, a philosophical debate began within the political world. Those against the new Articles of Confederation or as we know it now, the Constitution, began to write to their allies to try to convince the American people and state legislatures not to pass the new document for various reasons.

“George Mason, the author of the Virginia Declaration of Rights and a delegate at the Convention wrote, ‘This Government will commence in a moderate Aristocracy,’ he predicted, and though it was impossible to tell whether ‘in its Operation’ it would produce ‘a Monarchy, or a corrupt oppressive Aristocracy,’ it would probably ‘vibrate somewhere between the two, and then terminate in one or the other.’”[1]

Many were worried about the amount of power given to the federal government and wanted the states to retain more powers under the Constitution. These members were known as the Anti-Federalists.

Others, on the opposite side of the argument, were upset that the document did not have a stronger central authority, and thought that the new Constitution would not give enough power to the federal government to keep the Union together. James Madison wrote to Thomas Jefferson, who was in Paris at the time, telling him, “that the plan, should it be adopted, will neither effectually answer its national object nor prevent the local mischiefs which everywhere excite disgust against the state governments.”[2] Although Madison was not completely satisfied with the amount of authority that the new Constitution granted the federal government, he did understand that this new Constitution was necessary to the preservation of the Union.

So, in the midst of this political discussion, three men found the Constitution so imperative to the survival of our nation, and that along with Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay wrote numerous articles to defend and promote the document. These articles were printed in weekly newspapers in an attempt to convince the people and legislatures to vote in favor of the Constitution, while also replying to articles the Anti-Federalists were writing against its approval. “The great accomplishment of The Federalist… was to show that the Constitution was coherent and republican.”[3] By explaining each part of the Constitution and the reasoning behind its make up, The Federalists were able to convince the nation of the importance of the Constitution, while also leaving behind their explanation to their posterity. Today, the Federalist Papers (the compilation of the articles from the federalists) is the greatest primary resource we have in understanding the Constitution and reasoning behind it. In them, one can truly see the genius of the writers of the Constitution and can begin to understand how and why our government is supposed to work the way it is outlined.

[1] Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay. The Federalist Papers. Ed. Rossiter, Clinton and Intro. Kesler, Charles R (New York: Signet Classic, 1999), P. vii
[2] Ibid, p. Vii.
[3] Ibid, p. viii.

Common Sense: Part 2

2009-08-12T19:32:00.003-04:00

Of monarchy and hereditary succession

Paine adheres to the doctrine that "all men are created equal" but definitely not into equal results. Two particular outcomes result in that one man can become a king while another his subject. There is much confusion as to how a man can become more distinguished in the fashion of a king. In the beginning of history there where no kings, so how did they come to be? Scripture denies the invention of government by kings. It is important to take note the centuries the Jews were without a king, as the their king of course is God. Not until their Heathen peers influenced them did the Jews allow such practices. Instead they had originally followed a republican structure of government. The stories of Gideon and Samuel are examples of why man cannot rule another, as it is not in the people's right to grant a man that honor.

"For all men being originally equal, no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others forever." Paine makes a powerful argument against hereditary succession. For one, it is unnatural. Though, even if a man was so distinguished by virtue or wisdom does not guarantee his successors are of same intellect, temperament, or judgment. Also, as stated in his argument against monarchies, because man has not the right to grant these honors on another, it follows that the king also may not have authority to do so.

Take the example of George Washington. He was begged and pleaded to remain in office after his second term, but he knew what kind of precedent he would have set as he had feared a monarchy in America. He also absolved himself from the electoral process that selected his successor. Had Washington favored anyone to succeed him, the democratic process would have been sullied, possibly leading to another bad precedent. (see The Real George Washington)

Full Text...

MANKIND being originally equals in the order of creation, the equality could only be destroyed by some subsequent circumstance: the distinctions of rich and poor may in a great measure be accounted for, and that without having recourse to the harsh ill-sounding names of oppression and avarice. Oppression is often the CONSEQUENCE, but seldom or never the MEANS of riches; and tho' avarice will preserve a man from being necessitously poor, it generally makes him too timorous to be wealthy.

