Americans... this is your future.
I am ready for the call.
bump
Constitutional rule derives from a people who understand the nature and demands of the virtues and their relation to our final end. It is aware of an order transcendent to politics. Arbitrary rule arises when a leader, seeing that the people have no real order of soul, sees himself able to impose whatever form of rule that he thinks good for the people. Unless they acquiesce in this rule and its decrees, they are no longer citizens, whatever a written Constitution might say.
Bump...
Americans... this is your future.
Obama isn’t “leader” enough to be mentioned in the same sentence as Hitler or Napoleon and yet here we are...
A Jesuit who apparently hasn’t lost his mind and been seduced by the prince of darkness.
“Men, therefore, in society having property, they have such right to the goods which by the law of the community are theirs, that nobody hath a right to take their substance or any part of it from them, without their own consent …”
(John Locke, The Second Treatise of Government, chapter 11, paragraph 138.)
“We have met the enemy and he is us”
Pogo Possum - Okefenoffee Swamp - many years ago
Readers of Plato and Aristotle know their recurring thesis: a tyrant arises out of a democracy when the citizens have little or no inner principle of order other than what they will for themselves.
I'm convinced this is what has happened to our nation. This undoing of our love of freedom has taken decades to accomplish and much of it has been subtle and seemingly innocent. With a tidal wave there is drama and shock- with erosion there is slow and steady change. But look at the results- they are the same.
“This question of legal plunder must be settled once and for all, and there are only three ways to settle it:"
"1. The few plunder the many. 2. Everybody plunders everybody. 3. Nobody plunders anybody.”
We are certainly at #2. When the plunder runs out, and it soon will, I doubt the public will return to Founding era virtue. A corrupted people will need totalitarian government, being suitable for no other.
What’s most remarkable about this article is that it was written by a Jesuit who serves on the faculty at Georgetown University. When you start to see this sort of thing from “Catholics” who had spent most of the last 60 years turning from God and getting very comfortable with Mammon, you know something is up.
I want to see our republican leaders take this part and throw him out by impeachment. I know, I am dreaming.
Jefferson's thesis -- upon which he expounds at length -- is that the Crown had violated the precepts of Lockeian social contract, that the obligations of the government to its citizens had been ignored, while the obligations of the citizenry were being enforced at gunpoint. To Locke and Jefferson, that meant the social contract was dissolved; no contract can be unilateral.
We are at that same point (and beyond) today. Our government is NOT "just." It does NOT derive its powers from the consent of the governed; how could Obamacare have passed if it did, when a vast majority of citizens opposed it? And it is not protecting the rights of its citizens; it is merely perpetuating itself and its own elitist vision. Therefore, the social contract, if not dissolved, is certainly eroded, and we find ourselves in much the same position the Founding Fathers did in the days of tri-corn hats.
That is the lesson we've forgotten. That is the lesson we must relearn if America is to once again be free.
What a powerfully insightful statement! Others, including Supreme Court Justices have stated it clearly before; yet, for generations, we have failed, as a people, to study the ideas essential to our liberty which were carefully laid out in our Declaration of Independence and the writings of the Founders and Framers of our Constitution. Instead, we allowed so-called "progressives" to work, like termites, gradually to censor those ideas from our textbooks and our public discourse.
The U. S. Constitution's Precious Cargo*
"Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court even can do much to help it." - Judge Learned Hand
The Constitution's words are only the vehicles which carry great ideas across the centuries. The precious cargo must be defined, protected, and treasured by "We, the People" in order for its benefits to accrue to each generation. Take the word, "liberty". What message does this semantic vehicle bring?
Abe Lincoln: "We all declare for liberty, but
in using the same word we do not mean the same thing...."
"The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep's throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator,
While the wolf denounces him for the same act...."
"Plainly," said Lincoln, "the sheep and the wolf are not agreed
upon a definition of liberty."
To some, he said, "liberty" means: that each individual in the society may do as he sees fit with himself and the earnings from his labors. To others, "liberty" means: that some persons may do as they see fit (or arbitrarily determine to be best) with other persons' earnings. Lincoln wisely observed that each respective view can be called by the other party by two "different and incompatible" names: "liberty" (unbridled license) and "tyranny" (power abused).
Down through the centuries since 1787, America's constitutional vehicle has traveled, proclaiming right up front that its primary purpose is to "secure the Blessings of Liberty." This is not just any old vehicle. This is the Constitution of the United States of America! Its makers left volumes of writings and definitions of the cargo of priceless treasure its words carry. Its intent to secure a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common Defense, and promote the general Welfare (common good) and "secure the Blessings of Liberty" relies on a clear understanding of, and strict adherence to, its underlying philosophy that each individual possesses Creator-endowed rights, as well as its structural provisions for protecting them from abuses of power by those they elect to positions of power in public office.
"Liberty"--the word--can become "liberty"--the blessing--only to those who care enough to know the difference between "license" and "tyranny": to those who will never mistake the real treasure of liberty envisioned by America's Founders for its counterfeits--rampant, unbridled license among the citizenry or abuse of power by those to whom power is delegated. Both are equally fatal to true liberty.
* "Lessons In Liberty" Series by La Vaughn G. Lewis, Free Lance Writer and Co-Editor of "Our Ageless Constitution" & "Rediscovering the Ideas of Liberty"
BFL
One of the most important threads of this year...
I believe there are several FReepers capable of coming up with some very well worded “pariculars” to list the abuses of the government, and its representatives have imposed upon us over just the last 40-50 years...
But since we still have the mechanism to throw off these very representatives...It comes down to what is anyone prepared to do about it, and what are you prepared to sacrifice for it???
When we lose that ability to effect change every two years, then it might be time to throw off that government in a manner fitting and honorableto those whoactiually did to get this Union started...
When it ever comes time to go to guns, everyone loses, lets not forget that...
They're willing to challenge the IRS and the Power of the government, and ready to call out the evil that is now taking over our society. He's answering a call to rise up and speak the truth and he's willing to suffer if need be, to lose leadership of our church.
Then the most amazing thing happened: The entire congregation erupted in jubilant applause!
Fantastic article! Well spoken words that get down to the heart of the matter. A free man must have a free soul ordered by God.
Without a religious & God fearing people any hope for long term Constitutional Government may be in vain. Figuring out how to turn our population back to God is anther challenge I have yet to seriously contemplate. I’ve been so wrapped up in trying to solve the problem of restoring the structure of liberty I seem to overlook its foundation.
Of course there is the potential problem of the church collaborating with the State to instead of freeing souls to stand upon their own with God, enslaving them to an early institution.
Yes it does. Deus Vult!