Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

As the rule of law dissipates...
American Thinker ^ | 4 SEP 2019 | David L. Rosenthal

Posted on 09/04/2019 6:55:18 AM PDT by LavaDog

When legislatures create laws that call for actions to be taken that contradict constitutional law, they exceed the boundaries of their delegated powers, contradict the law of the land, and set up conditions leading to violation of civil rights. Executives who sign those pieces of legislation into law also act corruptly and in violation of constitutional law. Red flag laws, for example, which permit circumvention of due process, are unconstitutional. Yet judges use them as a basis for issuing orders to confiscate firearms. When they do so, they are violating constitutional law. Judicial orders that call for confiscation of firearms on the basis of unsubstantiated claims are unenforceable. Yet police officers obey those orders. When they do so, they are violating constitutional law and their oath to support and defend the Constitution.

(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: constitution; oath; ruleoflaw

1 posted on 09/04/2019 6:55:18 AM PDT by LavaDog
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Flimsey Grahamnesty needs to be the first removed.
He has voted for amnesty THREE times, before he came out for red flag laws.

Nothing undermines the rule of law more than abandoning it for fraudulently documented foreigners.


2 posted on 09/04/2019 6:58:39 AM PDT by Lurkinanloomin (Natural Born Citizen Means Born Here Of Citizen Parents_Know Islam, No Peace-No Islam, Know Peace)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Look for civil disobedience to increase.


3 posted on 09/04/2019 6:58:59 AM PDT by Biggirl ("One Lord, one faith, one baptism" - Ephesians 4:5)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Lurkinanloomin

Politicians who will not defend the borders of a nation should not waste money sending our troops anywhere.

If we are not a nation there is no point in the existence of the military industrial complex.

Eventually the deplorables will figure it out—and then the Swamp Creatures won’t have such a fun part-ee at the taxpayer’s expense.

No border defense—then no taxes for military defense.


4 posted on 09/04/2019 7:03:43 AM PDT by cgbg (Democracy dies in darkness when Bezos bans books.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Lurkinanloomin

The liberals want a hot war.
Sadly, they may get their wish.


5 posted on 09/04/2019 7:04:06 AM PDT by Da Coyote (eh)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Here is the real question, imo. The base of the right is the sector of society which is “Christian”... not in the sense of those who are born again true believers, but those who adhere to a basis for law and ethics which springs from a Christian basis.

The question is, how obligated are we to obey the civil magistrate (Romans 13) when that magistrate does not fulfill his duty to rule as a sub-regent of God, but rather rules in defiance of God? Are we to remain “patriots” in the sense that we embrace “my country” including the civil government?

This was the question which launched our own revolutionary war... when is defiance, rejection of the civil magistrate and replacement, (even to the point of violent revolution, if necessary) justified?

If this question horrifies you, it only shows you have no awareness of the REAL issues concerning liberty and the founding of the USA.

Get used to the word “treason.” You are going to be hearing it a lot.


6 posted on 09/04/2019 7:10:00 AM PDT by mostly_lies
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Barr failed the American people so devastatingly!


7 posted on 09/04/2019 7:13:51 AM PDT by RoseofTexas
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Da Coyote

Sadly, once you realize there is no other way to deal with the libtards your emotions over the whole thing change.


8 posted on 09/04/2019 7:21:06 AM PDT by wastoute (Government cannot redistribute wealth. Government can only redistribute poverty.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Keep track of everyone who votes to promote anarchy.

Didn’t I see an article posted earlier about California passing a law making it legal to not cooperate with police.

If it all unravels, and mass anarchy ensues, make sure to find the people who passed all these laws and push them straight out into the middle of the fray. Don’t let them hide from it.


9 posted on 09/04/2019 7:21:50 AM PDT by z3n
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Those officials who must take an oath to defend the Constitution & then refuse to do so need to be immediately removed from office.


10 posted on 09/04/2019 7:25:43 AM PDT by oldtech
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: mostly_lies

I wish I had saved it, alas, I didn’t. Years ago someone here posted a sermon from WWI on this very topic. This was years before Bonhoeffer. Both influenced me profoundly. Quick run down. There is nothing in the Bible that requires one to be a victim. Of a rapist. Of a thief. Even of your own government. The mountain He recommended “moving” was The Herodian, THE GOVERNMENT.


