The Ruthless Truth blog

by Timothy Reeves, Oregon Tenth Amendment Center

Any honest reading of the US Constitution gives the impression that the Federal Government is but a lackey to the states. However, when it comes to the way it has been interpreted (incorrectly), there are three clauses which are widely cited as authority to usurp power which belongs elsewhere. In this article, I intend to delve into these and examine how they are true or false. I also intend to highlight the impact that the abuse/use of these clauses has had.

Commerce Clause

Article I Section8 Clause3 of the Constitution states that Congress has the power:

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;

This obviously means Congress has the right to regulate how much grain you can grow on your land for your own consumption, right? If you said no it does not (like any other thinking person), you are out of step with the US Supreme Court. This also means that the Congress can force you to purchase health insurance, right? If you said no, you are out of step with the Congress. Surely the Commerce clause means that if a migratory bird (that is hunted in another state) lands on your property, then your property can be seized by the Federal Govt. due to it’s part in interstate commerce right? No?

How about this one; The Federal Government can make gun laws (in direct contravention of the US Constitution) because they are sold over state lines. Obviously the ambiguous verbiage above allows them the authority to ignore the clearly unambiguous verbiage of “shall not be infringed,” right?

Well, there is the Government’s case, now how about the governed? For our case I will focus on some quotes from the founders:

How about that James Madison (the acknowledged father of the Constitution)?

It is very certain that [the commerce clause] grew out of the abuse of the power by the importing States in taxing the non-importing, and was intended as a negative and preventive provision against injustice among the States themselves, rather than as a power to be used for the positive purposes of the General Government.

So… the way I read James Madison here is that the Commerce clause is to keep the states themselves from interfering with commerce (laying tariffs between states, placing restrictions on imports, etc…). It seems that Madison did not want the Federal Government using the Commerce clause to control… well.. everything.

How about Thomas Jefferson? Here is the quote I found from him-

“[The commerce clause] does not extend to the internal regulation of the commerce of a State (that is to say, of the commerce between citizen and citizen) … but to its external commerce only, that is to say, its commerce with another State, or with foreign nations, or with the Indian tribes.”

Hmmm… I think Thomas Jefferson agreed with me. The Commerce clause was intended only to regulate resale.

In fact, the federalist papers used the term “commerce” dozens of times, and they all amounted to the resale of things by merchants and shippers, not one time did it mean growing of agriculture or manufacturing of products for sale. If this context was examined, then this would be the original intent of the Constitution.

Necessary And Proper Clause

Article I Section8 Clause18 states that Congress has the power:

To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

Most school children are taught that this clause was added so that Congress could legislate on issues that would come with new inventions. (My teacher used to say that there were no autos in 1789, so they needed to put this clause in).

Surely this clause means that Congress can make any law they want, right? The problem with this view is that at the end of this clause the Constitution clearly limits the power to making laws necessary to carry out the other laws in the Constitution. In other words, Congress has the power to raise and support a navy, so they have the power to train sailors and commission ships.

These powers are referred to as “incidental powers.” They must be smaller than the power they are used in conjunction with. That is, they may regulate interstate commerce, but may not regulate state governments or laws.

Some examples of “necessary and proper” overreach are:

In 1896, it was ruled that it was legal for the Federal Government to condemn a railroads property to build a national park on the basis that it was necessary to the national defense that the citizens are proud of their country.

Now, I love my country as much as anyone else alive, however, I love the freedoms more than the national park, and this just illustrates what freedoms we do not have. The necessary and proper clause was also used to justify the national bank as necessary to conduct the borrowing and national defense powers of Congress. But lets look at some other input:

Joseph Story (an early Supreme Court Justice) said-

“The plain import of the clause is, that congress shall have all the incidental and instrumental powers, necessary and proper to carry into execution all the express powers. It neither enlarges any power specifically granted; nor is it a grant of any new power to congress. But it is merely a declaration for the removal of all uncertainty, that the means of carrying into execution those, otherwise granted, are included in the grant.”

This about spells it out. The debate for McCullough Vs. Maryland is another source for quotes from Hamilton, Madison and Jefferson.

General Welfare Clause

To promote or to provide for the general welfare, appears in two places in the US Constitution;

First in the preamble, which is just a listing of reasons and gives no powers whatsoever, and then Article I Section8 Clause 1 where it states:

“The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;”

Does this clause mean that Congress has no limits except what they believe will advance the “general welfare?” Is it just the Supreme Court which determines the general welfare, but the federal government may do anything that the court does not forbid? This is the primary opinion of the elite and the elected. It has been used to justify welfare, Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, and a host of freedom-destroying legislation. But what did the founders think of this?

Take James Madison-

“If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress… Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America.”

or this one:

“With respect to the words general welfare, I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.”

Or this one from Thomas Jefferson

“Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.”

