by Diane Rufino, Dec. 23, 2020
Our country is, no doubt, in a horrible mess – an embarrassment to the world and on the verge of destroying the very goodness, principles, and freedom that we had been founded on. For the second time in our history, we are witnessing the fraudulent theft of a presidential election by the overly-ambitious Democratic Party (Chicago engaging in massive fraud to tip the scale to John F. Kennedy, when it was Nixon who actually won the legitimate votes). Democrats planned and executed a massive scheme involving election tampering, voter fraud, massive voter and election irregularities, and other unconscionable election manipulation for the purpose of stealing the 2020 election from one of the most effective presidents of all time – Donald Trump. It was nothing short of a political coup, with a virtual moron waiting to occupy the White House.
The Tenth Amendment Center re-posted an article this month titled: America Embraces the Tyranny the Founders Fought to Reject in which the author Mike Maharrey wrote: “The American Founding generation fought a long, bloody war to free themselves from a tyrannical government, only to see the people eventually embrace the very system they struggled to throw off. That may seem like a stinging indictment, but careful examination of U.S. governance today reveals that it rests on essentially the same philosophical foundation as the 18th century British system Americans rejected. The founding generation developed a brand new conception of government, resting it on the consent of the governed and the idea that governing institutions must operate within constitutional constraints. Today, we still see the vestiges of those founding ideals in political rhetoric and popular conscience, but the U.S. government long ago threw off constitutional fetters and now functions much like the English system Americans fought to free themselves from.”
It was not long ago before our Founders invoked the hand of the Almighty (Providence) in our creation and in our intention to remain a land of the free. And given how a chunk of anti-USA, anti-liberty, Godless, socialist/communist, and even non-citizens have used every vile tactic known and created to push their agenda, to disrupt and destroy the historic and critical institutions necessary for a moral, honest, and good people and its vestiges, especially those of education, religion, science, and morality, and has wreaked havoc on the peace and tranquility of our country and has, little by little, chiseled the force and effectiveness from the face of the Constitution and has created in its wake the leviathan of a federal government (including a Swamp and Deep State) that we are subjected and subjugated to today, we face the most important question we can ask today. That question is this: How long can this country endure still clinging to at least some of the principles on which we were founded? We certainly don’t have a population intelligent enough, moral enough, informed enough, dedicated enough, or dutybound enough to care about our future. In short, our freedoms and liberties matter little to them, the Constitution as written for us and for which hundreds of thousands shed their blood and died for her ideals matter little to them (let’s face it, they don’t even understand the Constitution or what its grand purpose is), and the longevity of the “greatest country on Earth” or “the freest country on Earth” matters little to them. To them, it’s about how much government can give them and do for them, and how much the government can wield its immense power and pass laws and policies to redistribute wealth from the wealthy (but mostly the middle class) to those who live in poverty. (Yet, it’s astonishing how so many claim to be poor but are among the most obese in our communities, have the nicest nails, and have their hair done).
In other words, the most important question we must ask is “Where are today’s revolutionary patriots, ones like Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, and George Washington? And where are today’s rabble rousers like the colonial Sons of Liberty? Where are those with the courage, the cunning, the intelligence, the articulation, the ambition, and the singular motivation to stand up for Individual Liberty, to engage in civil disobedience, and to fight tooth and nail against the tyranny that has infected our government.
Patrick Henry, perhaps our most vocal, passionate, and articulate of founders for the security of individual liberty, delivered a stirring speech to open the Virginia Convention on June 5, 1788, which met to debate the question of whether to ratify the proposed new Constitution of the United States:
“Mr. Chairman, I am much obliged to the very worthy gentleman for his encomium. I wish I was possessed with talents, or possessed of anything that might enable me to elucidate this great subject. I am not free from suspicion: I am apt to entertain doubts. I rose yesterday to ask a question which arose in my own mind. When I asked that question, I thought the meaning of my interrogation was obvious. The fate of this question and of America may depend on this. Have they said, We, the states? Have they made a proposal of a compact between states? If they had, this would be a confederation. It is otherwise most clearly a consolidated government. The question turns, sir, on that poor little thing — the expression, We, the people, instead of the states, of America. I need not take much pains to show that the principles of this system are extremely pernicious, impolitic, and dangerous. Is this a monarchy, like England — a compact between prince and people, with checks on the former to secure the liberty of the latter? Is this a confederacy, like Holland — an association of a number of independent states, each of which retains its individual sovereignty? It is not a democracy, wherein the people retain all their rights securely. Had these principles been adhered to, we should not have been brought to this alarming transition, from a confederacy to a consolidated government. We have no detail of these great consideration, which, in my opinion, ought to have abounded before we should recur to a government of this kind. Here is a resolution as radical as that which separated us from Great Britain. It is radical in this transition; our rights and privileges are endangered, and the sovereignty of the states will be relinquished: and cannot we plainly see that this is actually the case? The rights of conscience, trial by jury, liberty of the press, all your immunities and franchises, all pretensions to human rights and privileges, are rendered insecure, if not lost, by this change, so loudly talked of by some, and inconsiderately by others. Is this tame relinquishment of rights worthy of freemen? Is it worthy of that manly fortitude that ought to characterize republicans? It is said eight states have adopted this plan. I declare that if twelve states and a half had adopted it, I would, with manly firmness, and in spite of an erring world, reject it. You are not to inquire how your trade may be increased, nor how you are to become a great and powerful people, but how your liberties can be secured; for liberty ought to be the direct end of your government.