11 posted on 09/04/2019 7:26:47 AM PDT by wastoute (Government cannot redistribute wealth. Government can only redistribute poverty.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

If the elected politicians break the law by doing an end run around our basic set of Constitutional Rights; does that mean they can be removed by doing an end run around the normal process?

One bad turn deserves another. It’s also the duty of every American to ignore unlawful laws made by traitorous politicians. I do believe a rope and a tree were frequently used to deal with traitors. This might be a good time to consider bringing that option back.

It is the responsibility of every politician to know if their vote is in accordance with our laws and Constitutional Rights. If not; then they have just become a criminal.


12 posted on 09/04/2019 7:30:42 AM PDT by Boomer (Our melting pot has turned into a pressure cooker)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Lurkinanloomin
People think that the “Rule of Law “ has suddenly vanished. We have not had the “Rule of Law” since the perverts, degenerates, and traitors put one of their own in the White House. One Bill Clinton. While it is true that the “Rule of Law” no longer exists in the United States of America, it is not a sudden phenom, it disappeared when the Clintons arrived in Washington, D.C. And the disappearance of the "Rule of Law" was affirmed when again the degenerates, perverts, and traitors put another one of their in the White House.This one is known as barrack obama. And to demonstrate how low we, as a Nation have sank, is worshiped and adored by the unwashed masses and media. And last but not least, to add insult to injury to the United States he brought a crossdressing male to pose as his wife.

As it now stands in the united States of America, we have two groups of people. We have the Elites who are exempt from the laws. And we have the sheep that the laws are used to control.

That is what the people now want. We had a system that worked for well over 100 years. But the people did not like it, so they changed it. How did they change it? By putting perverts, degenerates, and traitors in the White House and Congress.

13 posted on 09/04/2019 7:35:04 AM PDT by sport
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: mostly_lies

Here is one I found, it may not be the actual one but it is pretty good.

Norwich Cathedral

Sunday, 27 September, 1914

H Hensley Henson

YE HAVE HEARD THAT IT WAS SAID, THOU SHALT LOVE THY NEIGHBOR, AND HATE THINE ENEMY: BUT I SAY UNTO YOU, LOVE YOUR ENEMIES.—St. Matthew v.43.

1. THE Founder of the Quakers relates in his Journal that, while he lay in prison at Derby about the time of the Battle of Worcester, he was “pressed for a soldier,” and declined on religious grounds to bear arms. From his dungeon, he wrote a letter to the Officers concerned in his commitment, reminding them of these words of CHRIST, which I have chosen for my text. Was GEORGE FOX right in his understanding of the LORD’S admonition? Ought Christians to refuse military service for themselves, and as citizens to repudiate the method of war? Does the Gospel really prohibit war to its professors? Are the nations of Europe to-day engaged in a great act of revolt against the Law of CHRIST? Such questions can hardly be avoided. It is safe to assert that they are engaging the thought, and troubling the consciences, of many Christian folk in Christendom to-day. It will not need, then, that I should offer reasons for addressing you this afternoon on the anxious and difficult question of Christianity and War.

2. In a famous book, widely read in Germany, and now in an English translation widely read in this country, General VON BERNHARDI does not scruple to claim the sanction of Christianity for the doctrine that “war is not merely a necessary element in the life of nations, but an indispensable factor of culture, in which a true civilized nation finds the highest expression of strength and vitality.” He admits, indeed, that “Christian morality is based on the law of love,” but he maintains that “Christian morality is personal and social, and in its nature cannot be political.” Accordingly, though “it tells us to love our individual enemies,” it “does not remove the conception of enmity.” Nay, CHRIST Himself said, “I AM NOT COME TO SEND PEACE ON EARTH, BUT A SWORD,” and in point of fact “there never was a religion which was more combative than Christianity.”

This reasoning will not bear examination. It is at once too sweeping and too limited. Even if we allow that Christianity is directly concerned only with personal morality, we are surely not committed to the conclusion that the State may rightly do what is forbidden to the Citizen. Personal morality would be a very poor thing if it had no effect on public action. The Christian Citizen cannot leave his Christianity out of his civic life, or close his Bible when he opens his Ledger. Somehow or other, he must hold the two together—personal duty as a disciple of CHRIST, and public duty as a citizen of the State. Christianity cannot be simply ruled out of the political arena, when the issue of war and peace is presented for the citizen’s decision.