In reality, the “General welfare” clause is a qualifier. Congress may only lay taxes for revenue to be used for the general welfare (as opposed to the special welfare) of the states, for example, they may lay taxes to build postal roads, but they may not lay taxes for building postal roads in New Hampshire, to the detriment of the rest of the states. So, ironically, the way that Congress horse-trades favors for votes in Congress makes most legislation unconstitutional.

There’s More

In addition to these gross misconceptions by the Federal Govt., they add the Supremacy clause, which states:

“This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwith-standing.”

This is pointed to anytime the Federal Government wants to escape criticism from people saying they have exceeded their authority. However, a careful reading of the passage above makes it clear that only laws in pursuance of the US Constitution are supreme. Anytime the Federal Govt. goes beyond the Constitution, citizens are not bound to obey them.

The preceding examples of intentional misconstruction of the Constitution are examples of our Federal Government out of control. They pit the citizens against each other; they take from the hand of labor to give to the hand of not only the needy, but the banks and corporations as well.

They make people perpetual slaves by addicting them to handouts and then denying them the escape from this perpetual misery by over-regulating prospective employers for these people. They have bogged us down in perpetual wars overseas for over a period of 70 years, ignoring the appropriate method of war-making under the Constitution.

They have criminalized multiple forms of commerce, suspended Habeas corpus in absence of properly declared wars, and they have systematically denied due process rights for the people.

Indeed, this list could go on for pages. Most of these transgressions against the natural rights of man are done in the name of the good intentions (saving people from themselves). These need to end, and our country needs to return to the republican form of government it was founded on. Our states need to resume pushing back at the Federal Government and interposing on our behalf.

Tim Reeves is an 11 year veteran of the U.S Navy, and is now an engineer, He grew up in Michigan, but has resided in the Pacific NW since 1992. He’s the State Chapter Coordinator for the Oregon Tenth Amendment Center.

Copyright © 2010 by TenthAmendmentCenter.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given

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by Brian Roberts

Social Justice for All

It appears that there are two popular definitions of “social justice”. One involves an individual who chooses to give freely to people in need; this one is historically referred to as charity. The other requires the use of government force under the guise of good will to seize production from one and give to another. This one is nothing but theft and historically results in little less than slavery. Unfortunately, this is what most people mean when they speak of social justice.

Definition of Justice:

“The administering of deserved punishment or reward”

Is it possible that adding the word “social” before “justice” can result in a definition that makes it “just” to steal from someone because it is socially acceptable to do so? Promoters of social justice should spend a moment and reflect on which definition they support, why they embrace it and whether their concept of “justice” infringes on another person’s rights or freedom, and whether this other person guilty of a crime and thus punishment.

When the definition of social justice does not involve government force then it is easily supported. Voluntarily sharing private wealth with someone in need is truly a selfless act of love. On the other hand, if the definition somehow involves government force, then that position represents a hostile act counter to any possible definition of justice.

Christians often support the social justice movement because they have been led to believe believe that government enforced redistribution represents a selfless act, thereby an act of charity. As a Christian myself, I must ask what selfless act was performed and by whom? Does the government that administers such a program act selflessly or do they act in their own best interest? Are the politicians honorable statesmen or are they corrupt and self-serving?  Is the Church that sponsor’s such an act selfless, or is it frustrated by its failure to elicit charitable action from free men? Are you as an individual acting without regards to self, or do you somehow believe that the way to win hearts is by force? Is it selfless to force someone under penalty of law to provide for another?

All social justice advocates should consider this: How can “justice” arbitrarily be redefined by the creation of law that takes property from one man that has committed no crime and gives it to another who has offered no service to earn it? That is injustice, by definition.

Definition of Injustice:

“Violation of another’s rights”

Regardless, social justice advocates march on chanting “and social justice for all…” without respect for our founding documents and the concepts of life, liberty and property; and while ignoring that “social justice” is nothing more than a selfish lie disguised as a selfless act.

Social Justice is Incompatible with Federalism

So what does this have to do with the 10^th amendment and state sovereignty?

As a Texan, I know that a large majority of my fellow citizens do not want the laundry list of enslavement acts that the social justice movement proposes. The recent passage of the health care bill was a huge “win” for social justice activists. But the “win” is short sighted because if left to stand it will literally rip this country apart. In Texas, large numbers have properly identified government enforced social justice as a farce designed to control and over-tax the population, not unlike the goals of global warming advocates, or dictators from the recent past.

The Constitutional solution for social justice champions would be to implement their programs at the state level. The founder’s knew that different regions would have different needs and priorities, so they did two things. First, they chained the federal government down and outlined only specific enumerated topics upon which federal laws could be made and enforced. Second, they left the state government’s options wide open.

Madison made this clear in Federalist #45:

“The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.”

The catch is that states must find a way to fund expensive social justice programs.

Free men do not produce so that others can loot. And that is the rub, isn’t it? If social justice programs are implemented at the state level, then it will be impossible to force producers to continue to produce. Individuals and corporations will simply move to another state; and without these producers paying taxes, the state will go broke. Lacking a fiscally sound method of implementation at the state level, social justice programs are fundamentally incompatible with federalism as defined in our Constitution.

