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Eliminate Non-Essential Government Now
In Friday’s last hour, a federal government “shutdown” was averted by a last-minute deal struck by House Democrats and Republicans to approve a federal budget for the remainder of the fiscal year. According to the Los Angeles Times, the Republicans achieved $39 billion in spending cuts out of a federal budget that will run an approximately $1,600 billion deficit this year alone. The Democrats were able to prevent defunding of Planned Parenthood and minor curbs on the power of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). As a result of the compromise, the 800,000 “non-essential” government employees that would have been laid off will be back at work on Monday, providing their non-essential services without interruption.
Politicians and media pundits ranged from frightened to hysterical at the prospect of this so-called shutdown lasting even a day, as if some epic blight would have consumed the land, marked by cars turned over and burning, wells dried up, and livestock lying dead at the side of the road.
Of course, no reduction in government spending can be discussed without the usual round of Keynesian economic gibberish. So, we also had to hear about how the economy would be devastated due to those 800,000 lost jobs, resulting in the loss of their own spending and the elimination of all of the money those employees help the government spend into the economy. Among the burning cars and dead livestock we would find shanty towns full of former Wall Street billionaires, wiped out by the sudden and devastating drop in demand for their products.
While even less exaggerated claims about the harm that would be caused if the shutdown had occurred are meritless, there is a much more important question to be asked that virtually every media outlet has been silent on. This is not surprising. Like all other political and economic debate in America today, the discussion is completely focused on results. To ask the most important question, we have to shift the discussion from results to rights. On that basis, the distinction made here in terms of essential vs. non-essential services provides a unique opportunity.
The shutdown would not affect the military, any core law enforcement functions, or any other federal government activity deemed “defense of life and property.” This assumes that our present bombing of Libyans is “defense of life and property,” although whose lives or properties are being defended while Libyan lives and property are being destroyed is an inquiry for another day.
The shutdown would not affect entitlement spending, which together with military spending makes up almost three quarters of the present $3.7 trillion budget. Social Security checks would still go out, Medicare and Medicaid claims would still be paid, and HUD landlords would still get their rent checks.
While the most important questions of rights actually revolve around this “welfare-warfare state,” it is not at issue in the so-called shutdown. Only those services deemed by the government itself as “non-essential” would cease. That begs the question:
Can even a democratically-elected government force its citizens to pay for services that everyone acknowledges are not needed?
One must remember that every dollar that the government spends, whether it is bombing some far-off nation, paying medical claims, or investigating the mating rituals of the Namibian Tiger Beetle, has been collected from taxpayers under the threat of violence if they do not pay. If you doubt this, just ask Wesley Snipes. There is a process that you can go through to get approved to visit him where he currently resides. All manner of propaganda is employed to distract the victims of taxation from this basic reality. However, any government, whether elected by the people or autocratically maintained by a military dictator, is invested with the power to force people to pay taxes.
It is this reality that inspires the occasional clear-thinking individual to suggest that there be some limit to what individuals can be forced to pay for, regardless of how their government is constituted. In other words, one must define what government spending is necessary and what is not. Proponents of different political philosophies define “necessary” in terms of government activity in different ways.
For founding fathers in Thomas Jefferson’s camp, individuals could only be forced to pay for the protection of their own life and property, which translates to national defense for the federal government. Their opponents, led by Alexander Hamilton, argued that individuals can and should be taxed for other activities that contributed to “national greatness,” including the building of infrastructure, the maintenance of a large military establishment, and the protection and subsidization of government-connected corporations.
Modern liberals or progressives go a step further, saying that in addition to Hamilton’s program, the government has the legitimate authority to tax individuals for the purposes of providing needed benefits to others, such as retirement benefits, medical care, housing, food, and clothing. Some conservatives argue that this is merely legitimized theft, as the government here is not providing services equally accessible to the whole tax base, but rather transferring wealth from some individuals to others.
In any case, none of those debates were in play in regards to the recently-avoided shutdown. Assuming that the arguments made by both conservatives and liberals are valid, and that all of the above services are necessary for a peaceful and just society, neither conservatives nor liberals would give up anything in a government shutdown. The only services that would be interrupted would be those that both conservatives and liberals agree are non-essential, i.e., UNECESSARY services.
Under what theory of government can individuals be forced to pay for unnecessary government services? They are not needed for individual or national security. They are not needed to ensure “social justice.” By the government’s own admission, they are not needed at all. If individuals can be taxed to underwrite even these services, is there anything at all that they cannot be forced to pay for?
There is a further philosophical question to be answered here in terms of the huge federal deficits that these unneeded services contribute to, which have resulted over the years in a $14 trillion national debt. It is not only present taxpayers’ rights that are in question, but the rights of people who are not even born yet. Even if you believe that the United States government is one “of the people, by the people, and for the people,” do “the people” have the right to force future American citizens to pay for unnecessary services provided to taxpayers today? Won’t those future taxpayers be people? Don’t they have any rights at all?
Looking at the founders again, Thomas Jefferson argued that future generations could not be legitimately forced to pay for any services provided to present taxpayers, not even “essential” services like national defense. His opponent Hamilton made no such philosophical distinction. In fact, he argued that the national debt would be a national blessing, as it would tie the corporate creditors to the government. His only qualification was that the debt not be “excessive.” Hamilton, the original American conservative, believed as conservatives do today that the greatness of the empire (the collective) outweighed the rights of the individual, even those individuals not yet born and therefore unable to give their “consent” via participation in the election process. Who was right, Jefferson or Hamilton?
Sooner or later, anyone truly interested in liberty has to come to the grips with the fact that any taxation, even taxation to provide defense of life and property, violates that natural law that no one should be forced to do anything or deprived of his property to pay for anything, as long as he is not harming others. Once this natural boundary is crossed, the limit of what one person or group can force another to do or pay for must be set artificially by men. Certainly, the most liberal limit on what citizens can be forced to pay for by their government is what the government itself deems as necessary. If government spending cannot be limited even to its own expansive definition of “essential services,” then what right is left to anyone to keep any of their own money? Why not just turn it all over to the government to spend as the government sees fit?
Obviously, if you believe that individuals have any rights at all, you must call for an immediate and permanent government shutdown of all “non-essential services.” This should be the bare minimum limit on government spending even if the government wasn’t running a deficit that represents theft from future generations.
But what of results? Fortunately, the idea that there is a choice to be made between individual rights and the “needs of society” is just another myth propagated by those who wish to extort your money for their own ends. There is no compromise or “balance” needed between individual rights and the benefits of these non-essential government services, because there are no benefits. The quality of life for Americans would be immediately and dramatically improved if they were eliminated.
Primarily, the present roster of 2.1 million federal employees, even in terms of percentage of population, is orders of magnitude larger than the “swarms of officers to harass the people and eat out their substance” sent by King George in the 18th century. Reducing this modern swarm of federal employees by roughly 40% would significantly reduce the amount of government meddling in Americans’ lives and overriding of their otherwise sound decisions about what to spend their money on, how to conduct their business, what to eat, what medical services to purchase, etc.
Assuming that this subset of federal government employees earns the overall average of approximately $100,000 in salary and benefits, this also would be an immediate reduction of $80 billion in government spending, twice the amount cut in the compromise between Republicans and Democrats to pass this year’s budget. That doesn’t count all of the spending associated with these people doing their jobs, which could be as much as $500 billion.