But there is another and great distinction for which no truly natural or religious reason can be assigned, and that is the distinction of men into KINGS and SUBJECTS. Male and female are the distinctions of nature, good and bad the distinctions of Heaven; but how a race of men came into the world so exalted above the rest, and distinguished like some new species, is worth inquiring into, and whether they are the means of happiness or of misery to mankind.

In the early ages of the world, according to the scripture chronology there were no kings; the consequence of which was, there were no wars; it is the pride of kings which throws mankind into confusion. Holland, without a king hath enjoyed more peace for this last century than any of the monarchical governments in Europe. Antiquity favours the same remark; for the quiet and rural lives of the first Patriarchs have a snappy something in them, which vanishes when we come to the history of Jewish royalty.

Government by kings was first introduced into the world by the Heathens, from whom the children of Israel copied the custom. It was the most prosperous invention the Devil ever set on foot for the promotion of idolatry. The Heathens paid divine honours to their deceased kings, and the Christian World hath improved on the plan by doing the same to their living ones. How impious is the title of sacred Majesty applied to a worm, who in the midst of his splendor is crumbling into dust!

As the exalting one man so greatly above the rest cannot be justified on the equal rights of nature, so neither can it be defended on the authority of scripture; for the will of the Almighty as declared by Gideon, and the prophet Samuel, expressly disapproves of government by Kings.

All anti-monarchical parts of scripture have been very smoothly glossed over in monarchical governments, but they undoubtedly merit the attention of countries which have their governments yet to form. "Render unto Cesar the things which are Cesar's" is the scripture doctrine of courts, yet it is no support of monarchical government, for the Jews at that time were without a king, and in a state of vassalage to the Romans.

Near three thousand years passed away, from the Mosaic account of the creation, till the Jews under a national delusion requested a king. Till then their form of government (except in extraordinary cases where the Almighty interposed) was a kind of Republic, administered by a judge and the elders of the tribes. Kings they had none, and it was held sinful to acknowledge any being under that title but the Lord of Hosts. And when a man seriously reflects on the idolatrous homage which is paid to the persons of kings, he need not wonder that the Almighty, ever jealous of his honour, should disapprove a form of government which so impiously invades the prerogative of Heaven.

Monarchy is ranked in scripture as one of the sins of the Jews, for which a curse in reserve is denounced against them. The history of that transaction is worth attending to.

The children of Israel being oppressed by the Midianites, Gideon marched against them with a small army, and victory thro' the divine interposition decided in his favour. The Jews, elate with success, and attributing it to the generalship of Gideon, proposed making him a king, saying, "Rule thou over us, thou and thy son, and thy son's son." Here was temptation in its fullest extent; not a kingdom only, but an hereditary one; but Gideon in the piety of his soul replied, "I will not rule over you, neither shall my son rule over you. THE LORD SHALL RULE OVER YOU." Words need not be more explicit: Gideon doth not decline the honour, but denieth their right to give it; neither doth he compliment them with invented declarations of his thanks, but in the positive style of a prophet charges them with disaffection to their proper Sovereign, the King of Heaven.

