Are We Forgetting America’s Founding Values?

by Diane Rufino, October 18, 2023

“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.” – Thomas Jefferson, second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence (1776)

In this simple, yet eloquent declaration of independence, it is apparent that our founding values and principles include the right of equality and to inalienable (non-transferable) rights that include life (most important), liberty (a very close second), and the pursuit of happiness (often interpreted as the pursuit of property and all the happiness it brings).  

The foundations of the government of the United States are oriented around the ideas of liberty, self-governance, and equality as articulated in the natural rights tradition of John Locke and others. This tradition holds that, by nature of their existence, human beings possess rights, independent of any governing or societal power. In the maintenance of these rights natural rights thinkers saw the greatest possibility for individuals to flourish through the freedom to direct their own lives. The people maintain their freedom and rights through formal institutions of government and informal community traditions and institutions. This maintenance requires the people to be vigilant and informed in order to ensure that these institutions are directed towards their right ends. It was an understanding of these fundamental principles that informed the design of the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights. In fact, it was the Declaration of Independence that pronounced to “a candid world” that the American colonies were separating from Great Britain and denouncing its long-held tradition that its government is based on the principle of “the divine right of kings.” In fact, it listed all 27 grievances against the King and Parliament and announced that the colonies would thereafter be independent and would establish governments based on the principle of “Individual Sovereignty” which is the notion that it is the People who are the ultimate sovereigns and that, as the Declaration states: “…… That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –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….”

Having been an essential and influential Founding Father, President John Adams, in a speech (1798) to the military warned: “We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other…..” 

We all learned in our history classes that the earliest settlers came to the North American continent to establish colonies that were free from the tyrants and other controls that existed in European societies (the “divine right of kings”). They wanted to escape the controls placed on many aspects of their lives by kings and governments, priests and churches, noblemen and aristocrats. As Benjamin Franklin articulated in 1774: “The ordaining of laws in favor of one part of the nation, to the prejudice and oppression of another, is certainly the most erroneous and mistaken policy. An equal dispensation of protection, rights, privileges, and advantages, is what every part is entitled to, and ought to enjoy.”

In their quest and determination to escape the control of Great Britain, the American colonies, to a great extent, succeeded. In 1776, the British colonial settlers declared their independence from England in Jefferson’s famous Declaration of Independence and established a new nation, the united States of America – a federation of individual and sovereign States. In so doing, they defied the king of England and declared that the power to govern would lie in the hands of the people, the original, natural, and ultimate sovereigns.

They were now free from the divine right and power of the British kings. In 1787, when they wrote the Constitution for their new nation, they separated church and state so that there would never be a government-supported church. This greatly limited the power of the church. Also, in writing the Constitution they expressly forbade titles of nobility to ensure that an aristocratic society would not develop. There would be no ruling class of noblemen in the new nation.

The historic decisions made by those first settlers have had a profound effect on the shaping of the American character. By limiting the power of the government and the churches and eliminating a formal aristocracy, the early settlers created a climate of freedom where the emphasis was on the individual. The united States came to be associated in their minds with the concept of individual freedom…. With Liberty! This is probably the most basic of all the American values. Scholars and outside observers often call this value individualism, but many Americans use the word freedom. It is one of the most respected and popular words in the United States today.

By freedom, Americans mean the desire and the right of all individuals to control their own destiny without outside interference from the government, a ruling noble class, the church, or any other organized authority. It’s what we mean when we talk about Liberty. The desire to be free of controls was a basic value of the new nation in 1776, and apparently, it has continued to attract people from other countries and territories to America.

There is, however, a cost for this benefit of individual freedom: self-reliance. Individuals must learn to rely on themselves or risk losing freedom. Ronald Reagan once warned the American people: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”
(Translated to mean that citizens must learn to stand on their own two feet; they must take responsibility for themselves).

This strong belief in self-reliance continues today as a traditional American value. It is perhaps one of the most difficult aspects of the American character to understand, but it is profoundly important. Most Americans believe that they must be self-reliant in order to keep their freedom. If they rely too much on the support of their families or the government or any organization, they may lose some of their freedom to do what they want. Even if they are not truly self-reliant, most Americans believe they must at least appear to be so. In order to be in the mainstream of American life—to have power and/or respect—individuals must be seen as self-reliant. For example, if adult children return home to live with their parents because of economic conditions or a failed marriage, most members of the family expect this to be a short-term arrangement, until the children can find a job and be self-reliant. Although receiving financial support from charity, family, or the government is possible, it is usually expected to be for a short time, and it is generally not admired. Ideally, most Americans would and should say that people have a responsibility for taking care of themselves.

It is important to understand what most Americans mean when they say they believe in equality of opportunity.

They do not mean that everyone is—or should be—equal. However, they do mean that each individual should have an equal chance for success. Americans see much of life as a race for success. For them, equality means that everyone should have an equal chance to enter the race and win. In other words, equality of opportunity may be thought of as an ethical rule. It helps ensure that the race for success is a fair one and that a person does not win just because he or she was born into a wealthy family or lose because of race or religion. This American concept of “fair play” is an important aspect of the belief in equality of opportunity.

However, the price to be paid for this equality of opportunity is competition. If much of life is seen as a race, then a person must run the race in order to succeed; a person has the responsibility to compete with others, even though we know not everyone will be successful. If every person has an equal chance to succeed in the United States, then many would say that it is every person’s duty to try. It’s not a duty but a privilege of being in this country.

In recent years, with a declining economy, Americans are questioning whether the “American Dream” is in fact dead. For the most part, the American Dream has not meant that the average American can really go from rags to riches. It has traditionally meant that by working hard, parents can enable their children to have a better life when they grow up. “I want my children to be better off than me.” Every generation could be a little more prosperous and successful than their parents. While the distance between the very rich 1% and the rest of the population has dramatically increased over the last years, the overwhelming majority of Americans still believe in the ideal of the American Dream; that is, if they work hard they and their children can have a better life. The ideal of upward mobility still exists in America. However, we must distinguish between idealism and reality in understanding the relationship between what Americans believe and how they live. Some who find that they are working longer hours for less money still hope that the American Dream will exist again, if not for them, then for their children.

The fact that American ideals are only partly carried out in real life does not diminish their importance. Most Americans still believe in them and are strongly affected by them in their everyday lives. It is easier to understand what Americans are thinking and feeling if we can understand what these traditional American cultural values are and how they have influenced almost every facet of life in the United States.

But let’s get back to the topic of this article – “Are We Forgetting America’s Founding Values?” The American system of government is built upon a philosophical foundation that makes an argument for a constitutional republic. The principles contained below define the protections built into the Constitution for this purpose. In understanding these principles, We the People are better able to protect and advance freedom and opportunity for all. The list is not comprehensive but provides a starting place for the investigation of the American experiment in self-government:

Natural/Inalienable Rights – Rights which belong to humans by nature and can only be justly abridged through due process. Examples are life, liberty, and property (and the happiness that property brings).

Liberty – The power to think and act as one sees fit without restraint except by the laws of nature and interfering with someone else’s rights.

Equality – All individuals have the same claim as human beings to natural rights and treatment under the law.

Justice – Having a political order that protects the rights of all equally and treats everyone equally under the law.

Consent & Republican Government – There are principles of republicanism contained in the US Constitution that provide the foundations upon which the sovereignty of the people within government is maintained:

• Majority Rule/Minority Rights – Laws are made with the consent of the majority but do not infringe on the inalienable rights of the minority.

• Consent of the Governed/Popular Sovereignty – The power of government comes from the people.
• Democracy – A form of government in which ultimate authority is based directly on the will of the people.

Republic – A constitutional form of government with elected representatives who represent and serve the interests of the the will of the people.

Patriotism – Pride in one’s citizenship and and love of country.

Limited Government – To keep the governing power to its proper scope, government must be limited and provide recourse for citizens to be protected from arbitrary power.

Rule of Law – Government and citizens all abide by the same laws regardless of political power. Those laws must be stable and justly applied.

Due Process – The government must apply law and rules equally to all people.

To keep government within these limited bounds, there must be rules that bind both individual citizens and government action:

Separation of Powers: The branches of government each have powers to limit the powers of the other branches and to prevent any branch from becoming too powerful.

Checks and Balances: Constitutional powers are distributed among the branches of government allowing each to limit the application of power of the other branches and to prevent expansion of power of any branch.

Federalism: (restated in the Tenth Amendment) The national and state governments have a balance of separate and shared powers. The people delegate certain powers to the national government, while the states retain other powers; and the people retain all powers not delegated to the governing bodies. As James Madison wrote in his essay, Federalist No. 47 in 1788: “The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”

The Bill of Rights: As a final recourse against government abuse, the Founding generation codified a list of rights that they believed were essential to the maintenance of their constitutional governing structure, including:

• Freedom of Religion – The right to choose one’s religion or form of worship, if any, without interference; freedom of conscience. (First Amendment)

• Freedom of Speech, Press, and Assembly – The right to express one’s opinions freely, orally or in writing and the right to gather with others in groups of one’s choice without arbitrary or unreasonable restrictions. (First Amendment)

• The right to be safe and secure in one’s home – Only if the government can show “probable cause” can it secure a warrant to search a citizen’s home and personal effects. (Fourth Amendment)

• Private Property -The natural right of all individuals to create, obtain, and control their possessions, beliefs, faculties, and opinions as well as the fruits of their labor. (Declaration of Independence)

• The reminder that the list of rights in the first ten amendments do not exhaust the rights reserved to the American citizen. (Ninth Amendment)

The maintenance of our republican government requires the people be vigilant, informed, and virtuous, ensuring that governing institutions are directed towards their right ends. Good habits, or virtues, promote self- government and help guarantee that communities orient themselves towards advancing the spirit of a common purpose. A people who can first govern themselves and their actions so as not to deny any other individual of his or her essential rights and privileges can be trusted to establish a government that best serves them and their legitimate interests. They can be trusted to establish a government that treats everyone on an equal basis, without a bias towards friends, family, and political party. A list of those civic virtues include:

• Patrotism – 38 percent of Americans today claim that patriotism is very important to them, compared to 70 percent 25 years ago. You can imagine what a mess our society would be if only 38 percent of people had positive self-esteem. What we have here is the immature cry of spoiled, entitled people—people who have had it too easy; people who seem to believe that we don’t live in a very nice country because not everybody has every good thing given to them on a silver platter. They should see more of the world and then they might better appreciate what we have here in America. Once again, we see the diseased fruit of entitlement and the cult of negativity.

• Courage – The ability to take constructive action in the face of fear or danger. To stand firm as a person of character and do what is right, especially when it is unpopular or puts one at risk.

• Honor – Demonstrating good character and being trustworthy.

• Humility – A recognition that one’s ignorance is far greater than one’s knowledge. Putting others ahead of ourselves in thought, word, and deed. A willingness to give others credit and to admit when we are wrong.

• Integrity – To tell the truth, expose untruths, and keep one’s promises.

• Justice – Equal Justice, that is. Upholding of what is fair and right. Respecting the rights and dignity of all.

• Moderation – The avoidance of excess or extremes.

• Prudence – Practical wisdom that applies reason and other virtues to discern right courses of action in specific situations.

• Respect – Regard for and defending the equal rights and inherent dignity of all human beings, including oneself.

• Responsibility – Acting on good judgment about what is right or wrong even when it is not popular. Individuals must take care of themselves, their families, and their fellow citizens/others in civil society and a republic and be vigilant to preserve their own liberty and the liberty of others.

Equally, there are social and civic vices, of which we currently seeing the consequences. These social and civic vices include:

• Cowardice – Failing to take constructive action in the face of fear or danger. A lack of firmness or conviction.

• Contempt – Showing disregard, disdain, or lack of consideration for someone or something worthy of action or admiration.

• Selfishness – the tendency to put one’s own interests above others, often disregarding their feelings or needs

• Extremism – Acting in excess or to an extreme. Lacking restraint.

• Dishonor – Failing to demonstrate good character, integrity, and acting deceptively.

• Self-Deception – Acting on a belief that a false idea or situation is true. Being deluded or deceived by ideas that endanger the humanity of others and movements that are unjust.

• Injustice – To harm others by applying unequal rules and damaging another’s inalienable rights and dignity.

• Hubris – To have excessive pride, vanity, and arrogance that usually leads to a tragic fall.

• Imprudence – Acting without care or thoughtfulness for consequences. Exercising lack of wisdom appropriate to situations.

• Irresponsibility – Acting on poor judgment or failing the trust others place in you.
  
  

It is important to remember a few things about our traditional American values:

(1) They are articulated masterfully in our Declaration of Independence (1776), which I sadly believe is not being taught in today’s classrooms. If Americans truly understood and appreciated the thoughts and advice of our Founding Fathers in that document, we wouldn’t be in the mess we are today. At the very least, we are in a Constitutional crisis. I highly advise everyone to read the Declaration and especially focus on the list of grievances against the King. Read the list again and think about what is going on now in our own country. After over 200 years of ignoring the explanations and advice given to each State in the Federalist Papers (Madison, Hamilton, and Jay), I often think we have more to fear today from our own government in DC than the colonists had to fear from the British Parliament and the King. We have become the very creature that our Founders tried so hard to prevent.

I wrote an article (a very long one) about how government has, for too many years and even starting in George Washington’s administration, usurped powers not delegated to it in the Constitution (taking them away from the rightful parties – the States and the People) and transforming itself into an overly-energetic institution, ignoring the will of the People who elected its officials and using its departments (several of which are unconstitutional) and agencies as weapons to silence and harass those groups and individuals that pose a threat to their power. Yes, the actions against Donald Trump come to mind. Remember, our Founding Fathers were rightly suspicious of the accumulation of governmental power by one person or a governmental body, which, as James Madison once explained, would be “the very definition of tyranny.”

My article is titled “A Re-Declaration of Independence” and can be read at this site – https://forloveofgodandcountry.com/2021/01/23/a-re-declaration-of-independence/.