The somewhat popular services provided such as national parks would not cease to exist without the government providing them. In fact, there could be a two-fold benefit in eliminating these particular government services. First, the land and assets associated with them could be sold at public auction, enabling the government to make a huge payment on the existing national debt. Second, these services could be taken over by more competent private enterprises which would risk their own money to provide them. As they would be competing for customers with other amusements such as Disney World or Carribean cruises, they would provide these services with higher quality and at a lower overall cost than the government does. In addition, that cost would be paid voluntarily by those who actually use the services, rather than involuntarily by everyone.
Finally, there would be no loss of demand in the economy due to the wages of those 800,000 employees no longer being spent into the economy. Remember, those wages all represented demand that was forcefully taken away from taxpayers and paid out to those employees. Should those government jobs be eliminated, the money would merely be spent by its rightful owners on whatever they chose to spend it on, rather than spent by other people. Wealth created by productive activity is not increased when forcefully extorted from its rightful owners, and therefore does not decrease when returned to them.
In conclusion, Americans should not be apprehensive about the prospect of a “government shutdown” as defined in the recent budget crisis. They should demand it. Neither conservatives nor liberals would be compromising any of their values. Under even the most “extreme” interpretations of conservative or liberal philosophy, there is no legitimate authority for the government to tax individuals to pay for these services. Eliminating them would provide an immediate fiscal, economic, and social benefit to American society, and Americans would regain a tiny smattering of that liberty we all claim to cherish. New national elections are coming next year. Solving our biggest problems, like entitlement and military spending, will not be on the table. So, let’s set a more achievable goal and at least make this demand: No Non-Essential Government.
A Modest Proposal for Interposition
So, the Tea Party Congress is seated and the “revolution” is underway. After voting to repeal Obamacare, a largely symbolic gesture that has no hope of passing in the Senate or overturning a presidential veto, the new Congress has outlined its plan to attack the federal deficit. The result: A proposal to cut $100 billion in “non-defense discretionary spending.” While that may sound like a lot of money to someone who hasn’t taken a gander at the federal budget in about 50 years, it amounts to a little under seven percent of this year’s deficit.
That’s right. Seven percent of the deficit, not the budget. In other words, the tea parties, the stormy town hall meetings, the supposed “mandate from the people” to cut the size and scope of the federal government will result in the government spending $1,380 billion more than it collects in taxes this year instead of $1,480 billion more. Worse yet, the same people who “stormed the Bastille” and threw the former bums out will defend this proposal with half-hearted panaceas like “you have to start somewhere.”
However, if history has taught us anything, it is that this isn’t “just the beginning,” with more substantial cuts to follow. This will be the high water mark as far as reduction in government spending is concerned. We should expect that by the time that this proposal goes through the process of back room deals and compromises with special interest-motivated committee members, that the $100 billion number will be reduced by at least half, perhaps more. They may even end up increasing federal spending. Would anyone honestly be surprised?
It has been obvious for at least a century that “throwing the bums out” doesn’t make a lick of difference in the behavior of our elected officials. Now we know that staging protests, waving signs, raising a ruckus at town hall meetings, and then throwing the bums out doesn’t make a difference either. Clearly, it is time to stop doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
The nullification movement has been decried by the left as right wing extremism at its most dangerous, despite the fact that it was conceived and introduced by Thomas Jefferson, the father of the Democratic Party. However, I have a proposal that I believe both conservative and liberal Americans would find very reasonable. There is a way to use the idea of state interposition to force the Congress to at least listen to its constituents. Let’s put the idea of interposition together with another of Jefferson’s ideas, drafted by him in a resolution of the Continental Congress in 1775 in response to Lord North’s Conciliatory Proposal.
“That this privilege of giving or of withholding our monies is an important barrier against the undue exertion of prerogative, which if left altogether without our control may be excercised to our great oppression; and all history shews how efficacious is its intercession for redress of greivances and reestablishment of rights, and how improvident it would be to part with so powerful a mediator.”
Let me be clear. As opposed as I am to all taxation, I am not suggesting that one dollar be cut from the existing tax schedule for 2011. What I am suggesting is that the people exercise their right to withhold their taxes until the Congress does what the people have clearly mandated them to do – balance the budget. A seven percent cut in the deficit just isn’t enough and we are running out of time. We can argue later about the role of government and the wars in the Middle East and Social Security and the rest. Right now we have to take away this Congress’ ability to borrow any more money or we’re going to be in the same boat as Greece.
I am not calling upon people to exercise civil disobedience or rebel. The stakes are high in either of those endeavors and we have other options. I am calling upon people to utilize their state legislatures to support them in withholding their taxes until a balanced budget is passed by Congress. As much as I’d personally like to see them withhold their tax money permanently, they would then release the funds to the federal government.
This would be accomplished in the same way as several other recent nullification/interposition efforts. The state legislatures would pass a law indicating that no person or business in their state could be prosecuted or fined by the federal government for failing to file an income tax return or failing to pay their quarterly payroll tax deposits, so long as said filings and payments were made within sixty days of the Congress passing a balanced federal budget. For those who still trust the people less than they do the government, a stipulation could be added that the funds go into escrow and be audited by the states, if necessary.
This would accomplish two things. First, it would reestablish exactly who works for who in this relationship. Obviously, elections have failed to do that. More importantly, it would work. The blind fear that would grip our legislators when they realize that the party is really over would at least scare them sober enough to balance what would still be an over $2 trillion budget. While it wouldn’t solve our long-term problems, that truly would be a start.
Bloated governments are imploding all over the world and ours is poised to do likewise for all of the same reasons. Now that we have seen what “extremism” really looks like in Greece, Egypt, and Tunisia, this proposal should strike any rational person as reasonable and moderate. We do not need a rebellion or violence to balance the federal budget – just a little adult supervision.
© Thomas Mullen 2011
The Constitution Does Not Protect Our Property
>The U.S. Constitution is widely believed to have been written to limit the powers of the federal government and protect the rights of its citizens. Inexplicably, this belief is held even by those who acknowledge that the constitutional convention was called for the express purpose of expanding the powers of the federal government, supposedly because the government under the Articles of Confederation was too weak. That this was the purpose of the convention is not a disputed fact. Nevertheless, most people who care at all about the Constitution continue to believe and promote the “Constitution as protector of rights” myth.
To the extent that the Constitution enumerates certain powers for the federal government, with all other powers assumed to be excluded, it does set some limits on government. When one includes the first ten amendments of the Constitution, it also protects certain rights. Indeed, the ninth amendment makes the very important point that the specific protections of certain rights does not in any way deny the existence of others, while the tenth amendment makes explicit the implied limitation to enumerated powers in the Constitution itself. At first glance, the so-called “Bill of Rights” seems to confine government power within an airtight bottle, rendering it incapable of becoming a violator of rights instead of protector of them.
