Free Republic

This squib began as a review of Professor Randy Barnett’s latest work, Our Republican Constitution. However, once I got into his explication of the two contradictory visions of the Constitution and what it means for Western Civilization, I decided to linger on the high points. If the Leftist avalanche of executive branch lawmaking, group rights, collegiate snowflakes, moral relativism, and horrid supreme court decisions under a Constitution designed to secure unalienable rights leaves you puzzled, then Professor Barnett’s latest book will help clarify the insanity that is modern progressivism. For those familiar with his previous works going back to The...

For those not old enough to know, New York City’s crime rate prior to the Mayor Rudy Giuliani era was so bad that a sci-fi movie, Escape From New York (1981) did very well at the box office. In this dystopian story, Manhattan was walled off and filled with the worst criminals from across America. Mayor (1994-2001) Giuliani famously put into practice a “no broken windows” (NBW) theory of law enforcement. His police no longer ignored misdemeanor violations of the law. The criminal element soon realized that not only were petty crimes prosecuted, but prison time for felony violations was...

In view of the increasing failures of national, state, local government from San Jose, CA to Sweden to protect their citizens from thugs, both secular and religious, where do innocent people turn when the institutions designed to serve the community fail to do so, or worse, actually turn against the people? From my last post, John Locke explained in Chapter XIX of his Second Treatise, the legislative power, or, simply the legislative, granted by society to government is the essence of republicanism. When any force, from outside or within, alters the legislative, government is dissolved. Locke writes: "When the legislative...

From the 1776 Maryland Declaration of Rights and the 1783 New Hampshire Bill of Rights we are reminded of the proper American attitude toward a government hostile to freedom: The doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind. In a recent post to her Eagle Forum website, the highly respected and admired Phyllis Schlafly unfortunately resorted to a lot of snark and little reason in her decades’ old opposition to an Article V convention of the states to reclaim free government. Beginning with her title, “Failed Republicans Want...

From the 1776 Maryland Declaration of Rights and the 1783 New Hampshire Bill of Rights we are reminded of the proper American attitude toward a government hostile to freedom: "The doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind." In a recent post to her Eagle Forum website, the highly respected and admired Phyllis Schlafly unfortunately resorted to a lot of snark and little reason in her decades’ old opposition to an Article V convention of the states to reclaim free government. Beginning with her title, “Failed Republicans Want...

Many American minds have been twisted by a hundred years of progressivism. A once proud and independent people have become increasingly meek and dependent on the decisions and goodies disbursed by faraway masterminds. Part of that twist moved our attention and expectations from the dispersed power in our states, and toward a single focal point in Washington, DC. For any real or imagined problem, the perceived answer no longer resides within our communities or states. No, there must be a national program to deal with and regulate everything. This top-down imperial approach, that treats the fifty states no better than...

Not long ago, certainly within the last couple of years, I yielded to the urge to start a squib when the US senate punted another enumerated power to president Obama. It might have been the power of the purse or maybe the treaty power, but in any event, I opened Tacitus’ (55-117AD) Annals, and tapped out a few notes below. Throughout the imperial period, Roman emperors kept up the façade of republicanism. They pretended to consult the senate and be guided by its votes. The senate in turn, pretended it had a will of its own. If men are willing...

My copy of Congressman X* arrived in yesterday’s mail. Since the identity of congressman X is anonymous, I should be hesitant to accept anything inside. But, since nothing I read contradicts my personal beliefs which took decades to form, I admit my bias in accepting his accusations against congress, party leadership, the president, and the typical voter. Simply put, government is a lie. Voters are too ignorant see through the gauze, the hype, the smoke, the deceptions to realize that everyone in Washington, DC looks out for themselves first, last and always. Money is everything. Worry about the country? Don’t...

Lest anyone jump to an erroneous conclusion, I’ll participate in the upcoming presidential election process and vote for Trump. Since Hillary is the sum of every corrupt quality, every character flaw that cannot be allowed in the Oval Office, nothing will keep me from supporting the opponent of this vile traitor. As a registered Republican I receive regular emails from GOP candidates standing for election to Florida’s second congressional district. The candidates appear to be honest men and women of conservative bent who oppose all things Obama. Ditto for the eventual Republican senatorial nominee. Anyone who promises to do his...

Full title. HISTORIC MILESTONE: Petition signatures received from 100% of state house legislative districts in U.S. Supporters of the Convention of States Project from every state house legislative district in the United States have signed their name to the Convention of States petition, achieving an historic milestone for the Project. The petition calls for an Article V Convention of States for the limited purpose of proposing constitutional amendments that restrict the power and jurisdiction of the federal government, propose fiscal restraints, and impose term limits on federal officials. In less than three years, the COS Project has achieved this historic...

In Book XI of The Spirit of the Laws, Charles de Montesquieu touched on the nature of liberty and representation in republics. While the term ‘liberty’ is somewhat ambiguous, he ascribed to it tranquility of mind arising from the opinion each person has of his safety. In order to have this liberty, it is requisite the government be so constituted as one man need not be afraid of another. To foster liberty, free men send representatives to deliberative bodies to craft laws on their behalf. The great advantage of reps is their capacity to discuss public affairs in the course...

On February 18th, 1792, James Madison posted an anonymous squib in his newspaper, the National Gazette. He asked: May not governments be properly divided, according to their predominant spirit and principles, into three species of which the following are examples? First. A government operating by a permanent military force, which at once maintains the government and is maintained by it; which is at once the cause of burdens on the people and of submission in the people to their burdens. Such have been the governments under which human nature has groaned through every age. Such are the governments which still...

This squib goes hand-in-hand with my two earlier posts that made the case for an annual Article V state convention, here and here, to defeat both an out control administrative state and runaway scotus. My vision is a regular convention that will examine in detail the past year’s congressional statutes, regulations issued under the auspices of the president, as well as supreme court decisions. Those that infringe upon our liberty can, if recommended by the convention, be repealed or overturned by thirty-eight subsequent state ratifying conventions or state legislatures. What prompted me was the outrageous Obergefell v. Hodges scotus decision...

Democrats just love democracy. Who could possibly oppose democracy? Didn’t progressive icon Woodrow Wilson inform the nation that the purpose of the United States was to make the world safe for democracy? What reasonable person could be against all power to the people? I am, and I am in good company. Our framing generation had enough experience with overly democratic state governments to figure out that majoritarian abuse of minorities was just as harmful and dangerous to freedom as the executive tyranny of George III. Benjamin Rush famously said that while the state constitutions of 1776-1780 barred the front door...

In Part I, I examined how and why an Annual Article V State Amendments Convention should become a regular feature of the American governing scene. To further support my thesis, I shall illustrate here the impropriety of allowing scotus to be the sole arbiter of our rights. The right and duty to define them and determine their practical reach ultimately belongs to We The People when acting in our sovereign capacity via Article V. I will show that scotus fails to keep to its own standards of what constitutes legitimate law, rights and liberty interests. To scotus, the notion of...

Did you ever wonder why unsuccessful candidates merely “suspend” their campaigns after losing a key primary, instead of terminating them? Surely all those candidates knew that it’s impossible to restart a presidential campaign once it’s been suspended. In the famous words of Theodore Roosevelt’s daughter Alice Longworth, “You can’t make a soufflé rise twice.”

In yesterday’s blog, I related the founding generation’s assumptions regarding the necessity of virtue in stable republics. Many conservatives today believe our early years after Independence was an idyllic era of strong private and public virtue. Some tend to disbelieve the 1787 Constitution was necessary. Resting on that belief, the same conservatives look about today, see nothing but corruption of public virtue, and throw their hands up in despair of ever returning the US to freedom. Contrary to common belief, the first dozen years after Independence were something of a governing and political mess. Right out of the chute in...

The hard work of volunteers and supporters like you is making all the difference, and I'm thrilled to report yet another major victory. Yesterday afternoon, the Louisiana state legislature became the eighth state in history to pass the Convention of States resolution! For too long the “elite” in D.C. have acted with impunity, disregarding the will of We the People and crushing state sovereignty. Now the people of Louisiana have joined with Florida, Georgia, Alaska, Alabama, Tennessee, Indiana, and Oklahoma in this historic fight to restore the rightful authority of the people and the states.

This letter is among Cato’s best. Like Machiavelli in a few of his Discourses on Livy, Cato touches on the nature of despots, and the measures taken by the Roman Republic to hold on to liberty. The lesson for America 2016 is that we must take measures, as did the Romans, to restore free government. The essence of republicanism is the checks the people put upon their governors. Keep the governors within certain bounds and nations are free. Without checks on government, men are slaves because the magistrates make their own rules and follow their lusts. Only those nations who...

On the eve of troubles with George III in the 1760s, His Majesty’s subjects on the North American continent regarded themselves as among the luckiest people on earth. Charles De Montesquieu praised the English constitution for its mixture of monarchy and republican spirit. Not only were colonials prosperous, they enjoyed a level of liberty not seen perhaps since the best days of the Roman Republic. To be enlightened in the 18th Century was to be interested in antiquity, and to be interested in antiquity was to be interested in republicanism. Many of the men destined to become the statesmen and...