Ignoring these Constitutional restraints, the social justice movement has positioned the federal government to become the administrator of “justice” precisely because it has the ability to use the force of the barrel of a gun to keep producers producing. Keep in mind, having the ability is not the same as having the Constitutional authority; and when the federal government attempts to create and then enforce laws in which it has no authority, we have a real problem as a country.

Thomas Jefferson bluntly stated:

“Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force”

It’s also important to note that, unlike the states, the federal government has the ability to print money. This is significant to the social justice movement because real production plummets when individual incentives are removed from the system.  By design, printing money will help alleviate the pain of becoming a second-rate country… at least for a  little while.

At some point, since history tends to repeat itself,  the federal gloves will come off. Hopefully, when this happens state representatives will have already passed aggressive state-level  nullification and interposition legislation to protect the people from these unconstitutional laws and enforcement measures. Otherwise, “we the people” are on our own.

Brian Roberts [send him email] is the State Chapter Coordinator for the Texas Tenth Amendment Center

Copyright © 2010 by TenthAmendmentCenter.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

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by Thomas E. Woods, LewRockwell.com

Over the past few years, but especially during the past several months, there has been an extraordinary revival of interest in Thomas Jefferson’s idea of state nullification of unconstitutional federal laws. According to Jefferson, if the federal government were to monopolize constitutional interpretation, it would of course interpret the Constitution in its own favor and consistently uncover previously unknown reservoirs of additional federal power. Only a fool would consent to such a system, thought Jefferson, and the peoples of the states were not fools.

Needless to say, nullification is nowhere to be found on the three-by-five card on which our betters have written out the range of allowable opinion, so it has been greeted with the usual hysteria from predictable quarters.

The latest, and to my mind most laughable, example comes from Sean Wilentz, a history professor at Princeton, writing in The New Republic. The subtitle of Professor Wilentz’s article “The Essence of Anarchy” is “America’s long, sordid affair with nullification.” What Professor Wilentz omits in his alleged history of that “long, sordid affair” could fill an entire book, and indeed just weeks ago I announced the impending release of my own book on precisely this subject. (Nullification will cover the origins and theory of nullification, its forgotten nineteenth-century history, modern applications of the idea, and much else.) For now I’ll note the New England states that appealed to nullification (or interposition) against President Jefferson’s embargo, against what they considered the unconstitutional calling up of the New England militia during the war of 1812, against the use of military conscription, and against a law providing for the enlistment of minors.

Pretty “sordid,” huh?

In addition to other examples, we might also refer to the legislature of Wisconsin, which as late as 1859 was quoting from Jefferson’s Kentucky Resolutions of 1798 in opposition to unconstitutional aspects of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. Sordid, I tell you. Here’s the text of a handbill that circulated in Milwaukee in the 1850s:

All the People of this State, who are opposed to being made SLAVES or SLAVE-CATCHERS, and to having the Free Soil of Wisconsin made the hunting-ground for Human Kidnappers, and all who are willing to unite in a STATE LEAGUE, to defend our State Sovereignty, our State Courts, and our State and National Constitutions, against the flagrant usurpations of U.S. Judges, Commissioners, and Marshals, and their Attorneys; and to maintain inviolate those great Constitutional Safeguards of Freedom – the WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS and the RIGHT OF TRIAL BY JURY – as old and sacred as Constitutional Liberty itself; and all who are willing to sustain the cause of those who are prosecuted, and to be prosecuted in Wisconsin, by the agents and executors of the Kidnapping Act of 1850, for the alleged crime of rescuing a human being from the hands of kidnappers, and restoring him to himself and to Freedom, are invited to meet at YOUNGS’ HALL, IN THIS CITY, THURSDAY, APRIL 13TH, at 11 o’clock A.M., to counsel together, and take such action as the exigencies of the times, and the cause of imperiled Liberty demand.

What’s that? A “state league” to defend “state sovereignty” on behalf of human freedom against the “flagrant usurpations” of the federal government? How sordid!

Do you suppose Professor Wilentz teaches that at Princeton? Does he even know about it?

What Professor Wilentz also omits, and perhaps doesn’t know, is that abolitionists who opposed the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 expressly endorsed nullification and even referred to John C. Calhoun by name in support of their ideas. A shame Professor Wilentz wasn’t around to tell them that only a “racist” would refer to the wicked Calhoun, and that mature adults should never be allowed simply to consider his ideas on their merits.

Wilentz spends some of his time giving us a 60-year-old interpretation of the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, where nullification and interposition were first expressly advanced, as if no scholarship had appeared since then. He tells us that Jefferson was “in a panic” when he drafted the Kentucky Resolutions. In other words, Jefferson wasn’t really in his right mind, so we can excuse him for dreaming up crazy constitutional ideas that irritate Princeton professors.