However, this theory does not hold up well under closer examination. To begin with, the Constitution itself does not protect a single right other than habeas corpus, and that comes with a built-in exception. What the Constitution does do is grant powers, and not just to a representative body, as the Articles of Confederation did, but to three separate branches. That leaves it up to the Bill of Rights to serve the purpose of protecting our rights. Generally, those ten amendments protect our rights under extraordinary circumstances, but not under ordinary circumstances. More specifically, the Bill of Rights provides protections for the individual during situations of direct conflict with the federal government, such as when one is accused or convicted of a crime, when one is sued, on the occasion of troops being stationed in residential areas, or when one speaks out against the government or petitions it for redress of grievances.
Make no mistake, these protections are vital and have provided protections for the people against government abuse of power many times in U.S. history. However, they have proven ineffective against the slow, deliberate growth of government power under ordinary circumstances, when the specific conditions described in those amendments do not exist. This is primarily due to the absence of protection, either in the Constitution or in any subsequent amendment, of the most important right of all: property.
By “property,” I do not mean exclusively or even primarily land ownership, although land ownership is one form of property. By “property,” I mean all that an individual rightfully owns, including his mind, body, labor, and the fruits of his labor. It is specifically the right to the fruits of one’s labor that the Constitution fails entirely to protect. In fact, it makes no attempt to do so whatsoever.
In the Constitution itself, the word “property” appears only once, and that is in reference to property owned by the federal government (an inauspicious start). Nowhere does it make any mention of property owned by the citizens.
The document does grant the federal government the power to tax “to pay the Debts and provide for the common defense and the general welfare of the United States.” This is a strikingly unlimited scope for which the federal government may tax its citizens. Arguments that taxes may only be collected to underwrite the subsequently enumerated powers have been struck down. Sadly, those decisions have probably been correct. While the power of the Congress to pass laws is explicitly limited to those “necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers,” no such language binds the power to tax. The fact that the explicit limitation exists for lawmaking (which Congress ignores anyway) but not for taxation lends further weight to the argument that the Constitution grants Congress unlimited power to tax its citizens.
One can certainly make the argument that in 1789, the term “general welfare” would have been interpreted much differently than it is today. Indeed, one might assume that the term “general welfare” meant the general protection of each individual’s rights. Perhaps that is what many of the founders believed at the convention. However, it is clear that Alexander Hamilton and his Federalists, the driving force behind calling the convention, had far different ideas about what the term “general welfare” meant. Remember that for Hamilton, the purpose of government was not the protection of rights, but the realization of “national greatness.” This could only be achieved at the expense of individual rights, primarily property rights.
So, the Constitution itself grants Congress unlimited power to tax and does not even mention, much less protect, the individual right to keep the fruits of one’s labor. Certainly the Bill of Rights addresses this deficiency, doesn’t it?
It does not. Like the Constitution itself, the Bill of Rights is virtually silent on the central right of property. Out of all ten amendments, the word “property” appears in only one of them:
“No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”
Unlike the congressional power to tax granted in the Constitution, the constitutional protections codified in the Fifth Amendment are severely limited to specific, extraordinary circumstances. The entire Fifth Amendment is set in the context of criminal law, granting certain protections to the accused and/or convicted. The phrase “due process of law” is a specific legal term that refers to those accused of a crime being given notice of the charges, opportunity to face their accusers, call witnesses in their defense, etc. This was obviously the intent of this protection of property, rather than a general protection of property rights against taxation.
Even if one discards the clear intention of this clause of the Fifth Amendment and interprets “due process of law” more broadly, the amendment offers no more protection of property than if one interprets the clause narrowly. Since the power to tax is an enumerated power, Congress would be following due process of law simply by levying the tax in the first place.
The last clause of the Fifth Amendment, regarding property taken “for public use,” is similarly limited to extraordinary circumstances. This clause undoubtedly refers to eminent domain, which is a grievous abuse of property rights, but certainly not one that affects a large percentage of the population. Even here, no right is protected. The clause merely requires the government to give the victim “just compensation.” There is no mention of the primary component of the right of property, consent.
Furthermore, there is no mention of how “just compensation” is to be determined, although history has shown that the government itself determines what compensation is just arbitrarily. In a free society, the value of property is determined by the price at which the owner is willing to exchange it. However, since there is no requirement here of the owner’s consent, no such price determination can occur.
As for the remaining protections of property in the Constitution and Bill of Rights, there are none. These two phrases, protecting property under only the most extraordinary circumstances are the length and breadth of the Constitution’s involvement with this most fundamental right. It is this deficiency that has allowed the federal government to grow into the monster that it is, concerned with virtually nothing but the redistribution of wealth.
If you believe the official myth about the Constitution, this might seem shocking. After all, the document was drafted by the same people that had seceded from their nation and fought a long and bloody war primarily to defend their right to keep the fruits of their labor. How could they draft a document to recreate their government, which they said only existed to secure their rights, and not only fail to secure the most important right, but actually empower their government to violate it with impunity? Certainly this was history’s most colossal error.
However, when you consider the political platform of the Federalists, which included corporate welfare, monetary inflation, deficit spending, government debt, and militarism, all designed to maintain the wealth and power of a privileged elite at the expense of the rest of the citizenry, the unlimited power to tax and lack of protection of property seem less like error and more like deliberate intention.
Whenever the subject of “constitutional rights” (a problematic term itself) comes up, people reflexively refer to the right of free speech. This is an important right, and one defended across the political spectrum. However, free speech, freedom of the press, and the other rights protected by the Bill of Rights, without property rights, are inconsequential – the mere window dressing of liberty. It is property that enables one to determine the course of one’s own life. Without it, the right to life is no right at all, but rather a privilege granted by those who own your labor.
George W. Bush was an enthusiastic supporter of the right of “free speech.” During a town hall meeting, an average American who opposed Bush’s policies rose and began hurling insults at the president, eliciting boos from the Bush-friendly audience. Bush reprimanded the crowd, reminding them that this man had a right to speak his mind, even if they did not like what he had to say. It was not the only time that he stood up for free speech. This was no accident. A government that has the unlimited power to seize the property of its citizens can afford to be magnanimous when it comes to free speech. Yet, for the citizen who no longer owns the fruits of his own labor, the right to complain makes him no less a slave.
Tom Mullen is the author of Where Do Conservatives and Liberals Come From? And What Ever Happened to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness? Part One and A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America.
The U.S. Constitution: The 18th Century Patriot Act
At some point in the past, the American ethos was centered on suspicion of government –whether liberal, conservative, or otherwise. For most of America’s first two centuries, Americans were taxed less, regulated less, and left more alone by their government than any other people in the world. These conditions resulted in an explosion of innovation, wealth, and culture unsurpassed at any time in human history.
As that trend seems to have reversed, Americans look to their past to try to establish where we have gone wrong and what we can do to solve our problems. Increasingly, some Americans point to the U.S. Constitution and our abandonment of its “limits on government” as the reason for our downfall. It is generally argued by “strict constitutionalists” that the purpose of the U.S. Constitution was to limit the power of the government. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Don’t get me wrong. If our government were limited to the powers granted it in that document, the United States of America would be far freer, far more prosperous, and likely not facing any of the monumental problems that it is facing now. However, that does not change the facts about why the Constitutional Convention was called or why the Constitution itself was created. If you are astounded that any Republican can still claim that George Bush was “pro-freedom” or that any Democrat can claim that Barack Obama is “anti-war,” you should be equally surprised that anyone can claim that the U.S. Constitution limited the powers of the central government.