3. Again, Christianity can never give the last word to any external authority, whether State or Church, when the question of personal duty is in debate. There is a higher authority which must sanction the demands of State or Church before they can be entitled to the Christian’s obedience, and that is the authority of the Christian’s own conscience. “WE MUST OBEY GOD RATHER THAN MAN” is a very early summary of Christian duty, and it makes short work with the supreme claim which the State is ever eager to advance. “THE KINGDOM OF GOD,” said our SAVIOUR, “IS WITHIN YOU.” When we consider the matter, we can see two good reasons why Christianity should limit its direct teaching to the individual. On the one hand, it is only by making individuals right that you can really reform society which is made up of individuals: on the other hand, CHRIST brought the Truth to men by means of a Life and Teaching which were offered under historical conditions, that is, at a given time and place. Those historical conditions would pass away, and Men would find themselves in novel circumstances. Personal Duty always proceeds on the same principles: but Laws and Social Standards are in perpetual flux. The ancient world, based on slavery, and governed despotically, could provide no economic or political precedents for the right ordering of modern communities. The circumstances of our SAVIOUR’S Life have no parallel in the world as we know it: and if He had given precise directions to His contemporaries for their civic behaviour, it is difficult to see what value those directions could have possessed for the free citizens of modern England. When, however, the case of individual morality is considered, the Gospel is found to contain not only luminous precepts, each one of the embodiment of a far-reaching principle, but also a Perfect Example of Personal Virtue, illustrating those precepts and applying those principles.

4. The Rule for the Individual is suggested in a Gospel, and illustrated in a Life, but it is not laid down in a code. Indeed, such is the nature of the Christian Rule that it could not possibly be expressed in a series of regulations determined with relation to a specific epoch, or suggested by a specific social system. It is essentially an attitude of the mind that is required of us, not a prescript manner of acting; and that Christian Attitude of Mind must reveal itself variously as the occasion requires, and the situation compels. It is evident, therefore, that we must not seek in the New Testament the political and economic guidance which God rather means us to find in the experience of Mankind, slowly disclosing the lines of rational human progress.

5. Besides, when we read the Gospels, and try to draw from them a system of practical morals, we must always remember that Christianity was designed for the acceptance of men like ourselves living in the world, and taking their full share of all the normal burdens of the world’s citizenship. “I PRAY NOT THAT THOU SHOULDEST TAKE THEM FROM THE WORLD, BUT THAT THOU SHOUDEST KEEP THEM FROM THE EVIL ONE” was the SAVIOUR’S prayer for His disciples. We may rightly, therefore, set aside any understanding of the Gospels which would really make them useless for us here and now, when we seek to do our duty in the world. Again and again devoted believers have rebelled against this rule of sound interpretation, and have insisted even passionately on a literal understanding of the Words of CHRIST. Hostile critics of Christianity, such as Julian in the fourth century, and Voltaire in the eighteenth, have applauded them, rightly perceiving that their own denunciation of CHRIST’S Teaching as essentially impracticable gains considerably plausibility from such unpractical theorizing of Christians themselves. But experience has never failed to rebuke this undisciplined and irrational fervour. Sooner or later the advocates of literalism are driven into seeking artificial conditions of life, or are forced in spite of their theories to accept working compromises, which presuppose the abandonment of their main principle. Such examples to the contrary as may be suggested will hardly bear examination. Thus the most famous of them all, the Quaker rule in Pennsylvania (Vide The Quakers in the American Colonies, by Rufus Male: Jones, p.503), while it must always be regarded as a notable instance of the power of the Christian Ideal to exalt men above conventional standards of virtue can hardly be allowed to prove the success of the attempt to apply the Sermon on the Mount literally to human life. For the Quakers did not rely wholly on their moral appeal. They adopted a system of regularly bribing the Indians to keep the peace, a system which was probably not wholesome for the Indians themselves, and cannot be said to be distinctively Christian. Moreover, the refusal of the Quakers to serve in the Army on the ground that Christianity forbade fighting, could not really exempt them from responsibility for the military procedures which they denounced, for not only did they enjoy to the full the security which the Army and Navy guaranteed, but as tax-payers they shared in maintaining these Forces. In fact, they fought by deputy, pleading that conscience forbade them to fight in person: but in morals it is a well-established rule that what a man does by deputy he really, in point of moral responsibility, does himself. The Quaker, if he would be as logical as he is conscientious, must shake off the dust of his feet against every civilized government, and withdraw beyond the confines of civil order altogether.