Whether he realizes it or not, Wilentz is here repeating the thesis of Adrienne Koch and Harry Ammon, from their 1948 William and Mary Quarterly article “The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions: An Episode in Jefferson’s and Madison’s Defense of Civil Liberties.” Koch and Ammon suggest that nullification was really just an ad hoc response to an emergency situation rather than an enduring constitutional doctrine in its own right.

Unfortunately for Wilentz, the subject has been explored a teensy bit further in the six decades since then. As Kevin Gutzman shows in his book Virginia’s American Revolution: From Dominion to Republic, 1776–1840, Jefferson did not invent nullification in a moment of haste. The germ of nullification is directly traceable to the Virginia ratifying convention of 1788 (and indeed even into the colonial period). There, supporters of the Constitution insisted that the federal government would possess only the powers “expressly delegated” to it, and that Virginia would be “exonerated” should the federal government ever reach for a power beyond those delegated. Edmund Randolph and George Nicholas assured Virginians of these principles in so many words. Both men served on the five-man committee that was to draft Virginia’s ratification instrument. Randolph went on to serve as U.S. attorney general, and Nicholas as attorney general of Kentucky.

Throughout the 1790s, Virginians kept returning to the assurances they had been given in 1788. To give just one example: appalled by Alexander Hamilton’s financial program, and particularly the federal assumption of state debts, Patrick Henry introduced a resolution, passed by the Virginia legislature, that cited Hamilton’s program as an example of precisely what Virginians had been assured could not happen – the exercise by the federal government of a power it had not been delegated. Henry reminded his fellow Virginians that they had been sold the Constitution on the grounds that the federal government would have only those powers expressly delegated to it, and that the state government would be a sentinel watching over federal officials and remaining on guard against federal encroachments. Is that really so far from what Jefferson would later say?

By the time Jefferson drafted the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, therefore, he was merely developing these longstanding principles. He certainly was not spinning out an ad hoc response. Much less was he acting merely “in a panic.”

My favorite part of the whole piece comes when Wilentz offers us this aside: “Madison also wrote of nullification that ‘[n]o man’s creed was more opposed to such an inversion of the Repubn. order of things’ than Thomas Jefferson’s.”

Folks, Wilentz may not know it – and the automatons posting the fawning comments at the New Republic’s site obviously don’t know it – but that remark alone proves he has no idea what he is talking about. First of all, Madison’s statement about Jefferson is clearly false, as any competent historian knows. Jefferson included the very word “nullification” in his draft of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798! How can Wilentz, a Princeton historian, not know this?

But here’s the real kicker. Wilentz neglects to mention that the elder Madison, in his zeal to separate nullification from Jefferson’s legacy, tried denying that Jefferson had included the dreaded word in his draft of the Kentucky Resolutions. Madison had seen the draft himself, so he either knew this statement was false or was suffering from the effects of advanced age. When a copy of the original Kentucky Resolutions in Jefferson’s own handwriting turned up, complete with the word “nullification,” Madison was forced to retreat.

You see what this means? Nearly 180 years later, Sean Wilentz is still trying to defend a claim that Madison himself withdrew. Whether that speaks poorly of Wilentz’s honesty or his competence is something only he himself can know.

As for Madison’s claim at an advanced age that the Virginia Resolutions had never contemplated nullification, and Wilentz’s related claim that nullification supporters wickedly and perversely misinterpreted Madison, my book addresses this point directly. For now we might note that (1) the other state legislatures understood Madison at the time as saying precisely what Madison (and Wilentz) later tried to deny he was saying; (2) Madison did not correct this alleged misunderstanding when he had the chance to in the Report of 1800 or at any other time during those years; and (3) the text of the Virginia Resolutions clearly indicates that each state was “duty bound” to maintain its constitutional liberties within its “respective” territory, and hence Madison did indeed contemplate action by a single state as supporters and opponents alike took him to be saying at the time.

Faced with a bipartisan, cross-ideological push for the decentralization of political power, all Sean Wilentz can think to do is – you’ll never guess! – revive the specter of 1950s resistance to civil rights. Few today would defend the indignities to which American blacks were subject at that time, though it seems safe to assume that the grievances of civil-rights activists would have been greatly alleviated from the start had the constitutional remedy of enforcing the Fifteenth Amendment been actively and consistently applied. But I wonder if, just as Wilentz expects us for that reason to repudiate the principle of decentralized power, we can expect him to denounce his own beloved federal government – after all, didn’t Woodrow Wilson’s decision to enter World War I lead to the deaths of 116,000 Americans for no good reason? Weren’t Japanese individuals rounded into detention camps in the 1940s? (Incidentally, I wonder how “sordid” it would have been had California and Washington state interposed to prevent the internment of these poor souls.)