(2) Our values are traditional, foundational, and fundamental. They reject the “divine rights of Kings” and acknowledge that the country is controlled by the will of the People, the original and ultimate sovereign. That is the reason that the Declaration of Independence is considered a founding document. It was intended as a companion to the US Constitution – intended to enlighten those reading it and understanding it. Government, as stated in the second paragraph of the Declaration, is instituted for the primary purpose of protecting every individual’s inalienable and God-given rights. This is the formula for Liberty. As Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson wrote to then-President George Washington in 1791 offering advice on the constitutionality of a national bank (which was proposed by Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton): “I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground that ‘all powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states or to the people.’ To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specially drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition.” – Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on the Constitutionality of a National Bank, 1791 (President George Washington

(3) As the wise Aristotle said, “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” The relationship among these values – the rights and the responsibilities – creates our nation’s foundation. They create a “limited government” – a government “of the people, by the people, and for the People” and a set of virtuous and moral guidelines on how each of us needs to conform our behavior in an ordered society. Unfortunately, we now have an unlimited government and our current generation is more criminal than intellectual.  

(4) America’s history teachers need to teach these values and principles to our students, and we, as parents, need to re-enforce them to our children. We have a duty. We enjoy freedom and liberty (to an extent) but they are slowly slipping away. The very least we can do as American citizens is to teach our children to love this country, to respect her, and to be patriotic. It has been these traditional values that have served a fledgling new country and have sustained us through the years. They are essential to this nation’s continued success. And so, it is imperative that we share them with future generations.

I’ve been told that our nation’s motto is “Truth & Tradition.” Our goal must be to bring back these traditional American values back into our national discourse and our nation’s classrooms and homes.

References:

“America’s Principles and Virtues,” Bill of Rights Institute.  Referenced at:  https://billofrightsinstitute.org/resources/principles-and-virtues

“Six Basic American Cultural Values,” Vintage American Ways, 2023.  Referenced at:     https://vintageamericanways.com/american-values/

Diane Rufino, “A Re-Declaration of Independence,” forloveofgodandcountry.com, January 23, 2021.

“Founding Fathers Quotes on the Dangers of Centralized Power in the Ninth & Tenth Amendments,” Ammo.com.  Referenced at: https://ammo.com/articles/founding-fathers-quotes-centralized-power-ninth-amendment-tenth-amendment

“Founding Fathers Quotes on the Dangers of Centralized Power in the Ninth & Tenth Amendments,” Ammo.com.  Referenced at: https://ammo.com/articles/founding-fathers-quotes-centralized-power-ninth-amendment-tenth-amendment

Master Plan to Save America – https://www.theepochtimes.com/epochtv/a-master-plan-to-heal-america-5253606

Conservative Activist Charlie Kirk Speaks About American Values at UC-Davis –  https://www.theepochtimes.com/epochtv/conservative-activist-charlie-kirk-speaks-about-american-values-at-uc-davis-5122658

APPENDIX – Quotes from our Founding Fathers on their Novel Plan to Federalize the Individual and Sovereign States under the US Constitution

Individual Liberty

“Liberty must at all hazards be supported. We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned and bought it for us, at the expense of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood.” – John Adams, 1765

“Without liberty, law loses its nature and its name, and becomes oppression. Without law, liberty also loses its nature and its name, and becomes licentiousness (disregarding accepted rules or conventions).” – James Wilson, Of the Study of the Law in the United States, 1790

“In Europe, charters of liberty have been granted by power. America has set the example … of charters of power granted by liberty. This revolution in the practice of the world, may, with an honest praise, be pronounced the most triumphant epoch of its history, and the most consoling presage of its happiness.” – James Madison, Essays for the National Gazette, 1792

“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” – Benjamin Franklin  

““We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other….”   — President John Adams, in a speech to the military, 1798

“Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote!” – Benjamin Franklin  

Federalism

“The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.” – James Madison, Federalist 45, 1788

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” – Tenth Amendment, 1791

“I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground that ‘all powers not delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states or to the people.’ To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specially drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take possession of a boundless field of power, no longer susceptible of any definition.” – Thomas Jefferson, Opinion on the Constitutionality of a National Bank, 1791 (President George Washington ignored his advice and went ahead to support a national bank, as proposed by his Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton)

Limited Government

“The general government is not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws: its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects, which concern all the members of the republic, but which are not to be attained by the separate provisions of any.” – James Madison, Federalist 14, 1787

“It will not be denied that power is of an encroaching nature and that it ought to be effectually restrained from passing the limits assigned to it.” – James Madison, Federalist 48, 1788

“I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.” – Thomas Jefferson, Letter to James Madison, 1787

“The propriety of a law, in a constitutional light, must always be determined by the nature of the powers upon which it is founded.” – Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 33 (1788)

Separation of Powers

“An elective despotism was not the government we fought for; but one in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among the several bodies of magistracy as that no one could transcend their legal limits without being effectually checked and restrained by the others.” – James Madison, Federalist No. 84 (1788)

“The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” – James Madison, Federalist No. 47 (1788)

“A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.” – James Madison, Federalist No. 51 (1788)

“The principle of the Constitution is that of a separation of Legislative, Executive and Judiciary functions, except in cases specified. If this principle be not expressed in direct terms, it is clearly the spirit of the Constitution …” – Thomas Jefferson, letter to James Madison, 1797

Representative Government

“As good government is an empire of laws, how shall your laws be made? In a large society, inhabiting an extensive country, it is impossible that the whole should assemble to make laws. The first necessary step, then, is to depute power from the many to a few of the most wise and good.” – John Adams, Thoughts on Government, 1776

“Pure democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have, in general, been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths.” – James Madison, Federalist No. 10 (1787)

“I have no fear that the result of our experiment will be that men may be trusted to govern themselves without a master.” – Thomas Jefferson, Letter to David Hartley, 1787

“We may define a republic to be … a government which derives all its powers directly or indirectly from the great body of the people and is administered by persons holding their offices during pleasure for a limited period, or during good behavior.” – James Madison, Federalist No. 39 (1788)

“All Men Are Created Equal”

“The ordaining of laws in favor of one part of the nation, to the prejudice and oppression of another, is certainly the most erroneous and mistaken policy. An equal dispensation of protection, rights, privileges, and advantages, is what every part is entitled to, and ought to enjoy.” – Benjamin Franklin, Emblematical Representations, ca. 1774

“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.” – Declaration of Independence, 1776

“I can only say that there is not a man living who wishes more sincerely than I do, to see a plan adopted for the abolition of slavery.” – George Washington, Letter to Robert Morris, 1786

“It is much to be wished that slavery may be abolished. The honour of the States, as well as justice and humanity, in my opinion, loudly call upon them to emancipate these unhappy people. To contend for our own liberty, and to deny that blessing to others, involves an inconsistency not to be excused.” – John Jay, Letter to R. Lushington, 1786

Private Property

“One of the most essential branches of English liberty is the freedom of one’s house. A man’s house is his castle.” – James Otis, on the Writs of Assistance, 1761

“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.” – John Adams, A Defence of the Constitutions of the Government of the United States of America, 1787

“Government is instituted to protect property of every sort; as well that which lies in the various rights of individuals, as that which the term particularly expresses. This being the end of government, that alone is a just government which impartially secures to every man whatever is his own.” – James Madison, Essay on Property, 1792

“A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” – Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, 1801

America, The Land That I Love

by Diane Rufino, July 11, 2022

I’m a long-time activist. I started a Tea Party group in 2009 in my area of North Carolina and have been running it ever since. I believe in the Tea Party movement because it embraces our core American values and principles and fights for them. I recently (November 2021) started another citizen-activist group, a conservative education advocacy group for outraged and frustrated parents and concerned citizens. The group not only has already made a difference with the local board of education but has inspired neighboring counties to form similar groups of their own.

I fight tirelessly for them. I fight because this is the land that I love. I wish more people would. As Ronald Reagan once said: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

A growing number of Americans distrust the federal government. According to a Pew Research Center poll published on June 6, 2022 and a Monmouth University poll released on May 12, 2022, a growing number of Americans distrust the federal government and believe our country is headed in the wrong direction. “Only two-in-ten (20%) Americans say they trust the government in Washington DC to do what is right ‘just about always’ or ‘most of the time.’” Even more telling, 79% of Americans surveyed said that they believe the country has “gotten off on the wrong track.” The fact is that most Americans recognize that an all-out war is being waged against our republic and against every American’s individual liberty. That war is being waged in the name of socialism, social justice, and an uber-progressive agenda.

I fight for our founding values and principles because this is my country. I fight because this country, for better or worse, is the land that I love.

Why do I love her?

I love her because she was founded and designed to be exceptional. The Declaration of Independence, a brilliant and revolutionary document written largely and substantially by my favorite Founding Father, Thomas Jefferson, articulates the reasons why the founding American colonies decided to separate from Great Britain but most importantly, the values and principles that would come to define them.

Paragraphs one and two articulate those values and principles. They read:

“When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

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.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –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. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, 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.–Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.”

These principles were considered “revolutionary” back in the 17thand 18th centuries. Back in those days, countries were ruled by kings and blue-bloods. They believed that there was a divine right for certain individuals to rule. America would be different. They would be the source of government power, through elected officials, and government would be tasked to protect and secure their individual rights and liberty.

The Declaration didn’t just proclaim to a candid world our reasons to separate from Great Britain but rather, it continues to influence our country to this very day. What many people don’t know is that the Declaration influenced the very drafting of the Constitution in 1787 when the States decided to scrap the Articles of Confederation in favor of a totally new constitution and new form of government. It also inspired the abolitionist movement and the ultimate prohibition of slavery in this country, it inspired Martin Luther King Jr. to lead his people to fight against racial discrimination and fight for a federal civil rights law, and most recently, it offers encouragement and direction to the modern conservative originalist movement [including the Tea Party movement starting back in 2009 and continuing, Turning Point USA, Judicial Watch, the Heritage Foundation, Freedom Watch – with its motto “Government fails, freedom works”, Citizens United, The American Conservative Union (ACU), American Family Association (AFA), Americans for Prosperity (AFP), The Conservative Caucus, Family Research Council (FRC), and Eagle Forum].

As mentioned above, the Declaration informed our US Constitution and continues to do so.

Most Americans don’t actually know the nature of the Constitution. Many regard it as nothing more than a founding document and those on the left regard it as something even more inconsequential – as an outdated founding document. The truth is that it is so much more. In fact it is critical to our constitutional republic. It created the federal government, assigned it a series of enumerated powers, sets limits and boundaries on the branches of government, provides for a series of checks and balances to keep the government in check (with the antagonism of the States being the most powerful of those checks and balances), and provides a legal mechanism for changing or amending it (Article V). It establishes the “Supreme Law of the Land” (Article VI) which therefore forms the basis for our Rule of Law.

Our US Constitution, like all constitutions, is a social compact, drafted and ratified by the people of the several states, to protect We the People from an ambitious and oppressive government. The Constitution is intended for We the People; it is for the protection of our Liberty. People need to view it that way in order to understand why it is so important and critical and why activists like myself fight so hard to defend it, to chastise elected officials for violating it, and to explain it to others. Education is the best way to keep we Americans informed and help them be responsible voters.

The fact is that we almost didn’t get that Constitution in 1787. The discussions and debates among the delegates devolved into headstrong arguments and stubbornness. When it seemed that there would be no overcoming this and that the Convention had come to an impasse, the eldest delegate to the Convention, Pennsylvania’s Benjamin Franklin called upon all the delegates to take a moment and appeal to God to imbue them with rationality, purpose, and vision and to remind them of why they had met in Philadelphia in the first place. This is what he said on June 28, 1787, just one month into the convention:

“We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded; and we ourselves shall become a reproach and by-word down to future ages…I therefore beg leave to move — that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate in that service.”   

Granted, the Constitution was not perfect when the delegates to the Philadelphia Convention (Constitutional Convention) completed their draft and signed it (on September 20, 1787). In fact, several key delegates found the final draft to be unsuitable and a danger both to state sovereignty and to individual liberty and refused to sign it. They demanded that a Bill of Rights be included and certain key states, including Virginia, North Carolina, New York, Massachusetts, and North Carolina, agreed (and made note of that condition in their ratification conventions).

Alexander Hamilton, in his Federalist Papers essay No. 1, understood how difficult it would likely be for the Constitution to be ratified by all the independent States. He explained:

“After an unequivocal experience of the inefficiency of the subsisting federal government, you are called upon to deliberate on a new Constitution for the United States of America. The subject speaks its own importance; comprehending in its consequences nothing less than the existence of the UNION, the safety and welfare of the parts of which it is composed, the fate of an empire in many respects the most interesting in the world. It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made; and a wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind. This idea will add the inducements of philanthropy to those of patriotism, to heighten the solicitude which all considerate and good men must feel for the event. Happy will it be if our choice should be directed by a judicious estimate of our true interests, unperplexed and unbiased by considerations not connected with the public good. But this is a thing more ardently to be wished than seriously to be expected. The plan offered to our deliberations affects too many particular interests, innovates upon too many local institutions, not to involve in its discussion a variety of objects foreign to its merits, and of views, passions and prejudices little favorable to the discovery of truth.

Among the most formidable of the obstacles which the new Constitution will have to encounter may readily be distinguished the obvious interest of a certain class of men in every State to resist all changes which may hazard a diminution of the power, emolument, and consequence of the offices they hold under the State establishments; and the perverted ambition of another class of men, who will either hope to aggrandize themselves by the confusions of their country, or will flatter themselves with fairer prospects of elevation from the subdivision of the empire into several partial confederacies than from its union under one government.

A torrent of angry and malignant passions will be let loose. To judge from the conduct of the opposite parties, we shall be led to conclude that they will mutually hope to evince the justness of their opinions, and to increase the number of their converts by the loudness of their declamations and the bitterness of their invectives. An enlightened zeal for the energy and efficiency of government will be stigmatized as the offspring of a temper fond of despotic power and hostile to the principles of liberty. An over-scrupulous jealousy of danger to the rights of the people, which is more commonly the fault of the head than of the heart, will be represented as mere pretense and artifice, the stale bait for popularity at the expense of the public good. It will be forgotten, on the one hand, that jealousy is the usual concomitant of love, and that the noble enthusiasm of liberty is apt to be infected with a spirit of narrow and illiberal distrust. On the other hand, it will be equally forgotten that the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgment, their interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.

After having given it an attentive consideration, I am clearly of opinion it is your interest to adopt it. I am convinced that this is the safest course for your liberty, your dignity, and your happiness. I affect not reserves which I do not feel. I will not amuse you with an appearance of deliberation when I have decided. I frankly acknowledge to you my convictions, and I will freely lay before you the reasons on which they are founded. The consciousness of good intentions disdains ambiguity. I shall not, however, multiply professions on this head. My motives must remain in the depository of my own breast. My arguments will be open to all and may be judged of by all. They shall at least be offered in a spirit which will not disgrace the cause of truth.

I propose, in a series of papers, to discuss the following interesting particulars: The utility of the Union to your political prosperity, the insufficiency of the present Confederation to preserve that Union, the necessity of a government at least equally energetic with the one proposed by this new Constitution, the conformity of the proposed Constitution to the true principles of republican government, its analogy to your own state constitutions, and lastly, the additional security which its adoption will afford to the preservation of that species of government, to Liberty, and to property.

It may perhaps be thought superfluous to offer arguments to prove the utility of the UNION, a point, no doubt, deeply engraved on the hearts of the great body of the people in every State, and one, which it may be imagined, has no adversaries. But the fact is, that we already hear it whispered in the private circles of those who oppose the new Constitution, that the thirteen States are of too great extent for any general system, and that we must of necessity resort to separate confederacies of distinct portions of the whole.1 This doctrine will, in all probability, be gradually propagated, till it has votaries enough to countenance an open avowal of it. For nothing can be more evident, to those who are able to take an enlarged view of the subject, than the alternative of an adoption of the new Constitution or a dismemberment of the Union. It will therefore be of use to begin by examining the advantages of that Union, the certain evils, and the probable dangers, to which every State will be exposed from its dissolution. This shall accordingly constitute the subject of my next address.”

The strongest argument against the ratification and adoption of the new constitution by certain key delegates to the Convention and then by certain key States during the ratification period was its lack of a Bill of Rights. They argued that the new constitution was defective in its failure to protect individual freedom and liberty because it lacked such a bill. They pointed to England, which adopted a Bill of Rights in 1689 (and which the colonists regularly pointed to in defense of their rights – their “rights as English subjects”).

A Bill of Rights was finally added when the first US Congress convened, thanks to James Madison, who kept his promise to Virginia and introduced a series of amendments (proposed in large part by the individual states themselves) on June 8, 1789 and to Thomas Jefferson for emphasizing to his good friend that “A bill of rights is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.” The Bill of Rights was hugely popular and overwhelmingly supported, and it officially became part of the US Constitution in December 1789.

The Declaration was “submitted to a candid world” in July 1776 as the American Revolution was just getting started. The American colonies/states fought successfully and against all odds when British General Charles Cornwallis surrendered to General George Washington (who had help from French General Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette, and French Army troops) at Yorktown (VA) on October 19, 1781. The treaty of Paris, signed by American delegates Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and a representative of the King of Great Britain, King George III, on September 3, 1783, acknowledged the independence and sovereignty of all the American states.

Article I reads: “His Britannic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, New-Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode-Island & Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New-York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina & Georgia, to be free sovereign & Independent States; that he Treats with them as such, and for himself his Heirs & Successors relinquishes all Claims to the Government Propriety and Territorial Rights of the same & every Part thereof.”

With respect to the Declaration of Independence, America was, and continues to be, founded on its “revolutionary” principles. She appeals to a higher standard than other countries. In America, we believe that all governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. All nations, all people, look to our country as a beacon of light and right. It’s this principle, along with our commitment to individual Liberty that makes America a truly unique and legitimate nation.

I love America for her commitment to the Declaration and because it defines us as Americans. I know it defines me. I sing its praises whenever I speak to my Tea Party group and I sing its praises, and reference it, whenever possible when I write.

The Declaration is masterful and revolutionary because it explains the concept of Individual Sovereignty, which is the concept upon which our nation and our government system was based, and explains the proper purposes of government.  Individual Sovereignty is the government philosophy that asserts that true sovereignty belongs to the people, who in turn delegate it to their governments. Since government belongs inherently to the people, it must act in their best interests. And since government belongs to the people, whenever they believe it to be destructive of its purposes (as the Declaration explains), they have the right to “throw off” that government and resume all sovereign power over themselves until a new government is established. If governments abuse the authority entrusted to them and citizens have no opportunity to correct such abuses (which they do by calling for an Article V Convention or pressuring their States to interpose and nullify abusive and unconstitutional federal laws and actions or in the last resort, to revolt or to secede), outside interference is justified. By specifying that sovereignty is based on the people, the international community can penetrate nation-states’ borders to protect the rights of citizens. Perhaps that is why it is important to maintain friendly relations with like-minded nations.

Related to the concept of “individual sovereignty” is the understanding that a person has the right of conscience – the right to think and believe as he or she chooses. A person has a functioning mind and the actual or potential ability to make choices based on reason and awareness, in accordance with his or her belief set, which may or may not be justified by religious teachings. Young children have such minds and are therefore also sovereign, but the ability to use reason is something that develops as the child’s brain matures, and therefore the parents have a responsibility to exercise some of the sovereignty rights on behalf of their children. This “parental obligation” creates a moral obligation on the part of parents to provide wisdom and judgement, as well as education oversight and material needs for their children. Upon the age of maturity, the child becomes a fully sovereign human being and is emancipated from his or her parents. Individual sovereignty also explains why we as Americans have the rights to life, to speak freely, to exercise our religious beliefs, to assemble, to protest, to keep and bear firearms for self-protection, and to be safe and secure in our homes and to have our privacy respected. These are inalienable rights, which means they attach to us by way of our very humanity.

Also related to the concept of individual sovereignty is the notion that Americans have the right to the fruits of their own labor and should be minimally taxed. The fundamental right to acquire, possess, and sell property is the reason Jefferson included the term “and the pursuit of happiness” as one of the inalienable rights included in the Declaration of Independence. The fundamental right to acquire, possess, and sell property is the backbone of opportunity; it incentivizes us and gives us a valid reason to get a good education, to decide on a good and prosperous career, to save our money, to invest, to seize opportunities, and to invest in starting a business. It’s the most practical means to protect one’s assets and the most practical means to pursue happiness. This right, along with the free enterprise system (articulated by Adam Smith in “Wealth of Nations”) that stems from it, is the source of individual prosperity, national prosperity, and the foundation of economic liberty.

In short, our country was founded on the revolutionary notion of Individual Liberty. I love that about America. I am free. Every day I can exercise my freedoms without government oppression or suppression (as long as I am not around members or organizations on the extreme left, although I’m confident I can hold my own).

“Liberty” is defined as the state of being free to exercise one’s inalienable and civil rights and to be free from unreasonable government control. Liberty means a person can freely exist within society from oppressive restrictions imposed by authority (government) on one’s way of life, behavior, or political views.

I doubt that those rounded up after the January 6 so-called “insurrection” believe this is a free country. I doubt Donald Trump believes this is a free country after what the Democrats in Congress did to him while he was duly elected to serve as president. I doubt that all those (politically targeted) who have been needlessly and unfairly harassed, defamed, and financially drained by the government believe this is a free country. I realize that many Americans doubt that we are still a “free people.” They doubt that this country can still be characterized as “the land of the free” (even though we are defended by “the brave”).

But we continue to look to the Declaration of Independence as the defining articulation of what it means to be an American and to live in America.

Besides being our initial founding document, the Declaration of Independence guided, and continues to guide, our understanding of the US Constitution. It provides the foundation, the foundational principles, and the intention of our Founding generation in drafting the Constitution and creating the government it did. It continues to be our nation’s moral compass. That is, except when certain factions try to divide our nation’s people and communities according to race.

America is the product of religion and world history, namely western civilization (the Bible, Rome’s Cicero, Tacitus, Livy, Plutarch, etc), the influence of English and French Enlightenment philosophers (such as John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Baron de Montesquieu, Frederic Bastiat, Adam Smith, Immanuel Kant), and the history, in particular, of Great Britain, our mother/parent country. The ol’ saying that “we stand on the shoulders of others” is certainly true when it comes to this wonderful country.

Despite what those on the left may say, this country has been shaped by Judeo-Christian beliefs and culture. John Winthrop, who sailed across the Atlantic on board the ship Arbella in 1630, delivered the following sermon just before he and his fellow Puritans arrived in New England (where they settled the Massachusetts Bay Colony):

“We are entered into covenant with Him [God] for this work. We have taken out a commission. The Lord hath given us leave to draw our own articles. We have professed to enterprise these and those accounts, upon these and those ends. We have hereupon besought Him of favor and blessing. Now if the Lord shall please to hear us, and bring us in peace to the place we desire, then hath He ratified this covenant and sealed our commission, and will expect a strict performance of the articles contained in it; but if we shall neglect the observation of these articles which are the ends we have propounded, and, dissembling with our God, shall fall to embrace this present world and prosecute our carnal intentions, seeking great things for ourselves and our posterity, the Lord will surely break out in wrath against us, and be revenged of such a people, and make us know the price of the breach of such a covenant……….

To provide for our posterity, is to follow the counsel of Micah, to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. For this end, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities. We must uphold a familiar commerce together in all meekness, gentleness, patience and liberality. We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body. So shall we keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as His own people, and will command a blessing upon us in all our ways, so that we shall see much more of His wisdom, power, goodness and truth, than formerly we have been acquainted with. We shall find that the God of Israel is among us, when ten of us shall be able to resist a thousand of our enemies; when He shall make us a praise and glory… For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.”

As mentioned earlier, it was a call to God and a call for daily prayer at the convention center in Philadelphia in June 1787 by Ben Franklin that enabled the delegates to get beyond their petty differences and push forward and eventually come to a consensus regarding a new Constitution and a new form of government.

Furthermore, in his Farewell Address, President George Washington said: Liberty is “the palladium of your political safety and prosperity….  The name of American, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. With slight shades of difference, you have the same religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together. The independence and liberty you possess are the work of joint councils and joint efforts—of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.

      The basis of our political systems is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government. But the Constitution which at any time exists, until changed by an explicit and authentic act of the

whole people, is sacredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to establish government presupposes the duty of every individual to obey the established government. 

      A government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation on the ruins of public liberty.

      The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern, some of them in our country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If in the opinion of the people the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit which the use can at any time yield.

        Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle…..”

John Adams famously explained in his letter to the Massachusetts militia, on October 11, 1798: “Because We have no Government armed with Power capable of contending with human Passions unbridled by morality and religion, avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

In fact, it is religion and morality (virtue) that is necessary to support and sustain our constitutional republic. If we expect to have a “limited government” as the originally-intentioned Constitution created, We the People must be expected to be able to govern ourselves appropriately, and those guidelines come from God’s law and from the teachings of Jesus. It is from the Judeo-Christian tenets and teachings that we can clearly and assuredly know the difference between right and wrong and therefore guide our conduct.  If a free people are to govern themselves politically, they must first be able to govern themselves morally and effectively.

Our nation’s appreciation and adherence to such tenets and teachings continued up until 1962. In that year, the US Supreme Court decided the landmark case of Engel v. Vitale, which declared that school-sponsored prayer is unconstitutional, as being a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. The following year, the Supreme Court handed down an equally disastrous ruling. In Abington Township (PA) v. Schempp (1963), the Court declared that Bible readings and the recitation of the Lord’s prayer also violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

It was Madalyn Murray O’Hair, an avowed hedonist and atheist activist, who filed numerous lawsuits challenging various laws and government practices based on the issue of ‘separation of Church and State,’ with one such case eventually making its way to the Supreme Court (consolidating into the Abington v. Schempp case). To understand just how much this woman was despised and how dangerous Americans believed her to be to our critical national institutions, LIFE magazine, in 1964, did a cover story on her and referred to her as “the most hated woman in America. [As a side note, in 1995, O’Hair, her son, and her granddaughter, went missing in their home state of Texas. Rumor has it that she was still so utterly despised that law enforcement didn’t even bother to look for her for over a year].

1962-1963 – that’s when public schools began to fall apart, that’s when society began to degenerate, that’s when social morality began to become a thing of the past, that’s when violence began to increase, and that’s when the incidence of school shootings began to rise (sharply with each succeeding decade).

I remember attending high school from 1974-78 and we still were able to start our days in home room by enjoying a moment of silence in order to pray (or to just contemplate). When I was doing my student teaching in 2012 in the public school system, students began their day watching President Obama on the televisions that were installed in each classroom.  Quite a difference, yes?

If there is any confusion or denial of the fact that our country was founded on Judeo-Christian values, one just needs to look at the first and second paragraphs of the Declaration of Independence. Our American Founders staked this country on “self-evident truths” that stem from “the laws of Nature and Nature’s God. They did so in order to justify the dedication of America to individual liberty. That is, that liberty comes from our humanity and not from government. If the Declaration is to be believed worldwide, then America’s “self-evident truths” are not just unique to our country and to Americans, but they apply to all men and women everywhere. They are as true today as they were in 1776. This universal principle of Liberty and the defense of it is what inspires men and women to enlist in our armed services and to spread and defend it all across the planet. The oath that our enlisted men and women take reads: “I, ____________________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same… “

Americans still believe in these ideals. They are still willing to fight for them, whether as enlisted men and women or as citizen-activists.

Our founding values and founding principles, our founding documents, our nation’s devotion to individual Liberty, and our foundations in, and reliance on, religion are just some reasons I love America.

Our government, created and vested with enumerated powers by the US Constitution, was initially unique and self-containing. But we all know that government has been dishonest and scheming over our 230-plus years for the sole purpose of enlarging and consolidating its powers and for taking greater and greater control over our lives, our property, and our livelihoods. If you have any doubt about this inglorious history, try comparing the “facts submitted (by the 13 colonies/states) to a candid world” in the Declaration to support their claim that Great Britain had established “an absolute tyranny” over them to the actions of our current federal government. [For additional arguments to this point, read my article “A RE-DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE,” written and posted on my blogsite January 22, 2021 – https://forloveofgodandcountry.com/2021/01/23/a-re-declaration-of-independence/ ]

I love this country because I love its people. They are among the most hard-working, church-going, God-fearing, industrious, affluent, and generous in the world.

