Posted on 10/29/2001 10:24:04 AM PST by gopusa.com
Our current national travails have provoked much talk of a new spirit of "trusting government." Certainly, it is important and desirable that the citizens of a nation at war have confidence and trust in their government. We should be mindful, however, that this need for trust cuts both ways. War tends necessarily to increase the concentration of power in the federal government, and particularly in the executive branch.
In a free republic, such times as war increase as well the necessity that citizens trust their own judgment. Even as we willingly accept the increased energy of the government in those areas where it is truly necessary, we must increase as well our vigilant insistence that government power respect the permanent principles of liberty. The particular danger in times of war or crisis is that the legitimate need for energetic government action will provide cover for those who, from vice or ignorance, seek to expand government power at the expense of the very liberty which it is government's purpose to secure.
Read the complete article at http://gopusa.com/alankeyes/ak_102901.shtml
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