And really, even Wilentz’s acute hypochondria would presumably stop short of declaring that the fourteen states allowing medical marijuana in defiance of the federal government’s prohibition must be a bunch of “racists” who secretly aim to oppress people. California is even considering legalizing marijuana across the board – a clear act of nullification. What, pray tell, does this have to do with race? May it be possible that people who advocate decentralized power might actually favor – wait for it – decentralized power? Or do we automatically assume that their stated principles conceal a sinister conspiracy to oppress, even though centralized power is what made possible the unprecedented oppressions and atrocities of the twentieth century?

To be sure, Wilentz grudgingly concedes that nullification supporters are “not currently concerned with racial supremacy” (not currently concerned, you understand – you never know what people who don’t subscribe to The New Republic may think of next). But then why smear them by writing an entire article on the subject that never soberly considers the relevant questions on their merits, and instead associates the idea exclusively with racial oppression? Hitler despised states’ rights; does that make him a model of enlightenment and toleration?

Wilentz is not entirely wrong, of course. Dangers exist at all levels of government. Libertarians understand that better than anyone. The question that supporters of the states against the federal government are asking today is this: right now, where are the greater threats to our liberties liable to come from, Utah or D.C.? I cannot come up with an adequate word to describe someone who, having observed the enormities of twenty-first-century Washington no matter which party is in control, is more concerned about the potential for abuse of power in Boise or Santa Fe.

I suppose I don’t need to tell readers what we are all supposed to do now that Professor Wilentz has handed down his ex cathedra pronouncement, but I’ll tell you anyway. We’re supposed to abandon all non-approved opinions forthwith; promise in the future to run everything by Sean Wilentz first, lest we incorrigible haters fall back into our wicked ways; and show proper remorse for having disturbed our left-neocon overlords at The New Republic. Here they are trying to drum up another round of war propaganda (which has nothing to do with hatred, you understand), and we have the gall to distract them with Thomas Jefferson!

Oh, and Sean: nobody buys the “racism” smears anymore. No one in his right mind believes, with Keith Olbermann, that people who drive pickup trucks are likely to have sinister intentions, or that “arrogant” as an adjective to describe Barack Obama is a “racist code word.” That game is over. The non-zombie population, which is growing all the time, just tunes it out. At this point, “racist” now encompasses, at the very least, the Tea Party, the GOP, constitutionalists, libertarians, anarchists, anyone who has ever said a kind word about the South (since what reason other than “racism” could anyone have for doing that?), anyone who opposes Obama, and anyone who opposes health mandates. That pretty much leaves, as a working definition for “racist,” someone who doesn’t subscribe to The New Republic.

All these groups I’ve just mentioned probably amount to more than half the country. If the American population is so full of “hatred” and “racism” that every other person is liable to be a Klansman, I wonder if Professor Wilentz can explain to us why he favors open immigration. Doesn’t he instead have a moral obligation to warn potential immigrants to stay away from such a cauldron of “hatred”?

Supporters of nullification today, says Wilentz, “take refuge in a psychodrama of ‘liberty’ versus ‘tyranny.’” He then says that the constitutional doctrine they promote would allow “racial segregation and inequality up to the point of enslavement.” So people who are concerned about a government that makes up the rules as it goes along are engaged in “psychodrama,” but people who think the repeal of the Thirteenth Amendment is likely enough to be worth mentioning are the very model of reason.

Sean Wilentz is supposed to be a great Princeton professor. He is a reliable court historian of the regime (which by some definitions may indeed make him a great Princeton professor). He thinks he can parry opponents of the central government by means of distortions, omissions, outright falsehoods, hysteria, and name-calling. This is the best the Establishment can do against nullification? Professor Wilentz’s poor students should demand their money back.

Thomas E. Woods, Jr. [visit his website; send him mail] is a senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute. He is the author of nine books, including two New York Times bestsellers: Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse and The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History. His next book, to be released this summer, is Nullification.  Pre-Order Here.

Copyright © 2010 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

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by Chuck Baldwin

Yesterday, The Wall Street Journal carried a story entitled “Obama Steps Up Confrontation.” It said in part, “On Thursday, the president challenged Republicans who planned to campaign on repealing his health-care bill with, ‘Go for it.’ Two days later, he made 15 senior appointments without Senate consent, including a union lawyer whose nomination had been blocked by a filibuster.

“At a bill-signing event Tuesday, he is set to laud passage of higher-education legislation that was approved despite Republican objections through a parliamentary maneuver that neutralized the party’s filibuster threat.”

Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN) called Obama’s decision to federalize most student loans “really brazen” and “the most underreported, biggest Washington takeover in history.”

See the WSJ report at:

http://tinyurl.com/wsj-obama-confronts

If history teaches us anything, it teaches us that power always craves more power. And there are only 2 ways to check power: internally, through self-discipline and humility; or externally, through equally determined and equipped counterforces.

Americans should thank God that George Washington was our first President, because no one exemplified self-discipline and humility more than he did. After having led the colonies to perhaps the most miraculous revolution in world history, Washington was universally adored and even idolized. There were many that even attempted to make Washington America’s king. He flatly refused this proposal, of course. (Compare Washington’s character and humility to former President G.W. Bush, who, on this subject, said, “If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I’m the dictator.”)

