Republic

Priests for Life ^ | 1-12-04 | Fr. Frank Pavone

[cpforlife.org]

Republic
Fr. Frank Pavone
National Director, Priests for Life

"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."

That quote is not from an anarchist or a totalitarian leader. It is, perhaps surprisingly, from John Adams, the second President of the United States, and a signer of the Declaration of Independence.

Similar quotes can be found in the writings of other Founding Fathers of our nation, because although they had the opportunity to do so, they did not establish a democracy. What they established for America, instead, is a republic. And great is the difference between the two.

In a democracy, policies are made by a direct majority vote of the people. What the majority says, goes, and that is final and absolute. So, for example, if the majority were to say that murder is OK, it would be OK. There would not be a mechanism, in a pure democracy, to keep it from being OK, except that the majority changed its mind.

A republic, however, is based not on the rule of the majority, but on the rule of law. Representatives are elected, and they pass laws. They are accountable to the people, and in this sense majorities matter. But they are also accountable to a higher law, and there is the key difference. There are certain laws that the majority can never change. These laws flow from the fundamental rights of the human person and from God Himself.

The Founding Fathers recognized this and expected all future generations of Americans to recognize it as well. Alexander Hamilton, a signer of the Constitution, wrote, "[T]he law...dictated by God Himself is, of course, superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all times. No human laws are of any validity if contrary to this" (The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, Vol. I, p. 87).

James Wilson, another signer of the Constitution and a US Supreme Court Justice, wrote, "All [laws], however, may be arranged in two different classes, 1) Divine. 2) Human...Human law must rest its authority ultimately upon the authority of that law which is Divine" (The Works of the Honourable James Wilson, Vol. I, pp. 103-105).

The Founders of our nation believed in Biblical law, and that was the standard for law and government in our country until the turn of this century. Now, instead, legal positivism has become the standard. It says that there are no unchanging, superior laws. Rather, man-made law is the final law and can always change according to circumstances. That's the poisoned soil out of which Roe vs. Wade and other abortion decisions have grown.

It's time for a change. We need to re-discover our own history and impart it to our youth. The primary legal document of our nation, the Declaration of Independence, recognizes in its first sentence that "the laws of nature and of nature's God" are primary. We are not a democracy; we are a republic.

Comments on this column? Email us at mail@priestsforlife.org, Priests for Life, PO Box 141172, Staten Island, NY 10314; Tel: 888-PFL-3448, 718-980-4400; Fax: 718-980-6515; web: Priests for Life

[cpforlife.org]

"We are not a democracy; we are a republic."

God Save The Republic

[cpforlife.org]

PING

[cpforlife.org]

Please let me know if you want on or off my Pro-Life Ping List.

[AdamSelene235]

Republics can be just as abusive as a democracy. The key is to limit the size and scope of government. Unfortunately, we've reached the point where government has almost completely crowded out civil society. Given the decadence and nihilism currently pervading Western culture, I doubt rehabilitation is likely. Best bet is to bottom out and go for another Renaissance.

[caisson71]

Will there ever be a form of government that lives eternal? I believe most will agree that even our republican form of democracy is still an experiment.

[OXENinFLA]

http://www.bushcountry.org/news/oct_news_pages/n_101403_sound-true.htm

At about the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution in 1787, a Scottish history professor by the name of Professor Alexander Tyler had this to say about "The Fall of the Athenian Republic" over 2,000 years previous to that date.
.
The Fall of the Athenian Republic. "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse (generous gifts) from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, (which is) always followed by a dictatorship." "The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance, from abundance to complacency; from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back into bondage."


.....Snip

[cpforlife.org]

"Best bet is to bottom out and go for another Renaissance."

I would propose that we "bottomed out" on January 22, 1973 and have been there since. When is the "Renaissance" coming?

Could it be with FR?

[Federalist 78]

Now, instead, legal positivism has become the standard. It says that there are no unchanging, superior laws. Rather, man-made law is the final law and can always change according to circumstances. That's the poisoned soil out of which Roe vs. Wade and other abortion decisions have grown.

"But it is not possible to give to each department an equal power of self-defense. In republican government, the legislative authority necessarily predominates." -Federalist #51. , "Of the three powers above mentioned, the judiciary is next to nothing.''- Fed #78.

Article 3, Section 2, Clause 2

In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.