Having premised these things, I shall, with the aid of my judgment and information, which, I confess, are not extensive, go into the discussion of this system more minutely. Is it necessary for your liberty that you should abandon those great rights by the adoption of this system? Is the relinquishment of the trial by jury and the liberty of the press necessary for your liberty? Will the abandonment of your most sacred rights tend to the security of your liberty? Liberty, the greatest of all earthly blessing — give us that precious jewel, and you may take everything else! But I am fearful I have lived long enough to become an old—fashioned fellow. Perhaps an invincible attachment to the dearest rights of man may, in these refined, enlightened days, be deemed old—fashioned; if so, I am contented to be so. I say, the time has been when every pulse of my heart beat for American liberty, and which, I believe, had a counterpart in the breast of every true American; but suspicions have gone forth —’ suspicions of my integrity — publicly reported that my professions are not real. Twenty—three years ago was I supposed a traitor to my country? I was then said to be the bane of sedition, because I supported the rights of my country. I may be thought suspicious when I say our privileges and rights are in danger. But, sir, a number of the people of this country are weak enough to think these things are too true. I am happy to find that the gentleman on the other side declares they are groundless. But, sir, suspicion is a virtue as long as its object is the preservation of the public good, and as long as it stays within proper bounds: should it fall on me, I am contented: conscious rectitude is a powerful consolation. I trust there are many who think my professions for the public good to be real. Let your suspicion look to both sides. There are many on the other side, who possibly may have been persuaded to the necessity of these measures, which I conceive to be dangerous to your liberty. Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined. I am answered by gentlemen, that, though I might speak of terrors, yet the fact was, that we were surrounded by none of the dangers I apprehended. I conceive this new government to be one of those dangers: it has produced those horrors which distress many of our best citizens. We are come hither to preserve the poor commonwealth of Virginia, if it can be possibly done: something must be done to preserve your liberty and mine. The Confederation, this same despised government, merits, in my opinion, the highest encomium: it carried us through a long and dangerous war; it rendered us victorious in that bloody conflict with a powerful nation; it has secured us a territory greater than any European monarch possesses: and shall a government which has been thus strong and vigorous, be accused of imbecility, and abandoned for want of energy? Consider what you are about to do before you part with the government. Take longer time in reckoning things; revolutions like this have happened in almost every country in Europe; similar examples are to be found in ancient Greece and ancient Rome — instances of the people losing their liberty by their own carelessness and the ambition of a few. We are cautioned by the honorable gentleman, who presides, against faction and turbulence. I acknowledge that licentiousness is dangerous, and that it ought to be provided against: I acknowledge, also, the new form of government may effectually prevent it: yet there is another thing it will as effectually do — it will oppress and ruin the people.
There are sufficient guards placed against sedition and licentiousness; for, when power is given to this government to suppress these, or for any other purpose, the language it assumes is clear, express, and unequivocal; but when this Constitution speaks of privileges, there is an ambiguity, sir, a fatal ambiguity — an ambiguity which is very astonishing. In the clause under consideration, there is the strangest language that I can conceive. I mean, when it says that there shall not be more representatives than one for every thirty thousand. Now, sir, how easy is it to evade this privilege! “The number shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand.” This may be satisfied by one representative from each state. Let our numbers be ever so great, this immense continent may, by this artful expression, be reduced to have but thirteen representatives. I confess this construction is not natural; but the ambiguity of the expression lays a good ground for a quarrel. Why was it not clearly and unequivocally expressed, that they should be entitled to have one for every thirty thousand? This would have obviated all disputes; and was this difficult to be done? What is the inference? When population increases, and a state shall send representatives in this proportion, Congress may remand them, because the right of having one for every thirty thousand is not clearly expressed. This possibility of reducing the number to one for each state approximates to probability by that other expression — “but each state shall at least have one representative.” Now, is it not clear that, from the first expression, the number might be reduced so much that some states should have no representatives at all, were it not for the insertion of this last expression? And as this is the only restriction upon them, we may fairly conclude that they may restrain the number to one from each state. Perhaps the same horrors may hang over my mind again. I shall be told I am continually afraid: but, sir, I have strong cause of apprehension. In some parts of the plan before you, the great rights of freemen are endangered; in other parts, absolutely taken away. How does your trial by jury stand? In civil cases gone — not sufficiently secured in criminal — this best privilege is gone. But we are told that we need not fear; because those in power, being our representatives, will not abuse the powers we put in their hands. I am not well versed in history, but I will submit to your recollection, whether liberty has been destroyed most often by the licentiousness of the people, or by the tyranny of rulers. I imagine, sir, you will find the balance on the side of tyranny. Happy will you be if you miss the fate of those nations, who, omitting to resist their oppressors, or negligently suffering their liberty to be wrested from them, have groaned under intolerable despotism! Most of the human race are now in this deplorable condition; and those nations who have gone in search of grandeur, power, and splendor, have also fallen a sacrifice, and been the victims of their own folly. While they acquired those visionary blessings, they lost their freedom. My great objection to this government is, that it does not leave us the means of defending our rights, or of waging war against tyrants. It is urged by some gentlemen, that this new plan will bring us an acquisition of strength — an army, and the militia of the states. This is an idea extremely ridiculous: gentlemen cannot be earnest. This acquisition will trample on our fallen liberty. Let my beloved Americans guard against that fatal lethargy that has pervaded the universe. Have we the means of resisting disciplined armies, when our only defence, the militia, is put into the hands of Congress? The honorable gentleman said that great danger would ensue if the Convention rose without adopting this system. I ask, Where is that danger? I see none. Other gentlemen have told us, within these walls, that the union is gone, or that the union will be gone. Is not this trifling with the judgment of their fellow—citizens? Till they tell us the grounds of their fears, I will consider them as imaginary. I rose to make inquiry where those dangers were; they could make no answer: I believe I never shall have that answer. Is there a disposition in the people of this country to revolt against the dominion of laws? Has there been a single tumult in Virginia? Have not the people of Virginia, when laboring under the severest pressure of accumulated distresses, manifested the most cordial acquiescence in the execution of the laws? What could be more awful than their unanimous acquiescence under general distresses? Is there any revolution in Virginia? Whither is the spirit of America gone? Whither is the genius of America fled? It was but yesterday, when our enemies marched in triumph through our country. Yet the people of this country could not be appalled by their pompous armaments: they stopped their carer, and victoriously captured them. Where is the peril, now, compared to that? Some minds are agitated by foreign alarms. Happily for us, there is no real danger from Europe; that country is engaged in more arduous business: from that quarter there is no cause of fear: you may sleep in safety forever for them.“
Where is the danger? If, sir, there was any, I would recur to the American spirit to defend us; that spirit which has enabled us to surmount the greatest difficulties: to that illustrious spirit I address my most fervent prayer to prevent our adopting a system destructive to liberty.
Two days later, on June 7, Patrick Henry delivered a dramatic appeal for the need to add a Bill of Rights to the Constitution and also a stern warning should the States fail to do so in forming their first common government. He urged:
“Mr. Chairman, the public mind, as well as my own, is extremely uneasy at the proposed change of government.. I consider myself as the servant of the people of this commonwealth, as a sentinel over their rights, liberty, and happiness. I represent their feelings when I say that they are exceedingly uneasy at being brought from that state of full security, which they enjoyed, to the present delusive appearance of things. A year ago, the minds of our citizens were at perfect repose. Before the meeting of the late federal Convention at Philadelphia, a general peace and a universal tranquility prevailed in this country; but, since that period, they are exceedingly uneasy and disquieted …….. Make the best of this new government–say it is composed by anything but inspiration—you ought to be extremely cautious, watchful, jealous of your liberty; for, instead of securing your rights, you may lose them forever. If a wrong step be now made, the republic may be lost forever. If this new government will not come up to the expectation of the people, and they shall be disappointed, their liberty will be lost, and tyranny must and will arise. I repeat it again, and I beg gentlemen to consider, that a wrong step, made now, will plunge us into misery, and our republic will be lost.“
I take the words, the advice, and the warnings of our Founders very seriously as they alone went through the tumultuous years when England sought to subjugate the American colonies and to deprive them of the rights and liberties endowed and reserved to them by the English Bill of Rights and even the Magna Carta, the threat of retribution by the King and Parliament for daring to assert those rights, the indignation of King George at the colonists for daring to remonstrate (protest) against his mistreatment of them, the humiliation of having the King disband colonial legislatures and assemblies, of having Royal governors and generals rule them, of being taxed without representation, and of having their guns and ammunition seized and destroyed, the threat of death by hanging for daring to declare their separation from England by issuing the Declaration of Independence and other such documents (“For the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor”), and the horror, death, and destruction involved in fighting for their independence. They were witness to the tyranny in the American colonies that those in England suffered for hundreds of years at the whim of the King. To them, individual liberty meant everything; it was something that was certainly worth fighting for. It was something that freedom-loving people felt compelled to do. In England, the country which gave us the history to support our founding documents, human rights and individual liberty were not associated with the reign of a King. Rarely did the English kings respect the many compacts they signed to recognize the rights of his subjects. Our early settlers and founders knew that if they were to enjoy the liberty that nature and God bestowed upon them, they would have to design a government “of the people, by the people, and for the people.” There must be no king, no monarch, no concentrated aggressive government. Government must be absolutely obligated to secure and protect every individual’s natural (inalienable) and civil right.
We Americans today don’t think like them. Heck, a good chunk of people in our country were allowed to come here illegally and have no meaningful connection to our gloried history and the foundation we have based on grand and noble principles. We are too far removed from the circumstances that led to the revolution. We’ve lost the revolutionary spirit.
Mr. Maharrey continues in his article America Embraces the Tyranny the Founders Fought to Reject:
“In America, law was king and constitutions stood as the supreme law of the land. It wasn’t that the British system lacked a constitution, but its unwritten nature and the English conception of its place in the political order was vastly different than the one that evolved in the American states. In American thought, constitutions remained above governments. They limited the action of every governmental branch, and political systems were subject to words of their constitutions. In short, constitutions stood as the supreme law of the land, and the entire system of government flowed out of them. (In other words, the Constitution created the “common” or federal government and by consent of the people of the states that ratified the document, the government’s powers were only intended to be those listed expressly in that compact).
In the English conception, the constitution was not a superior law set above the government. In a sense it was the government. The actions of Parliament, the courts and the King formed the substance of the constitution and were in no way limited by it.
In the British system, the people were not sovereign – Parliament was. In essence, the government itself enjoyed supremacy. As historian Gordon S. Wood put it in the Creation of the American Republic, any limits on Parliament were strictly theoretical – even moral and natural law restrictions. Constitutional and legal limits only bound lawmakers as far as lawmakers were willing to be bound.
For the Englishman, there was no distinction between the ‘constitution or frame of government’ and the ‘system of laws.’ They were the same. Every act of Parliament was, in essence, part of the constitution. Wood quotes Blackstone to make this point:
‘The English constitution therefore could not be any sort of fundamental law. Most eighteenth-century writers…could not conceive of the constitution as anything anterior and superior to the government and ordinary law, but rather regarded itself, as ‘that assemblage of laws, customs and institutions which form the general system; according to which the several powers of the state are distributed, and their respective rights are secured to the different members of the community.’ The English constitution was not, as the Americans eventually came to see with condescension, committed to parchment.’
Wood makes the implications of this system crystal clear, writing, ‘All law customary and statutory was thus constitutional.’
In a nutshell, the 18th century British system the Americans went to war to free themselves from rested on a living, breathing constitution. The government itself defined and enforced whatever limits it might have. Essentially, it was unlimited in power and authority.
As American political thought evolved, the English systems became absurd. Political power was conceived as limited, first by principle, and second by the will of the people as expressed through written constitutions.
The founding generation believed equity – justice according to natural law or right – bound and limited all political power. Government served a limited purpose, as Thomas Jefferson put it in the Declaration of Independence, ‘to secure these rights,’ life, liberty and property. It followed that the people establishing government retained the right and authority to maintain it within those limits. Government was not supreme; it was merely an agent of the people. Written constitutions served a limiting purpose. They provide the ‘political bible’ that Paine referred to, specifically circumscribing the scope of governmental power. As Paine put it: ‘A constitution is not the act of a government, but of a people constituting a government; and government without a constitution, is power without a right.’