The concept of an American monarch may seem foreign to us today, but remember that a monarchy was the only form of government the colonists had ever known. And there can be no doubt that a monarchy (or some form of it) has been the single most popular form of central government that the nations of the world have utilized. But remember, too, the theme of America’s War for Independence was “No King But Jesus.” And no one believed that more than General George Washington did.

Like most of America’s founders, Washington distrusted government in general and despised big government in particular–even though people were willing to make him government’s imperial ruler. Listen to the Father of our Country:

“Government is not reason; it is not eloquence; it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”

Unfortunately, there hasn’t been a man of George Washington’s caliber in the White House for many a moon. Instead of distrusting and limiting the central government, the vast majority of modern Presidents have completely ignored the constitutional role of the Presidency, and have sought to expand the authority of the executive branch of the federal government to proportions never allowed in the Constitution or envisioned by its creators. And Barack Obama is following the example of his predecessors by continuing this malevolent model (with increased rapidity, I might add). The above-mentioned stories are just the latest examples of what is fast becoming an imperial Presidency. It seems that every day another example of executive arrogance and usurpation of power takes place.

Given the lack of genuine humility and character of America’s President–and the unwillingness of Congress and the Supreme Court to restrain his unconstitutional propensities–it is left to the states and the People to hold this would-be king in check.

And here is another reason to be thankful for America’s founders: they recognized the ultimate role of the states in safeguarding and protecting liberty. As James Madison said in Federalist 45, “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.”

In Federalist 39 Madison said, “Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a FEDERAL, and not a NATIONAL constitution.” (Emphasis in the original.)

If America’s founders desired that a national–or monarchal–government be established in the United States, what was the purpose of the original 13 colonies retaining individual statehood? Why would each State retain its authority as “a sovereign body,” if not to serve as a vanguard against the encroachment upon liberty by the central government?

And never has liberty been more vulnerable to oppression and tyranny than right now! Why? Because ever since 9/11, both political parties in Washington, D.C., have placed America in a state of perpetual war. This fact alone puts the federal government in a position to become America’s oppressor.

In the first place, the Congress of the United States (then controlled by Republicans) abdicated its constitutional obligation to be the sole determiner regarding America’s entrance into war by providing then-President Bush with virtually unlimited and unchecked ability to determine and wage war clearly outside the perimeter of constitutional authority. And since taking over the federal government last year, Democrats in Washington, D.C., have followed suit.

But listen to Madison: “The executive [President] has no right, in any case, to decide the question, whether there is or is not cause for declaring war.”

Furthermore, the condition of unending, perpetual war only serves the purpose of lessening liberty. To quote Madison again: “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” Madison also declared, “If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.” And one more from Madison: “The means of defense against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home.”

One needs to only look around to observe that Madison’s warnings are quickly becoming a reality in these United States.

What all this means is that the American people cannot rely on Washington, D.C., to control itself. We cannot trust Washington politicians and bureaucrats to have the character and self-discipline to honor the Constitution and defend our liberties. If we are to preserve our freedom in this country, it will be up to the body politic in each State to do it. If the Congress and Court in Washington, D.C., will not rein in this burgeoning monarchy at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, then the states and People must.

At this point, I do not believe there is any way to avoid it: a showdown between freedom-loving states and the federal government is inevitable. But not only is it inevitable, it is absolutely necessary! The central government in Washington, D.C., is quickly morphing into a monarchy–or at the very least an oligarchy. And neither the Donkeys nor the Elephants inside the Beltway are willing to do anything to stop it. Either the states determine to defend the rights and liberties of the American people now, or we are destined to be governed by DC’s despots. Furthermore, we cannot cede to the US Supreme Court–or to any other federal authority–our independence, and most certainly, those fundamental elements necessary to our very survival. Only the states and the People, respectively, can maintain these bulwarks.

The question is, Will my State raise the “Don’t Tread On Me” flag and sincerely defend my liberties? And the follow-up question is, If my State will not do it, which states will, and what will I do? We have little choice. Either we join with a State that will fight for our liberties and help procure freedom for our posterity, or we follow radical unionists (and globalists) into a modern-day monarchy that is marching America toward oppression and servitude.

