Blog

Whose Responsibility is It?

Having spent time describing the three unalienable rights of life, liberty and property upon which our Republic was founded and from which all others flow it is necessary to speak of the natural responsibilities which form their inverse image.  Peering through the looking glass at original intent we try to make sense of the present wonderland where rights and responsibilities are never what they seem. 

There are five natural responsibilities.  First, we’re responsible for our actions.  No one can make us do anything.  Even when forced it is still us who must make our muscles move and make our voices speak.   We are responsible for the validity of our word and it should be our bond that we will do what we have said we will do when we have said we will do it.   Second, each person is responsible for their own sustenance.  We should provide for ourselves not expecting others to meet our needs or supply us with the comforts we desire.  Third, we are responsible for our children.  It is the duty of every parent to provide for the physical, emotional and spiritual support of our children until they are old enough to care for themselves.  Fourth we are responsible for the fulfillment of all contracts we have freely accepted.   And fifth, everyone has a responsibility to a social system which provides them freedom to use their own talents and energy for their own goals.  

As stated earlier these natural responsibilities are directly linked to the natural rights of humanity to life, liberty and property.  A person’s right to life inherently carries a responsibility to provide for them self and for their family without making demands upon the goods or time of others.  This responsibility to care for our family extends existentially in both directions.  Just as it is incumbent upon all of us to care for our own children, each of us, initially claims the support of our parents, therefore it is equally incumbent upon us to care for our parents if they can no longer care for themselves.  As we have the liberty to use our time and talents for our own improvement we are inherently responsible for how we use them and for any consequences that flow from their use.  And since legitimate government exists to protect our natural rights we are responsible for contributing to its ability to fulfill this function.  This would include reasonable taxes and public service.

This is the extent of our natural responsibilities.  Once we move beyond these we enter into the realm of moral or religious responsibilities.  While natural responsibilities like natural rights are objectively arrived at by the nature of humanity moral or religious responsibilities are by their nature subjectively learned.  Consequently the fulfillment of natural responsibilities flow logically from life while in most cases unless moral or religious obligations are personally perceived and agreed upon they must be fulfilled through the application of law and its ability to compel compliance.

As these secondary type responsibilities are most properly the purview of a moral code or religion and as each moral code or religion may carry different obligations it is presumptuous of government to impose upon its citizens what should instead be a free choice.  For, the imposition of one moral code or religion could possibly transgress or ignore the moral obligations of another the sanction of one moral code or religion over another inherently restricts the citizen’s enjoyment of their unalienable rights.

Today our ever-expanding government invents new responsibilities and then force feeds them to a powerless public.  These include responsibilities to the nation and the world.  On a daily basis we hear of our responsibility to the poor, the uneducated, or the uninsured.  And these new responsibilities do not just extend to our fellow Americans.  Through the continuous imposition of these constantly proliferating rights internationalists seek to transfer the wealth of the United States to the third world as their open borders policy invites the third world to come here to claim it.  Using our tax money the government seeks to care for everyone’s needs from cradle to grave.  The inefficiencies of bureaucracy ensure that a large percentage of these resources get flushed down the sewer while we fall deeper into debt.

These newly invented responsibilities are not natural and our government must violate the natural rights of its citizens to fulfill them.  They do this by expropriating our property and the enjoyment of the fruits of our labor which diminishes our lives from all they could be to what they allow them to be.  In addition, the only way the government can expropriate these things and distribute them from who earned them to who they believe deserves them is to increase their power by diminishing ours.

If not from nature where do these government enforced responsibilities originate?  They spring from ideology and the quest for power.  By preying upon the gullibility of the uninformed, the culpability of the greedy and the lethargy of the uncaring the Progressive clique has gained control of the American experiment.  It has used the ideology and terminology of extreme socialism, “From each according to their ability to each according to their need” to construct a conveyor belt transferring wealth from producers to consumers.  The Progressives buy votes and continued support by dividing the swag from their plunder of American capitalism.  Even though the government’s propaganda arms drone constantly about these enforced responsibilities still the majority of Americans instinctively know the difference between natural responsibilities and government mandated ones.  If we don’t demand a stop to this proliferation of imagined responsibilities and the expropriation of resources needed to fulfill them we will lose our natural rights and the ability to fulfill the natural responsibilities which flow from them.

Aug 22, 2010 | Categories:Commentary | Tags: , , | 1 Comment »

Letter to the Editor: “Get the Feds Out of Religion”

Loudon County – Regarding the recent editorials on the display of religious symbols on public property.  This is a bit of clarification of the First Amendment regarding religion. 

The First Amendment applies only to the federal government, not state or local governments. It states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”  To say it is up to the LCBS to stand up for the First Amendment is inaccurate. 

Some important facts regarding government and religion. 

In the same year the Constitution was approved by Congress, that same body passed the Northwest Ordinance. This Ordinance mandated that religion, morality and knowledge were to be included in all formal education. 

Religion taught in formal education was to focus on the five points of fundamental religious beliefs which were found in all the principal religions of the world.  They are  recognition and worship of a creator, that the creator revealed a moral code of behavior,  the creator holds mankind responsible for the way they treat each other, that mankind lives beyond this life, and in the next life individuals are judged for their conduct in this one. 

Thomas Jefferson proposed the following accommodations for religious instruction at the state University of Virginia:  the responsibility for teaching the five points noted above,  teaching the development of moral obligations in which all sects agree, encourage different religious sects to establish a professorship, enable students to attend religious exercises with that professor on campus, and urge students to participate in regular religious exercises. 

The Founders clearly intended, as evidenced in their writings, that there be a separation of church and state but never religion and state.  They wanted the clergy separate from government, the government to indirectly support all religions but have no one state sponsored religion, and no federal government, including the Justice system, interference with religion.  As Madison wrote “there is not a shadow of the right in the general government to intermeddle with religion” 

In 1940, the Supreme Court, as a way to work around the First Amendment, used the Fourteenth Amendment, to step in and crush state and individual rights regarding religion, in clear violation of our Founders intent. 

In 1947 The Supreme Court ruled not only that the State or Federal government cannot pass laws which aid one religion but now they cannot even pass laws that indirectly aid all religions equally. This is in direct violation of the Founders intent as well. 

In 1963 in a case outlawing Bible reading in schools the issue was put before the Supreme Court that if you are not supporting any religions are you not in fact supporting the religion of secularism?  The court refused this argument.  The fact remains the state sponsored religion today is secularism. 

George Washington wrote “of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports…. 

There is a pressing need today to get the feds out of religion (and everything else for that matter) and have the States give equal encouragement to all religions on a non-preference basis.

Aug 17, 2010 | Categories:Commentary, Sovereignty, federalism | Tags: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

VA Senator McEachin: The 10th Amendment has been “Deemed” Unconstitutional

From Henrico Senator, Donald McEachin, and courtesy of the Richmonder blog, comes the latest flaccid attempt to cast the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as alternately “unconstitutional”, “illegal” and “neo-confederate”.

It seems McEachin is perturbed by Gov. McDonnell’s recent decision not to publicly confirm or deny the fact that sovereign states have the power to judge for themselves the constitutionality of federal laws.

What’s not clear is why McEachin chose to pick on Gov. McDonnell when his real beef lies with Thomas Jefferson. After all, it was the author of the Declaration of Independence who pointed out in 1798 that the several states had

constituted a general government for special purposes — delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force: …that the government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that…each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress.

Rather than contest the clear and irrefutable logic of a legendary Virginia statesman like Jefferson, McEachin instead hides behind the skirts (I mean robes) of Supreme Court precedent. Precedent which has conveniently found that, not only is the Court (itself a branch of the federal government) the final judge of constitutionality, but the federal government’s power actually has no limits at all.

That sure sounds an awful lot like the general government’s “discretion, and not the Constitution,” has become “the measure of its powers.”

Forget all the examples of nullification being used peacefully and successfully by states to increase individual freedom, from medical marijuana to resistance of the Fugitive Slave Acts. According to McEachin, the 10th Amendment is nothing but ”unconstitutional and illegal drivel.”