Every nation has something to build a spirit of nationalism, to derive meaning and purpose and to stir in its people a sense of patriotism. Examples include a specific ethnic character, a shared history, a shared purpose for existing, a common religion. In the case of America, our sense of patriotism derives from our glorious history (although spotted and stained at times), our love and appreciation of the Declaration of Independence, our shared love and pursuit of liberty, and our appreciation of the US Constitution. In short, our patriotism and our love of country stems from an IDEAL. “We hold these truths 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.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –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…”

English writer G.K. Chesterton famously observed that “America is the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed.” (which was/is set out brilliantly and clearly in the Declaration of Independence).

The country that I love holds a great promise for all, no matter where they may be, that all men everywhere are endowed at creation – at birth – with an inalienable right to liberty. In fact, it seems that America’s role in the world is to preserve and to spread, by example and by action, that “sacred fire of Liberty.”  I am encouraged by this reality. I am also encouraged at the groundswell of patriotism and the groundswell of activism and protest to defend our Constitution, our precious republic, and our founding values, principles, and institutions. It gives me hope. It is because of our foundational principles and values, not despite them, that America is great in my eyes.

America, for all its faults and its unglorified history, is still the land that I love. I will always love her, I will always praise her, and will always fight for her.

Diane Rufino

References: 

Matthew Spalding, “Why is America Exceptional?”, The Heritage Foundation.  Referenced at:  https://www.heritage.org/american-founders/report/why-america-exceptional

The Declaration of Independence – https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript

The Federalist No. 1 (Alexander Hamilton) – https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed01.asp

“John Winthrop’s Dream of a City on a Hill, 1630,” The American Yawp Reader.  Referenced at:  https://www.americanyawp.com/reader/colliding-cultures/john-winthrop-dreams-of-a-city-on-a-hill-1630/

Diane Rufino, A RE-DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE,” my blogsite (ForLoveofGodandCountry), January 22, 2021.  Referenced at: https://forloveofgodandcountry.com/2021/01/23/a-re-declaration-of-independence/ ]

Treaty of Paris (1783) – https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-40-02-0356

George Washington’s Farewell Address – https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/Washingtons_Farewell_Address.pdf

John Adams’ letter to the Massachusetts militia, October 11, 1789 –  https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/99-02-02-3102   and  https://oll.libertyfund.org/quote/john-adams-religion-constitution

WHEN THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT COMES FOR YOUR GUN RIGHTS & LIBERTIES

by Diane Rufino, June 14, 2022

As we all know, our inalienable rights do not come from government; they come from our Creator, endowed at our creation, and are recognized by nature’s law. Our rights are recognized in our constitutions – “Recognized” and not “granted.” They are recognized and enshrined so that government will always protect and secure them and not violate or burden them.

Liberty is the ability to freely exercise those rights, unencumbered by government authority. Liberty is defined as “the state of being free within society from oppressive and/or arbitrary restriction imposed by government authority or on one’s exercise of fundamental or civil rights and way of life, behavior, or political views.”

The most fundamental and sacred right is the RIGHT TO LIFE. As a corollary to that right is the right to protect and secure that life. And that is where the Second Amendment comes in.

The Second Amendment reads: “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.”   (“Shall not” means “Must not”).

The gist of the Second Amendment is that the individual must have the right and ability to protect his or her life against whatever force that might be used, by evil-intended persons, by foreign enemies, and even by their own government, to take their lives. Firearms is not necessarily limited to just muskets and rifles.

In this article, I wish to address the federal government’s latest gun grab – a series of Red Flag laws.

In spite of the “SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED” language of the Second Amendment, and the Re-assertion of the Reserved Rights of the individual states by the Tenth Amendment, the federal government insists it must take over the Second Amendment, put limits on it, and violate the rights of the American people, in antagonism to the founding purpose of our country. That is what is referred to as government tyranny.

Tyranny, as opposed to constitutionally-limited government, is the result of government abusing and unconstitutionally expanding their authority and imposing such oppressive or arbitrary restrictions on individual liberty. Tyranny is defined as “cruel and oppressive government or rule,” or “cruel, unreasonable, or arbitrary use of power or control.”  Thomas Jefferson defined it this way: Tyranny is when the government believes it can enact laws and policies legally without regard that they be illegal for the citizenry.

What can citizens do if the government, in general, fails to protect our inalienable and civil rights according to the Declaration of Independence and social contract theory and instead, evinces a desire to violate and prohibit their free exercise?  John Locke, an enlightenment philosopher, championed this new government theory and authored his Two Treatises of Government, which provided the foundation for Jefferson’s magnificent Declaration less than 100 years later. Jefferson explained, as according to Locke that if a sovereign violated these rights, the social contract was broken, and the people had the right to revolt and establish a new government.

And in fact, Jefferson wrote as much in the Declaration, in paragraph two: “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.”   (Declaration of Independence – NOT an outdated or racist founding document)

He also wrote: “The Constitution of the United States and the constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the People…. That it is their right and duty to be AT ALL TIMES armed.”  And in another letter: “Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our Will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the limits of the law because law is often but the tyrant’s will and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.” 

James Monroe wrote: “Of the Liberty of conscience in matters of religious faith, of speech and of the press, of the trial by jury of the vicinage of civil and criminal cases, of the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus, of the right to keep and bear arms…  If these rights are well-defined and secured against encroachment (as articulated in the US Constitution and state constitutions), it is IMPOSSIBLE that government should ever degenerate into tyranny.”

Finally, former US Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis wrote: “The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.”  

Fidelity and loyalty to the US Constitution is so important, that an oath is taken by the President of the United States, the representatives in the US Congress, the federal judges, other federal employees, and even state government employees to “uphold, defend, protect, support, and preserve the Constitution of the United States.”  (Note that oaths include a variation of such terms).

Every fourth year, on January 20, Inauguration Day, the vice-president-elect is sworn in first, and repeats the same oath of office, in use since 1884, as senators, representatives, and other federal employees: “I _________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.”

Around noon, the president-elect recites the following oath, in accordance with Article II, Section I of the U.S. Constitution: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Notice that the oath for all federal and state officials demands and requires that each “support, preserve, and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Everyone in this country is required to attend school during the formative ages – 5 through 18 or 19. English, grammar, and reading are essential core subjects and so the definitions to the following terms should be crystal clear, and most especially to those serving as representatives in government on our behalf:

Uphold – to maintain, make no illegal or material changes (so as not to alter the meaning, intent, substance, or integrity of something)

Defend – to resist an attack made on something; to protect from harm, danger, or transformation

Protect – to keep safe from harm or injury. To preserve or guarantee by means of formal or legal measures

Support – to hold up, to make sure something remains functional and meaningful

Preserve – to maintain something in its original, existing, and intended state

On May 14 of this year, a deadly mass shooting killed 10 innocent persons at a TOPS supermarket in Buffalo, NY and then ten days later, on May 24, the horrific shooting at Robbs Elementary School in Uvalde occurred, killing 17 children and 2 teachers. The call from citizens concerned over the rise in school shootings invigorated Democrats to resume their agenda of gun control.

And so, on June 8, The Democrats in the US House of Representatives, with some willing Republicans, passed a wide-ranging gun control package, 223-204 (federal “Red Flag laws”) in response to the aforementioned mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde. Hopefully, but not certainly, the proposals will have almost no chance of being approved by the Senate and being signed into law by President Biden. The US Senate would need at least 10 Republican Senators to join with the Democrats. Unfortunately, at this point (June 14), there appears to be ten Rinos who would be so willing to do so:

Roy Blunt (R-Missouri) – (202) 224-5721

Richard Burr (R-NC) – (202) 224- 3154

Bill Cassidy (R-LA) – (202) 224-5824

Susan Collins (R-MA) – (202) 224-2523

John Corwyn (R-TX) – (202) 224-2934

Lindsey Graham (R-SC) – (202) 224-5972

Rob Portman (R-Ohio) – (202) 224-3353

Mitt Romney (R-UT) – (202) 224-5251

Patrick Toomey (R-VA) – (202) 224-4254

I urge all those who support and cherish (and depend upon) the rights recognized by the Second Amendment to contact these so-called Republican US Senators.  

The bill, a package of eight bills (federal “Red Flag Laws”), in essence, would allow federal courts to temporarily remove a firearm from an individual who is adjudged to pose a threat to themselves or others (the general definition of a “red flag law.” These bills would raise the age limit for buying a semi-automatic rifle, prohibit the sale of ammunition magazines with a capacity of more than 15 rounds, and would build on executive actions banning fast-action “bump stock” devices and “ghost guns” that are assembled without serial numbers. The House bills also include incentives designed to increase the use of safe gun storage devices and creates penalties for violating safe storage requirements, providing for a fine and imprisonment of up to five years if a gun is not properly stored and is subsequently used by a minor to injure or kill themselves or another individual.

Rep. Jim Jordan explains: “The answer is not to destroy the second amendment, but that is exactly where the Democrats want to go.”

Republicans have noted that a US appeals court ruling last month found California’s ban on the sale of semiautomatic weapons to adults under 21 was unconstitutional. “This is unconstitutional and it’s immoral. Why is it immoral? Because we’re telling 18-, 19- and 20-year-olds to register for the draft. You can go die for your country. We expect you to defend us, but we’re not going to give you the tools to defend yourself and your family,” said Thomas Massie of Kentucky.

The legislation passed by a mostly party-line vote of 223-204 (only one Democrat voted against the package).  As an aside, there are 19 states, along with the District of Columbia which have such “Red Flag” laws:  Washington, Nevada, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Illinois, Indiana, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, and Florida.

Do Guns Kill, or do People Kill?  That is the question.  Another question is this: Will more federal regulation work; will they prevent such horrendous and senseless killings? 

“Guns Don’t kill; People Kill.”  People with evil intent, committed to getting a firearm and succeeding in doing so, are the problem. Criminals and killers are who they are because they ignore laws. They find ways around the law. There are always ways for criminals and killers to get guns. Laws can never stop them. They and their evil heart use guns to kill. Good people, trained in firearm safety and committed to the rightful purpose of keeping and bearing arms for their self-protection and the protection of those unable to do so, are the ones who use guns to kill the bad guys. They are the ones that stop the violence. It is not the gun’s fault; it is not the fault of an “outdated” Second Amendment. It is the lack of decency in society, the fault of a culture that minimizes the role of the nuclear family, a general acceptance of crime, the rise of racism, the rise of uncontrolled illegal immigration, an out-of-control welfare system that rewards broken families, and the lack of religion or morality in schools and the vilification of religion generally. In the past decades, the results of all these changes in our society have translated into an increase in societal violence, with the most egregious being school shootings. This is what the statistics show, and here are those statistics:

For each decade, the numbers presented below represent (a) All Combined School Shootings; (b) Adolescent Shootings; (c) Adult Shootings; (d) All Combined Deaths; (e) Students Killed; (f) Adults Killed:

1940’s:   (a) 1    (b) 0    (c) 1    (d) 5    (e) 0    (f) 5     

1950’s:   (a) 0    (b) 0    (c) 0    (d) 0    (e) 0    (f) 0     

1960’s:   (a) 0    (b) 0    (c) 0    (d) 0    (e) 0    (f) 0     

1970’s:   (a) 1    (b) 1    (c) 0    (d) 2    (e) 0    (f) 2     

1980’s:   (a) 7    (b) 2    (c) 5    (d) 12    (e) 10    (f) 2     

1990’s:   (a) 13    (b) 10    (c) 3    (d) 36    (e) 29    (f) 7     

2000’s:   (a) 5    (b) 4    (c) 1    (d) 14    (e) 12    (f) 42     

2010’a:   (a) 8    (b) 6    (c) 2    (d) 51    (e) 42    (f) 9

So far, just in the past two years, 2021 and 2022, there have been 27 school shootings – Uvalde, TX marking the 27^th such shooting, where 19 elementary-age children and 2 teachers were killed, and which came only 10 days after a deadly shooting at a TOPS supermarket in Buffalo, NY which senselessly claimed the lives of 10 people.     

Before going further, it should be pointed out that prior to the landmark District of Columbia v. Heller case (2008, written by Justice Antonin Scalia) and the McDonald v. Chicago case (2010, written by Justice Samuel Alito), the only case in which the US Supreme Court addressed the meaning of the Second Amendment was that of United States v. Miller (1939) in which, in a very limited ruling, the justices concluded that the Second Amendment does not guarantee an individual the right to keep and bear a sawed-off double-barrel shotgun. Writing for the unanimous Court, Justice James Clark McReynolds reasoned that because possessing a sawed-off double barrel shotgun does not have a reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well-regulated militia, the Second Amendment does not protect the possession of such an instrument. The cases of Heller and McDonald reversed that interpretation and we now have our historic meaning restored – the second amendment confers actually two rights – the right of an individual to keep and bear arms for personal protection and security and the right of protection and security by an armed militia.

With the Heller and McDonald cases, the Supreme Court reiterated and emphasized strongly that “the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense” and that “individual self-defense is ‘the central component’ of the Second Amendment right.”

The University of Canterbury writes:

“For many people, the gun is a potent symbol of all that is wrong with the American culture. It is considered to represent aggression, violence, male dominance, sexual frustration and a host of other behaviour that is abhorrent in a civilized society. However, for other Americans, the very same gun symbolizes all that is right, independence and self-sufficiency, outdoorsmanship, and the ability to protect oneself and one’s family in an increasingly dangerous world. To these members of ‘the gun culture’, a firearm is the virtual embodiment of much loved traditional American values. Inevitably these two highly divergent viewpoints leave little room for agreement or even constructive debate.

This study considers the arguments put forward by the National Rifle Association of America (the NRA), an organization whose views are seldom articulated, although they are often regarded as the only formidable obstacle that stands before the goal of rational gun control. Clearly something must be done to counter rising crime and violence, yet it is the contention of this study that gun control, no matter how attractive such legislation may initially appear, is simply not the real answer within the American context.”

According to the NRA back in 1994, the organization defended the Second Amendment’s grant of human rights as follows (Remember, this was a time when Miller was the leading Supreme Court case on the subject):

NRA Defense of the Second Amendment

Obviously, the NRA emphatically rejects the Supreme Court’s determination that the Second Amendment ‘right’ of the people to keep and bear arms in merely a collective right which refers to the people only as a common body (See Miller). This, claims the NRA, is unconstitutional. The restrictive interpretation by the Court is regarded by the NRA as spelling dire peril for all of the other rights guaranteed by the constitution. For example, a letter to the editor in the June 1991 issue of the NRA’s American Rifleman lamented: ‘The First Amendment is our highest expression of democracy of the intellect and the spirit. The Second Amendment is the highest expression of the physical and the material foundation of our democracy. The First without the Second would reduce democracy to little more than a ghost haunting reality and praying that it will

not be exorcised by the natural forces of bureaucracy, greed, power, and corruption. History gives that ghost

little hope.

On the basis of such fears and given the significant number of important court decisions that were going against them, in 1978 the NRA Board of Directors established the Firearms Civil Rights Legal Defense Fund (FCRLDF), a powerful, nonprofit organization created specifically for the purpose of providing assistance in the form of legal advice and financial aid to individuals and groups in order to wage precedent-setting legal battles in defense of the Second Amendment and in favor of gun owners. The Fund also provides sponsorship and research grants for legal research and educational programs in a variety of gun-related areas. In order to finance its efforts, the FCRLDF, like numerous anti-gun organizations, has been awarded tax-exempt status and all donations made to the Fund are tax-deductible for federal tax purposes. However, this also means that the Fund

must be financially supported solely by contributions specifically made by concerned individuals and organizations.”

Despite the NRA’s fears, and even despite several important court decisions which have gone against them, in reality there is very little chance that the Second Amendment will ever be repealed, given the strong historical connection to the right to keep and bear arms enshrined in the English Bill of Rights of 1689, as well as Militia Laws, inherited from our mother country, Great Britain, and the overwhelming support of American patriots.  

While the NRA has continued to maintain a deep and abiding fear that recent anti-gun forces and outraged citizens over the rising number of school shootings could successfully push for the Second Amendment to be repealed, they fought hard to push for a traditional, historic interpretation of the Second Amendment and the liberalization of gun laws. The American legacy of firearms, and the right of the people to keep and bear firearms for self-protection and protection of their land (militias) has resulted in countries like Japan deciding not to invade the US homeland in WWII and Mexico not invading the US as well.

Charleton Heston said it best as the president of the NRA (National Rifle Association) – “You can take my gun when you pry it away from my cold dead hands.”

According to The John Birch Society, the Deep State’s war on the gun rights of Americans, especially now in response to the recent deadly mass shootings, has nothing to do with public safety but and everything to do with disarming victims so they can be more effectively oppressed. This is the conclusion and warning given by Alex Newman, a columnist with the John Birch’s The New American magazine. In fact, data and common sense both show that disarming law-abiding citizens worsens public safety, allowing criminals free rein.

A podcast from the John Birch Society, by Mr. Newman (titled “Behind the Deep State”), is available at this link –  https://thenewamerican.com/?powerpress_pinw=222452-podcast

We the People MUST NOT allow for the erosion of the Second Amendment – both its meaning and intent and its vital role in our lives and ultimately for the protection of all our freedoms and liberties. We the People MUST NOT allow a government gun grab.

So, what can we do, as American patriots and concerned citizens, to resist and refuse to enforce such federal bills?

First, let’s review our US Constitution, our US Bill of Rights, and our state constitutions.

As codified in law with the 2nd Amendment, the People did not delegate the power to regulate or control the ownership of firearms to the federal government. “The right to keep and bear arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.” And, as the 10th Amendment makes clear: “All powers not delegated to the federal government are reserved to the States or to the People themselves.”  (Madison’s The Federalist Essay No. 45 goes into great detail about the division of power and especially the States’ reserved powers). The Tenth Amendment is actually a restatement of our essentially and critical form of government – federalism, a federation of sovereign states, each reserving their historic and traditional sovereign powers but delegating common authority to the federal government for common functions and mutual benefit),

State legislation to nullify federal gun laws or regulations focus on these basic and essential principles and propose to enact state law that bans the federal government and its officials within state jurisdiction from effectively enacting and enforcing such regulations. Enforcing an unconstitutional, overbroad and abusive federal law on a free people is the very definition of tyranny.

So, the first remedy is to contact all the traitorous Rino US Senators and demand that they NOT vote for the House “Red Flag laws.” 

I.  CONTACT THE FOLLOWING RINO US SENATORS.

I urge everyone who supports and wishes to defend and preserve the Second Amendment to contact the following so-called Republican Senators. Their office phone numbers are provided:

Roy Blunt (R-Missouri) – (202) 224-5721

Richard Burr (R-NC) – (202) 224- 3154

Bill Cassidy (R-LA) – (202) 224-5824

Susan Collins (R-MA) – (202) 224-2523

John Corwyn (R-TX) – (202) 224-2934

Lindsey Graham (R-SC) – (202) 224-5972

Rob Portman (R-Ohio) – (202) 224-3353

Mitt Romney (R-UT) – (202) 224-5251

Patrick Toomey (R-VA) – (202) 224-4254

II.  STATE NULLIFICATION OF UNCONSTITUTIONAL FEDERAL LAW:

The second remedy is State Nullification, which Thomas Jefferson termed “the rightful remedy.” 

A model State Sovereignty Tenth Amendment Resolution for the independent States has be en proposed by the Tenth Amendment Center. Every citizen should submit this to their state legislators and request that they take the issue up with the legislature, and also take up the issue of federal enforcement of red flag laws with their local sheriff. Sheriffs are the highest-ranking law-enforcement official and closest to the people. It they believe a law to be unconstitutional, arbitrary, or abusive, they have the discretion to refuse to enforce it.

MODEL TENTH AMENDMENT RESOLUTION: 

The following is a sample 10th Amendment House Concurrent Resolution approved by the Tenth Amendment Center. To all constitutional activists and concerned patriots, I encourage you to send this to your state senators and representatives and ask them to introduce this resolution in your state legislature.

A RESOLUTION affirming the sovereignty of the People of the State of _________.

WHEREAS, in the American system, sovereignty is defined as final authority, and the People, not government, are sovereign; and

WHEREAS, the people of the State of __________ are not united with the People of the other forty-nine states that comprise the United States of America on a principle of unlimited submission to their federal government; and

WHEREAS, all power not delegated by the people to government is retained; and

WHEREAS, the People of the several States comprising the United States of America created the federal government to be their agent for certain enumerated purposes only; and

WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads as follows: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people;” and

WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of federal power as being that which has been delegated by the people to the federal government in the Constitution of the United States, and also that which is necessary and proper to carry into execution those enumerated powers; with the rest being left to state governments or the people themselves; and

WHEREAS, powers, too numerous to list for the purposes of this resolution, have been exercised, past and present, by federal administrations, under the leadership of both Democrats and Republicans, which infringe on the sovereignty of the people of this state, and may further violate the Constitution of the United States; and

WHEREAS, when powers are assumed by the federal government which have not been delegated to it by the People, a nullification of the act is the rightful remedy; that without this remedy, the People of this State would be under the dominion, absolute and unlimited, of whoever might exercise this right of judgment for them.

NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE  _____ OF THE _______ GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ______, WITH THE SENATE

CONCURRING, that we hereby affirm the sovereignty of the People of the State of _______ under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise delegated to the federal government by the Constitution of the United States; and, be it further

RESOLVED, that this Resolution shall serve as a Notice and Demand to the federal government to cease and desist any and all activities outside the scope of their constitutionally-delegated powers; and, it be further

RESOLVED, that a committee of conference be appointed by this legislature, which shall have as its charge to recommend and propose legislation which would have the effect of nullifying specific federal laws and regulations which are outside the scope of the powers delegated by the People to the federal government in the Constitution; and, be it further

RESOLVED, that a committee of correspondence be appointed, which shall have as its charge to communicate the preceding resolutions to the Legislatures of the several States; to assure them that this State continues in the same esteem of their friendship as currently exists;  that it considers union, for specified national purposes, and particularly those enumerated in the Constitution of the United States, to be friendly to the peace, happiness and prosperity of all the States; and, be it further

RESOLVED, that a certified copy of this resolution be transmitted to the President of the United States, the President of the United States Senate, the Speaker and the Clerk of the United States House of Representatives, and to each member of this State’s Congressional delegation with the request that this resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.

III.  INDIVDUAL NULLIFCATION OF UNCONSTITUTION FEDERAL LAW.

The third Remedy is Individual Nullification.  Michael Boldin, founder and director of the Tenth Amendment Center explains in his article (and podcast) of June 8, 2022 four steps to this remedy:

1. The right to keep and bear arms is a natural right. Not a gift from government. It’s not something we get FROM the constitution or the 2nd Amendment. We have this right from our Creator, at birth. This is essential. Because as soon as we take a position that we have “2nd Amendment Rights” rather than a natural right to keep and bear arms, then the people with power – will ALWAYS end up using that power to define the limits of their own power.  (as long as the people keep letting them, that is)

2. We the people have to be willing to exercise our rights whether the government wants us to or not. James Otis put it this way: “There is nothing that will destroy liberty more than a prevailing opinion that it is better to tamely submit than nobly assert and vindicate our privileges.” And Thomas Jefferson might have the best reminder on this: “A free people claim their rights, as derived from the laws of nature, and not as a gift of their chief magistrate”

3. “Refuse to cooperate with officers of the Federal Government.” That was James Madison’s strategy for states and individuals to keep the feds in check without relying on the federal government to magically limit its own power. When the federal government assumes powers not delegated by the US Constitution, it is necessarily taking power and rights from other sovereigns, whether it be the States or We the People. The natural depositories of those rightful powers and rights have the right and the duty to protect them and re-assert them. We the People don’t have to wait for the State to act on our behalf.

However, we’ve seen a small handful of states take this essential step of not complying with unconstitutional federal gun laws. Missouri is the gold standard. Arizona is silver, and Montana takes the bronze. Almost every other state or local “2nd Amendment Sanctuary” creates a sanctuary for nothing.

By the way, the federal government has tried to keep guns out of the hands of individuals who pose a safety threat to themselves and others primarily with its federal firearms registry, and it has not worked to prevent the terrible and astounding rise in gun violence in our society.

4. Get rid of state laws restricting the right to keep and bear arms.Whether it’s state prohibitions that mirror federal ones (like suppressors or bump stocks), We the People MUST remove permit requirements, reciprocity and everything in between.

For more information and details on this option, listen to Michael Boldin’s podcast of June 8 at this link –

4 Essential Steps to Nullify Federal Gun Control

IV.   BUY AS MANY GUNS & AS MUCH AMMUNITION AS YOU CAN.  DEFEND YOURSELF AND THOSE WHO ARE UNABLE TO DO SO

Defy and resist federal gun control regulation by buying as many guns and as much ammunition as you can. There may well come a time when you feel your life and safety are at grave risk, as well as the life and safety of others. Exercise a robust belief in the Second Amendment. The government – NO government – has the right to deny you this fundamental right.

V.  INCLUDE MEANINGFUL SAFETY MEASURES AT SCHOOLS

If there is an increase in school shootings, the solution is not to ban guns from good people but rather to tighten security at local schools and universities. There are several viable options, such as:

(1)  Keep all school doors and windows locked during the day, while students and teachers are in the facility. Keep classroom doors locked during the day, while classes are in session.

(2)  Use only one main door for parents and visitors to enter the school and employ metal detectors.

(3)  Allow teachers, administrators, coaches, and school custodians to keep and carry firearms in their classrooms and offices, as well as be officially trained.

(4)  Request that veterans volunteer their time to provide school safety, or provide financial resources or other incentives in order to hire them or retired police officers or security officers.

These sensible measures make a whole lot more sense than violating and burdening the rights of American citizens in their fundamental right to keep and bear arms.

In an address to the annual meeting of the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce on March 30, 1961, California Governor Ronald Reagan spoke this prophetic words: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

In his first gubernatorial inauguration address of January 5, 1967, he repeated the same sentiment: “Perhaps you and I have lived too long with this miracle of Liberty to properly be appreciative. Freedom is a fragile thing and it’s never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by way of inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people.  And those in world history who have known freedom and then lost it have never known it again.

Knowing this, it’s hard to explain those among us who even today would question the people’s capacity for self- government. I’ve often wondered if they will answer, those who subscribe to that philosophy: if no one among us is capable of governing himself, then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else? Using the temporary authority granted by the people, in increasing number lately at all levels of government, have sought control even of the means of production as if they could do this without eventually controlling those who produce. And always they explain this as necessary to the people’s welfare. ‘The deterioration of every government begins with the decay of the principle upon which it was founded.’  This was written in 1748, and it’s as true today as it was then.”

Freedom requires the action and commitment of people who want to live a life of liberty. Only they can preserve it.

Diane Rufino

References:

Michael Boldin, “Essential Strategy: 4 Steps to Nullify Federal Gun Control,” Tenth Amendment Center, June 8, 2022.  Referenced at: https://blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/2022/01/4-essential-steps-to-nullify-federal-gun-control/  

Michael Bolding, “Path to Liberty” (podcast), Tenth Amendment Center, January 14, 2022.  Referenced at:  https://blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/2022/01/4-essential-steps-to-nullify-federal-gun-control/

The Oath of Office – https://history.house.gov/Institution/Origins-Development/Oath-of-Office/#:~:text=It%20reads%3A%20%E2%80%9CI%2C%20AB,of%20evasion%2C%20and%20that%20I

C. D. Fletcher, “Guns Don’t Kill, People Do: The NRA’S Case Against Gun Control,” University of Canterbury, 1994. Referenced at: file:///C:/Users/Diane%20Rufino%20Surface/Downloads/Fletcher_thesis_1994.pdf

School Shootings – https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Number-of-mass-school-shootings-and-deaths-from-1940-early-2018_fig2_324617091

The Guardian, “US House Passes Gun Control Bill, June 9, 2022.  Referenced at:  https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jun/09/us-house-passes-gun-control-bill-faces-defeat-senate

Alex Newman, “Behind the Deep State” (podcase), The John Birch Society.  Referenced at: https://thenewamerican.com/?powerpress_pinw=222452-podcast

Alex Newman, “The Plot Against Guns is Not About Safety But Tyranny,” The New American, June 13, 2022.  Referenced at:  https://thenewamerican.com/plot-against-guns-is-not-about-safety-but-tyranny/?mc_cid=f9b2612efc&mc_eid=8d4ce7a42a

The Tenth Amendment Center, “A Proposed Model State Sovereignty 10^th Amendment Resolution” –  https://tenthamendmentcenter.com/10th-amendment-resolution/

State Red Flag Laws, Pew Research – https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2021/10/05/red-flag-laws-are-saving-lives-they-could-save-more

California Governor Ronald Reagan’s First Inaugural Address – https://governors.library.ca.gov/addresses/33-Reagan01.html  

A Fundamental Question and Some Fundamental, Yet Contested, Truths

by Diane Rufino, June 6, 2022

I’ve been asking this fundamental question for many years now: Is too much individual freedom ultimately destructive of the greater prize – liberty?  