Within this philosophical framework, a sovereign government institution such as Parliament is fundamentally tyrannical.
Even a casual look at American governance today reveals a system having much more in common with the 18th century British model than the one the founding generation forged nearly 250 years ago. America operates under a ‘living breathing’ constitution with the U.S. Supreme Court taking on the role of sovereign.
In 1776, the British Parliament acted with absolute sovereign authority. Today, the federal government rules with that same kind of unlimited power. The federal government determines the extent of its own authority through the Supreme Court. Any limits on Congress or the president are merely theoretical, constrained only by the whims of five out of nine politically connected lawyers. Every opinion of the Supreme Court becomes ‘part of the fabric of the Constitution.’
For all practical purposes, the federal government today operates without any limits at all. Everything the federal government does and approves is considered “constitutional.” Even though the founders committed the U.S. Constitution to parchment, judges, politicians and academics have morphed the meaning of words and changed the character of the “supreme law of the land” into something that the framers and ratifiers would scarcely recognize.
Americans won the Revolution, but they squandered the fruits of victory in a quest for government solutions to every problem. Instead of a limited government committed to protecting basic rights – life, liberty and property – we have an institution that attempts to control every aspect of our lives.
We have become what our forefathers sought to destroy.”
We have become what our forefathers sought to destroy and we have become the generation of Americans that our Founders feared – too weak, too skeptical, and too disillusioned to do what is right and what is necessary. The intentional tampering of the 2020 presidential election has proven to us mere peasants that we no longer have a say in government; our voices have become meaningless unless it is for the Democratic (demonic) Party. The creature created by the People with the Constitution has now become the Master. Political Parties have assumed the individual’s Right to Vote and have used that right recklessly, dishonestly, and with evil and malicious intent. The end game is power….. eternal and unchecked power, as well as the transformation of the United States according to its grand scheme of progressive thought and equality in all things (except as it touches on the grand exalted political elites).
I have held this point of view for many years now, but the events of this election season have solidified my position. Sadly, it is a fatal position. When I bring up this subject with family, friends, and fellow patriots, most have much more optimism than I. They somehow believe that good and honesty and decency and love of country will win out and triumph over the consistently scheming and dishonest progressives (ie, Democrats). Good can never win out over evil when evil has the ability to rig the system and conduct themselves according to a different set of rules, standards, ethics, and morality.
It appears I am not the only one who thinks as I do. I was listening to the Rush Limbaugh Radio Show on December 23 when a caller, a woman named Angie from Minnesota, called in to comment on the situation in Georgia. She talked about the futility of voting and believing that votes are a sacred civic exercise by citizens. She talked about the futility of trying to do what is right for the country (aka, keeping Trump in office) because the Dominion machines, which have been proven to be programmable by a forensic audit, are in place to ensure the outcome of an election. “Let’s face it, it’s a take-over” she said.
Here is the transcript of Angie’s dialogue with Rush: (The Rush Limbaugh Show, December 23)
RUSH: This is Angie in Big Lake, Minnesota.
ANGIE: And I have a comment, and it kind of piggybacks on earlier when you were talking about the Georgia runoff with another caller. And what I think is I really — and I hate to be the Debbie Downer here. But I really think that this is a takeover. And this runoff in January, you know, get out and vote. People want to get out and march and, you know, really take it to the streets, and Trump is trying to do rallies and whatnot.
And I think it’s just, unfortunately, a big waste of our time. The Dominion machines are here. They’re in place; they’re here to stay. Nobody’s changing it. All the lawsuits that we’re bringing forward, they just keep declining. We have thousands of people, election workers, poll workers that have come forward and said, you know, what they’ve seen. It’s just everything’s declined.
Dominion is here. They’re not gonna change it, and if we can’t clean up the election in November, it’s really pointless for the January. I think this is a takeover. I really… I know everybody wants to get out there and get their votes in, and I think people are forgetting that these machines are programmable, and they are gonna continue. No matter how many votes come in for Trump.
No matter how many rallies he does. They’re gonna take the votes, they’re gonna steal seats, and we’re gonna watch it happen because they don’t have any help. We just have Trump, who’s one person, and he has so many people in his own party that aren’t helping. And, you know, I get text messages from the Trump team, you know, about let’s, you know, vote or let’s get out, you know, and rally.
Unfortunately, the American people like myself and us regular citizens aren’t in any position of authority to do anything. We can take it to the streets, but ultimately these machines are programmable, and if you go and vote, they’re gonna steal the seats anyway. That’s my comment, and I just feel like… I know everybody is upset. We all are. I am. My family is. And Trump says, “Well, I’ll run again in four years.” Well, it ain’t gonna matter if he runs again in four years or not.
RUSH: Why not?
ANGIE: What happened in 2016 when he won and they did not plan on that? They’re never gonna let that happen again, and we’re watching it. And they’re gonna take this election, they’re gonna take the Georgia runoff, and we will never… It will be pointless. I don’t mean to be the Debbie Downer, but I feel like I’m being realistic here.
RUSH: No, no, no. Let me put… So what are you gonna do? I mean, you basically just established a scenario where we are cooked. We’re finished. It’s over. And there’s nothing we can do because there’s no way we can ever win another election.
ANGIE: Correct. I mean, at this point, if our president can’t overturn what has happened with some of these states… If we can’t even go to the Supreme Court, if we can’t even go to the judges, to these courts in these states and present evidence of things that have happened, of things that have been fraudulent and nobody will listen, nobody will look, nobody will do anything?
A president can’t even do anything! He’s bringing lawsuits, and he’s not gaining any ground. You know. I mean, we’re watching this happen. And Biden didn’t even campaign. Where were his rallies, you know? A couple people here and there. He wasn’t even doing rallies. Trump had the whole country just united and excited and get out and vote, and we did. And it doesn’t matter because these machines are in place.
And this was the machine that Hugo Chavez said he never wanted to lose another election. And now they’re here. And if we don’t get Trump in the White House, if he can’t get this all overturned and we don’t have him for four more years to remove this Dominion system… Biden’s not gonna remove it. Nobody’s gonna remove it. The virus was sent here from China — you know, on purpose, I believe. This is my belief, and then these machines are in place. They were programmed. We have witnesses. People have risked their lives to come forward.
RUSH: Yeah, I know. We got hundreds of thousands of them.
ANGIE: Yeah, and they’ve come forward with what they’ve seen, and we can’t gain any ground. So I believe it’s a takeover. I think we’re watching it happen.
RUSH: Takeover by who? You’re got 25 seconds. A takeover by who?
ANGIE: By the left. By Biden. By the left. It’s not even Biden. It’s people that we don’t even know behind the scenes.
ANGIE: All right. Okay. Understood. I’m glad you called, Debbie — Debbie Downer. Angie is her name. She’s in Big Lake, Minnesota.
The truth is that more and more Americans think like Angie thinks. They are despondent and without hope. They believe as we all used to believe – that talk is cheap, but voting is free, so our greatest power is taking our sentiments to the polls and voting for the representatives who will best serve us and our country. They believe that America’s best days are long behind her; they believe that Donald Trump possesses the right mindset to be our president and to act in the country’s best interests and the interests of all its citizens, they believe that America is quickly moving in the wrong direction, and they believe that with Democrats as a powerful political party, we have allowed the federal government and its officials to become the tyrants that prompted our founding generations to separate from England and to put their lives and property on the line to do so.
If voting is to mean anything in our system of government (that is, where citizens have a direct say in their government), we need major voter reform. We need to eliminate fraud and abuse and any possibility of such. We need manual ballots and mandatory and meaningful voter identification. We should tolerate NO machines and no flabby expansion of voting rules, such as extended early voting, Sunday voting, same-day registration and voting (“One Stop Voting”), and/or mail-in voting without strict conditions (such as, mail-in voting only for military and maybe those who are working or going to school out of the country at election time). We need voting to be that sacred right and duty that it was meant to be. Samuel Adams said it best: “Let each citizen remember at the moment he is offering his vote that he is not making a present or a compliment to please an individual – or at least that he ought not so to do; but that he is executing one of the most solemn trusts in human society for which he is accountable to God and his country.” (The Boston Gazette on April 16, 1781). Alexander Hamilton wrote: “A share in the sovereignty of the state, which is exercised by the citizens at large, in voting at elections is one of the most important rights of the subject, and in a republic ought to stand foremost in the estimation of the law.”
The Right to Vote is our Power. It is the way we not only have a say in government, but the way we have power over government. Too many people fought very hard to make sure all citizens of all colors, races, ethnicities, genders, and abilities have their right to vote protected in the Constitution and in our laws. The civil protests and riots of the 1960’s, led by men like Martin Luther King Jr., and the suffragette movement, led by women such as Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, are just two examples of the value human beings place on their right to vote and to have their voice heard equally as with others. The theory of democracy is that in a system based on a government of, for, and by the people, it is the vote, the basic building block, that gives people the power to control their government and to shape what policies they want and the future direction of their town, state, and country. “By voting, we add our voice to the chorus that forms opinions and the basis for actions,” said Jens Stoltenberg
To secure honest and fair elections, we not only protect the right, but we protect the civic power of the Individual. Power must vest in the People and NOT a political party. Government has already zapped too much power away from the people, and so the ballot box is really all we have. Therefore, we need honesty and complete transparency. We need people dedicated to the idea and the grand experiment in individual Liberty that is America.
There is one thing we should never forget….. Voting is an individual, personal thing. Every reference to the Right to Vote in our Constitution notes that it is an individual right. It is reserved specifically to the person, the individual. The Right to Vote does NOT belong to a political party. Abraham Lincoln said: “Elections belong to the people.” It belongs to the people; not to a political party!! A political party has no right to coerce (including offering money) a person to vote for that party if he /she really has no intention of exercising that right. This is misappropriation. It is nothing more than an attempt to make use of “useless idiots” for the purpose of a political power grab. We saw this clear as day in several elections over the years, but at no time more clearly than this 2020 presidential election. The Right to Vote has been, and continues to be, the main tool in the wheelhouse of the Democratic Party. It has manipulated and misappropriated votes on the one hand (ie, voter and election fraud), and on the other hand, is has denied or at the very least, diluted the votes of others. Every vote fraudulently cast cancels or nullifies the vote of a citizen who has been promised that his or her right is protected and valued. We have a crisis involving our right to vote abs involving our rightful expectation of honest, fair, and transparent elections. Abraham Lincoln once said: “The ballot is stronger than the bullet.” Isn’t it ironic that the Democrats not only wants to deny us our guns, deny us the right to keep and bear arms – but it also wants to deny those who don’t support their party their due influence at the ballot box.
So, what do we need to fight for our country and to save it from the forces of evil and progressivism? What do we need to do to prevent election fraud and meaningless citizen participation at the ballot box? What do we need to do to fight the tyranny that reigns in Washington and especially the halls of Congress? What do we need to do to end the political entitlement that is the Democratic Party – a party so determined to hold power that it has cheated, rigged elections, taken money from those who actually earn it in order to redistribute it to others, with the intent to buy their votes at election time (making them “more comfortable in their poverty”)? How do we undo the policies of progressivism that have systematically destroyed the foundations of this country? How do we end the constant attacks on our Right to exercise Free Speech, our Right of Conscience (defined in the Bill of Right as our Right to freely exercise the teachings of our religion), and our Right to Keep and Bear Arms? I mean, why do we think we need to wait for men and women in black robes to tell us what our natural and God-given rights are?
The greatest threats to our republic, and especially its democratic elements of which voting is key, are laziness, comfort, permitting oneself to be ignorant and uninformed, and apathy. Eternal vigilance is the price of eternal freedom.
We need the energy and the activism of our early revolutionary founders and patriots – patriots such as Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, John Adams, Samuel Adams, James Madison, George Mason, and the Sons of Liberty. There are some great and brilliant activists doing all they can to illuminate the citizenry, to point out the tyranny of government, and to stir them to action, but we need so many more. After signing the Declaration of Independence, president of the Continental Congress, John Hancock proudly proclaimed: “There! His Majesty can now read my name without glasses. And he can double the reward on my head!” Indeed, he was proud to sign his name to that daring declaration by the collective states to declare their independence from England and he didn’t care what consequences should befall him. It was the first official step to freedom.
In 1775, in a speech to the Second Virginia Convention, Patrick Henry exclaimed: “Give me liberty, or give me death!” He meant it. His words were meant to support his resolutions to call up the militia in Virginia and train them to protect them against the actions of the British redcoats. His entire speech spoke about how bad it would be to live in fear of the government and how futile it would be to assert our rights when government has too much power over us:
“Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free– if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending–if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained–we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!
They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot?”
Prior to 1775, we had the great Samuel Adams, the resounding voice for freedom and leader of the Sons of Liberty in Boston. He organized the Sons of Liberty to oppose unpopular English policies (mostly the excessive taxation without representation and the shutting down of colonial businesses) and to sanction acts of civil disobedience (such as the Boston Tea Party, hanging stamp collectors in effigy, tar and feathering agents of the King enforcing his policies, destroying the products that arrived in Boston Harbor to be forced upon the colonists by the Crown, blocking the ports, burning the houses of those doing the King’s bidding, etc) and even sometimes violent actions when necessary. They were a more militant, direct-action group in contrast to the petitioning and speeches of more moderate figures like John Adams and Benjamin Franklin. [See the Reference provided below for a more comprehensive list of the more active members of the Sons of Liberty and their acts of resistance]. Some say that together with Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams’ most important contribution to America’s cause was that he had “the most thorough understanding of liberty.” (his distant cousin John Adams’ words).
Samuel Adams said: “Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: first, a right to life; secondly, to liberty; thirdly to property; together with the right to support and defend them.” And “The natural liberty of man is…not to be under the will or legislative authority of man.” It was Adams’ great wish that American children and young adults would always be educated “in the art of self-government” so that future generations would always be capable of “assuming that freedom of thought and dignity of self-direction which [God] bestowed.”
We need men and women today with this passion. We need more guardians of individual liberty. We need more citizens to love their country more than they want free stuff and to fight for her founding ideals. We need these citizens to open their minds to the true meaning of liberty and its security and to understand why it is essential that the government remain limited.
Thomas Jefferson was forever the voice of the rights of man. He explained the importance of the popular referendum (right to vote): “The elective franchise, if guarded as the ark of our safety, will peaceably dissipate all combinations to subvert a Constitution, dictated by the wisdom, and resting on the will of the people. “
Dwight Eisenhower delivered the same message over a century later: “The future of this republic is in the hands of the American voter.”
With Americans today facing far more coercion and enjoying far less freedom to govern themselves than we once had, we need to recover the same devotion to liberty that Patrick Henry, Sam Adams, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, George Mason, members of the Sons of Liberty, and so many others of our early years had. It is they who should always inspire us in our duty to the country. If progressives succeed in relegating such men to the “shameful racist” annals of American history, then we are lost. Samuel Adams once said: “If ye love the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”
That is the question and over-all message I want to leave with this article: “Where are today’s revolutionary patriots?”
References:
Mike Maharrey, “America Embraces the Tyranny its Founders Fought to Reject,” The Tenth Amendment Center, January 8, 2016. (Re-posted on December 19, 2020).
Speech Delivered by Patrick Henry at the Virginia Convention Debate of the Ratification of the Constitution, on June 5, 1788 (“Liberty, the greatest of all earthly blessing – give us that precious jewel, and you may take everything else!”). Referenced at: https://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/patrick-henry-virginia-ratifying-convention-va/
Speech Delivered by Patrick Henry at the Virginia Convention Debate of the Ratification of the Constitution
Patrick Henry on| June 7, 1788 (arguing for the critical need for a Bill of Rights to put absolute limits on the actions of government). Referenced at: https://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/speech-delivered-at-the-virginia-convention-debate-of-the-ratification-of-the-constitution-june-7-1788/
PODCAST & VIDEO (“Embracing What The Founders Sought to Destroy”) – Embracing what the Founders Sought to Destroy | | Tenth Amendment Center Blog OR https://tenthamendmentcenter.com/2020/12/embracing-what-the-founders-sought-to-destroy/
“She Doesn’t Mean to Be a Debbie Downer, But…,” The Rush Limbaugh Show, December 23, 2020.
Referenced at: https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2020/12/23/she-doesnt-mean-to-be-a-debbie-downer-but/
Thomas Jefferson, The Jeffersonian Cyclopedia, John P. Foley, ed. (New York: Funk & Wagnalls Company, 1900), p. 842.
Alexander Hamilton, The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, Harold C. Syrett, ed. (New York, Columbia University Press, 1962), Vol III, pp. 544-545
Patrick Henry’s speech, delivered at Richmond, Virginia – March 23, 1775. Referenced at: http://www.emersonkent.com/speeches/give_me_liberty_or_give_me_death.htm
Voices of the Revolution: The Sons of Liberty. Referenced at: https://www.constitutionfacts.com/us-declaration-of-independence/sons-of-liberty/
“Raising a Glass to Samuel Adams,” Foundation for Economic Education. Referenced at: https://fee.org/articles/raising-a-glass-to-sam-adams-18-choice-quotes-on-liberty/ [September 27 marks the anniversary of the birth of the Sons of Liberty].
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