About one hundred and thirty years after this, they fell again into the same error. The hankering which the Jews had for the idolatrous customs of the Heathens, is something exceedingly unaccountable; but so it was, that laying hold of the misconduct of Samuel's two sons, who were intrusted with some secular concerns, they came in an abrupt and clamorous manner to Samuel, saying, "Behold thou art old, and they sons walk not in thy ways, now make us a king to judge us like all the other nations." And here we cannot observe but that their motives were bad, viz. that they might be LIKE unto other nations, i. e. the Heathens, whereas their true glory lay in being as much UNLIKE them as possible. "But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, give us a King to judge us; and Samuel prayed unto the Lord, and the Lord said unto Samuel, hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee, for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, THAT I SHOULD NOT REIGN OVER THEM. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt even unto this day, wherewith they have forsaken me, and served other Gods: so do they also unto thee. Now therefore hearken unto their voice, howbeit, protest solemnly unto them and show them the manner of the King that shall reign over them," i.e. not of any particular King, but the general manner of the Kings of the earth whom Israel was so eagerly copying after. And notwithstanding the great distance of time and difference of manners, the character is still in fashion. "And Samuel told all the words of the Lord unto the people, that asked of him a King. And he said, This shall be the manner of the King that shall reign over you. He will take your sons and appoint them for himself for his chariots and to be his horsemen, and some shall run before his chariots" (this description agrees with the present mode of impressing men) "and he will appoint him captains over thousands and captains over fifties, will set them to clear his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots, And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers" (this describes the expense and luxury as well as the oppression of Kings) "and he will take your fields and your vineyards, and your olive yards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give them to his officers and to his servants" (by which we see that bribery, corruption, and favouritism, are the standing vices of Kings) "and he will take the tenth of your men servants, and your maid servants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work: and he will take the tenth of your sheep, and ye shall be his servants, and ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shell have chosen, AND THE LORD WILL NOT HEAR YOU IN THAT DAY." This accounts for the continuation of Monarchy; neither do the characters of the few good kings which have lived since, either sanctify the title, or blot out the sinfulness of the origin; the high encomium of David takes no notice of him OFFICIALLY AS A KING, but only as a MAN after God's own heart. "Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel, and they said, Nay, but we will have a king over us, that we may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us, and go out before us and fight our battles." Samuel continued to reason with them but to no purpose; he set before them their ingratitude, but all would not avail; and seeing them fully bent on their folly, he cried out, "I will call unto the Lord, and he shall send thunder and rain" (which was then a punishment, being in the time of wheat harvest) "that ye may perceive and see that your wickedness is great which ye have done in the sight of the Lord, IN ASKING YOU A KING. So Samuel called unto the Lord, and the Lord sent thunder and rain that day, and all the people greatly feared the Lord and Samuel. And all the people said unto Samuel, Pray for thy servants unto the Lord thy God that we die not, for WE HAVE ADDED UNTO OUR SINS THIS EVIL, TO ASK A KING." These portions of scripture are direct and positive. They admit of no equivocal construction. That the Almighty hath here entered his protest against monarchical government is true, or the scripture is false. And a man hath good reason to believe that there is as much of kingcraft as priestcraft in withholding the scripture from the public in popish countries. For monarchy in every instance is the popery of government.

To the evil of monarchy we have added that of hereditary succession; and as the first is a degradation and lessening of ourselves, so the second, claimed as a matter of right, is an insult and imposition on posterity. For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have a right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others for ever, and tho' himself might deserve some decent degree of honours of his contemporaries, yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit them. One of the strongest natural proofs of the folly of hereditary right in Kings, is that nature disapproves it, otherwise she would not so frequently turn it into ridicule, by giving mankind an ASS FOR A LION.

Secondly, as no man at first could possess any other public honors than were bestowed upon him, so the givers of those honors could have no power to give away the right of posterity, and though they might say "We choose you for our head," they could not without manifest injustice to their children say "that your children and your children's children shall reign over ours forever." Because such an unwise, unjust, unnatural compact might (perhaps) in the next succession put them under the government of a rogue or a fool. Most wise men in their private sentiments have ever treated hereditary right with contempt; yet it is one of those evils which when once established is not easily removed: many submit from fear, others from superstition, and the more powerful part shares with the king the plunder of the rest.

This is supposing the present race of kings in the world to have had an honorable origin: whereas it is more than probable, that, could we take off the dark covering of antiquity and trace them to their first rise, we should find the first of them nothing better than the principal ruffian of some restless gang, whose savage manners of pre-eminence in subtilty obtained him the title of chief among plunderers; and who by increasing in power and extending his depredations, overawed the quiet and defenseless to purchase their safety by frequent contributions. Yet his electors could have no idea of giving hereditary right to his descendants, because such a perpetual exclusion of themselves was incompatible with the free and restrained principles they professed to live by. Wherefore, hereditary succession in the early ages of monarchy could not take place as a matter of claim, but as something casual or complemental; but as few or no records were extant in those days, the traditionary history stuff'd with fables, it was very easy, after the lapse of a few generations, to trump up some superstitious tale conveniently timed, Mahomet-like, to cram hereditary right down the throats of the vulgar. Perhaps the disorders which threatened, or seemed to threaten, on the decease of a leader and the choice of a new one (for elections among ruffians could not be very orderly) induced many at first to favour hereditary pretensions; by which means it happened, as it hath happened since, that what at first was submitted to as a convenience was afterwards claimed as a right.