Is it any wonder that these statists are so fond of piously quoting case law in a pathetic effort to avoid having to defend such outrageous claims with logic or reason?

P.S. Click to hear Tom Woods on Virginia’s own Freedom & Prosperity Radio discussing his powerful new book Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 21st Century.

Crossposted from the Tertium Quids blog.

Aug 06, 2010 | Categories:Commentary, Nullification, Sovereignty, VA Politics, federalism | Tags: , , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

The State Versus the Individual

In America, individualism is a kind of philosophical almost theological ideal upon which our society was founded.  This foundation birthed a society of free individuals who entered into a social contract wherein they surrendered some authority and power to government to gain enough security and peace to enjoy their rights while retaining their inherent freedom and inviolable personal independence. 

That man was conceived of by our founders as a created being is attested to in the Declaration of Independence when it says, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”  These rights the Creator endowed us with fall into two broad categories.

 The primary of these is the right to think and act as we see fit in matters which concern and affect only ourselves.  Then there are civil rights.  These are the rights all people possess before entering into the social contract such as, to act, to own property, to manage our own affairs in areas that might affect others all of which are not surrendered by our entrance into society, since they are inherent and endowed by our Creator.   These second are the rights which no one individual can assure for themselves without the cooperation of others, hence the need for a social contract and society.  And although the individual is not personally capable of ensuring the enjoyment of these rights this does not give society the authority to curtail them.  It’s for the protection of these rights that governments are established, or as the Founders put it, “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men.”

All of the above refers to and elaborates upon the rights of individuals.  Each individual as created and endowed is sovereign in and of their own person and should therefore enjoy the unfettered exercise of their rights which besides those already enumerated also consist of the right to equality before the law, to participate in political activity, to engage in commerce, and to express their thoughts and beliefs. 

The state is nothing more than individuals bound together by the social contract which they have all either directly or indirectly agreed to.  The state is not an individual.  The state is not a separate entity with inherent rights of its own.  This is a destructive concept which is equivalent to making the state god and is contrary to reality.  For when states begin to exert their personhood, to demand their rights this always equates to the usurpation of individual rights by corrupt leaders who say by their actions, “I am the State” in the name of a vague collective that is ultimately beneficial to them.

When contemplating the forceful nature of government within the lives of men Henry David Thoreau accepted the motto, “That government is best which governs least,” and he even expanded it to say, “That government is best which governs not at all” making him the poster child for modern anarchists.  While not embracing the extremity of Thoreau’s position the reasonableness of Jefferson’s is seen in his statement, “I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences of too much liberty, than those attending too small a degree of it.”  Perhaps Thoreau had too much faith in his fellow man, but sad to say his descendants have become a people with too much faith in government.  For government, once it has secured the peace and security necessary for the individual to enjoy the use of their personal rights, once it has secured the border from invasion and made provision for defense is more an encumbrance than a help.

Over the years there have been many abuses of power by the representatives of the people.  The rights of the individual have been curtailed and the imagined rights of the government have been expanded at their expense.  However, the American ship of state has always righted itself after the aristocratic or bureaucratic storm passed.  However, today the dreamweavers of collectivism are ensnaring whole generations in their cradle-to-grave web of dependency.  Collectivism is not native to the human condition, and it does not spontaneously evolve from the actions or the desires of life.  Everywhere it is imposed by ideologues through either the use or the threat of force.  The modern manifestations of collectivism in its extreme Communism, National Socialism, and Fascism have everywhere been attended by massive dislocations of society, mass murder, war and collapse.  In its milder and more immediate manifestations, socialism and corporatism leads the way to stagnation, loss of incentive and economic collapse.

In America we see the fusion of politicians, unions, interest groups and too-big-to-fail crony capitalism into a formless cross-party bloc reminiscent of the outfit which has controlled Chicago politics for generations.  The principle proponents of this new conception of American society, the Progressives in the left-wings of both major political parties, have maneuvered themselves to the apex of power, and are controlling all three branches of the federal government.  They have the stated goal of transforming America, and the transformation they have in mind is the collectivization of all for the benefit of the few.  Washed away will be the individualism which has been our foundation and the sanctity of the rights this individualism proclaims.  As an unnatural creature the collective state asserts its imagined rights at the expense of our endowed ones.