Remember that there was already a federal government of the United States prior to the U.S. Constitution. It was defined in a document called the Articles of Confederation and had been in existence since 1778. Under the Articles, the young nation had defeated the mightiest military empire in human history to win its independence. Acknowledging the true meaning of the words “federation” and “federal,” the document defined the relationship between the states as “a firm league of friendship with each other.” There was no implication that the United States was one nation and the several states merely subdivisions within it. There was no president to usurp power. There was no Supreme Court to legally sanction tyranny. There was no IRS. While the federal government would pay for any war fought by the federation out of a common treasury, the Articles left the actual act of taxation to the States.
“The taxes for paying that proportion shall be laid and levied by the authority and direction of the legislatures of the several States within the time agreed upon by the United States in Congress assembled.”[1]
Compared to the overtaxed, overregulated society that is America today, the America of the 19th century was one of astounding liberty and prosperity. However, even America after 1787 had much more government than America in its first decade. We are taught that this was a grave problem and that the Constitution was necessary to avoid imminent destruction from any number of horrors, including invasion by a foreign power, civil war, or economic upheaval as a result of protectionism by the states. We accept these assertions as facts because of the reverence we hold for the founders of our country. However, how different was the atmosphere surrounding the Constitutional Convention from that surrounding the Patriot Act, the TARP bailout, or the current efforts to expand government power in the name of environmentalism? Despite the pure heresy of the idea, there was really no difference at all.
By 1787, there were two dominant parties in America. Unlike the two dominant parties today, the Federalists and what would later become the Democratic-Republicans of that time really were diametrically opposed on fundamental issues. Led by Alexander Hamilton, the Federalists sought a much more powerful central government with a central bank, a standing army, and an alliance with big business that would control the economy. In opposition to them were Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and their followers that believed that the central government’s powers should be limited, and that power should be concentrated locally (and mistrusted generally). They opposed a central bank and a standing army and supported a truly free market.
It was not Thomas Jefferson or Patrick Henry that led the effort to call the Constitutional Convention, which neither even attended. It was Hamilton and his Federalists that wanted it. As superbly documented in his book, Hamilton’s Curse, Thomas Dilorenzo reminds us that Hamilton actually wanted even more power for the central government than he eventually got into the Constitution.
“At the convention, Hamilton proposed a permanent president and senate, with all political power in the national government, as far away as possible from the people, and centered in the executive. He also wanted “all laws of the particular states, contrary to the constitution or the laws of the United States [government], to be utterly void,” and he proposed that “the governor…of each state shall be appointed by the general government, and shall have a negative [i.e., a veto] upon the laws about to be passed in the state of which he is governor.”[2]
Read the rest at LewRockwell.com…
[1] Article VIII, Articles of Confederation
[2] Dilorenzo, Thomas Hamilton’s Curse Crown Publishing Group (Random House) New York, NY 2008 Pg. 16
Tom Mullen is the author of Where Do Conservatives and Liberals Come From? And What Ever Happened to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness? Part One and A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America.
>The Democrats Privatize Wealth Redistribution
>George W. Bush redistributed more wealth during his presidency than any president had since Lyndon Johnson. Republicans really have never had any problem with redistributing wealth as long as the proceeds go to the right people. Since Medicare benefits senior citizens, a constituency that no election can be won without in the baby boomer retirement era, Republicans had no problem using the force of government to take money from one individual and use it to buy “healthcare” for another – as they did with their Medicare prescription drug benefit. Neither do they hesitate to redistribute to bankers, under the cover of “saving the financial system.” God help us if there is ever a constituency of senior citizen bankers.
In fact, if one looks at the federal budget as it existed before the massive bailouts started – pre-TARP – at least 80% of the almost $3 trillion budget amounted to wealth redistribution. Always there was some rationalization for why this or that group must receive federal funds “for the good of all.” The farmers must be subsidized because there is absolutely no way to sustain farming in a market economy. If large farming corporations weren’t subsidized, we would all starve. Medical research must be subsidized because we will eventually all die of cancer, AIDS, and other horrific diseases if the government doesn’t subsidize medical research. Corporations in general must be subsidized because if one were to go out of business, everyone would be unemployed.
The Democrats typically attempt to characterize the Republicans as racist or elitist because the Republicans have traditionally resisted wealth redistribution for the poor or minorities. However, the reality is that Republicans do this for the same reasons that Democrats resist redistribution to bankers and corporations (or at least they used to). The poor and minorities don’t vote Republican. That is the only reason that Republicans attempt to leave them out.
No one in America seems to know any American history. Following the American Civil War, when black voters universally supported the Republicans due to their perception that the “party of Lincoln” had set them free, it was the Republicans who promised “40 acres and a mule” to blacks and the Democrats who proclaimed themselves “the party of white men.” Enslaved by their former ruling class and now used as pawns in a political power game by the new one, the freed black voters of post-Civil War America serve as a perfect metaphor for the supposed “beneficiaries” of all government redistribution schemes. Whether it is elderly people trying to scrape by on a Social Security Check, poor people trying not to starve on public welfare, or Iraqi citizens enjoying their newly provided “freedom,” the so-called beneficiaries of government wealth redistribution are never the winners. It takes an alarming lack of skepticism not to ask who the real winners are.
As this new century has “progressed” (pun intended), even the blurry lines separating the two parties have begun to melt away. Remember that George Bush’s redistribution schemes also included stimulus “tax refunds” to everyone, whether they actually paid taxes in the first place or not. “Compassionate conservatism” was nothing more than a euphemism for attempting to blend traditional Republican rhetoric about “free markets” and “limited government” with thinly-veiled redistribution schemes. By doing so, Bush’s Republicans hoped to hold onto their own base while chipping away at the Democratic voting blocks by promising them other people’s money, just as the Democrats do.
Throughout the 20th century, the two parties employed this strategy of “borrowing a page from the other’s playbook” over and over, always hoping to win voters away from the opposition while retaining the loyalty of their own traditional supporters. It was this that caused many liberals to criticize Bill Clinton for being “too much like a Republican.” Why George Bush has managed to hold on to his image as an “extreme conservative” defies explanation.
Until now, there has always been at least one thing to say in favor of the Democrats. They have been honest about their intentions. They have come right out and said that their intention was to redistribute wealth in order to achieve “equality” or “social justice” or some other utopian goal. Certainly, no lucid American can deny that the Democratic platform has been a socialist one for at least the last century. It has been the Republicans who have deceived their followers to a much greater extent by promising them liberty and property rights and then redistributing almost as egregiously as the Democrats.
One hallmark redistribution strategy used by the Republicans was “privatization.” Somehow, they managed to successfully characterize forcibly extracting money in taxes from their citizens and redistributing it to private corporations as “free enterprise,” as if “private” and “free” were synonymous. Alexander Hamilton must have smiled in his grave.
However, the Democrats have truly broken new ground during this presidential administration. Not only have they managed to outspend the voracious Bush administration in just ten short months, but they have taken a page from the Republican playbook and actually privatized wealth redistribution. Formerly, however transparent the scheme, the money at least made it into the federal treasury for a moment before being paid out to the special interest that had bought it with votes. However, H.R. 3962, the so-called “Affordable Health Care for America Act,” dispenses with this formality. Now, using the coercive power of government, private citizens will be forced to pay their money directly to government supported health insurers whether they wish to or not. The veneer that this is “public money” being spent for the “public good” has been completely stripped away. There is now simply a government pointing a gun at its citizens and forcing them to pay directly to the special interest that has successfully lobbied for their money. Even King John of the Robin Hood tales did not extort for his friends this overtly.
A more perverse merger of left and right political corruption is unimaginable. Using the government’s numbers, this will provided coverage for 36 million uninsured Americans at a minimum of $15,000 per covered life. Assuming these numbers to be at least “in the ball park,” President Obama and his so-called liberals have just handed over a half a trillion dollars a year to corporate America (the health insurance companies). What true progressive could possibly support this?
The price of this corporate welfare, of course, is that any remaining vestiges of voluntary contracts between insurer and insured that health insurance still retained has been eliminated. Insurers are no longer allowed to determine rates demographically and based upon a real risk model. They are no longer allowed to offer diverse coverage packages to compete with one another for different customer groups. They now must offer low rates and uniform benefits to everyone as entitlements. Like individual welfare recipients, they have surrendered all of their liberty and property rights in return for other people’s money. They are now just one more arm of the state bureaucracy.
The worst aspect of this great fraud is the implications it has for the liberty of every American. The closest parallel to this heretofore has been automobile insurance. Americans have been forced to buy auto insurance directly from an auto insurer in order to exercise the “privilege” of driving on the government’s roads. This was of course enacted for the public good, to ensure that poor drivers could not bankrupt the innocent by demolishing their cars or saddling them with exorbitant hospital bills. However, as hostile to liberty as these laws are, they still leave the driver a choice. He can choose not to drive, however impractical or unrealistic that choice might be.
However, with this new bill, even that smattering of liberty is ripped away. Americans are now forced to purchase insurance from a government-protected and subsidized health insurance company merely because they are alive. Worse yet, they are not merely forced to make a single payment of tribute to satisfy their “individual responsibility.” They must go on paying, year in and year out, for as long as they live. They cannot decline. They cannot conscientiously object. There is no escape from this tyranny save one: death. For those individuals that can demonstrate that they are completely incapable of paying, someone else will be forced to pay for them. No matter what, the government’s corporation will be paid. Even life is no longer a right, but a privilege that the government extends to its subjects for a fee.
From 2001-2006, the Republicans controlled all branches of government. It was an horrific period of utter destruction of American liberty. The Democrats have now been given their chance and in ten short months they have far outdone the Bush Republicans for this dubious distinction. Make no mistake. If the Republicans regain power, they will be worse still. Americans should understand that they will affect no “change” in their government by electing either of these two parties. The federal government is a monster that has taken on a life of its own. Both parties are now its minions and are indistinguishable from one another.
Our Declaration of Independence says that “mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
Are we there yet?
© Thomas Mullen 2009
The Myth of the Christian Nation Divides Us
While our politicians get on with the work of plundering our wealth, planning our lives, and preparing their next war of aggression, they remain comfortably insulated from criticism of any of these substantive actions because they have successfully distracted average Americans with issues that should not involve government at all. There is none more divisive than religion.
The left reads into the First Amendment of the Constitution an active role for government in prohibiting the acknowledgment of religion or God in any public setting. The right reads into our Declaration of Independence a requirement of belief not only in God, but in the Christian God, in order for one to claim the unalienable rights that are “endowed by our Creator.” Neither position is correct.
If there was one thing that our founders made clear, it was their belief that each person’s inner life belonged wholly to him or her. They referred to this as the “right of conscience,” and they revered it above all other rights. They believed that each human being had the right to answer for himself the questions of whether there is a God and what the nature and will of God might be. They believed that reason was the means for man to do so. Regardless of the conclusions that any individual might reach, he was still entitled to all of the same unalienable rights. This is the true meaning of “religious freedom.”
Among the growing minority that has recognized our loss of liberty and the importance of regaining it, there are many who mistakenly say that the United States was “founded as a Christian nation,” and that only returning to Christian principles will solve our problems. Others may not require that one believe in Christ, but do insist that belief in God is necessary in order to give authority to the law of nature and the natural rights. These positions not only alienate atheists, who are admittedly a small minority, but also a large contingency of Christians and other believers in God who do not want government – which is an institution of force – to play any role in their inner lives. This is an unnecessary division among people who might otherwise unite to fight for their liberty.
It is long past time to answer some fundamental questions about our history once and for all. Did the founders of the United States believe in God? Was the United States founded as a “Christian nation?” Was the Constitution based upon Christian or Judeo-Christian laws as found in their scriptures? Did the founders believe that belief in God was necessary to claim the unalienable rights?
The answer to the first question is a resounding “yes.” Even Jefferson, arguably the most “liberal” of the founding fathers, believed in a supreme being, despite the accusations of atheism made against him by political rivals. He also revered Christianity as the greatest religion in human history, as did his “conservative” counterpart, John Adams. However, neither Adams nor Jefferson believed that Jesus Christ was the son of God or even a divine being. Most people are familiar with Jefferson’s bible, which he cut apart and reorganized to eliminate all of the miracles. However, John Adams, a Unitarian, was even more hostile towards the idea that Jesus Christ was God. In a letter to Jefferson, he wrote,
“They all believe that great Principle which has produced this boundless universe, Newton’s universe and Hershell’s universe, came down to this little ball, to be spit upon by Jews. And until this awful blasphemy is got rid of, there never will be any liberal science in the world.”[1]
Neither Adams, Jefferson, Washington, nor Franklin believed that Jesus was literally the son of God or otherwise a divine being in any way. Rather, they admired most of the moral principles of Christianity, although not all of them. For instance, they disagreed with Jesus’ doctrine to “turn the other cheek.” They believed that self defense of one’s life, liberty, and property was not only a right, but a duty. However, it was the Christian principles of love and non-aggression that are espoused in virtually all religions that inspired John Adams to say, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”[2] This will become even more apparent shortly.
In any case, the answer to the first question is “yes.” Most of the founders believed in God. They revered the moral teachings of Christianity, although most of the philosophical leaders among them did not believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ.
Our second question is, “Was the United States founded as a Christian nation?” In 1796, the United States signed a treaty with Tripoli, promising a monetary gift in return for a cessation of hostilities. That treaty was unanimously ratified by the senate and signed by President John Adams. Among its articles resides the answer to our second question.
“Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.”[3] [emphasis added]
Thomas Jefferson confirmed this statement in his autobiography when commenting on a Virginia bill to establish religious freedom.
“Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting “Jesus Christ,” so that it would read “A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;” the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination.”[4]
Next, there is the question of the philosophical basis for the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and original system of laws of the United States. According to Thomas Jefferson, that philosophical basis was most directly the enlightenment philosophers, specifically John Locke and Algernon Sydney. In 1825, Jefferson actually got a resolution passed by the Board of the University of Virginia to make this point clear.
