I came across on the web and thought it it interesting.
Also of note, oathkeepers has decided to stand down in Oregon at the wishes of the family.
Patrick Henry and George Mason were two of the anti-Federalists opposed to the increase of power granted to the government by the Constitution, although one or both may have changed their opinion by the time it was ratified. History proved that their initial misgivings were valid.
As one farmer, Plough Jogger, complained at an illegal convention:
I've labored hard all my days and fared hard. I have been greatly abused, have been obliged to do more than my part in the war; been loaded with class rates, town rates, province rates, Continental rates, and all rates . . . been pulled and hauled by sheriffs, constables, and collectors, and had my cattle sold for less than they were worth. I have been obliged to pay and nobody will pay me. I have lost a great deal by this man and that man and t'other man, and the great men are all going to get all we have, and I think it is time for us to rise and put a stop to it, and have no more courts, nor sheriffs, nor collectors nor lawyers, and I know that we are the biggest party, let them say what they will. . . . We've come to relieve the distresses of the people. There will be no court until they have redress of their grievances.[viii]
The state, however, made some attempt to pacify the farmers by accepting goods instead of the near-worthless issued money, but this did little to help the situation. For the next several years, farmers petitioned the Massachusetts General Court for tax and debt relief, while protestors harassed state tax collectors, shut down courts, and prevented debt collection. Violence was averted for several years, but the state militias were called out numerous times to stand threateningly in front of large gatherings of increasingly desperate Regulators, and it quickly became apparent that one of these standoffs would lead to bloodshed. The situation was eerily reminiscent of the protests and threats that had been made against those who had enforced the British tax policies before the war, a connection that was not lost on either side.
Footnotes
[i] Henry Knox in a letter to George Washington, October 23, 1786, as printed in Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove, Voices of a People's History of the United States (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2005), 105.
[ii] When the government was finally unified in the Constitution, at least five-sixths of those who ratified it were directly benefited financially (Charles A. Beard, An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States [New York: Dover, reprinted 2004], 149-152).
[iii] William Hogeland, The Whiskey Rebellion (New York: Scribner, 2006), 32; Curtis P. Nettels, The Emergence of a National Economy, 1775-1815 (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1962), 23-34.
[iv] Thomas Dilorenzo, Hamilton's Curse (New York: Random House, 2008), 59.
[v] Robert A. Feer, "Shay's Rebellion and the Constitution: A Study in Causation," The New England Quarterly 42 no. 3 Sep., 1969, 390-393.
[vi] Thomas Dilorenzo, Hamilton's Curse, 45.
[vii] As Morris put it, it was his intent to see that wealth flowed "into those hands which could render it most productive," (E. James Ferguson, Power of the Purse: A History of American Public Finance, 1776-1790 [Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1961], 124); William Hogeland, The Whiskey Rebellion, 32.
[viii] As quoted in Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove, Voices of a People’s History of the United States, 104.
I am deeply suspicious of the motivations of anyone who employs the term “American imperialism”.
Conservatives should be for what works. The Constitution is a wonderful document, not because it is perfect, but because for a very long time it worked.
Unfortunately, this essay provides yet one more example where a major threat to the US was resolved mostly in a way to benefit the rich and powerful, then later gussied up with patriotic bunting and speeches.
Thus we have the unconstitutional treatment of the Copperheads during the Civil War, the extension of government powers during the Progressive Era, the creation of the IRS partly to fund WWI, the creation of the welfare state in response to The Depression, the centralization of the workforce during WWII, the creation of the DHS and NSA snooping during the war on terror, etc.
Read
I see a number of red flags going up as I read through this.
My advice to other readers is to take this article with a huge truckload of salt.