6. Moreover, such direct and abrupt action does not seem to accord with the revealed method of CHRIST. Christian Morality is essentially and professedly progressive. The Quaker wishes to do at a stroke what can only be done gradually. War is not abolished while men regard one another with such envy and mistrust as to maintain armaments. The striving of traders one against another in eager competition is in the same moral category as violent conflict. The Law-courts witness breaches of the Golden Rule of CHRIST scarcely less extreme than those of the Battle-field. Until the springs of conduct have been cleansed, it is vain to speak of the abolition of war. Just because the Reformation of the World is gradual and progressive, it is vain to appeal to precedents as fixing the present duty of Christians. In so far as the Quakers protested against the cast-iron casuistry of the Churches, their protest was sound. From the first such rigidity was disallowed. The Disciples were taught to expect fresh revelations of duty. “I HAVE YET MANY THINGS TO SAY UNTO YOU, BUT YE CANNOT BEAR THEM NOW. HOWBEIT WHEN HE, THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH, IS COME, HE SHALL GUIDE YOU INTO ALL THE TRUTH”—so the LORD spake, and the History of the Church is the fulfilment of His Words. Precedents, therefore, are no safe guides for Christians when they seek to know their duty. They must rather ask what may be the fresh application of the MIND OF CHRIST which the new circumstances are calling for. It is the principal defect of the older casuists that they are dominated by precedents. The Centurions mentioned in the Gospel are made to justify military service. ONESIMUS, the converted slave sent back by ST. PAUL to his master PHILEMON, is made to justify slavery. The Patriarchs are even made to justify polygamy. It was suggested satirically two generations ago, when the moral rightness of slavery was hotly debated in America, that the Slave-owners of the South ought to set up statutes to ONESIMUS in gratitude for the services he had rendered them. Once grasp the proper progressiveness of Christian morality, and all such appears to precedent become futile and misleading. For the Christian Society has learned something in the course of its long and chequered history; and the Christian conscience has been educated in the School of CHRIST, so that the moral standard itself has been raised, and what seemed tolerable even to a ST. PAUL is now universally judged to be intolerable. Accordingly, if we are to decide that War is not necessarily prohibited to a Christian Man, we shall have to find better reasons for our decision than those which the precedents of Christian Warfare can give us.

7. The Quaker “testimony” against War, mistaken as a rule for present guidance, has priceless value as a protest against Christian acquiescence in a lower level of practice than the Christian conscience really sanctions. Certainly a great change is passing over Christian opinion with respect to War. If we are still compelled to admit that War may be indispensable, we are confident that most of the reasons which have been offered for Wars in the past are insufficient, and that only in the plain interest of justice may Christians sanction the dread Appeal to the Sword. General sentiment is moving in a Christian direction. The immense popularity of TOLSTOY’S writings is an evidence of this. Impracticable and exaggerated though his doctrines are, they yet make an appeal to the general conscience which is impressively successful. Everywhere men allow that his indictment of current European morality is substantially just. We cannot ignore this, or read our New Testament without the suggestive commentary which the great Russian Prophet offers. The doctrine of VON BERNHARDI and all that brutal school whose representative he is, shocks the Christian Conscience, and only needs to be plainly stated to a free modern democracy, trained in the fundamental ideas of Christianity, in order to be indignantly repudiated. If we, professed Christians and citizens of a free democracy, fight, it is assuredly not because we believe in “the inevitableness, the idealism, and the blessing of war, as an indispensable and stimulating law of development,” but because we, solemnly weighing our religious and civil duty, can see no other course rightly open to us. We hold with EDMUND BURKE, himself the passionate apologist of Britain’s long war against Napoleon, and with an even more anxious conviction:

The blood of man should never be shed but to redeem the blood of man. It is well shed for our family, for our friends, for our God, for our country, for our kind. The rest is vanity; the rest is crime.