“Resolved, that it is the opinion of this Board that as to the general principles of liberty and the rights of man, in nature and in society, the doctrines of Locke, in his ‘Essay concerning the true original extent and end of civil government,’ and of Sidney in his ‘Discourses on Government,’ may be considered as those generally approved by our fellow citizens of this, and the United States.”[5]
Despite this and other unqualified statements by the founders regarding the philosophical basis for our founding principles, there are many that claim that the founders drew their philosophy from Judeo-Christian scriptures or teachings. While there is much common ground between these teachings and the enlightenment philosophers, the founders were clear that where scripture or dogma conflicted with the enlightenment philosophy of liberty, it was the non-aggression philosophy of liberty that prevailed. Regarding the scriptures, Jefferson wrote,
The whole history of these books is so defective and doubtful that it seems vain to attempt minute enquiry into it: and such tricks have been played with their text, and with the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right, from that cause, to entertain much doubt what parts of them are genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills.[6]
The founder’s skepticism about man’s knowledge of the will of God was not confined to the scriptures themselves. John Adams makes clear that at least he recognized that human beings had no ability to definitively determine the will of God.
“That there is an active principle of power in the universe, is apparent; but in what substance that active principle resides, is past our investigation. The faculties of our understanding are not adequate to penetrate the universe.”[7]
Finally, there is the most important question. Did the founders assert that belief in God was necessary to claim the unalienable rights? As with the other questions, they answered this one quite unambiguously. In a letter to Peter Carr, Thomas Jefferson advised his young friend,
“Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because if there be one he must approve of the homage of reason more than that of blindfolded fear.”[8]
“Do not be frightened from this enquiry by any fear of its consequences. If it ends in a belief that there is no god, you will find incitements to virtue in the comforts & pleasantness you feel in its exercise, and the love of others which it will procure you. If you find reason to believe there is a god, a consciousness that you are acting under his eye, & that he approves you, will be a vast additional incitement; if that there be a future state, the hope of a happy existence in that increases the appetite to deserve it; if that Jesus was also a god, you will be comforted by a belief of his aid and love. In fine, I repeat that you must lay aside all prejudice on both sides, & neither believe nor reject anything because any other persons, or description of persons have rejected or believed it.” Your own reason is the only oracle given you by heaven, and you are answerable not for the rightness but uprightness of the decision.”[9] [emphasis added]
There are those who argue that without God, there is no authority to base the natural rights upon. This was not the assertion of our founders and it directly contradicts our Declaration of Independence, which reads,
“We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…” [emphasis added]
While the founders believe that our rights came from our Creator (whomever or whatever the Creator might be), they explicitly said that these truths are self evident. They are truths that can be observed directly. This is directly inspired by Locke’s empiricism. While he, too, believed in God, he based his philosophy only upon what he could directly observe in nature or reasonably conclude from those observations. Therefore, his philosophy recognized the existence of God but did not depend upon it for its validity.
Consider a useful analogy. If a priest and an atheist were both to consider a rock lying upon the ground, both would agree that the rock exists. They could see it, touch it, and hear its sound if they picked it up and then dropped it from their hand. The priest would say that the rock was created by God. The atheist would explain its existence with scientific theories. They may disagree vehemently on this point, but no third party would have to decide who is correct. All can see that the rock exists, for its existence is self evident. The same is true of our natural rights. Our Declaration of Independence says so explicitly.
The only authority that the founders recognized as the basis for our laws was the non-aggression principle, which they recognized as the fundamental law of nature. The beauty of this idea is that it transcends religion and thus welcomes members of all religions, as well as those with no religious beliefs at all. The non-aggression principle allows each individual to use his reason to answer the most important philosophical questions of life for himself, without being forced to assent to any beliefs that he does not hold. It allows people to believe in God voluntarily, or to not believe, as their reason dictates. The only restriction upon them is that they commit no aggression against anyone else, regardless of their beliefs. Jefferson expressed this beautifully when he wrote,
“The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.[10]
If all of America’s founding principles, including freedom of religion, could be summed up in two sentences, no better than these could be found anywhere. If we could agree to live by this one statement alone, the number of people no longer divided along partisan lines would be staggering. Our politicians are wasting trillions of our dollars and assuming un-delegated powers over us that apply to believers and non-believers alike. We must grant each other the ability to exercise the right of conscience freely within the boundary of non-aggression. Only then will we see clearly where the true source of our crisis lies – in a government whose every act contradicts the reason for its existence and perpetuates a state of war with its people. We must unite together to eliminate this earthly threat in order to resume the pursuit of our happiness, both in this world and the next.
[1] Adams, John Letter to Thomas Jefferson January 22, 1825 from The Works of John Adams Second President of the United States Vol. X Charles C. Little and James Brown Boston, MA 1851Pg. 415
[2] Adams, John To the Officers of the First Brigade of the Third Division of the Militia of Massachussetts 11 October 1798 from The Works of John Adams Second President of the United States Vol. IX Charles C. Little and James Brown Boston, MA 1851Pg. 229
[3] Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the United States and the Bey and Subjects of Tripoli of Barbary June 17, 1797 from The Avalon Project Yale Law School Lillian Goldman Library https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/bar1796t.asp. There has been some debate on whether the language in Article 11 was translated correctly from the original Arabic in which the treaty was written. However, this is irrelevant. It was the English translation containing these exact words that the Senate reviewed and ratified, making the question of translation irrelevant on this point.
[4] Jefferson, Thomas Autobiography from Jefferson Writings edited by Merrill D. Peterson, Literary Classics of the United States, New York, NY 1984 pg. 40
[5] Thomas Jefferson, Writings, ed. Merrill Peterson (New York, N.Y.: Library of America, 1984), p. 479
[6] Jefferson, Thomas from The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. 14 edited by Albert Ellery Bergh and Andrew A. Lipscomb The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association 1904 pgs. 71-2
[7] Adams, John Letter to Thomas Jefferson January 22, 1825 from The Works of John Adams Second President of the United States Vol. X Charles C. Little and James Brown Boston, MA 1851Pg. 414
[8] Jefferson, Thomas Letter to Peter Carr August 10, 1787 from Jefferson Writings edited by Merrill D. Peterson, Literary Classics of the United States, New York, NY 1984 pg. 902
[9] Jefferson, Thomas Letter to Peter Carr August 10, 1787 from Jefferson Writings edited by Merrill D. Peterson, Literary Classics of the United States, New York, NY 1984 pg. 903-4
[10] Jefferson, Thomas Notes on Virginia from Jefferson Writings edited by Merrill D. Peterson, Literary Classics of the United States, New York, NY 1984 pg. 285
Tom Mullen is the author of A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America.
>The Natural Law Provides the Answers
>There are many well-intentioned people that invoke the Constitution of the United States when looking for the solutions to what they believe (or are led to believe) are “dilemmas” confronting America today. This results in spirited debates about what the framers of the Constitution might have intended when writing it, in spite of the fact that there are hundreds of essays by our founders that explain what they intended beyond any reasonable doubt.[1] However, establishing the specific meaning of each article or phrase in the Constitution cannot supply the answers to the questions confronting us now. The Constitution is not a philosophical document. It is a legal one. As such, it does not express the philosophy upon which our nation was founded. In other words, it does not answer the question, “What will our government attempt to do?” but rather, “How will our government attempt to do it?”[2]
The answer to the former question, “What will our government do?” or, more precisely, “What should our government do?” is answered by the other of our founding documents, The Declaration of Independence. Some mistakenly dismiss the Declaration because “it does not have the force of law,” which it does not. This completely misses the point. The law is merely the attempt to codify the underlying principles of justice – to put the philosophy into practice. However, it is the Declaration that articulates that philosophy. Like the Constitution, the statements made in this document are clear and unambiguous. While often mistaken for platitudes that are left open to subjective interpretation, each statement in the Declaration of Independence actually has a specific, objective meaning that must be known in order for the whole to be understood.
The very first sentence of the Declaration contains one of its most important philosophical concepts: the laws of nature and of nature’s God. Before one proceeds any farther, it is vital to determine exactly what the law of nature is, for it is the foundation for all that follows. The law of nature is clearly defined in John Locke’s Essay Concerning the True Original Extent and End of Civil Government.
“The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions…”[3]
Reason is the law of nature that the Declaration refers to. It was reason that allowed Locke and our founders to observe the self-evident fact that all men are created equal, to conclude based upon that observation that they are endowed with certain unalienable rights, and to further conclude that the sole purpose of government is to secure these rights. These were not articles of faith, but reasoned conclusions based upon empirical evidence.
That it was Locke’s philosophy that our founders adopted is also clear. They did not conclude, as Hobbes did, that man should give up his natural rights upon entering society in return for the security that an absolute monarch could provide. Neither did they conclude that man must subordinate his rights to the “general will,” as Rousseau thought necessary for civil society. Rather, they clearly stated, as Locke did, that the purpose of government was to secure our rights.
There are further conclusions that proceed directly from this. First, we do not have “Constitutional rights.” Our rights are neither granted by the U.S. Constitution nor by its first ten amendments, commonly referred to as the “Bill of Rights.” Our natural rights precede the government and the Constitution. The so-called Bill of Rights does not grant rights but rather prohibits certain violations of our rights by the government.[4] The Constitution is a means toward an end: the end of securing our rights. To the extent that it does so it is a useful instrument. To the extent that it fails to do so it is not.
Similarly, we must also conclude that we cannot lose our inalienable rights. The very meaning of the word “inalienable” means that they cannot be taken away, not even by majority vote. Regardless of any Supreme Court decision or new legislation, our rights will not and cannot ever change. No Constitutional Amendment can revoke our rights or grant us new ones. Those rights may be violated by unjust laws, rulings, or Constitutional amendments, but they remain our rights nevertheless. It is appropriate for us to demand that they be respected and it is our duty to defend them, for the exercise of our natural rights is the essence of being human.
Finally, our Declaration answers the question that is ultimately asked whenever our present difficulties are truly understood. “What can I do?”
Our Declaration also answers this question.
“That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
This also comes from Locke, who wrote,
“…whenever the legislators endeavour to take away, and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any farther obedience, and are left to the common refuge, which God hath provided for all men, against force and violence. Whensoever therefore the legislative shall transgress this fundamental rule of society; and either by ambition, fear, folly or corruption, endeavour to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other, an absolute power over the lives, liberties, and estates of the people; by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the people, who have a right to resume their original liberty, and, by the establishment of a new legislative, (such as they shall think fit) provide for their own safety and security, which is the end for which they are in society.”[5]
Based upon these passages, one might be tempted to conclude that we have no alternative but armed rebellion. To be sure, it is the right of every individual to defend himself by force when his natural rights are violated, for violation of those rights is the definition of the state of war. However, before loading our weapons, we should stop to consider whether our government has truly acted against the will of the people or not. Has it truly acted against our will in establishing massive redistribution programs that violate each individual’s right to property and bankrupts us as a whole? If so, then what of the tens of thousands cheering President Obama as he promised universal health care and the tens of millions who voted him into office? Has our government truly acted against our will in creating and expanding our military empire and tyrannical security/police state? If so, then what of the tens of thousands cheering President Bush and the tens of millions who voted him into office?
In truth, reason should force us to recognize that our government has not become the monster that it is by acting contrary to our will, but by giving us exactly what we have asked it for. As a people, we now openly refer to government as a “provider of services” rather than a “securer of rights.” We have elevated Democracy to an ideal, allowing the majority to grant the government power to violate the very rights that it exists to protect, most consistently property, which is the means of both life and liberty. This was anticipated by our founders, who warned us specifically against the dangers of democracy.
“Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Government, the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from acts of government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of Constituents.”[6]
We have forgotten that the “checks and balances” written into our Constitution were put there to protect us from democracy. We no longer have any concept of what our natural rights are, much less how best to secure them or even that we should be trying to secure them. If anything, we have come to believe that man in civil society has what Hobbes mistakenly believed he possessed in the state of nature – a right to everything, which is why he equated the state of nature with the state of war. Our society now exists in that state of war of “everyone against everyone” that Hobbes described in his state of nature, for most of us believe that we have a right to everything and that we can bring the force of government to bear against our neighbors to secure that right. To engage in armed defense of what we think are our rights amidst such confusion would result in a bloodbath of unprecedented proportions, which is no small statement considering the wars of the last century. As important as rediscovering our true natural rights is the understanding of what we do not have a right to – namely the life, liberty, or property of any other human being.
It is not the majority that determines what our rights are, but it is the majority that makes the laws that are supposed to protect them. We must rediscover our founding philosophy and persuade our fellow Americans to again accept it as our creed, with a written Constitution as its supporting code.[7] For any one of us to regain our freedom, we must “educate and inform the whole mass of the people.[8]” While they are ignorant of the law of nature, they are a force of tyranny that cannot be overcome, no matter how just the cause or how committed the patriot. Once reacquainted with this most fundamental of laws, they are equally irresistible as the “only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.[9]” When the inhabitants of America are again guided by reason to reclaim their natural rights and to defend those rights for everyone, we can institute new Government without firing a shot. What could be more progressive than that?
——————————————————————————–
[1] These are, of course, the Federalist Papers and the rebuttals to them called the Anti-Federalist Papers.
[2] Even the preamble, which states “in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense…,” is really a list of objectives, rather than a statement of the ultimate goal.
[3] John Locke Second Treatise on Civil Government Ch. 2 Sec. 6
[4] Neither are the rights specifically protected in those amendments an exhaustive list of our rights. To ensure that there would be no confusion on this matter, the Ninth Amendment clearly states that the “enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
[5] Locke, Second Treatise Ch. 19 Sec. 222
[6] Madison, James to Thomas Jefferson October 17, 1788
[7] This wonderful characterization of the Declaration of Independence as our American Creed and the Constitution as its corresponding Code was suggested to me by my friend and respected colleague, David R. Gillie.
[8] Jefferson, Thomas Letter to James Madison December 20, 1787 Memoirs, Correspondence, and Private Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Late President of the United States Vol. 2 edited by Thomas Jefferson Randolph Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley New Burlington Street London 1829 Pg. 277
[9] Ibid.
© Thomas Mullen 2009
>A Crisis of Legitimacy
>There came a point between last year’s criminal bailout of the financial sector and the latest theft of $30 billion more to throw on the AIG bonfire that further acts of armed robbery by this government against its people ceased to matter, at least for me. It is not that I have thrown up my hands and given up. Far from it. Rather, I see the acceleration in both the frequency and the size of the bailouts for what they are – the death struggle of a drowning regime, flailing its arms as the water enters its lungs. With each new bailout and subsequent addition to its mountain of debt, the regime loses a little more of the only oxygen it has left – its legitimacy in the eyes of its people.
Legitimacy is the recognition by its people that their government is their rightful government, that the power it wields is legitimate power. In a free society, our Declaration of Independence tells us that governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed. As I’ve discussed before, the philosophy that inspired the founding of our nation asserts that such consent is given by a free people for only one reason: protection of their property. Thus, the legitimacy of the government of a free people only endures as long as that government continues to protect the property of its citizens. Once it ceases to protect property – or begins to attack and plunder property – it ceases to exercise legitimate power, for it no longer has the consent of the governed.
For those who understand these simple principles of liberty, the government of the United States lost its legitimacy decades ago. While there are many convincing arguments for an even earlier date, certainly after 1913 the matter was settled conclusively. It was in 1913 that the United States ceased to be a republic with a government whose purpose was to protect the property of the individual and became a social democracy with a government whose purpose was to plunder the property of the individual for “the good of society,” or “the general will,” if you prefer the language of the statist Rousseau. The good of society was, of course, defined by the state – the plunderer – eliminating any possibility that some inadvertent benefit might befall the governed. The good of society was defined as the twin statist pillars of tyranny that still dominate our society today: to achieve economic equality at home and to make the world safe for democracy abroad. These remain the two goals of the America democratic empire, espoused by both major political parties.
In order to achieve these ends, individual liberty – the only liberty– must be sacrificed. Why? Because in order to attempt to achieve the two pillars the state must attack the means and the tangible stuff of liberty – property. That is why in 1913, along with the new philosophy, came the insidious Income Tax, the Federal Reserve, and the 17th Amendment. These were the tools with which the new social democracy plundered the property of the individual in order to achieve its goals. Once the individual lost the right to the fruits of his labor, he lost his liberty, for there cannot be one without the other.
Certainly, the free enterprise juggernaut that was created by the former republic continued to thunder forward. However, it was now progressing under the weight of the coercive power of the state, which constantly attacked it, rather than under the rightful protection of the state, which had previously acted only in defense of property. The drag on free enterprise was light at first, but relentless in its growth. While America enjoyed good decades and bad after 1913, the seeds of systemic failure were sown, and the end to which we have now come inevitable.
This argument certainly begs the question of why the 1913 coup was a bloodless one. Why would a nation “conceived in liberty” quietly allow the very core of their liberty to be taken from them? The answer is that it was not taken from them, but given away. One must remember that the power in a democracy lies in the majority. This is where the significance of the 17th Amendment comes into play. This was the masterstroke of the new social democracy. By giving more “power to the people,” and eliminating the key check on federal power that the state legislatures possessed when they chose U.S. senators instead of popular vote, it was then a simple matter for the federal government to buy the liberty of the people. They deftly picked the pocket of an unsuspecting public by relieving them of their property (and therefore their liberty) by promising them other people’s property. This was the deal with the devil that was offered to the American people, and they took it. For those who objected, the two pillars were there to be thrown in their faces, with a hundred million voters to shout them down. As the Star Wars III character so eloquently put it, “So this is how liberty dies – to thunderous applause.”
So, at that point, the link between legitimacy and property rights was broken. Legitimacy remained dependent upon the consent of the governed, but after 1913 the American public no longer consented to government for protection of their property. Increasingly over the ensuing decades, that consent was given in return for the promise of other people’s property. Inevitably, “progress” for society became defined as the extent to which property could be stolen from one group and redistributed to another – at home through social programs, regulation, and other “economic policy” and abroad through military adventurism and empire-building. It should be obvious to the reader that this type of “progress” can only lead to the prospect that we may soon face ourselves: no property, and thus no liberty, at all.
One might be tempted to despair that a thousand years of tyranny awaits us. However, there is one flaw in the social democracy’s model: it is unsustainable. It has lived off of the productive capacity of the former republic for almost 100 years, but in that time the parasite has killed off the host. There are now a few in the minority that argue that government shouldn’t destroy the property rights of the individual in pursuit of the two pillars. What will become obvious very soon is that government cannot achieve its goals in this way. The model depends upon a productive element in society supplying the property needed for plunder, but without liberty there is eventually no productivity either. This is why empires fall, and for no other reason.
Thus, since the government’s legitimacy is now based upon its ability to provide its citizens with other people’s property, and because it will soon no longer be able to do so, it will obviously soon lose its legitimacy. Without legitimacy, regimes fall. If the surrealism of a government spending staggering sums of money in its last death throes has not hit home to the average American, the first medical claim unpaid for lack of funds under one of its socialist medical programs, the first Social Security check that bounces, or the first time a local welfare department closes its doors will spur this epiphany. If nothing so dramatic occurs (we do, in the end, have a printing press), then there will come a day – and that day is months or years away, not decades – that tens of millions of unemployed Americans are going to wake up and realize that the government’s promise of security via other people’s property was false. Then, the regime will fall.
Lest one assume that there is no work to be done by the majority of Americans, let us not create new illusions to replace the old ones. History shows that a corrupted people that throws off the tyranny of an oppressive government can only create something worse in its place. We must face the fact that the American people are corrupted – not because they drink too much liquor, have too much sex, or don’t go to church – but because they have lost all recognition of the rights of their fellow human beings to the fruits of their labor. The French Revolution should serve as a perfect example to Americans at this point in history. While the French rightly threw off the tyranny of a government that plundered their property, they merely transferred the privilege of plunder to themselves, all for the misguided cause of “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.” The result, as we know, was a bloody reign of terror.
We will achieve similar results with our own revolution without a change of ideology. We must reject entirely the notion that we have any right whatsoever to the property of others, and restore our founding principles as the organizing principles of our society. Should we again base our government on its original purpose of protecting property, we will once more secure the blessings of liberty and resume the pursuit of happiness. The true “time for choosing” is coming soon.
>Letter to President Bush Regarding the Housing Bill
>Mr. President,
I am writing to express my wishes in the strongest terms that you veto the housing bill that is likely to pass in the U.S. Senate tomorrow (Saturday July 26, 2008). This bill is an outright violation of the most basic property rights that our society is founded upon, redistributing tax monies paid by me and other citizens (who have no choice but to pay them) to those who either borrowed or lent in poor judgment. I am a homeowner that most likely paid too much for my own home, but would not consider using the force of government to extort “relief” from my fellow citizens. I deny their right to do likewise to me.
I have received a letter from U.S. Senator Mel Martinez stating that “we must use the resources of the federal government in a reasonable and responsible manner in order to mitigate future losses and put our housing market on the pathway to recovery.” I remind you, Mr. President, that those “federal funds” are nothing more than my property, paid in taxes for no other purpose than the protection of the rest of my property. My government, even by majority vote, does not have the right to dispose of my property to fund “grants for communities to purchase and renovate abandoned properties,” nor to “assist families facing foreclosure,” nor to prevent the bankruptcy of Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, lending institutions that should never have been sponsored by government in the first place.
We were once a country where each individual was guaranteed unalienable rights. Now, it seems that our rights can be voted away whenever the legislature believes it will win favor with an uninformed electorate. I remind you of your oath to the Constitution, Mr. President, and beseech you, as the last line of defense of my rights, to veto this bill. Thank you for your time and kind consideration.
Regards,
A Farmer