*If you appreciate this column and want to help me distribute these editorial opinions to an ever-growing audience, donations may now be made by credit card, check, or Money Order. Use this link

(c) Chuck Baldwin

NOTE TO THE READER:

Chuck Baldwin is a syndicated columnist, radio broadcaster, author, and pastor dedicated to preserving the historic principles upon which America was founded. He was the 2008 Presidential candidate for the Constitution Party. He and his wife, Connie, have been married for 37 years and have 3 children and 7 grandchildren. See Chuck’s complete bio at:
http://chuckbaldwinlive.com/home/?page_id=6

Please visit Chuck’s web site at http://chuckbaldwinlive.com

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In America, the Fracturing results from the Economic System

by John Kozy

Global Research, April 1, 2010

Consider this paraphrased account of a famous nation’s demise:

The death of the nation was both violent and natural. The fatal agents were the organic disorders of the system. The government had proven incapable of solving problems: it failed to preserve domestic order or an effective defense; it discovered no way of reconciling local autonomy with national stability and power; and its love of liberty failed to interfere with its passion for empire and war. The class struggle had become bitter beyond control and had turned democracy into a contest in legislative looting. The legislature degenerated into a mob, rejecting all restraint, voting itself every favor, and crushing initiative, industry, and thrift.

Education spread, but thinly; it stressed knowledge more than character and produced masses of half-educated people. The old problem of ethics and morals found no solution in religion, statesmanship, or philosophy. Religious superstition spread even while science reached its apogee. The growth of knowledge secularized morals, marriage, parentage, and law, and the pursuit of pleasure prevailed. Public games degenerated into professional contests; the people, who had once been athletic, now became spectators, content to witness rather than to do. Sexual morality was relaxed, and human life was portrayed as a round of triviality, seduction, and adultery. . . . The nation had destroyed itself; it died of its own tyrannous anarchy.

What nation do these paragraphs describe? It could be the United States of America, but it is not. These paragraphs come almost word for word from Will Durant’s The Life of Greece where he describes the demise of Athenian democracy.

Madison, in The Federalist, No. 10, writes,

The friend of popular governments never finds himself so much alarmed for their character and fate, as when he contemplates their propensity to [factions]. . . . Complaints are everywhere heard . . . that our governments are too unstable, that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and that measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and . . . rights. . . .

The latent causes of faction are . . . sown in the nature of man. . . . A zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points, as well . . . ; an attachment to different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good. . . . But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. . . .

It is in vain to say that enlightened statesmen will be able to adjust these clashing interests, and render them all subservient to the public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm. . . .

The inference to which we are brought is, that the CAUSES of faction cannot be removed, and that relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its EFFECTS. . . .

By what means is this object attainable? . . .

Madison believed that “[A]s each representative will be chosen by a greater number of citizens . . . it will be more difficult for unworthy candidates to practice with success the vicious arts by which elections are too often carried; and the suffrages of the people being more free, will be more likely to centre in men who possess the most attractive merit and the most diffusive and established characters.” Unfortunately he was wrong, but he was right in writing that “Men of factious tempers, of local prejudices, or of sinister designs, may, by intrigue, by corruption, or by other means, first obtain the suffrages, and then betray the interests, of the people. . . .”

When the number of contentious factions in a society becomes large, society becomes ungovernable; it literally implodes. All appearances indicate that the United States has reached this point. A recent poll found that only 21% of Americans believe that the government functions with the people’s consent, and nearly six in ten Americans say they are dissatisfied with the way democracy works in the United States.

Aside from the government’s being paralyzed, violence is ubiquitous and uncontrollable and the incarcerated are routinely freed to make space for others. Worse, the judicial system often convicts the innocent. Many laws are routinely ignored by even those who are generally law abiding citizens. Religious and racial intolerance is prevalent and often justified by untrue historical claims often taught to students in “history” classes.

Primitive societies are unified by common ancestries and beliefs, but current “advanced” societies lack both. The claim is often made, however, that there are fundamental beliefs that underlie even “advanced” societies. Unfortunately, these claims are always made on some level of generality. For instance, some claim that America was founded on “Christian” principles, but ‘Christian’ today is an abstract noun. It specifies nothing concrete. Yes, many of those who colonized America did so for religious reasons, but not all did, and those who did did not exhibit much “Christian” charity in dealing with others, even other Christians. The Constitution would never have been ratified by this disparate group had no assurance been given that the federal government would not attempt to impose a “state” religion upon the new nation, and even that did not placate all: Clifton Olmstead, in his History of Religion in United States quotes a Congregationalist minister about the separation: “It was as dark a day as ever I saw. The odium thrown upon the ministry was inconceivable. The injury done to the cause of Christ, as we then supposed, was irreparable,” and many today hold similar views. So, if someone had asked the colonists what “Christian” principles they all agreed to, I suspect that “None!” Would have been the answer.

But the same is true of what are called “American values” or, as it is often put, “what America stands for.” No one ever specifies what those values are or attempts to verify that Americans really hold them. Sen. David Vitter said, “I’m on the side of conservatives getting back to core conservative values,” but no one ever provides a specific list of them. As a matter of fact, the Pew Social and Demographic Trends Project found that “American adults from young to old disagree increasingly today on . . . values ranging from religion to relationships, creating the largest generation gap since divisions 40 years ago over Vietnam, civil rights and women’s liberation.” So appeals to America’s core values are appeals to nothing real. No group of traditional beliefs exists to unite America’s disparate groups. America is a fractured society.