Our Founding Fathers expressed their vision for an independent united States when they drafted and signed their names as delegates to the Declaration of Independence. In that grand document, Thomas Jefferson articulated the sovereignty of the individual according to God’s law and Nature’s law. Our rights come from our Creator; they are inalienable and can never be deprived, violated, or burdened by government. Such declarations are included in the Constitution and Bill of Rights and were included for a reason. They were meant to emphasize that the federal government was intended to be limited (limited to an articulated list of express powers and responsibilities) with its primary purpose to secure and respect the rights of the People.

“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.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –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.”

Abraham Lincoln once said: “Don’t interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.” (Of course, as president, he egregiously ignored the Constitution and violated the protections granted to the People).

Individual freedom and liberty can only truly exist when government is limited and when love of country and love for one another is more important than political ambition and social agenda. Individual freedom and liberty are maximized when government is restricted in its ability to over-regulate, is limited in its ability to intrude on and impact our lives and our livelihood ( our ability to work to support ourselves and our families), is limited in its ability to regulate, burden, and limit what we can do with our property (our ability to develop it to its best potential), and is respective and diligent in adhering to the Constitution.

But government can only remain limited to the extent that We the People can successfully and effectively govern ourselves. The more we can govern ourselves, the better we can conduct ourselves with self-respect and    To respect others, the less we need government to enact laws to restrain us in our exercise of freedom. That is where religion and morality come in. Religion and morality (virtue) are two critical foundations of self-government. Without them, we can’t really know right from wrong. We act in such a way as to only serve ourselves and to put ourselves above others, to disregard community and to care little about the health and welfare of our country.

And that is exactly what is going on in our country today and has been going on for too many years. We see too many people who are one-issue activists who make too much noise and are ultimately taking our country down the wrong path. As the issues of abortion (extreme pro-abortion), gender identity, and the LGBTQ agenda specifically demonstrate, we are becoming a degenerate society which is becoming increasingly divorced from the foundations required for personal responsibility and successful self-government. We are becoming more and more distant and disrespectful of one another and this is threatening our collective love and support for our republic and threatening our collective appreciation and support of the Constitution, and ultimately, it will undermine the integrity and longevity of our country. Our freedom and our liberties exist only as long as the Constitution is adhered to and only as long as the federal government, a creation of the States through the Constitution, remains limited. 

Our founding values, although expressed beautifully and clearly in the Declaration of Independence, are based on certain “uncontested truths.” Since the early days of our founding and up until the mid-twentieth century, we all understood there are such uncontested truths, like religion and morality and virtue. Sadly, what we are seeing today is a progressive agenda that requires that these truths be contested, ignored, and rejected. It began with Margaret Sanger’s policy of ethnic cleansing and eugenics, then Supreme Court decisions taking prayer out of schools and out of the public square, then a judicial ruling acknowledging a constitutional right of a woman to an abortion (Roe v. Wade, hopefully to be over-ruled soon), and now to a regime embracing hostility to religion, to free speech, and in general, to conservatives. The hatred is palpable. The degeneracy is palpable.

Dr. Ryan T. Anderson, acclaimed author and speaker and president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, has been talking about such “highly-contested truths.” According to Anderson, “highly-contested truths” are “the most important civilizational truths that shouldn’t be contested but are “things that we can’t afford not to get right.”

As he asserts, the first truth is that we are made in the image and likeness of God. Taking stock of our current American culture, we can see how this “truth” has become highly contested. Specifically, with the dehumanization of the unborn since the 1960’s and 1970’s and the articulation of a so-called constitutional right to have an abortion, 65 million unborn Americans have been unjustly killed in the 49 and a half years since Roe v. Wade was handed down. The contesting of this essential truth has become a moral and ethical stain on our nation and causes most of us, as Americans, to violate our collective conscience.

Dr. Anderson believes that “Abortion has corrupted everything it’s touched. It has corrupted our Constitution. It’s corrupted our courts and it’s corrupted the rule of law.”

The second highly-contested truth is that God asks very little of us in return, other than to accept the divinity of his son, Jesus Christ and to be faithful to Him, the Father. (This is not one of the “highly-contested” truths that Dr. Anderson talks about but it is one that I believe needs to be included).

In the gospel of Mark, chapter 12:28, the disciple recounts an account: “A scribe came to Jesus and asked, ‘Of all the commandments, which is the most important?’ It sounds like a fair question. After all, first-century Jews counted 613 regulations, 248 commands, and 365 prohibitions in the Law handed down by God. They ranged from the foundational (“You shall have no other gods before me.” Ex. 20:3) to the peripheral (“Do not cook a young goat in its mother’s milk.” Ex. 23:19). All of God’s laws are important of course, but surely some are more equal than others.

Jesus’ response was illuminating. It was simple and straightforward. He answered: “The most important one is this: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength’” (Mark 12:29–30). So here we have the “most important” commandment: Love the Lord.

But that was not the end of his reply. Rather than stopping after his apparently straight answer, Jesus continued: “The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There are no greater commandments than these” (12:31). In Matthew’s version, he explains that the second commandment is just as important as the first, adding that “all of God’s Law hangs on these two commandments” (22:39–40). The most important commandment, then, is twofold: Love the Lord and love your neighbor.

With these simple commandments, we have the foundations of religion – to love someone more than oneself – and the basis of the Golden Rule.

The third highly-contested truth is that we are created according to a biological scheme – as only two distinct genders, male and female. The push of transgender ideology, questionable gender identity, gender fluidity, and gender wokeness in our culture is something that is touching every segment of America. This new and progressive political agenda is not something that you can kind of opt out of, that you could hide from. It’s in all of our schools, all of our colleges and universities, all of our churches, all of our communities, in all of our movies (including Disney), and apparently, in almost every aspect of our current national discourse.

The victims of this counter-productive and scientifically-unsound ideology are diverse and wide-spread, from middle school girls who have been sexually assaulted in bathrooms by biological males identifying as female, to Catholic hospitals being sued for not performing sex reassignment procedures, to female college athletes not only losing chances to medal but also being forced to share a locker room with a biological male, and now to the innocent, vulnerable, and mentally-underdeveloped school-age children. As Anderson says: “It’s permeated everywhere in our culture, and we need people willing to stand up to tell the truth.”

The fourth highly-contested truth, according to Dr. Anderson, is that not only are we created male and female, but male and female are created for each other in marriage. Just because the US Supreme Court got it wrong in the Obergefell case (upholding gay marriage), Anderson argues, that “doesn’t change the truth about marriage, nor does it change the importance of marriage.”

Marriage has always been both a natural institution and a supernatural institution. It plays both a civic and a sacred function. Because of this, Anderson explains, even though we’ve temporarily experienced a setback with Obergefell, that doesn’t mean that we should stop advocating either for the truth about what marriage is, or simultaneously just trying to promote family and marriage.

The fifth and final truth is that all of us are created equal and all are created for God. It’s the corollary of being made in the image and likeness of God. This means it’s to our disadvantage to think or believe that we can organize our public life as if God doesn’t exist.

Dr. Anderson argues that this truth comes into play with the role of religion in the public square and the importance of religious liberty. “What we’ve tried to do now for two generations is to conduct our public life as if God doesn’t exist,” he says, “as if religion and morality have nothing to do with law and justice. And look where it’s gotten us.”

He continues: “The duties we have to God are the most important duties that we have, period. We need someone bringing that faith perspective to bear in our laws. We need a moral foundation to our laws.”

A virtuous people will courageously defend the rights endowed by the Creator and restored by the blood of patriots. But a fearful people, ignorant and without virtue and without a sense of a higher purpose, would readily cede these rights in exchange for a fleeting sense of security. They would gladly surrender their rights and their liberty in exchange for the protection and the management of their lives from the government. Princeton University’s Robbie George explains, “People lacking in virtue could be counted on to trade liberty for protection, for financial or personal security, for comfort … for having their problems solved quickly. And there will always be people occupying or standing for public office who will be happy to offer the deal.”

Our Constitution was designed and drafted to create a common government of limited responsibilities. Again, a limited government guarantees maximum individual liberty. Our country, comprised at the time of 13 individual sovereign states, fought for its collective independence based on the premise and promise of liberty. Upon winning that revolutionary war, governments were designed and tasked with protecting the rights and liberties of the People. Liberty first.

So the answer to my initial question is this: If we keep on our current course, if we continue to reject religion, morality, and the “uncontested truths,” and if we continue to allow the federal government to grow and to intrude into our lives and allow the federal government and the federal courts to make rulings that limit the rights that were once held as “inalienable,” then yes, individual freedom will ultimately jeopardize our liberty.

Let us never forget what John Adams said: ““We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution just as a whale easily goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” 

We want to leave our country in better shape for future generations. We may just have different ideas about how to do it, and that’s alright. Like our Founding Fathers, I will continue to seek to build consensus, uphold the rights of American citizens as outlined in the Constitution and work to pass legislation that preserves the greatness of our nation for years to come.

As President Ronald Reagan once advised: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

References:

Dr. Ryan T. Anderson, “The 4 Most Contested Truths in America,” Truth Network, May 23, 2022.  Podcast referenced at:  https://www.truthnetwork.com/show/family-policy-matters-nc-family-policy/41908/

Andrew Wilson, ”All God’s Laws Are Equal. Are Some More Equal Than Others?,” Christianity Today, November 22, 2019.  Referenced at:  https://www.christianitytod

RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE

by Diane Rufino, July 11, 2021

When I’m out in the pool, I usually bring Alexa outside with me to listen to my extensive Bruce Springsteen songlist. I especially look forward to his duet with Tom Morello on “The Ghost of Tom Joad.” It’s a real rocking version. I had never heard of Tom Morello before and so I looked him up. I learned that his is the lead guitarist for the group Rage Against the Machine.

I thought to myself: “What a great name for a band!”  My instinct told that the name was a reference, a bold reference, to their protest against an aggressive, intrusive government. Indeed, their songs express political views which are, to a great extent, extreme and revolutionary.

A definition of “machine” comes from the highly entertaining movie (one of my all-time favorites!), 3 IDIOTS, where the ultra-competitive student explains that “a machine is anything that reduces human effort. … Anything that simplifies work, or saves time, is a machine.”

I think of the government as a machine. On the one hand, for the great many Americans who rely on government hand-outs to sustain them, the government certainly can be seen as machine as it “reduces human effort” in getting education, learning a skill, getting a job (and all that it entails), and providing for oneself. On the other hand, it can be seen as a machine in that it is capable of doing a great many tasks, in a centralized manner.  The bottom line is that a large and aggressive government is seen (by those in DC, by career DC politicians, by “the swamp”) as an expedient.  “It gets the job done.” Who believes that?  Most times, as we have seen over the many years, government has become inexpedient. Ronald Reagan once said: “Government is like a baby. An alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other.”   

As I have made clear in my article posted on January 23, titled “A Re-Declaration of Independence,” [https://forloveofgodandcountry.com/2021/01/23/a-re-declaration-of-independence/ ], government has exceedingly abused its powers under the Constitution and over the many years, has usurped many powers reserved historically to the States. (refer to the Tenth Amendment and James Madison’s commentary in The Federalist Papers No. 45).  It continues to do so, becoming more abusive with each Democratic administration. I listed 47 examples of how the US federal government has become tyrannical and has not only been abusing its powers under the Constitution but creating assuming new powers as well, usurping them from the States and from you and I (the People), but I could have easily listed so many more.

The federal government has created an entitlement culture, it has expanded the welfare program (Reagan wisely commented: “Welfare’s purpose should be to eliminate, as far as possible, the need for its own existence.”), it has taken over public education and healthcare (both of which are unconstitutional actions), it weaponizes its many agencies (mostly unconstitutional) to target political opponents (ex: Obama’s IRS and now Biden’s IRS), it uses taxpayer-funded bailouts to rescue failing banks and businesses (the ones IT deems are worthy, thereby destroying the free-market system and picking “winners and losers”), it refuses to enforce one of its primary responsibilities – that of controlling immigration at our borders, it puts the interests of illegal aliens ahead of honest, law-abiding, and decent American citizens, it (Obama, that is, using his “pen and phone”) passed DACA, an unconstitutional program (thereby usurping rightful powers that belonged to the legislative branch), it abuses its taxing and spending powers to wantonly and arbitrarily raise taxes in order to compensate illegal aliens, enlarge the entitlement system, send grants to the States (unconstitutional; with such grants, the government is able to do an “end run” around the Constitution), and bail out certain select banks and businesses, it has been using Homeland Security and the FISA courts to spy on ordinary American citizens, reporters, and even a presidential candidate (Trump), it has restructuring Social Security deductions so that they are no longer a “personal property right” but rather a government slush-fund (thanks to the Supreme Court), it uses its full power to attack gun rights and gun-rights groups for the purpose of enacting gun control and burdening our Second Amendment rights, it has used Homeland Security Department to issue a directive to all law-enforcement agencies identifying conservative individuals and groups (those who “cling to their guns and religion…”) as potential home-grown terrorists (see “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment,” April 7, 2009 – just 2 ½ months after Obama was inaugurated), it colludes with the lame-stream media to propagandize (“the mouthpiece of the Democrats”), it colludes with the lame-stream media and left-wing radical groups to shut down the free speech and free assembly rights of conservatives, it colludes with the lame-stream media to incite hatred and bullying of conservatives, patriots, veterans, and conservative groups, inciting and encouraging violence from radical groups (BLM, Antifa, etc) to further a political agenda, it continues to lie to the American people and spreads falsehoods (at the very minimum, it sends out only one-sided information and data, discrediting the other side as if it is omniscient – think JFK assassination, RFK assassination, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr, Benghazi, Carter Page, the FISA warrants, “Trump and Russian Collusion,” global warming, etc), it has been working the American people up regarding the current coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, misleading them with incorrect and one-sided information concerning the rise in the number of cases and concerning the vaccines, shutting education, businesses, and travel down, causing many small (and large as well) businesses to go out of business and the loss of 20.6 million jobs (as of June 2020, with 7.7 million jobs providing healthcare benefits) resulting in an unemployment rate not seen since the Great Depression in the 1930s, it has resurrected racism in this country where it hasn’t existed in many many years (implementing Critical Race Theory for example), and much more. And most recently, it has ignored (if not been complicit in) the massive voter fraud and election tampering in the 2020 presidential election that continues to be proven with each passing month, each audit, and each lawsuit filed.

