Free Republic

How did CO2 -- the elixir of life -- turn out to be the evil gas of 21st century? The special interest in CO2 began when a handful of scientists, backed by political elements, proposed their hypothesis -- one which suggested that CO2 emission from anthropogenic sources, such as coal-fired plants, is the primary reason for what they allege is a dangerous increase in earth’s temperature. Despite the lack of observational evidence, political institutions popularized this hypothesis through state-sponsored research programs. In order to sustain their claims, these climate alarmists designed climate computer models to manufacture friendly results that supported...

In continuance of the Senate of the States series, the next three squibs leave the Federal Convention and visit the decades leading to the destructive 17th Amendment (17A). The 17A triggered a cascade of stunning downwind consequences, perhaps only second in effect to the immediate post-Civil War amendments. As opposed to the 13th – 15th Amendments which reset society, the 17A reset our republican governing form. Overnight, the 17A transformed the Framers’ exquisite compound democratic/federal structure into a democratic form deadly to republics.1 Why the 17th Amendment? What enormous forces convinced the people, states, and congress to trade a proven,...

Presidential Elections. Little over a week before the close of the federal convention, the senate was still responsible for appointing a president should no one obtain a majority, or if two with a majority had an equal number, of electoral votes. While their electoral college system minimized the possibility of “pre-bought” presidents, our Framers nonetheless cast a suspicious eye at the senate. The convention intended a ‘high-toned’ second branch to check the house, but had they gone too far? Their senate had the power to appoint the president, name his officers, appoint judges, make treaties and try impeachments. This constituted...

The convention adjourned July 26th to offer time for a Committee of Detail to smooth the resolutions passed to date. In addition to its assigned duty, it occasionally added what it regarded as necessary clauses in the Constitution, such as the duty of the senate to resolve disputes between states. Delegates will reconvene on August 6th. The lack of public news from the convention was infuriating. During this recess, a member of the North Carolina delegation apologized to his governor; his oath of secrecy forbade discussion of the proceedings. James Madison’s father tried his utmost, with no success, to pry...

Who were your ancestors? What is your ethnic background composed of? Sites like Ancestry.com and 23andme have always been some go to sources in answering all of your toughest questions. But how accurate are they? In a recent interview with Cracked, one of the major ancestry testing companies, (which specific company is unknown) spilled the beans on what really happens when you purchase an ancestry kit. While I can’t say I’m surprised, you may be shocked to learn that these ancestry sites aren’t always as accurate as they claim to be. Beyond this, they’ve also admitted to tampering with the...

1) Good Christmas present for smart people. Somewhat complex sophistries are explained in simple terms. It’s fun knowing how this stuff works. 2) This book is a guidebook to what’s really going on in our public schools. Weird, unproven theories and methods are commonplace, such as Sight-words to teach reading, Constructivism to teach knowledge, Common Core Math to teach arithmetic, and so on. Once you understand these gimmicks, then you can fight back more successfully against the school system. 3) A group, whether 2 people or 20 people, can use this book to initiate and focus discussions. You can pick...

New Honda Accord a major step backwards - and that's a good thing!By Jim BrayTechnoFile.comIt may not be back completely but, as evidenced by the newly redesigned 2018 Honda Accord, it looks as if the honoured Japanese carmaker is back on track. Or at least well on the way.I've been particularly vociferous about my Honda angst in recent years. The company makes terrific cars - and they still do, for the most part - but somewhere along the way between adding all the new drivers' aids and pursuing ever more strict fuel economy mandates the company seemed to lose its...

Since delegates resolved, on July 16th, the most contentious issue of the convention, equality of state suffrage in the senate, they quickly hammered out over twenty other fundamental resolutions in the next week. The Connecticut Compromise smoothed the way toward fitting the remaining pieces of our Constitutional puzzle. Among unresolved fundamental resolutions were judicial appointments. James Madison’s Virginia Plan of Government envisioned a bicameral congress, comprising a popularly elected house of representatives, and a senate appointed by the house of representatives. It also featured a judiciary powerful enough to check congress. Not only could the judiciary veto unconstitutional laws, it...

Have you ever wondered if the Founding Fathers spoke with a British accent? I know I have. Well here is the answer. The typical English accent didn’t develop until after the Revolutionary War, so Americans actually speak proper English. Here comes the science.

As of this Saturday in mid-July, the familiar enumeration of specific powers in Article I § 8 and prohibitions in Sections 9 & 10 didn’t exist. Delegates had agreed to a single executive, a judiciary, a House of Representatives proportioned by population, and little else. From Madison’s notes it appears that most delegates assumed the new government would act only on the people, and not the states. Without knowing if the new government was to act on just the people (a national government) or the people plus the states (mixed national and federal), today’s proceedings were somewhat murky and confusing...

