Posted on 01/25/2008 8:19:08 AM PST by pgyanke
That’s great! I anticipate being called to carpet for mentioning the “hallowed” New Deal... thanks for the ammunition!
Thank you for understanding my purpose.
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
If you would like to contribute, please read what I wrote and provide some feedback. Thank you in advance.
Lamar Alexander boiled it down to a one-liner:
“If you can find it in the Yellow Pages, then government ought not to be doing it.”
I like that. Going to add it to my homepage...
Let us know how it goes.
"Since God created man with certain unalienable rights, and man, in turn, created government to help secure and safeguard those rights, it follows that man is superior to the creature which he created. Man is superior to government and should remain master over it, not the other way around. Even the non-believer can appreciate the logic of this relationship."
I think it's a very good book.
Will do. My goal is to get as much feedback as I can quickly so I can email it this afternoon. We meet on Monday. I hope to give them interesting reading this weekend.
Let’s try the humanist version:
“Since man evolved randomly out of nothing, nothingness is superior to man. It follows then, that anything created by man is also less than nothing...”
What a horrible world view...
James Madison to Joseph C. Cabell
13 Feb. 1829
Letters 4:14--15
For a like reason, I made no reference to the "power to regulate commerce among the several States." I always foresaw that difficulties might be started in relation to that power which could not be fully explained without recurring to views of it, which, however just, might give birth to specious though unsound objections. Being in the same terms with the power over foreign commerce, the same extent, if taken literally, would belong to it. Yet it is very certain that it grew out of the abuse of the power by the importing States in taxing the non-importing, and was intended as a negative and preventive provision against injustice among the States themselves, rather than as a power to be used for the positive purposes of the General Government, in which alone, however, the remedial power could be lodged.
Thank you for another excellent attachment to my email...
They'll come back with "Why no one, of course."
From that point on, you own the argument.
L
Bastiat is a great place to start.
Any serious discussion of the proper role of government should also include a liberal dose of John Locke. I recommend his Second Treatise of Government (1690).
I would argue that without Locke, there would have been no American Revolution.
Here's what the constitution has to say about what the powers of congress should be...
=snip=
Section 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And
To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.
=end enip=
I appreciate your post. You are thinking as I am. Could I get your feedback on the email I prepared for them? It needs to be more generalized and summarized for my purposes...that’s what I tried to do.
>>Regulation of the environment so as to provide reasonably safe air and water<<
Obviously, you are not regulating the environment but people’s actions.
The foundation of American government was the social compact - where each individual on an equal basis compacted with others to lay aside their natural right to use personal force against trespass/injury, in exchange for an equitable institutional process to define, protect, prosecute and punish the trespass/injury of one against another.
Under the traditions of law we inherited, Viking/Saxon (tort) law was framed in terms of injuries to the individual rights of others: (1) physical rights of “were” (life or limb); psychological status rights of “mund” (peace or privacy); and ownership rights of private property.
Under the traditions of law we inherited from the maxims of Roman law came the basis of property law “sic utere tuo ut alienum non laedas. - each one must so use his own as not to injure his neighbor.” In addition to protections against individual trespass, the “police powers of government” were expanded to include the concept of public nuisance - dangers/injuries/trespass of such magnitude that they affect the general public. This is where government regulation of personal actions to protect public health, safety and morals from substantial injury came in.
In addition to these core government functions, was added the function of advancing or promoting the public benefit. (Unfortunately in the United States in the 20th century, the regulatory powers expanded as a de facto power to promote the public interest by force instead of just preventing injury.) This traditionally included the creation of roads and other infrastructure. This was to be accomplished by taxation for the common good and the creation of publicly owned property. All property was held subject to eminent domain - meaning that if the public needed the property for a legitimate public use, it could be taken as long as the property owner was made whole with just compensation.
In the United States, a great deal of effort was made to limit the power of government over individual liberty and freedom and to protect the individual from the tyranny of the majority.
That is the core of government according to Western and American traditions.
There’s some good stuff here. Thank you.
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