England since the conquest hath known some few good monarchs, but groaned beneath a much larger number of bad ones: yet no man in his senses can say that their claim under William the Conqueror is a very honourable one. A French bastard landing with an armed Banditti and establishing himself king of England against the consent of the natives, is in plain terms a very paltry rascally original. It certainly hath no divinity in it. However it is needless to spend much time in exposing the folly of hereditary right; if there are any so weak as to believe it, let them promiscuously worship the Ass and the Lion, and welcome. I shall neither copy their humility, nor disturb their devotion.

Yet I should be glad to ask how they suppose kings came at first? The question admits but of three answers, viz. either by lot, by election, or by usurpation. If the first king was taken by lot, it establishes a precedent for the next, which excludes hereditary succession. Saul was by lot, yet the succession was not hereditary, neither does it appear from that transaction that there was any intention it ever should. If the first king of any country was by election, that likewise establishes a precedent for the next; for to say, that the right of all future generations is taken away, by the act of the first electors, in their choice not only of a king but of a family of kings for ever, hath no parallel in or out of scripture but the doctrine of original sin, which supposes the free will of all men lost in Adam; and from such comparison, and it will admit of no other, hereditary succession can derive no glory. for as in Adam all sinned, and as in the first electors all men obeyed; as in the one all mankind were subjected to Satan, and in the other to sovereignty; as our innocence was lost in the first, and our authority in the last; and as both disable us from re-assuming some former state and privilege, it unanswerably follows that original sin and hereditary succession are parallels. Dishonourable rank! inglorious connection! yet the most subtle sophist cannot produce a juster simile.

As to usurpation, no man will be so hardy as to defend it; and that William the Conqueror was an usurper is a fact not to be contradicted. The plain truth is, that the antiquity of English monarchy will not bear looking into.

But it is not so much the absurdity as the evil of hereditary succession which concerns mankind. Did it ensure a race of good and wise men it would have the seal of divine authority, but as it opens a door to the FOOLISH, the WICKED, and the IMPROPER, it hath in it the nature of oppression. Men who look upon themselves born to reign, and others to obey, soon grow insolent. Selected from the rest of mankind, their minds are early poisoned by importance; and the world they act in differs so materially from the world at large, that they have but little opportunity of knowing its true interests, and when they succeed in the government are frequently the most ignorant and unfit of any throughout the dominions.

Another evil which attends hereditary succession is, that the throne is subject to be possessed by a minor at any age; all which time the regency acting under the cover of a king have every opportunity and inducement to betray their trust. The same national misfortune happens when a king worn out with age and infirmity enters the last stage of human weakness. In both these cases the public becomes a prey to every miscreant who can tamper successfully with the follies either of age or infancy.

The most plausible plea which hath ever been offered in favor of hereditary succession is, that it preserves a nation from civil wars; and were this true, it would be weighty; whereas it is the most bare-faced falsity ever imposed upon mankind. The whole history of England disowns the fact. Thirty kings and two minors have reigned in that distracted kingdom since the conquest, in which time there has been (including the revolution) no less than eight civil wars and nineteen Rebellions. Wherefore instead of making for peace, it makes against it, and destroys the very foundation it seems to stand upon.

The contest for monarchy and succession, between the houses of York and Lancaster, laid England in a scene of blood for many years. Twelve pitched battles besides skirmishes and sieges were fought between Henry and Edward. Twice was Henry prisoner to Edward, who in his turn was prisoner to Henry. And so uncertain is the fate of war and the temper of a nation, when nothing but personal matters are the ground of a quarrel, that Henry was taken in triumph from a prison to a palace, and Edward obliged to fly from a palace to a foreign land; yet, as sudden transitions of temper are seldom lasting, Henry in his turn was driven from the throne, and Edward re-called to succeed him. The parliament always following the strongest side.