8. Reluctantly but decisively then we reach our conclusion. War is indispensable in the world as we know it. Civilized Mankind has not yet succeeded in discovering a substitute for the Sword in certain cases. If it be too much to say with BURKE that “War is the sole means of justice amongst nations” (for much has been effected, and more might be, by Arbitration), yet there is no known alternative War when Power repudiates the restraints of international law and fundamental morality, and pursues it selfish object without regard to the rights and interests of nations. Then to refuse to fight is to hand over the control of the world to Violence, and to betray the Cause of Righteousness. The outbreak of the immense conflict which is now desolating Europe, and making its influence felt throughout the world, is proof of the necessity of War in the present stage of human civilization; but the extreme reluctance with which the necessity was admitted by the Statesmen of the Allied Powers, and especially by our own, it itself an impressive indication of the disgust with which the civilized conscience regards War in itself, and also a prophecy of the coming of a time when the last obstacles will have been overcome, and War will have passed for ever out of the admitted procedures of civilized mankind.

9. CHRIST’S Religion is pre-eminently a Power for Righteousness on the Earth, and therefore so long as the state of the world clothes War with the sublime character of a Moral Instrument, vindicating Justice against Oppression, so long will Christians recognize it as legitimate. They will remember that their MASTER did Himself illustrate the necessity of using force against wickedness when He cleansed the Temple with holy violence, and delivered that great denunciation of “SCRIBES AND PHARISEES HYPOCRITES,” which rings through the centuries like a battle-cry of the Lord. CHRIST’S Religion is in human society as a Leaven and a Light, an inner principle making always for Justice and Peace, and a revelation of Ideals which beckon on the advancing race towards its true goal. CHRIST’S Religion bears on the World through men and women who are filled with CHRIST’S Spirit, and striving to live according to the Law of His Example. The outbreak of a great War, albeit righteous in purpose and unavoidable, calls us all to searching of heart and criticism of life. How far are we really living in the spirit of the LORD’S Teaching? How far is our civic influence telling us a power for equity and forbearance in political life? How far are we setting forward in society those principles of “PEACE AND GOODWILL,” which are assuredly the very “MARKS OF JESUS”? The Abolition of War will only then take place, when those principles are so generally accepted by civilized peoples, that the whole weight of public opinion in every nation will be adverse to policies of aggression and methods of violence; and the task of Statesmen will be, not to build up the vast armaments, but to establish justice throughout the whole complicated fabric of society; not to thwart the progress of other nations, but to work harmoniously with them for the common welfare of Mankind. Some progress has been made. VON BERNHARDI’S Praises of War have an archaic sound, and surprise as much as they shock those who first hear them. This War is, we may dare to hope, destined, by the Governing Mercy of the ALMIGHTY, to cleanse the vision of the nations, and to clear their path, so that in the Retrospect it will be seen to bring appreciably nearer the Final Overthrow of the Theory and Practice of International Violence, and to hasten the Kingdom of the Prince of Peace.


14 posted on 09/04/2019 7:43:26 AM PDT by wastoute (Government cannot redistribute wealth. Government can only redistribute poverty.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Regrettably all laws written since the Constitution was ratified were written to control the People and keep the People adjusting to control lies


15 posted on 09/04/2019 7:46:46 AM PDT by no-to-illegals ( Liberals, leftists, Rinos, moslems, illegals, lamestream media. All want America to fail and die)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: z3n
Every vote for a Democrat is a vote to promote anarchy. There is a shit pot full of them that are now running for political office. And the sheep [voters] will elect a majority of them to political office.

In reference to your third paragraph, FRiend, I do not believe that they are hiding. The muslims that the voters, in their infinite wisdom, sent to Congress are saying it loud and saying id proud. Ditto the others. each day or several times a week, some college professor or someone else are quoted as saying. Kill Whites or other words to that effect. They are not saying that just to exercise their vocal chords. They have a purpose and reason for what they say.

16 posted on 09/04/2019 7:46:51 AM PDT by sport
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 9 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

Isn’t something like this the reason The Founders left us the 2nd. Amendment?


17 posted on 09/04/2019 7:53:36 AM PDT by jmacusa ("If wisdom is not the Lord, what is wisdom?''.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: LavaDog

18 posted on 09/04/2019 9:00:38 AM PDT by Boomer (Our melting pot has turned into a pressure cooker)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson