“Stop treating government as a necessary evil.” This is a solution? I would say stop treating government as a personal fiefdom.
Uncontrolled immigration. This is a key to Rome’s collapse. The Goths were allowed into the Empire as manual laborers. They killed Emperor Valens in battle at Adrianople in 378 A.D. and sacked Rome in 410 A.D.
The United States is not an empire. We are more akin to Republican Rome. We should look at why Republican Rome fell. Most of these historians of antiquity were British. They relate more to the Empire. Personal corruption started with absolutism. Read Suetonius’ The Twelve Caesars.
America is more akin to midieval times. The 1200 to the 1500’s.
We have the kings....political family names over generations moving into high leadership positions.......Bush, Kennedy, Rockefeller, etc.
We have the rich who control most of the financial wealth, and “grant” a certain percentage of good, hard working followers the ability to “own” property as long as the owners pay into the financial empire of the rich.
This group would be defined as the middle class.......or serfs. They would be the smarter in society. The innovators who enhance the wealth of the rich. Among them would be the Sheriffs who enforce the laws of the land as directed by the rich and the King’s Court.
We have the working class who works in physical labor jobs in agriculture and services. Many are not “granted” the credit rating to own property so they have to rent from the same rich landlords who grant property ownership to the middle class. This could be considered the servant class.
Then we have the peasants who are provided places to live by the rulers, and provided basic necessities in exchange for menial jobs or just for being loyal to the rich who grant them their subsistence.
That leaves the squatters who migrate from job to job. Who are criminals and illegal immigrants that will do whatever it takes to survive. They can be manipulated easily because they are criminal and will take the side of whoever protects them at the time. They live in the shadows of the King’s Castles.
The Roman Republic fell when the backbone of the Roman Legions, the citizen-soldier in the mold of Cincinnatus with a primary loyalty to the Republic, was replaced in the days of Marius by professional soldiers with a primary loyalty to their own commanders.
The greed of the patrician class in monopolizing the ownership of vast areas of land, however, greatly contributed to the economic ruining of the citizen soldier and his dissappearance.
America has succeeded where the Roman Republic failed by maintaining a strong middle class, by curbing the excesses of the monopolies, by curbing the excesses of the mob and by a military culture that would not dream of EVER staging a coup de etat.
It is a very tricky juggling act that America has accomplished so far.
Once any one of those balls falls, the American Republic will go the way of the Roman Republic.
“The United States is not an empire....”
I agree and it is good to keep in mind the major historical differences between the the two systems when making these comparisons.
In one very important area, however, I do see an ominous parallel between the Decline of the Roman Civilization and our own here in America. That area of similarity pertains to the debasing of the value of citizenship by leaders in search of expedient solutions to short term problems.
The Romans eventually destroyed their tax own tax base due to the indiscriminate over taxation of the middle class of artisans and farmers and the unwise short term exploitation of imperial territories in order to buy off some remote potentate who was threatening the fringe of an imperial territory or to buy more bread and circuses for the restive , and increasingly, non-Roman urban masses. In the post-Republican era of roman history the middle class had no effective political representation as the Political Class pandered to either the Patricians or the Urban Masses. Sound familiar?
Rome’s ability to enforce Imperial Edicts decreased apace with the economic decline of the productive middle class and the fringe Imperial Territories. During Rome’s ascent armies were raised by means of appeal to civic virtue and the possibility of attaining Roman Citizenship. In the decline phase Rome could only raise mercenary armies.
The debasement of U.S. Citizenship due to indiscriminate immigration policies and the political marginalization of the U.S. Middle Class strike me as baleful indicator of what lies ahead for our civilization if nothing is done.
| It could similarly be argued that the barbarians living in the Roman Empire wouldn't have turned on typed empire had they not been mistreated. Roman attitudes and not fulfilling agreements made with barbarian tribes led to the barbarians invading and conquering the empire (also, the barbarians were pushed by the Huns coming from the east). Much is given about how the barbarians brought down Rome. Could it be a little Germano-centric pride coming from Anglo-Saxon and German historians? The Roman Empire was already in decline. Its military was increasingly less Roman in makeup, its society had become decadent and lazy. Furthermore, the Persian Empire (could China eventually play its role in this United States/Roman Empire comparison?) was a rival power which threatened the Roman Empire's wealthy eastern provinces. The Roman Empire's capital was moved to Constantinople before the Western Roman Empire's capital was moved to Ravenna, itself not that far north. The Persians and the Romans themselves were more responsible for the fall of the Western Roman Empire than the barbarians. |
I think most of us agree that uncontrolled immigration and the total dependence on foreigners for everything is what destroyed Rome. Sure, decadence fueled the situation, but in itself was not the primary reason.
In the end, Rome was no longer Rome—It’s legions were manned by foreigners from the edges of it’s empire. Commerce and trade became totally dependent on Foreigners. Soon all the land owners surrounding Rome were not Roman; they were foreigners.
Does this sound familiar to what we are experiencing now?