This contest began in the reign of Henry the Sixth, and was not entirely extinguished till Henry the Seventh, in whom the families were united. Including a period of 67 years, viz. from 1422 to 1489.

In short, monarchy and succession have laid (not this or that kingdom only) but the world in blood and ashes. 'Tis a form of government which the word of God bears testimony against, and blood will attend it.

If we enquire into the business of a King, we shall find that in some countries they may have none; and after sauntering away their lives without pleasure to themselves or advantage to the nation, withdraw from the scene, and leave their successors to tread the same idle round. In absolute monarchies the whole weight of business civil and military lies on the King; the children of Israel in their request for a king urged this plea, "that he may judge us, and go out before us and fight our battles." But in countries where he is neither a Judge nor a General, as in England, a man would be puzzled to know what IS his business.

The nearer any government approaches to a Republic, the less business there is for a King. It is somewhat difficult to find a proper name for the government of England. Sir William Meredith calls it a Republic; but in its present state it is unworthy of the name, because the corrupt influence of the Crown, by having all the places in its disposal, hath so effectually swallowed up the power, and eaten out the virtue of the House of Commons (the Republican part in the constitution) that the government of England is nearly as monarchical as that of France or Spain. Men fall out with names without understanding them. For 'tis the Republican and not the Monarchical part of the Constitution of England which Englishmen glory in, viz. the liberty of choosing an House of Commons from out of their own body — and it is easy to see that when Republican virtues fail, slavery ensues. Why is the constitution of England sickly, but because monarchy hath poisoned the Republic; the Crown hath engrossed the Commons.

In England a King hath little more to do than to make war and give away places; which, in plain terms, is to empoverish the nation and set it together by the ears. A pretty business indeed for a man to be allowed eight hundred thousand sterling a year for, and worshipped into the bargain! Of more worth is one honest man to society, and in the sight of God, than all the crowned ruffians that ever lived.

Common Sense: Part 1

2009-08-02T20:13:00.003-04:00

Of the origin and design of government in general. With concise remarks on the English constitution.

Thomas Paine explains the virtues of society and the vices of government, though with much exaggeration. All the good between human intercourse derives from society and the opposite goes for government. He fails to entertain the negative of an unruly neighbor or the positives of a protective police force or fire department. But to illustrate his point, the two poles are acknowledged in that the one represents liberty the other oppression.

What necessitates the creation of government then? It's the "defects of moral virtue" or "the inability of moral virtue to govern the world." It is the role of government to protect our "freedom and security." Paine describes a form of government derived from the people, of the people and that this form of government requires simplicity. (Or perhaps simplicity is a side-effect of republican government.) If a government is simple, any defect will be identified early and remedied swiftly. This, I believe, may be assuming that the people remain diligent and hold their representatives accountable.

Antithesis to simple government, the English constitution exhibits many faults. Though established with a simple republican segment, it still contains "two ancient tyrannies." Paine examines the two opposing powers of the English government and soon exposes the fallacies of the entangling structure and a house divided.

The English constitution also assumes an illegitimate power to the king that is derived from neither the people nor from God. Whether the power is in check or not, the king has overruling authority, which means that even edicts from Parliament are actually by consent of the king. This demonstrates an important case for the decentralization of power. We see many cases of centralizing power in our time as government seeks to nationalize many private sector businesses (finance, auto, health). Also the term "too big to fail" has entered our lexicon which only evinces how some corporations are actually too big to function as intended and should either break up (decentralize) or whither away, which by the way doesn't necessarily require government involvement.

Full Text...

SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built upon the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him, out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.