But how did this fracture come about? Many causes can be cited, but the ultimate cause is clear. The fracturing results from the economic system. Madison had that right, too: “the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. . . .”

Think about it. Virginia was planned as a commercial venture by businessmen, operating through a joint-stock company, who wanted to get rich. Southern colonies were founded on the distinctly medieval concept of landed estates populated by masters and slaves, and Pennsylvania attracted an influx of immigrants with its policy of freehold ownership which meant that farmers owned their land free and clear of leases. This disparity of colonial economic systems brought about the Civil War.

American society is fractured by differing religious groups, racial groups, groups based on national origin, political groups, and economic groups. Waves of immigration were and still are being fostered to provide needed labor for America’s industrial enterprises, and although these waves of immigration are encouraged, the immigrants in each wave suffer racial and cultural discrimination. Assimilation, if it takes place at all, is slow and painful. So, economic motives have a role in every aspect of creating what passes for American “society.”

Some Americans have a silly-putty view of human nature. They believe that persons who come to America from other cultures can be squeezed here and there and molded into Uncle Sams. They are to be assimilated by learning English and adopting American customs and “values.” But what the Americans who hold this belief don’t realize is that if immigrants can be so squeezed to become model Americans, Americans can be squeezed to become as “un-American” as the others.

Americans often reject ideas because they are termed “foreign.” For instance, socialism to Americans is a foreign ideology, but, although it goes unacknowledged, so is capitalism. Adam Smith and David Ricardo, the grandfathers of America’s capitalist economic system, were not Americans. In fact, hardly any ideologies that have taken root in American have American origins. Certainly not Christianity, democracy, or hegemony. And the one American idea often boasted of has been totally ineffective—the melting pot. It never got hot enough to melt anything. Fractious groups created by the needs of the economic system make up America’s uncivil society. Andrew Arena, head of the FBI’s field office in Detroit, has said “radical and extremist fringe groups . . . can be found throughout our society.” But the factions prevalent in American society are not limited to the “radical and extremist fringe.”

The fractiousness of these groups is fostered by America’s elite. The strategy is one of divide and conquer. Politicians prey on hot-button issues to generate antagonism between groups: women’s righters against pro-lifers, environmentalists against developers, social liberals against social conservatives, labor against management, union organizers against right-to-work advocates, the poor against the wealthy, Republicans against Democrats and both against anyone else, hegemonists against pacifists, believers against atheists and often against each other, heterosexuals against homosexuals, whites against other races, Tea Parties against Coffee Cuppers, state’s rightists against federalists, and on and on. These group disparities are promoted to the point that they are not just ideological disputes. Many in these groups genuinely dislike those in other groups, and although overt display of this dislike is often disparaged, it is nevertheless quietly accommodated. These antagonisms make unity unattainable. Divide and conquer has become divided we fall.

In the days immediately following September 11, 2001, the mainstream press touted America’s “coming together” in response to the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center. But that coming together was quickly sundered. The Port Authority and the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation were soon at odds over how to redevelop the site. With much fanfare, a cornerstone was laid and secretly removed. Legal disputes over the attendant costs of illnesses related to the attacks are still in the court system. On the day of the attacks, New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani proclaimed, “We will rebuild. We’re going to come out of this stronger than before, politically stronger, economically stronger. The skyline will be made whole again.” But it hasn’t. Any many now doubt that Americans have been told the truth about what really happened on nine/eleven. Not only is America a society at war with itself, there is little that Americans can even agree on.

Madison claims “that the causes of faction cannot be removed.” Perhaps! But factionalism can be minimized, and the way to do it is not difficult to discern. All that needs to be done is for governments to enact legislation that enhances the well being of people rather than institutions and special interests. Promoting an economic system that exploits the people and impoverishes them at fairly regular intervals, restrictions on freedom, and corruption of the political system are not effective ways of making friends and influencing people. They are, however, effective ways of promoting anger, sometimes to the point of hatred. Any government anywhere, regardless of its form, democratic or authoritarian, that governs for the few rather than all generates factions. Such governments sooner or later lose their legitimacies and their societies implode.

During the Revolutionary War, John Dickinson composed the Liberty Song. Its last stanza reads, “Then join hand in hand, brave Americans all, by uniting we stand, by dividing we fall; in so righteous a cause let us hope to succeed, for heaven approves of each generous deed.” Nations and the institutions they support fall unless governments, like decent men and women, exhibit compassion, generosity, and a concern for the welfare of real, living people. That’s all that saving America requires.

John Kozy is a retired professor of philosophy and logic who blogs on social, political, and economic issues. After serving in the U.S. Army during the Korean War, he spent 20 years as a university professor and another 20 years working as a writer. He has published a textbook in formal logic commercially, in academic journals and a small number of commercial magazines, and has written a number of guest editorials for newspapers. His on-line pieces can be found on http://www.jkozy.com/ and he can be emailed from that site’s homepage.

John Kozy is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by John Kozy

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