Posted on 07/03/2003 5:59:18 AM PDT by Tribune7
On July 4, Americans everywhere will, at some point, have an opportunity to hear the words of the Declaration of Independence as written by Thomas Jefferson.
It is, without doubt, his best-known work. Jefferson, however, wrote volumes during his life and, not surprisingly, had many things to say concerning a myriad of subjects. He was, after all, a firm believer in "free speech and free press" and he often said precisely what was on his mind.
The following is a small sampling of quotations by Jefferson, which reflect his timeless wisdom on a variety of subjects. Small wonder that he became known as the "Man of the People" and the "Sage of Monticello."
"Determine never to be idle. No person will have occasion to complain of the want of time who never loses any. It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing."
Letter to his daughter Martha, May 5, 1787: "...Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter."
Letter to Col. Edward Carrington, Jan. 16, 1787: "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God."
(Excerpt) Read more at countypressonline.com ...
Believe it or not, Jefferson's understanding was more that federal power was weak (limited by the constitution). It was not clear to him, nor to others, that the constitutin permitted the purchase, and thus an amendment would be required.
Had he been of a Hamiltonian mindset, he would have just ignored the restraints of the constitution and done as he pleased.
I meet officiers in all branches of the military fairly frequently. When the subject turns to the enlisted men, their faces usually pale with horror and they preface their statements with things like "You don't understand what these guys are like....."
Which isn't to say we don't have some damn fine folks in the milltary, its just not the appropriate way to assess the school system unless you are making a underhanded appeal to nationalism.
The near-religious ferver of some people is genuinely frightening.
What a load of hoooey. We are the wealthiest people to ever walk the face of the Earth and yet we pretend we can not afford schooling without government aid/control. I've been in slums all over the world that had *multiple* naturally occuring private schools for extremely modest fees that even the impoverished slum dwellers could afford.
Education is not the problem in many of these places. Russians for example are highly educated but their country is still a basket case. Rule of law and the property rights that transform assets into capital would be a good move.
History shows that your contention is false.
History seems to show whatever you're in the mood for.
That's not what the Russians I went to grad. school with say. I studied physics with Ruskies. They are most impressive.
Only after the advent of public schools has the literacy rates approached 100%.
Quantity instead of quality. Literacy is more than being able to read a sentence which is all we have acheived. Independent & critical thinking have suffered or rather been snuffed out. Government schools simply grind out bland conformists.
College was a rich man's prerogative until late in the 20th century as is also obvious from the historical record.
And today you have to get a MS to get what used to be a Bachelor's level of instruction. A Bachelor's degree is no longer meaningful it is simply an instrument of class maintainence. The American University system is becoming a joke.
I happen to like it. Its the healthiest patient in the cancer ward.
The only solution to decadence is Renaissance or collapse. I'm gunning for the former.
I seem to recall that you believe the Enlightenment was mistake!
Now THAT's a gloomy outlook.
Sure it did. As the famous old saying goes, ideas have consequences. Hamilton's ideas had consequences, some good but also many bad. One of the worst ones was the fact that his political policies were prone to government expansion. Just as you attribute much of the good of today to Hamilton's ideas, so too derived some of the bad. To credit Hamilton's policies for America's wealth while denying any connection they have to the size of America's government is an absurdly selective and contradictory position for you to take. Either his ideas did have an impact of today, both the good parts and the bad parts, or they did not. You can't have it both ways.
And you dare to complain about my "logic."
So long as you continue to post illogical nightmares of semantical bullsh*t artistry as your primary form of argument and so long as you make such absurd implications where "monarch" does not mean "monarch," "state" does not mean "state," and the sort, I will complain of them to my heart's content.
Hamilton repeatedly warned that the Laws can be ignored by men and his fear of the mob which the democRATS courted was overwhelming. He repeatedly warned that no constitution no matter how well crafted would prevent the seizure of power by less than virtuous men should the population become immoral.
And all the better to him for realizing that. The problem, however, is that the course he advised and directes us on turned out to be highly prone to the very things you praise him for fearing, so in that sense he was a failure.
Governments act a certain way because of universal demands and reasons. Economics is not divorced from politics in the REAL world.
And nor is politics from economics, which is precisely the corrupting device of government.
Mercantilism, LOL. No way Jose.
Mercantilism indeed. It is the underlying economic theory behind protectionism, subsidies, and other sorts of interventionist policies that were pursued by Hamilton's federalists and the whigs after them.
Hamilton's Program did not protect Infant Industries. The Report which you quote was never implemented into law.
In it's entirity no, and thank goodness for that! With his support, America did indeed get protectionist policies in a select number of industries. Those select industries got as much as three times the rate of the 5% general revenue tariff dating back to the very first tariff policy of the very first congress. Plus you are again evading the issue at hand, which is your initial claim that, enacted or not, Hamilton did not favor protectionism. You claimed that he only favored revenue tariffs. In reality he did favor protectionism and advocated it in one of his most famous political doctrines.
As I said there was no infant industry protection during Hamilton's time.
The 1789 Congress passed a tariff with infant industry protective measures for carriages, nails, and a small number of other northeast/new england based manufactured goods. That policy continued with slight expansions throughout the first period of tariff history in America. Hamilton was alive throughout that period and, during it, publicly advocated infant industry protection.
All revenues from a tariff go to the government.
You are correct that all strict "arrival-in-port" collections from a tariff go to the government. All PAYMENTS of a tariff do not though. They are SHIFTED onto other parts of the economy by way of the price change, and that includes the REDISTRIBUTION of the consumer surplus to the protected producer.
Looking at American labor history illustrates my comments about welfarism are correct. Marx was not ALWAYS wrong.
Now that's odd, cause I don't ever recall the American labor union movement spawning any workers uprisings of any significance or success. Practically all of them were either put down or fizzled out. In fact, the prominence and scope of American labor uprisings is easily surpassed by tax revolts thus indicating the opposite of what you claim.
Popularity is no indication of correctness but when nothing replaces those policies that is certainly a good argument that a convincing alternative has not been sold to a democratic public.
Not entirely and in fact I would dispute that the opinion polls show what you suggest them to show. The overwhelming majority of Americans support a reduction if not overhaul of the current tax system, thus indicating that they are not happy at all with taxes being as high as they are. Welfare handouts enjoy a majority of popular support in some regions such as the northeast and left coast, but, aside from the recipients who have a vested interest in continuing them, the same cannot be said for the rest of the country.
Hamilton's speech was almost UNKNOWN during his lifetime, it was a secret and very little of its contents are known.
Yet it was known to the founding fathers and indisputably existed. You claimed that Hamilton never advocated the position that he did. That speech proves you wrong no matter how many or how few heard it.
The Report was not a speech and I never made any claims about its position on Infant Industry protection.
It was a major statement of policy advocacy and it did indeed advocate infant industry protection as I previously quoted for you. In fact it goes so far as to predict that the protective policies will lead to "the establishment of a domestic manufacture" from what was then, in his mind, infant industry.
I said IIP was NOT a part of the program Hamilton got through Congress. There is no doubt about what was in the Report but I never said that IIP was not in there.
In post 84 you stated "Hamiltonian tariffs were REVENUE tariffs." Was not Hamilton's own protectionist proposal in that report a "hamiltonian tariff"? In post 70 you also stated "Tariffs were used for REVENUE not protection." Yet the 5% tariff rate adopted in 1789 was hiked to three times that on a select number of new england manufactured goods in order to protect them.
Hamilton's "leanings" were to do every possible thing to ensure the Constitutional government succeeded. His actions are what he should be judged by.
Then why do you persist in excusing away his speech on monarchy (was that speech not an action of his?) and his support for protectionism (was that support not an action of his?). And you wonder why I observe your posts to be illogical nightmares...
He never published any public documents advocating, supporting or celebrating monarchy and you know it.
Yet he advocated it at the Constitutional Convention when he was trying to shape how the new government would be designed. You previously claimed that he did not hold those views. The speech at the convention proves otherwise.
One of the reasons the debates in the CC were to be secret were to prevent political enemies from doing exactly what you are doing-attempting to smear participants in that Brainstorming session for their statements.
Note to justshutupandfakeit: The year is 2003. The debates were released into public view some 160+ years ago. Al's advocacy of monarchy at that convention is now a public record and is well known. He's also been dead for about 200 years meaning I cannot politically smear him from doing his job in our government to begin with. Nor is simply making note of the historical fact of his monarchist leanings a "smear" upon him as it is, simply put, historical fact and will always be historical fact without care to whether you like or dislike it.
Hamilton had seen what a weak executive would do for the government and was determined to prevent further damage.
As was his right to argue, be it correct or misguided. But that is not the issue. The issue is your previous claim that Hamilton did not have monarchist leanings when in fact history irrefutably shows that he did.
What actions of Hamilton's have I denied? I never claimed Hamilton's Report would not have protected infant industries merely that his program did not do so nor did any until after he was dead.
Wrong, and wrong. You claimed that all "Hamiltonian" tariff policies were revenue only, yet perhaps the most famous tariff policy he ever proposed was anything but. You also persist in claiming that tariffs did not become protectionist until after Hamilton died, yet the very first Congress' tariff extended infant industry protection to a small select group of New England and Pennsylvania manufactured goods.
You seem to have a problem dealing with exactly what I say.
Your words seem to be causing you far more trouble on this thread than anyone else who has dealt with them. But that is what happens when one carelessly shoots his mouth off, which unfortunately seems to be a habit for you.
As I said the DoI had nothing to do with governing.
Shout it all you like, but it does not change the fact that (1) the DoI enacted the separation of the 13 colonies with Britain and (2) the DoI defined and enacted the new conditions of union between those colonies upon the separation taking place.
I am familiar with the arguments used by anti-Federalists including Lee.
Considering that your previous posts indicate little if any familiarity with even one of the most famous arguments put forth by them, that is in significant doubt.
They are less than impressive but that is what would be expected from the lesser lights proposing them.
Considering that you have not demonstrated any significant or accurate knowledge of the anti-federalist arguments to begin with, one cannot conclude your personal opinion of them to be anything more than uninformed and gratuitous.
Confusing question. If the "Union" was nothing other than the actual states WITHIN it, then those states existed prior to its formation, negating any such claim. Since I'm not sure where you're going with this, I'd like to ask that you flesh it out a bit before I head down a wrong path here.
Our friend attempts to prove that Jefferson was speaking of a possible separation from the Union by non-existant States (at the time he spoke that territory was a "possession" of the Union)
I find his use of 'sons' when referring to future inhabitants interesting; with it he gives persona to the inhabitants of those territories. They are not to be ruled over by an empire, but rather free to choose their course, even if it be separation (which he admittedly thought was an erroneous conclusion, but not one which should prompt agression).
In light of that, it is not obvious that GOPcap's argument turns on the future status of those territories, whether they remain territories, become states, or form a separate confederacy. The issue shifts from "What is to be done with these territories," to "What are we to do to our sons and daughters."
and pretends that the separate nation he postulated would have gotten that way through an illegal separation.
I have seen nothing to make me believe that Jefferson would have believed such a separation to be illegal, and certainly not immoral. As someone pointed out, separation for just cause was always available as a last resort, and justice (like beauty) lay in the eye of the beholder.
His claims that I attempt to change the meaning of State and Union are ludicrous in the extreme
I'm still confused by the insistance that 'state' does not mean what it purports to everywhere else when applied to a "province" of the USA. Hamiltonians seem to recognize the independence and sovereignty of these 'states' insamuch as they have not yet decide to take certain powers, which are never out of their reach.
that is exactly what he was attempting to do in a vain effort to prove my statement that not one of the founding fathers believed secession was legal.
Many of those who fought for independence refused the very notion of Union or central power. They may better represent the American Spirit better than H, J, or any of the philosopher-kings of the day, yet are not regarded as "founding fathers."
Odd then, that people on the 'secession is illegal' side of these arguments always make an appeal to the constitution as it derives it's power form the people. Those people, in at least two of the original states, believed that secession was both legal and a necessary condition of ratification. So, the constitution derives it's power from people who believed secession was legal.
Thank goodness they had the USSC to 'splain it to them.
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