In order to gain a clear and just idea of the design and end of government, let us suppose a small number of persons settled in some sequestered part of the earth, unconnected with the rest; they will then represent the first peopling of any country, or of the world. In this state of natural liberty, society will be their first thought. A thousand motives will excite them thereto; the strength of one man is so unequal to his wants, and his mind so unfitted for perpetual solitude, that he is soon obliged to seek assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the same. Four or five united would be able to raise a tolerable dwelling in the midst of a wilderness, but one man might labour out the common period of life without accomplishing any thing; when he had felled his timber he could not remove it, nor erect it after it was removed; hunger in the mean time would urge him to quit his work, and every different want would call him a different way. Disease, nay even misfortune, would be death; for, though neither might be mortal, yet either would disable him from living, and reduce him to a state in which he might rather be said to perish than to die.

Thus necessity, like a gravitating power, would soon form our newly arrived emigrants into society, the reciprocal blessings of which would supersede, and render the obligations of law and government unnecessary while they remained perfectly just to each other; but as nothing but Heaven is impregnable to vice, it will unavoidably happen that in proportion as they surmount the first difficulties of emigration, which bound them together in a common cause, they will begin to relax in their duty and attachment to each other: and this remissness will point out the necessity of establishing some form of government to supply the defect of moral virtue.

Some convenient tree will afford them a State House, under the branches of which the whole Colony may assemble to deliberate on public matters. It is more than probable that their first laws will have the title only of Regulations and be enforced by no other penalty than public disesteem. In this first parliament every man by natural right will have a seat.

But as the Colony encreases, the public concerns will encrease likewise, and the distance at which the members may be separated, will render it too inconvenient for all of them to meet on every occasion as at first, when their number was small, their habitations near, and the public concerns few and trifling. This will point out the convenience of their consenting to leave the legislative part to be managed by a select number chosen from the whole body, who are supposed to have the same concerns at stake which those have who appointed them, and who will act in the same manner as the whole body would act were they present. If the colony continue encreasing, it will become necessary to augment the number of representatives, and that the interest of every part of the colony may be attended to, it will be found best to divide the whole into convenient parts, each part sending its proper number: and that the ELECTED might never form to themselves an interest separate from the ELECTORS, prudence will point out the propriety of having elections often: because as the ELECTED might by that means return and mix again with the general body of the ELECTORS in a few months, their fidelity to the public will be secured by the prudent reflection of not making a rod for themselves. And as this frequent interchange will establish a common interest with every part of the community, they will mutually and naturally support each other, and on this, (not on the unmeaning name of king,) depends the STRENGTH OF GOVERNMENT, AND THE HAPPINESS OF THE GOVERNED.

Here then is the origin and rise of government; namely, a mode rendered necessary by the inability of moral virtue to govern the world; here too is the design and end of government, viz. Freedom and security. And however our eyes may be dazzled with show, or our ears deceived by sound; however prejudice may warp our wills, or interest darken our understanding, the simple voice of nature and reason will say, 'tis right.

I draw my idea of the form of government from a principle in nature which no art can overturn, viz. that the more simple any thing is, the less liable it is to be disordered, and the easier repaired when disordered; and with this maxim in view I offer a few remarks on the so much boasted constitution of England. That it was noble for the dark and slavish times in which it was erected, is granted. When the world was overrun with tyranny the least remove therefrom was a glorious rescue. But that it is imperfect, subject to convulsions, and incapable of producing what it seems to promise is easily demonstrated.

Absolute governments, (tho' the disgrace of human nature) have this advantage with them, they are simple; if the people suffer, they know the head from which their suffering springs; know likewise the remedy; and are not bewildered by a variety of causes and cures. But the constitution of England is so exceedingly complex, that the nation may suffer for years together without being able to discover in which part the fault lies; some will say in one and some in another, and every political physician will advise a different medicine.

I know it is difficult to get over local or long standing prejudices, yet if we will suffer ourselves to examine the component parts of the English Constitution, we shall find them to be the base remains of two ancient tyrannies, compounded with some new Republican materials.

First. — The remains of Monarchical tyranny in the person of the King.

Secondly. — The remains of Aristocratical tyranny in the persons of the Peers.