Up to now, the convention’s great divide was between the large and small states. Today, focus drifted toward the rift between north and south, non-slave vs. slave-holding states. The 3/5 rule and expected rapid population growth in the southwest disturbed some northern delegates. If slaves and whites filled new states as anticipated, southern states would soon dominate the House of Representatives. Abruptly, yet understandably, the aristocratic Gouverneur Morris (PA), who recently recommended doing away with the states, turned about in support of equal state suffrage in the senate as a counterbalance to a fast-growing south. Only a northern state senate...

In a new twist to the snowballing #Metoo scandal in Scandinavia, sexual harassment accusations have even reached the Swedish Academy, which is responsible for choosing the Nobel Prize in Literature. In chorus, thousands of female journalists and representatives of other trades drafted joint petitions to protest sexual assault.

As John Locke related in his Two Treatises of Government, the legislative power is the essence of republicanism. Despite the lessons of the great Enlightenment philosophers and the Framers’ long experience in colonial and free republican affairs, they experienced much difficulty in designing a suitable, stable, effective legislature for a young and growing society. 1 Yesterday’s grand committee met to address the basis of representation in the legislature. What compromise could overcome large state objections to parity among the states in the senate? Recall that large states feared small state dominance over taxation, and that the small would disproportionately burden...

Subtitle: Gouverneur Morris Warns of a Uniparty. The convention slogged on as the large/small state standoff continued over the question of representation in the senate. I will follow a different course today and let a little-known Framer, Pennsylvania’s Gouverneur Morris take center stage. We can thank Morris for the precise text and prose of our Constitution. As chairman of the Committee of Style, he not only smoothed and connected resolutions, he occasionally inserted clauses on his own initiative, which the convention typically accepted as written. Where history tagged James Madison as the father of the Constitution, Morris was its acknowledged...

While we take for granted today that the Framers breezily agreed to a compound republic of the people and the states, the issue still was unresolved five weeks into the convention! Tempers flew as arguments ranged on the one hand, from forming a national, democratic republic which did away with the states, and on the other, to keeping the existing Articles of Confederation. In late June, delegates far more resembled steely political negotiators than a band of brothers. What kept them going through the long summer was fear of the future if they did not come up with an adequate...

Peggy Noonan’s observation in the Wall Street Journal that the most recent jihadist mass murderer is “an idiot”—unlike the men who perpetrated 9/11, but like all who have struck us since—provokes more thought than likely went into it. Noonan correctly notes that 9/11 led us to expect more attacks with comparable planning and execution. Instead, we’ve been hit by random idiots, the most sophisticated of whom (the Bataclan murderers) operate at an elementary infantry level. So what? Our ruling class concludes that more and better policing has precluded attacks on the scale of 9/11, limiting Islamist terrorism to a level...

Subtitle: Swamp-Creatures. Meeting in Convention, delegates once again considered the Fourth Resolution, which dealt with senatorial elections, term length, age qualification, salary, and eligibility to additional offices. The answers to these issues will frame the senators’ dual-loyalty to the general government and their states. Under the Articles of Confederation, allegiance to the states was so strong that state interests typically superseded the interests of the nation. In turn, this led in part to the deteriorating social and economic conditions which pushed reluctant states to convene in Philadelphia. On the other hand, too strong an attachment to the capital city was...

June 14. William Patterson (NJ), spooked by the developing Virginia Plan, asked for a one-day adjournment to work on an improved federal design. June 15. He submitted the New Jersey/Patterson Plan. The Committee of the Whole will take up the amended Virginia and New Jersey Plans tomorrow. June 16. Since I previously blogged my observations of the New Jersey Plan here, I intended to overlook the proceedings of June 16th. However, the day had an impact on the issue of proportional v. equal representation of the states in the senate and is therefore worth a look. John Lansing (NY) and...

As of June 12th, the evolving senate still had no powers beyond those of the Confederation. Additional powers arrived after delegates determined its institutional shape and characteristics. At issue was the senate’s relationship with the lower house and the executive branch. Governor Randolph reminded the committee “the democratic licentiousness of the state legislatures proved the necessity of a firm senate.” The best model was the senate of Maryland, which consisted of fifteen members appointed to five-year terms by an electoral college of two electors from each county and one each from the cities of Baltimore and Annapolis. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland_Senate] Yet, even...

Salon’s Top 'Conservative’ List Is Nearly All 'Never Trump' Liberals Who Hate the Right Kristine Marsh October 16, 2017 Over the weekend, liberal online magazine Salon put out a highly mockable list of their top “25 Conservatives Actually Worth Following on Twitter.” The story made a splash on social media, because it seemed Salon’s only criteria for being a “worthy conservative” is that you had to be an outspoken “Never-Trumper” and a fierce critic of the right. Brownie points if you support Obamacare and spew profanities at the president. What didn’t count? Actually being a smart, thoughtful commentator on conservative...