Jul 10, 2010 | Categories:Commentary | Tags: , , , , | 2 Comments »

The Unlimited Blessings of Limited Government

The battles were over and the war won now the hardest task of all: how to secure the rights fought for while providing a government strong enough to endure.  The Framers gathered in Philadelphia for the purpose of proposing amendments to the Articles of Confederation.  Within days they decided instead to frame a new government launching an experiment in centralized but limited government. 

That they believed the people to be the source of legitimate authority is exposed in the Preamble which begins, “We the People.”  They based this belief upon the Enlightenment concept of Natural Law, that God endowed men with unalienable rights.  Many people in Western Civilization believed in Natural Law realizing that these rights, though endowed by the Creator as inherent prerogatives, would not continue to exist in organized society unless protected by limitations on government power.  The Framers believed Natural Law not only conferred rights it also established limits to the scope of government and man-made law.  In their mind no legitimate law violated the possession and enjoyment of the rights of man.  In declaring independence our ancestors proclaimed their purpose as assuming the station, “to which the laws of Nature and Nature’s God entitle them.”

Knowing all this was one thing, but devising a manner in which not only authority but also power could be conceded from society in general to a government which by the nature of organization consists of a much smaller number was quite another.  How was this power to be limited?  How were the rights of all to be protected from the power of the few?  What was to stop the concentration of power into the hands of factions combined for their own benefit?  How to provide a government with sufficient authority and power to ensure the security and order necessary for everyone to enjoy their natural rights, and yet restrained enough to allow them to do so?  This was the problem which confronted those locked in Independence Hall in 1787 devising a government strong enough to do good, yet limited enough to do no harm.

The concept of a written Constitution was the first step.  England had no written constitution.  It was ruled by tradition and precedent.  After the Revolution the Framers knew traditions and precedents can change.  So they looked to a written Constitution to provide a framework and guide for the new government, thus setting boundaries and establishing them for all to see.  They provided a means for change in the amendment process, but they made it difficult and cumbersome so that change would not be easy or readily accessible to the whim of a moment or the rulers of the day.

Beyond this primary recourse to a lasting written code the Framers sought to employ two vehicles for the limitation of government; a federal system wherein power is divided between the parts and the whole, and representation through which the voice of the people would speak.  To accomplish these twin goals the States retain their sovereignty and provide a legislature made up of two houses: the House of Representatives and the Senate.  The House of Representatives was and still is popularly elected by all eligible voters.  Every two years these closest of all national leaders return to the people for affirmation and a renewed mandate.  And the Senate, which was originally elected by the states through their legislatures who were all at least partially elected by the public thus, ensuring both: more input from the people and the federal nature of the government. The President and Vice President were and still are indirectly elected by the members of the Electoral College, which are chosen in accordance with procedures designated by the individual states, thus once again enhancing the federal nature of the government.  The President, with the advice and consent of the Senate, chooses the judges of the Federal Courts.

This system, which we’ve come to call checks and balances, provides that no law can be enacted without a majority vote by representatives elected directly by the people, representatives chosen by the States and signed by the President, whose election is a result of a combination of the people and the States.  Thus the authority of the people is employed, the voice of the people is heard, yet the indirect manner in which it is applied and the muted manner in which it is heard seeks to ensure a government insulated from the volatile passions of the day.

What the Framers sought was a government of reason. The Enlightenment thinkers believed through the use of reason people discover natural rights and natural law.  They also believed reason is the source of a government capable of protecting those rights by enforcing that law.  To this end they created a federal system to diffuse power and a representative republic to provide a voice for the people safeguarded from the emotions of the moment.  They hoped that reasonable people working within a federal government divided between branches and surrounded by a written constitution would ensure the authority of the many would pass through the hands of the few for the blessings of all. At least that was the hope.

Jun 24, 2010 | Categories:Commentary, Sovereignty, federalism | Tags: , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »