Free Republic

* How else was I to take such a statement other than as a declaration that you refuse Washington the power to tax entirely ?

As my case is made from the Constitution, that necessarily includes Article I., Section 8: “The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes...” One cannot hold the Constitution inviolate without an acknowledgement that Washington has the powers (few and defined) given it. A familiarity with the document renders this one of those “goes without saying” matters, so I didn’t say it expressly because it was implicit within the text. The tax on income was always in view.

I still maintain that when you have to add an amendment to force the constitutionality of a principle previously found unconstitutional by the Court, it is an evidence that the principle you are adding was not found in the original text (else would not have to be added...) and therefore is a forceful argument that it is a principle alien to the Founders’ conceptions and thus, yes, an argument for its own illegitimacy. You may differ, as you do, but I contend for the statement because the Sixteenth Amendment stands in contrast, not comparison, to the entire grain of the rest of the document.

* It hardly seems fair to complain that I answered your question.

This is a good comeback and not without its merits, so I’ll pass on the temptation to defend my original statement. In asking what D.C. does with your income tax that needs doing, I simply mean that education is paid for by property taxes (in the main), roads by fuel taxes and the cost of our defense is equal to the amount of corporate taxes in the country. Income tax revenue goes exclusively to pay interest on our ridiculous debts in foreign banks for all of the pork and Socialism we could (and should) do without. Since we did buy it, we do need to pay for it, but we need to STOP BUYING IT.

My argument is simply that Washington live within the means provided by the original text of the Constitution as written by the Framers. Money is power and the Framers provided for very little of it to keep Washington from assuming the powers they now claim. Government’s scope and scale had grown exponentially since 1913 and this was made possible only by the sudden influx of revenue geenerated by the plunder of the People’s wages. Our fatal mistake was in allowing Washington more money and more armaments than the People hold as a check upon it. By giving them trillions we have given them an overwhelming power against us. By providing them with a standing army, we have rendered our pop-guns useless as an insurance policy against tyranny. Jefferson spoke of “criminals and government” in the same breath as “the greatest threat” to our liberties. And we have overfunded and overarmed the criminals in government to our own peril. You would not arm and pay a robber, but we have and do.

And Jefferson, by the way, made the entire Louisiana Purchase without a nickel of income tax. The opportunity was golden, but never did it occur to him to fund the no-brainer by demanding a cut of every American’s earnings-—something to which the government has no title, but which Karl Marx made one of the planks of his Manifesto.

It is impossible to have limited government when you empower tyrants with unlimited funds.

As for O’Reilly and Leftists, they will always find fodder for their slants with or without me. While I never like arming my enemies, neither do I live my life in their service, express myself by their guidelines or entertain principles with any reference to them at all. I will not empower them at the expense of my natural rights under the First Amendment. After all, they never curb their prejudices from respect to my point of view.

My principles derive from the founders and their legacy in law. I should hope that would place me out of step with those out of step with the Constitution. That’s precisely the company I prefer. To be deemed “extremist” by radicals is an honour I embrace. But weighing whether what I firmly believe may or may not be counted extreme by those whose scales measure only their own arrogance is a favor I will not do my enemies. They discredit themselves, not my integrity. In these times of extreme danger and extreme debt, the man who fails to be extreme in his patriotism is unworthy the name “American”. I believe what I believe without reference or resort to anyone else’s pocket scale, just as you should. If that places me on the Left, the Right or elsewhere, I leave that to those who measure principle over having it. I aspire, as yet unsuccessfully, to be as extreme as Samuel Adams and Patrick Henry without whom we would not have had a Republic to begin with. And with the latter, I can only say, if this be treason, make the most of it.

It is a fearful thing indeed when a stern argument for limited government under the rule of law as embodied by the United States Constitution classes an American as a “Right-Wing Extremist and Anarchist” by even his countrymen who profess a love of liberty.

http://www.freelythinking.com/The_Law.pdf

Well, you certainly refuted a lot of things I didn’t say or imply, if that’s some matter of accomplishment for you. Posts are usually relatively brief and hardly the medium for an all-encompassing exposition of all ramifications, disclaimers and exceptions. I’m merely making broad suggestions which, I think, is all anyone expects to find here. Were this a committee rather than a blog, I dare say we’d all work through the realities and details with a bit more thought.

Perhaps my wording was misleading. with reference to the income tax amendment of 1913, my point was that had an income tax been constitutional it would not have had to have been amended. To repeat, the Supreme Court found it unconstitutional when Lincoln tried it and the only thing that made it “constitutional” was gluing it on the bottom with the 16th Amendment. we could make redistribution of wealth “constitutional” by amendment, but it still puts it at odds with the grain and fabric-—the spirit and intent-—of the organic Constititution proper.

Applying the argument to amendments among the Bill of Rights is warping what I said. The Bill of Rights is an affirmation of existing (non-negotiable) natural rights, not an addition of new taxing powers.

The amendment that gave women the right to vote? Yes, the same principle, in fact, does apply. Just as, prior to amendment, government had no constitutional right to tax income, prior to amendment women historically had no right to vote. Whether they should or should not have had that right is another discussion. In fact, they had no vote until it was granted by amendment. Just as Washington had no right to tax income. Ditto presidential term limits slavery. I wasn’t discussing the merits of this or that power; only their authority in law. I’m trying to conduct a reasonable discussion, not an emotional one.

You broadened my application to apply generally, which was not my meaning.

By the same half-cocked hysteria you have me sticking our creditors with legitimate debts and turning wounded vets into the streets.

Do stick with what I’ve actually argued. By pointing out the incontestable fact that the Constitution nowhere (even today) authorizes a standing army-—I see you couldn’t find it in there, either, you’ve leaped to the conclusion that I either don’t believe in national defense or disparage veterans, neither of which, of course, is the case.

Like Socialist Security, it needs to end now. But because generations have already been swindled for decades by it, it has to be phased out at a rate that keeps the promises made as the victims were paying in through the years. There’s no tidy way out of the kind of messes Washingrad has cooked up for us all. Someone invariably gets stuck holding the bag because Marxism simply doesn’t work. But since Socialist Security is insolvent, the bleeding should be stopped at once. Then we back our way out by keeping all the commitments we can. one way would be to eliminate the Departments of Energy, Education, HHS,Transportation and Labor (for starters) and funnel the money into the socialist security money pit.

National debts, deficits, veterans’ benefits and all other legitimate expenses of government must be paid down by spending cuts and elimination of bureaucracy, not by further taxation.

If you highlight a copy of the Constitution, marking only the words that actually empower government to do anything, you will find that the entire scope of legitimate government can be reduced to one half of one side of one sheet of 8.5” X 11” paper. That simply doesn’t cost $11,000,000,000,000.00.

You caught me fairly in a genuine mistake when I applied “country” to the entire span from 1607 to 1913, but is this really the level on which you want to hold this discussion? You point out that the colonies were taxed by another country, but that doesn’t even speak to what I was expressing. America’s greatness was not the result or consequence of England’s taxes on propoerty, foodstuffs and clothing. British taxation misses the point entirely that we spread from coast to coast without a nickel of income tax collected by Washingrad.

I am no advocate of anarchy and you seem unable to conceive of a world before 1913, admitting no allowance for government without income tax. But for your closing remarks to be true, you must maintain that America lived under anarchy until Woodrow Wilson signed the 16th Amendment in 1913. It was (and is) possible to enjoy the benefit of limited Republican governance without an income tax. History will not tolerate any other recounting.

Because we have overspent for so long, it will take a long time to revert to a proper revenue system. precisely because we do have legitimate debts run up by illegitimate means. Honor certainly does dictate that we dig our way out with character and determination. And that need not imperil any of our patriotic soldiers, sailors, airmen and veterans.

If you still object to “the power to tax” being “the power to destroy”, your argument is not with me for quoting John Jay, but with the author of many of The Federalist Papers for saying so in the first place. As a Federalist, he certainly was no anarchist, was he? For an Anti-Federalist like Patrick Henry or me, he was a bit too Statist.

You have to remember that we’re a long way from the Republic our Founders bought us. Consider-—and I mean think about, ponder, MEDITATE A MOMENT ON Thomas Jefferson’s summation of the entire proper scope of government: “No man has a natural right to commit aggression on the equal rights of another, and this is ALL from which the laws ought to restrain him.”

ALL?

All. For Jefferson, NO law was authoritative, binding or legitimate unless it directly kept me out of your business and you out of mine. Weighed in that scale, how many of the laws we have today are legitimate? For Jefferson, you were a sovereign free man and so was I. And the one AND ONLY genuine function of government was to police the line drawn between us. That can’t possibly cost $11,000,000,000,000.00.

If you want to accuse Jefferson and Jay of anarchy, you may, but they weren’t. We simply live in so totalitarian a government today that a Constitutional Republic looks like anarchy from here.

And...in a sense that’s a real danger. That generation could afford to live under near-anarchic freedoms becvause they shouldered the manly moral weight of personal responsibility. Because they were upright, honorable, God-fearing, self-governing men, they had little need of the external machinery of government. If this generation, however, has not the character and morality to responsibly handle that degree of liberty, anarchy might result indeed. Anarchy is not a matter of what happens in the streets. It’s a condition of the human heart. A righteous man of character will seek liberty where a libertine will seek only license. Men of character seek the freedom to do right. Men without it seek only the freedom to do wrong. The former is liberty, the latter anarchy. That’s the difference.

Everybody is missing the point. You’re still talking about the 20th century paradigm where the people sit on their hands and wish government would follow the Constitution. I’m operating in the new paradigm where the People aren’t asking any more. We are telling them what they may and may not do.

They work for us, remember. Until every citizen is willing to demand his rights, it’s all academic. Our Founding Fathers didn’t ask for their liberty, they demanded it-—and took it when it was not granted.

i was with you till that last two words; “strong leadership” is exactly what the Founders feared. The People were never meant to be led by government; only protected from foreign invaders.

Yes and no. We have a Chief Justice and supreme court, but they’ve slept through most of the 20th century and appear to be sleeping soundly through the present nightmarish travesty on Capitol hill. The purpose of roping ol’ POTUS into the mix is to underline the antiquated concept of checks and balances, to emphasize that the Executive Branch has a co-equal responsibility to ensure the constitutionality of any legislation signed without passing the buck to the Court and, above all, to promote all the gridlock we can achieve to prevent any actual governance from occurring. Jefferson noted, “The two enemies of the people are criminals and government”. While I agree, I’ve always thought he was being redundant.

To answer your specific question, the president should “investigate, explore and validate” “all by himself”. It doesn’t take that long to read the Constitution-—the only place to look for constitutionality. The idea is to compel each branch to derive their just powers once more from the consent of the governed as enumerated in the document they refuse to otherwise consult.

If the President is too busy to verify the constitutionality of a bill before he signs it, he’s too busy. Passing bills too long to read, signing laws without bothering to check their legality and outsourcing responsibility to the snoozing Court has gotten us this far. Yes, it would (hopefully) wind up in the Supreme Court, as you say. Which is why it’s unnecessary to require that in the amendment. That achieves the aim of bringing all three branches face-to-face with the law of the land.

True they seem to be creative even with the monosyllables of the Second Amendment (among others). The idea is to have external enforcement of our Constitution since expecting internal submission hasn’t worked. Just a little more fire to hold their feet to.

True they seem to be creative even with the monosyllables of the Second Amendment (among others). the idea is to have external enforcement of our Constitution since expecting internal submission hasn’t worked. Just a little more fire to hold their feet to.

Notice my user-name? You may infer from it that I am an advocate for...reversing Appomattox! ; )

Mr. Lincoln’s fanciful “Union” was a wishful figment of his ambitious imagination. As he conceived the union it was nothing more than a glorified Roach Motel: States check in, but they can’t check out.

Just how the Illinois lawyer waged a 5-year war without reading the Declaration of Independence remains one of history’s mysteries: “To secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the governed; that when any government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government...”

Lincoln was a tragic Shakespearean figure; a good man who made a very terrible leader. On his watch the Republic died and Empire was born. He burned the village to save it. Sadly, he probably had the best of intentions all the way to the end.

Interestingly, america does not date her independence from the surrender of Cornwallis or from the signing of the Treaty of Paris. We do not count our birth from the hour King George released us or acknowledged our independence. Americans date their independence from...the hour we claimed independence for ourselves. not from the hour of its accomplishment, but from the hour we refused to be subjects any longer.

Would God we were so today.

Mr. Lincoln’s fanciful “Union” was a wishful figment of his ambitious imagination. As he conceived the union it was nothing more than a glorified Roach Motel: States check in, but they can’t check out.

Just how the Illinois lawyer waged a 5-year war without reading the Declaration of Independence remains one of history’s mysteries: “To secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the governed; that when any government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government...”

Lincoln was a tragic Shakespearean figure; a good man who made a very terrible leader. On his watch the Republic died and Empire was born. He burned the village to save it. Sadly, he probably had the best of intentions all the way to the end.

Interestingly, america does not date her independence from the surrender of Cornwallis or from the signing of the Treaty of Paris. We do not count our birth from the hour King George released us or acknowledged our independence. Americans date their independence from...the hour we claimed independence for ourselves. not from the hour of its accomplishment, but from the hour we refused to be subjects any longer.

Would God we were so today.

I may not understand the thrust of what you’re expressing here, but I think you’re discussing a proposal of a Constitutional overhaul or total rewrite. I certainly make no such suggestion, as it would be the sum of all terrors.

What I mentioned in my article is that if the grave error of a Constitutional Convention ever is convened, there are zero safeguards to guarantee we end up with anything even similar to the government under our existing Constitution.

In 1787 there actually was no call for an entirely new Constitution; it was merelyt supposed to be a tweaking of the Articles of Confederation, but the result was a whole new form of government under a completely new Constitution. A very fearsome warning of what could happen if we were to pop the hood on the Constitution in these hyper-partisan Marxist times.

The Founders arranged for a lifetime appointment for Supreme Court Justices because they didn’t want them politicized by periodic re-election. It was hoped that justice would be furthered by removing the justices from the realm of politics.

That’s not exactly working out that way.

I would suggest we achieve the aim of the Founders by a modified means: SCOTUS appointees serve a single (non-renewable) twenty-year term on the bench. Frankly, I prefer 10 years.

This retains the aim of depoliticizing the bench while rectifying the lack of accountability for decades.

Perfect. Exactly so.

Can’t go along on this one, friend. John Jay states, “The power to tax is the power to destroy.” Washingrad needs no such power. We fought Great Britain over a 2-cent tax on tea. The income tax was proposed by Lincoln and found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. The only way they could make it Constitutional was to sew it on as an amendment. If the income tax were already legal and Constitutional, no amendmnet would have been necessary, would it? The fact of the Amendment is an argument for its own illegitimacy. WITHOUT AN INCOME TAX, the United States fought a revolution, secured its independence, defeated Mexico and Spain, ended slavery, built the tranconctinental railroad, wired the nation for telegraph and became a world power. What that Washingrad does with your income tax money is it, exactly, that they need to be doing? This country had ZERO income tax from 1607 to 1913 and did alright. The trouble with the fair tax is that it’s a tax to which Washingrad still has no right. Tax = “the power to destroy”. What is a “Fair Power to Destroy”?

Only since 1913 has Washingrad had the unlimited funds to create the monstrosity that sits astride the Potomac this day. I say it’s time we cut off their allowance. If they want money, let them do what the rest of us do-—produce something or get a real job.

You are correct: 3/4 of the States; not 2/3 as I erroneously stated.

Yes, but the “foregoing powers” are enumerated, not a suggested starting point.

Absolutely! The original purpose of the Senate was to be the watchdog for the rights of the individual States. The 17th Amendment reduced the Senate to a superfluous House of Representatives...neither of which represents anything but itself.

Great response. The Tenth Amendment leaves the People and the States as the sole guardians of their own liberties. Several states are reasserting their rights even as we speak. Virginia has banned mandatory health insurance laws, putting it on a direct collision course with D.C. if the Marxist bill passes there. Theirty-four other States are presently writing similar laws. All of this means an inevitable showdown at the Supreme Court. The States MUST continue to press for their own rights (and ours) and to curtail Washingrad’s usurped power. My amendment suggestion is one attempt to reduce Washingrad’s POWER by limiting it to its AUTHORITY alone.

Actually aamendments are a State initiative and one of the few remaining bulwarks of State power. If 2/3 of the States approve the Amendment, D.C. is stuck with it. it then remains for the People and the States (Amendment X.)to enforce it through the courts.