Over the last 200 years, Congress has exercised this authority to except certain areas from the jurisdiction of the federal court system. In Turner vs. Bank of North America 4 Dall. (4 U.S.,8(1799)),the Supreme Court concluded that the federal courts derive their judicial power from Congress, not the Constitution.
In Cary vs. Curtis 3 How, (44 U.S.), 236 (1845), a statute made final the decision of the secretary of the Treasury in certain tax deductions. The statute was challenged as an unconstitutional deprivation of the judicial power of the courts. The Supreme Court concluded that the jurisdiction of the federal courts (inferior to the Supreme Court) was in the sole power of Congress.
In Sheldon vs. Sill 8 How (49 U.S. 441 (1850)), involved the validity of the assignee clause of the Judicial Act of 1789 restricting such action to establish federal court jurisdictions. The Supreme Court sustained the power of Congress to limit the jurisdiction of the inferior federal courts.
In Ex Parte McCardle 6 Wall. (73 U.S.) 318 (1868), the Supreme Court accepted review on certiorari of a denial of a petition for a writ of habeas corpus by the circuit court. Congress, fearful the Supreme Court would honor the writ, passed a law repealing the act which authorized the appeal. The Supreme Court dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction.
In Lauf vs. E.G. Shinner & Co. 303 U.S. 323, 330 (1938), the Supreme Court upheld the power of Congress to define and limit the jurisdiction of the inferior courts of the United States in the form restrictions on the issuance of injunctions in labor disputes under the Norris-La Guardia Act of 1932.
In Lockerty v. Phillips 319 U.S. 182 (1943), Congress provided for a special court to appeal price control decisions under the Emergency Price Control Act of 1942. The Supreme Court sustained this restriction.
In the 107th Congress (2001-2002), Congress used the authority of Article III, Section 2, clause 2 on 12 occasions to limit the jurisdiction of the federal courts. ^{Article III, Section 2 - The Washington Times: Editorials/OP-ED}

[cpforlife.org]

Yes,

Professor Tyler should be MANDATORY in all history & civics classes.

“If you expect a nation
to be ignorant and free,
you expect what never was
and can never be.”
Thomas Jefferson

[SamAdams76]

Along these sames lines, that is why we elect presidents through an electoral college rather than through a direct vote. This ingenious system balances the electorate so that every citizen's vote counts no more or less than anybody else's. With a direct vote, the president would be decided by the urban centers. Candidates would seek to appeal to those voters only, ignoring anybody who lived in a rural area. But with "rural" states like Wyoming, Idaho, North Dakota and even New Hampshire providing valuable electoral votes, the candidates cannot afford to ignore the interests of citizens in those states.

[cpforlife.org]

Indeed,

Sam, Wasn't it a newly elected Senator, one Hitlery Rottenhamster Marx Klintoon that broached the subject of doing away with the electoral college after the 2000 elections? Very telling.

[Eala]

Please, God, Save The Republic

[Salvation]

I love all these quotes from our founding fathers. If only we could get the dimocrats to read them!!

[philetus]

Good luck Frank

[Federalist 78]

2 Chronicles 7:14 If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

[YepYep]

And, Dear God, please help the healing of our land.

[Cultural Jihad]

"For I was a stranger and you welcomed me." (Matthew o25:35)

[Sonny M]

Reminds me of a teacher in college one year. She asked me, why I always says this is a republic whenever she said this is a democracy.

My answer was simple "see article 4, section 4 of the U.S. constitution."

[philetus]

This:
"We need to re-discover our own history and impart it to our youth."
is what I meant by "good luck Frank.

[MHGinTN]

"Representatives are elected, and they pass laws. They are accountable to the people ..." Therein is the deadly malignancy of America's disease, the People are the sovereigns, but when the sovereigns defer their responsibilities to the purveyors of 'democracy' (the corrupt democrat and Republican representatives who pass laws that further their power, through the dole), the concept of Republic crumbles into judicial oligarchy such as we now have. The solution must, of necessity in dealing with the tumors, include impeachment and change of judicial representatives ... a cure the lazy sovereigns will not invoke, sadly, in their abject ignorance.

We have currently rising the reality of cannibalism about to be embraced by the sovereigns in the name of enlightened medical advancement. There are very good alternative approaches but the lazy sovereigns will not take the time to educate themselves in this series of issues, so the powerful medical lobbies will determine the direction the 'democracy purveyors' (the elected representatives of both parties) lead the nation, and that direction is clearly cannibalizing of the earliest aged individual human beings.

I sincerely wish we had time to invoke your cure, Kevin, of educating the youth who would then change the moral realities, but alas we are too far down into the slippery funnel of expedience and utilitarian morality to last that much longer a 'People-as-sovereigns-of-the-Republic' nation. The lazy sovereigns are now accustomed to swimming in the cesspool and the toxic contents will not grow exponentially.