Thirdly. — The new Republican materials, in the persons of the Commons, on whose virtue depends the freedom of England.

The two first, by being hereditary, are independent of the People; wherefore in a CONSTITUTIONAL SENSE they contribute nothing towards the freedom of the State.

To say that the constitution of England is an UNION of three powers, reciprocally CHECKING each other, is farcical; either the words have no meaning, or they are flat contradictions.

First. — That the King it not to be trusted without being looked after; or in other words, that a thirst for absolute power is the natural disease of monarchy.

Secondly. — That the Commons, by being appointed for that purpose, are either wiser or more worthy of confidence than the Crown.

But as the same constitution which gives the Commons a power to check the King by withholding the supplies, gives afterwards the King a power to check the Commons, by empowering him to reject their other bills; it again supposes that the King is wiser than those whom it has already supposed to be wiser than him. A mere absurdity!

There is something exceedingly ridiculous in the composition of Monarchy; it first excludes a man from the means of information, yet empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is required. The state of a king shuts him from the World, yet the business of a king requires him to know it thoroughly; wherefore the different parts, by unnaturally opposing and destroying each other, prove the whole character to be absurd and useless.

Some writers have explained the English constitution thus: the King, say they, is one, the people another; the Peers are a house in behalf of the King, the commons in behalf of the people; but this hath all the distinctions of a house divided against itself; and though the expressions be pleasantly arranged, yet when examined they appear idle and ambiguous; and it will always happen, that the nicest construction that words are capable of, when applied to the description of something which either cannot exist, or is too incomprehensible to be within the compass of description, will be words of sound only, and though they may amuse the ear, they cannot inform the mind: for this explanation includes a previous question, viz. HOW CAME THE KING BY A POWER WHICH THE PEOPLE ARE AFRAID TO TRUST, AND ALWAYS OBLIGED TO CHECK? Such a power could not be the gift of a wise people, neither can any power, WHICH NEEDS CHECKING, be from God; yet the provision which the constitution makes supposes such a power to exist.

But the provision is unequal to the task; the means either cannot or will not accomplish the end, and the whole affair is a Felo de se: for as the greater weight will always carry up the less, and as all the wheels of a machine are put in motion by one, it only remains to know which power in the constitution has the most weight, for that will govern: and tho' the others, or a part of them, may clog, or, as the phrase is, check the rapidity of its motion, yet so long as they cannot stop it, their endeavours will be ineffectual: The first moving power will at last have its way, and what it wants in speed is supplied by time.

That the crown is this overbearing part in the English constitution needs not be mentioned, and that it derives its whole consequence merely from being the giver of places and pensions is self-evident; wherefore, though we have been wise enough to shut and lock a door against absolute Monarchy, we at the same time have been foolish enough to put the Crown in possession of the key.

The prejudice of Englishmen, in favour of their own government, by King, Lords and Commons, arises as much or more from national pride than reason. Individuals are undoubtedly safer in England than in some other countries: but the will of the king is as much the law of the land in Britain as in France, with this difference, that instead of proceeding directly from his mouth, it is handed to the people under the formidable shape of an act of parliament. For the fate of Charles the First hath only made kings more subtle — not more just.

Wherefore, laying aside all national pride and prejudice in favour of modes and forms, the plain truth is that IT IS WHOLLY OWING TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE PEOPLE, AND NOT TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE GOVERNMENT that the crown is not as oppressive in England as in Turkey.

An inquiry into the CONSTITUTIONAL ERRORS in the English form of government, is at this time highly necessary; for as we are never in a proper condition of doing justice to others, while we continue under the influence of some leading partiality, so neither are we capable of doing it to ourselves while we remain fettered by any obstinate prejudice. And as a man who is attached to a prostitute is unfitted to choose or judge of a wife, so any prepossession in favour of a rotten constitution of government will disable us from discerning a good one.

Who is Mark Levin

2009-07-31T09:21:00.010-04:00

Lawyer, Author, conservative commentator, dog lover, The Great One.