Ask yourself:  Are you happy with the government’s take-over of healthcare, even though it was unconstitutional in its undertaking and then unconstitutional in the manner Chief Justice John Roberts attempted to save it?  If you were paying for your own health insurance, are you happy that your premiums have gone up substantially?  Are you happy with the government’s handling of the COVID outbreak?  Do you enjoy having to “mask up” everywhere you go?

Who looks at our current deranged and formerly racist president, deranged and vengeful House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and the cabal of corrupted and corruptible politicians in DC and thinks: ‘Yes, I trust them to do more to control my life and raise my children?’  Well, we know which group of people is happy to watch as the leviathan in DC grows ever larger and ever stronger, and never ask such questions.

I, on the other hand, despise the syndicate in DC (“The criminal syndicate known as the government of the United States”).  In the summer of 2009, I started a Tea Party group in my home county of Pitt in North Carolina and have been involved in running it and furthering its mission ever since. The Tea Party movement started, initially, as a fiscally conservative political movement within the Republican Party after CNBC report Rick Santelli called for a “tea party” from the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on February 19, 2009 after some heated words about the federal bail-out program. Of course, the name refers to the famous Boston Tea Party of December 16, 1773, the first in a series of events that ultimately led to the colonies’ fight for independence (American Revolution)  

Members of the movement called for lower taxes, for a reduction in the size and scope of government, for fiscal responsibility (ie, for reduced federal spending at home and abroad, for personal responsibility, for a strict separation of powers, for states’ rights (the power of the Tenth Amendment), and for free markets (unconstrained by government). In short, the movement stands for a smaller government of limited functions, as defined by the US Constitution and understood by the States when they ratified the unifying document.

I believe the motto of the Tea Party movement can be summed up by a famous quote by Henry David Thoeau: “Government is best when it governs least.”

The Tea Party movement is a grassroots movement to reign in the size and scope of the government.  After all, the Declaration of Independence proclaims that it the inherent right of the people to do so.  I see it as a duty.

Sadly, we’ve had far too many ambitious presidents and ambitious Congressmen, all too willing and eager to ignore the Constitution and anxious to grow the machine. They have done far too much damage. The greatest damage, in my opinion, was done by Abraham Lincoln in his deceitful plan to wage war against the Confederacy. He twisted and transformed the Constitution, and in doing so has left the lasting legacy that the inalienable and inherent rights articulated in the Declaration of Independence are no longer recognized. [The southern states, which gave our country the most intelligent and prolific of founding fathers, and which historically have been the most patriotic and loyal to the United States, just wanted to be left alone].  Democrats have historically and traditionally the party of big government and of animus to the Declaration and the Constitution (both which constrain their agenda). Conservatives have been the ones to at least make attempts to respect what our Founders gave us.

The last presidents to recognize constitutional limits and have acted to curb or curtail the growth of the federal government, or to even have downsized it were:

(1)  George Washington – He was committed to over-seeing a limited federal government (except for signing a bill creating a National Bank)

(2)  Thomas Jefferson – He was the author of the world-famous Declaration of Independence, arguably our most important and influential founding document. He eliminated taxes and otherwise was extremely fiscally conservative. He also fought the growing power of the judiciary.

(3)  James Madison – He drafted the US Constitution (“father of the Constitution”) and the Bill of Rights. He used his veto power to reign in the legislative branch that desperately wanted to expand the power of the federal government.

(4)  Martin Van Buren – He was dedicated to a limited federal government and used his veto power to reign in Congress.

(5)  John Tyler – He believed that tariffs imposed by the federal government were unconstitutional and he strongly supported States’ Rights.

(6)  Franklin Pierce –  He respected States’ Rights and would not allow the federal government to encroach upon them.

(7)  Grover Cleveland – He was known as the “last small government Democratic president.” He was anti-tax, anti- government tariff, and against an aggressive Congress (in fact, he used his veto power 414 times). He also refused to enlarge the influence of the US around the world (including Canada, Central America, and South America).

(8)  William Howard Taft – He was perhaps the last president in American history to believe in the limited powers of the Chief Executive.

(9)  Calvin Coolidge – He was a firm believer in the free market and believed the federal government should stay out of its way. He cut federal taxes by 50%, eliminated farm subsidies, and cut government spending by almost half.

(10)  Ronald Reagan – One can truly say that he lived up to his famous quote that “government is the problem, not the solution.”  He cut taxes, shaved budgets for non-military programs, historically forced the bankruptcy and then the downfall of Russia, reduced assistance to state and local governments, and implemented a massive down-sizing of government regulation and oversight.

(11)  Donald Trump – He was called “the most pure conservative President ever” by New York Magazine. He pursued pro-business policies, significantly reduced unemployment, reduced taxes and government regulation, confronted NATO regarding its unfair financial burden on the US, re-negotiated and signed new and equitable trade deals with foreign countries, and in doing so, led to one of the greatest economic booms in American history.  FACT.  He also influenced the judiciary for generations to come by not only appointing 3 conservative justices to the Supreme Court but also appointing more than 200 judges to the federal benches.

In short, the federal government, over the years, has assumed greater and greater power to intrude upon our lives, to run our lives, to coerce our businesses, to unduly burden our inalienable and God-given rights, to burden our property, and to interfere with our “pursuit of happiness,” believing it is helping its citizens (by helping take care of us and thus “reducing human effort”), by relieving us of the God-given right of free will and of the freedom to “pursue happiness.” Why exercise one’s God-given rights, why work, why get an education when government will take care of you and provide all the essentials for you. But you then have to ask yourself: If government doesn’t trust you to exercise your freedom and liberty, then why do we need freedom and liberty at all?  Why do we continue to use the phrase “The Land of the Free” when truthfully, we really aren’t free after all. We certainly can’t exercise all our rights to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” freely, as well as the rights and privileges guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. Increasingly, government creates and endorses policies to make the poorer and non-working (but capable of work) members of society “more comfortable in their poverty” rather than to pursue policies that are aimed at eradicating poverty. (This is one of the many areas I have devote my attention and have come up with solutions).  Why?  Because the government has no real interest in eradicating poverty. Poverty makes for good politics. It is a political expedient for the Democatic Party; it’s the foundation of their political agenda. Ignoring its motivation, the government has been using its powers as a massive re-distribution of wealth scheme, siphoning money from the upper but mostly middle class to those it believes need subsidizing.

President Ronald Reagan once explained (July 1, 1975): “If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism. If we were back in the days of the Revolution, so-called conservatives today would be the Liberals and the liberals would be the Tories. The basis of conservatism is a desire for less government interference or less centralized authority or more individual freedom and this is a pretty general description also of what libertarianism is. Now, I can’t say that I will agree with all the things that the present group who call themselves Libertarians in the sense of a party say, because I think that like in any political movement there are shades, and there are libertarians who are almost over at the point of wanting no government at all or anarchy. I believe there are legitimate government functions. There is a legitimate need in an orderly society for some government to maintain freedom or we will have tyranny by individuals. The strongest man on the block will run the neighborhood. We have government to ensure that we don’t each one of us have to carry a club to defend ourselves….”

Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty.

When he was stumping for Barry Goldwater during the 1964 presidential election, Reagan gave a famous speech (perhaps one of his most famous) titled “A Time for Choosing” in which he said: “This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves. You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or right. Well, I’d like to suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There’s only an up or down – the upside is man’s old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, but the downside is the path to the ant heap of totalitarianism. And regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.”

We all feel this foreboding sense that America is on a decline, although we enjoyed a short period of optimism with Donald Trump in the White House.

I rage against the Machine every day. I write, I help educate, I use my First Amendment rights to discuss and debate political issues, I come up with solutions and remedies, and I criticize all branches of government when they abuse their power and impose unconstitutional laws and policies.  I started a Tea Party movement in my county back in 2009 (which I am still active in to this day), I take up activist causes, I have established relationships with my representatives (federal, state, and local), and I provide free legal advice (especially when it comes to those who are victims of unconstitutional, abusive, or arbitrary government action).  I do it for my children and for my grandchildren someday. I do it for my friends and neighbors, whom I have great affection for, I do for those who are poor and uneducated and unable to comprehend the importance of our rights and the need to protect them, I do it for those unable to articulate or speak out, I do it for God.  And I do it for you too.

Many have raged against the machine over the years.  Reagan reminded us of this back in 1964, when he summoned the spirit of Patrick Henry: “You and I know and do not believe that life is so dear and peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery. Is nothing in life is worth dying for?  Should Moses have told the children of Israel to live in slavery under the pharaohs? Should Christ have refused the cross? Should the patriots at Concord Bridge have thrown down their guns and refused to fire the shot heard ’round the world? The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn’t die in vain…… You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, ‘There is a price we will not pay.’ ‘There is a point beyond which they must not advance.’

I hope wherever you are, you too are raging against the machine. A wise President Reagan concluded his “A Time for Choosing” Speech (1964) with these words: “You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on Earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.”

You may forget lessons, birthdays, jokes, and memorable quotes, but always remember these words: “Thank You Lord,” “ I Love You,” “….. Til Death Do We Part,” and “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.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –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.”   These are the important words to live by and which give our lives meaning.

References:

Diane Rufino, “A RE-DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE,” January 23, 2021 –  https://forloveofgodandcountry.com/2021/01/23/a-re-declaration-of-independence/

Text, Ronald Reagan speech, “A Time for Choosing” (September 27, 1964)  –  https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/reagans/ronald-reagan/time-choosing-speech-october-27-1964

Stephanie Soucheray, “US Job Losses Due to COVID-19 Highest Since Great Depression, Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, May 8, 2020.  Referenced at:  https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/05/us-job-losses-due-covid-19-highest-great-depression

James Madison, Federalist No 45 –  https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed45.asp

“The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected.

The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State. The operations of the federal government will be most extensive and important in times of war and danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security. As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the latter, the State governments will here enjoy another advantage over the federal government. The more adequate, indeed, the federal powers may be rendered to the national defense, the less frequent will be those scenes of danger which might favor their ascendancy over the governments of the particular States. If the new Constitution be examined with accuracy and candor, it will be found that the change which it proposes consists much less in the addition of NEW POWERS to the Union, than in the invigoration of its ORIGINAL POWERS. The regulation of commerce, it is true, is a new power; but that seems to be an addition which few oppose, and from which no apprehensions are entertained. The powers relating to war and peace, armies and fleets, treaties and finance, with the other more considerable powers, are all vested in the existing Congress by the articles of Confederation. The proposed change does not enlarge these powers; it only substitutes a more effectual mode of administering them. The change relating to taxation may be regarded as the most important; ….. “

A Few Suggestions to Those Who Represent Us in the North Carolina General Assembly

by Diane Rufino, February 1, 2021

Government is best and most responsive to the individual when it is closest to them. We’re talking about the local, the county, and even the state level. This is where the individual and his or her concerns matter. In DC, the person doesn’t matter at all, let alone his or her concerns and interests. The only worth of a person at the federal level is his or her voting affiliation. This is a very Jeffersonian principle. It is also, at the core, why Greece never solidified into a central government but remained a series of “city-states.”

And so, over the past years, I thought a lot about what our state government and state leaders should be doing with their time in office, and I’ve come up with a list of nineteen items. I’m hoping that like-minded individual (ie, constituents; voters) and groups will agree, at least to some items, and agree to work together to strategize and come up with action plans, with the ultimate goal of having action taken at the state (or local) level.

“Strength in numbers!”   Some of these ideas are:

(1)  North Carolina should create a State Escrow Account. The purpose of this initiative would be two-fold: (1)  To exercise a sovereign duty under the Tenth Amendment which is to check abuses and unconstitutional acts, laws, policies, and spending by the federal government; and (2) To make sure North Carolina citizens do NOT give in to federal tyranny, which includes over-taxation in order to spend that money on unconstitutional objects (ie, in order to “go around the boundaries of the Constitution”).  With a State Escrow Account, North Carolina citizens would first send their IRS filings and checks to the state government where an analysis would be done regarding the amount and the constitutionality of the amount of federal taxation. The state would withhold taxation amounts to the IRS that the federal government uses for unconstitutional purposes (like education, welfare, state grants, funds to foreign countries, bail-out funds, etc)  See my article “State Escrow Accounts to Curb Federal Funding,” www.forloveofgodandcountry.com, November 8, 2015.

(2)  The North Carolina General Assembly (NCGA) should take the lead and call for yearly “Round Table” meetings of all 50 States, and perhaps including a representative or representatives from the federal government. At these meetings, the states can bring up any issues and any problems they have (For example: gang violence, drug trafficking, homelessness, lack of jobs (ideas for job creation), healthcare costs in their state, education issues, how to resist over-reach by the federal government, what to do when they believe the Supreme Court has issued an unconstitutional ruling…  With 50 states at the table, each acting as an “independent laboratory” of experimentation and success/failure and applying free market principles, they can certainly more successfully solve their problems and become stronger (sovereign-wise), which is great so that they don’t have to look to and depend on the federal government.