Born September 21, 1957 in Pennsylvania. Along with writing the subject of our discussion, Mark Levin is author of Men in Black and Rescuing Sprite. He is also President of the Landmark Legal Foundation.

The Mark Levin Show
Levin's blog (currently on hiatus): And Another Thing...

Common Sense: Introduction

2009-07-31T08:29:00.006-04:00

Thomas Paine admits that the "sentiments contained" in his pamphlet weren't necessarily popular among everyone in the English colonies of America. But why wouldn't these words be "fashionable?" He observed that tyranny can be tolerated to some degree even among freedom-loving people. What is it that shielded the eyes of the oppressed colonists? Loyalty to the Mother country, perhaps? Were they ignorant of what true liberty entails while slowly subjugated to intolerable acts.

Paine also stated that "[t]he cause of America is...the cause of all." And the fight for independence was a universal circumstance, because it's a fight against those "against the natural rights of all Mankind." He recuses himself from any party and uses reason alone to defend those deprived of their natural rights, and their justification for retaliation.

Full Text...

Perhaps the sentiments contained in the following pages, are not YET sufficiently fashionable to procure them general favour; a long habit of not thinking a thing WRONG, gives it a superficial appearance of being RIGHT, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason. As a long and violent abuse of power, is generally the Means of calling the right of it in question (and in Matters too which might never have been thought of, had not the Sufferers been aggravated into the inquiry) and as the King of England hath undertaken in his OWN RIGHT, to support the Parliament in what he calls THEIRS, and as the good people of this country are grievously oppressed by the combination, they have an undoubted privilege to inquire into the pretensions of both, and equally to reject the usurpation of either. In the following sheets, the author hath studiously avoided every thing which is personal among ourselves. Compliments as well as censure to individuals make no part thereof. The wise, and the worthy, need not the triumph of a pamphlet; and those whose sentiments are injudicious, or unfriendly, will cease of themselves unless too much pains are bestowed upon their conversion. The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind. Many circumstances hath, and will arise, which are not local, but universal, and through which the principles of all Lovers of Mankind are affected, and in the Event of which, their Affections are interested. The laying a Country desolate with Fire and Sword, declaring War against the natural rights of all Mankind, and extirpating the Defenders thereof from the Face of the Earth, is the Concern of every Man to whom Nature hath given the Power of feeling; of which Class, regardless of Party Censure, is the AUTHOR.

P. S. The Publication of this new Edition hath been delayed, with a View of taking notice (had it been necessary) of any Attempt to refute the Doctrine of Independence: As no Answer hath yet appeared, it is now presumed that none will, the Time needful for getting such a Performance ready for the Public being considerably past. Who the Author of this Production is, is wholly unnecessary to the Public, as the Object for Attention is the DOCTRINE ITSELF, not the MAN. Yet it may not be unnecessary to say, That he is unconnected with any Party, and under no sort of Influence public or private, but the influence of reason and principle.

Philadelphia, February 14, 1776

5kYL: Principle Twenty-eight

2009-07-15T23:03:00.006-04:00

THE FOUNDERS' SENSE OF MANIFEST DESTINY

It is the mission of America to be the example of freedom to the rest of the world. From the founders standpoint, much anxiety was felt as they embarked in an experiment untried before in history. America is the first place that established the formula necessary for freedom. As history has evinced, the experiment is testament that freedom is the natural state of man that enables him to prosper. And the formula for freedom is the preceding 27 principles of course! So once we re-learn these principles, America will prosper again and a new generation of Manifest Destiny may commence.

5kYL: Principle Twenty-seven

2009-07-15T22:32:00.007-04:00

AVOIDING THE BURDEN OF DEBT

Debt is a burden that should be remedied immediately. Whereas an individual's debt may concern only two parties, a national debt affects everyone. Originally, according to the founders, the national debt was to be absolved within the generation that incurred it. Unfortunately, in circumstances as we face today, our national debt may also affect and enslave ones yet unborn.

As you are surely aware, the size of the national debt is of great concern to the electorate, as evidenced in the Tea Party movement as well as the national movement for the scheduled March on Washington.