(3)  The state legislature should craft and adopt a State Sovereignty Resolution or State Sovereignty Statute.  Alternatively, the NCGA can amend the NC state constitution to include a section, with strong language that addresses the natural right and its right under the Tenth Amendment, to exert all of its sovereign rights, including those which challenge and resist abusive and otherwise unconstitutional laws, actions, policies, spending, treaties, etc by the federal government.  [See the various State Sovereignty Resolutions that Diane Rufino has written or state sovereignty resolutions introduced or adopted by other states, or model state sovereignty resolutions that have been drafted and promoted by the Tenth Amendment Center].  See my blogsite for my version of a North Carolina State Sovereignty Resolution, dated Feb. 18, 2019 (www.forloveofgodandcountry.com.  Also, refer to the sample versions of a state sovereignty resolution in Addendum I (another of my versions) and Addendum II (Montana’s House Joint Resolution No. 26, aka, the Montana State Sovereignty Resolution). 

(4)  The state legislature should make it a top priority to make North Carolina a model state for true education. BACK TO EDUCATION & ENOUGH WITH PUBLIC SCHOOL INDOCTRINATION!!!  North Carolina needs to expand options for education, rather than the historic reliance on public school indoctrination (I mean, public school education). There should be unlimited charter schools, home school consortiums and other home school options, more religious school options, and opportunities at the high school level for trade school training.

(5)  The NCGA should make the in-depth study of our state and nation’s founding a top priority in its core education curriculum, as well as an in-depth study of all our founding documents (bringing in English history and roots) and all the reasons, harassment, instigations, and violations of human rights that led to our quest for independence (including a very public declaration with the Declaration of Independence) and ultimately, the American Revolution. In fact, the NCGA should either make this an entirely separate course on American History [with a firm reliance on our founding documents, commentary by our Founding Fathers, the meaning and scope of the Constitution of 1787 as explained clearly in the Federalist Papers, the debates in the individual State Ratifying Conventions (to learn how each state understood what the Constitution meant when they agreed to ratify it – simple compact or contract theory law), and our primary accounts of history (including how quickly the federal government began to ignore the boundaries of our Constitution and how Abraham Lincoln’s administration blatantly and unconscionably violated its sacred provisions, “transformed the union” re-interpreted the Constitution, and transformed the federal government and its powers and responsibilities] OR if this study is to be part of another American History course, then it MUST be taught by someone or some group widely recognized as being able to teach the topic authentically, knowledgably, and in detail.

(6)  The NCGA should make a STRONG change to the way that law schools in the state approach teaching Constitutional Law. Instead of teaching students what the Constitution means and what the scope of the powers of the branches of the federal government are through judicial rulings (judge-made law; through the many opinions of the Supreme Court), as if that is the ONLY way the Constitution should be interpreted, the NCGA should require that a preliminary Constitutional Law course be taught that teaches what the Constitution ACTUALLY means – as intended by those who wrote it and signed off on it (see James Madison and the debates and proceedings in the Philadelphia Convention of 1787), as explained by those who wrote it and were delegates at the Convention (See the Federalist Papers, a collection of essays written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay) in order that the States have a clear understanding when considering whether or not to ratify it, and according to those states, in their individual State Ratifying Convention after careful and rigorous debate, who relied on certain meanings and with certain “Ratifying Clauses” and conditions attached, when they agreed to adopt it.  Individual men in black robes don’t have the power to change the meaning of the provisions, the clauses, and the powers delegated to the federal government in the Constitution (yet they have been doing this for over 200 years). The purpose of a constitution is to be a permanent testament of the powers delegated from the People to the government, and that is exactly the approach law students MUST be taught.  If our Constitution is to survive and maintain its original integrity, this approach MUST be included in every North Carolina law school curriculum. 

(7)  North Carolina should invest and expand Project Veritas through communication and cooperation with other states.

(8)  North Carolina should invest and expand NC Voter Integrity Project through communication and cooperation with other states. (Jay Delancy, the founder of the NC Voter Integrity Project, would be best to advise and help all other states establish their own groups – and then they all can work together and share data)

(9)  Each state should have its own manufacture and distributor of ammunition. Congress CANNOT interfere with intrastate commerce. North Carolina should take the initiative on this plan.

(10)  The NCGA should discuss this question or idea with its fellow states:  Should the States negotiate with the Indian nation (Indian tribes) to: (a) adopt our US Constitution (or better yet, the constitution of the Confederate States of America) as part of its governing documents and (b) have them agree to adhere to it as our Founders intended and envisioned. In this way, we can secure the Constitution of our founding and keep it alive and working should it someday become extinct and irrelevant here in the United States.

(11)  North Carolina sorely needs election reform. Such election Reform should include a strict Voter ID requirement and the manual, hand-counting of ballots.  Here in North Carolina, we do not have the infamous Dominion machines, but the troublesome software is the same. This software is where the manipulation of votes takes place. The John Birch Society offers several suggestions to restore election transparency, integrity, and security.  In the February 15th issue of The New American magazine, titled “Restoring Election Integrity,” election expert Kurt Hyde explains specific changes in election laws and procedures that are needed:

• Reinstate paper ballots
• Reinstate voting and vote counting as public acts
• Reinstate the precinct as the place where voters cast their ballots and where the ballots are counted
• Allow candidates to choose areas to audit the vote
• Mandate that the election process be recorded with video and audio equipment
• Publicly and immediately post precinct vote results
• Mandate the cleaning up of all voter registration lists
• Eliminate same-day voter registration
• Put in place law to protect evidence
• Punish fraud and end early voting
• Require an absolute chain of custody for ballots
• Repeal laws that allow for unattended drop boxes for ballots and laws allowing for no-excuse absentee balloting
• Ballots must have verifying features
• Make it easier to recruit election clerks
• Don’t allow government employees or political hacks to run the polls
• Require paper voter sign-in sheets

As someone connected to the Abbeville Institute wrote: “The key to putting the country on a better path is not in national elections. It doesn’t matter an iota who your representative or Senator is, which party holds power, or who the president is. It doesn’t even much matter who is on the Supreme Court. We’ve been on a continual and incremental shift to the left for over 100 years and national elections have not stopped this. They’ve aided it. The key is in your State elections. We must support and elect people to our State governments who will interpose, nullify, and negate all federal over-reach. Your voice is louder the closer to home that your government is. In DC, you have no representation no matter who you send there. The power is in your State government and this sis where we must effect change.” 

(12)  The NCGA should pass legislation which would criminalize enforcement of unconstitutional edicts at the county level, and order sheriffs, county commissioners, and local/state prosecutors to carry out such enforcement.

(13)  Leaders in the state legislature, along with groups in North Carolina that are fed up with the Republican Party, should strategize and devise plans in order to build on the momentum that Donald Trump started in 2016 and which he delivered throughout his administration (to Make America Great Again, to Drain the Swamp, and to Give the Government Back to the People).  We call this growing momentum “The Great Awakening.”

(14)  The NCGA should push forward with Rep. Keith Kidwell’s effort to place checks on progressive state governors (like Roy Cooper) by requiring the General Assembly to be called into session in the event of a prolonged emergency in order that the legislature has an opportunity to protect We the People of North Carolina from draconian gubernatorial edicts.  Related to this issue, the NCGA should pass or amend existing legislation to set precise boundaries to what types of events or circumstances can be termed “a prolonged emergency.”  A vague statue is overly ripe for abuse and tyranny.

(15)  The NCGA should move forward with efforts to make North Carolina a “sanctuary state” for the Second Amendment.

(16)  In counties in which the school board members represent districts, it should be required that each member of that county’s Board of Education to be elected by ONLY by the voters in the district that he or she will serve and NOT by a county-wide election.

****  Items #13 – 16 were taken from “An Open Letter to NC General Assembly,” written by Rick Hopkins, in the Daily Compass (week of February 11. 2021

(17)  The North Carolina state legislature should follow the lead of the South Dakota state legislature:  

A new bill, HB 1194, has been introduced by newly-elected Republican state Rep. Aaron Aylward, in South Dakota’s Republican-controlled House of Representatives aims to give the state’s attorney general the power to reject any executive order issued by a US President deemed to be unconstitutional.

What exactly does the new bill authorize?

First, it creates “The Executive Board of the Legislative Research Council,” which has the authority to review any executive order issued by the President of the United States. Rep. Aylward hopes to rein in the president’s executive power by authorizing the state to review certain executive orders that “restrict a person’s rights.”

Second, as the bill’s text reads: “the ‘Board’ may review any executive order issued by the President of the United States, if the order has not been affirmed by a vote of the Congress of the United States and signed into law, as prescribed by the Constitution of the United States.”

Third, and according to the language of the bill: “Upon review, the Executive Board may recommend to the attorney general and the Governor that the order be further examined by the attorney general to determine the constitutionality of the order and to determine whether the state should seek an exemption from the application of the order or seek to have the order declared to be an unconstitutional exercise of legislative authority by the President.”

Under HB 1194, the state’s attorney general would be able to exempt South Dakota from the any executive order “that restricts a person’s rights” or is determined “to be unconstitutional” as long as the order relates to the following:

(a)  A pandemic or other public health emergency

(b)  The regulation of natural resources

(c)  The regulation of the agricultural industry

(d)  The regulation of land use

(e)  The regulation of the financial sector through the imposition of environmental, social, or governance standards, or

(f)  The regulation of the constitutional right to keep and bear arms

HB 1194 is not a per-se partisan bill. As Rep. Aylward insists: The legislation is not just a response to recent action from Biden, but is intended to push back against the steady expansion of executive power in the U.S. in general.”  In other words, it is a patriotic bill designed to put force behind the government scheme of federalism, to give enforcement power to the Tenth Amendment, and ultimately to resist the abuses and growing power (usurped powers) by the federal government.

“This isn’t just a President Biden issue but rather an overall executive overreach issue that we’ve been experiencing for a long time,” Rep. Aylward said. “The U.S. Congress has abdicated their duty for a long time in different areas. This bill is simply setting up a process to nullify acts that would be unconstitutional. When looking at the U.S. Constitution, the President only has the powers that are laid out in Article II.”

He continued to make the case that, if signed into law, the bill would go a long way toward restoring federalism in the country and for South Dakota specifically. As he put it: “If this were to pass, it would give South Dakota much of its power back. Per the Supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution, the powers of the federal government need to line up with what is laid out in the document.”

[Reference:  Phil Shiver, “South Dakota Republican Introduces Bill to Reject Biden’s Executive Orders, Blaze Media, February 9, 2021.   https://www.theblaze.com/news/south-dakota-bill-reject-biden-executive-orders  

(18)  The North Carolina state legislature should follow the lead of the North Dakota state legislature:

“All political power is inherent in the people. Government is instituted for the protection, security and benefit of the people, and they have a right to alter or reform the same whenever the public good may require.”   — Sec. 2, North Dakota Declaration of Rights

As the federal government in 1798 teetered dangerously close to what James Madison considered a vast misuse of its powers under the Constitution, he authored the Virginia Resolution. (The Virginia Resolution of 1798).

The resolution affirmed that “in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers, not granted by the said compact, the states who are parties thereto, have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits, the authorities, rights and liberties appertaining to them.”

The North Dakota legislature is putting forth 2 new bills designed to exert its state sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment and to resist the ever-encroaching and always aggressive federal government from stomping on the rights, livelihood, and enjoyment of the citizens of that state. The two bills are HB 1164 and HB 1282. The first addresses the constitutionality of executive orders issued by the President of the United States, and the second addresses the constitutionality of laws passed by the US Congress.

A group of North Dakota legislators have taken up the call for states to reassert control over the Constitution, as the Biden regime continues to rule by executive fiat, often promulgating unconstitutional orders infringing upon civil rights. This is the key to thwarting a wholesale slide into national despotism and ensuring that there are some places for Americans to go and enjoy the blessings of liberty. The question is whether leaders in those legislative chambers as well as Gov. Doug Burgum will pick up the mantle, not to mention Republicans in other states.

Recently, representatives Tom Kading, Matthew Ruby, and 7 other Republicans in the North Dakota House introduced HB 1164, which would task the attorney general with reviewing the constitutionality of the president’s executive orders. If any of his orders are deemed to be unlawful, this bill would prohibit any state or county agency or publicly funded organization from enforcing the edict.

The list of issues covered under the bill are:

(a)  Pandemics or other health emergencies.

(b)  The regulation of natural resources, including coal and oil.

(c)  The regulation of the agriculture industry.

(d)  The use of land.

(e)  The regulation of the financial sector as it relates to environmental, social, or governance standards.

(f)  The regulation of the constitutional right to keep and bear arms.

According to HB 1164, (a)  “The legislative management may review any executive order issued by the president of the United States which has not been affirmed by a vote of the Congress of the United States and signed into law as prescribed by the Constitution of the United States and recommend to the attorney general and the governor that the executive order be further reviewed,” the bill said.

(b)  “Upon recommendation from the legislative management, the attorney general shall review the executive order to determine the constitutionality of the order and whether the state should seek an exemption from the application of the order or seek to have the order declared to be an unconstitutional exercise of legislative authority by the president,” the bill reads.

According to Rep. Ruby: “Ruling by executive order is a disease that must be cured.”

He continued: “I would’ve supported it whether it was Trump or Bush or Obama — any of them. I really think there’s a huge difference between going through Congress and getting something passed compared to, you didn’t get your way so you’re putting it in as an executive order.”

The impetus for the bills, according to Daniel Horowitz of The Blaze, Republican North Dakota state legislators, and many others, is that “the Biden regime continues to rule by executive fiat, often promulgating unconstitutional orders infringing upon civil rights.”

Horowitz characterized the legislation as “the key to thwarting a wholesale slide into national despotism and ensuring that there are some places for Americans to go and enjoy the blessings of liberty.“

To put this new bill in perspective, the first challenge under this new bill might be Biden’s recent mask mandate, which unconstitutionally prohibits humans breathing without cloths on their mouths and noses inside any public transportation, including in-state ride-shares and taxis. The Center for Disease Control (CDC) created an entire criminal offense for something that never passed Congress. This, as one can easily recognize, is unconstitutional and ripe for a reign of tyranny.

HB 1164 is a great start to challenge a President’s use of Executive Orders as a way to legislate (or to adjudicate).

But North Dakota didn’t stop there. What if Congress decides to pass a bill that is unconstitutional? HB 1282, which was introduced by Rep. Sebastian Ertelt, would take this a step farther by proposing a “Committee on Neutralization of Federal Laws” to recommend whether a given law or regulation is unconstitutional. Legislators are calling it “A Committee on Nullification.”  Upon the recommendation of this committee, consisting of state legislative leadership and their appointees, the legislature would pass a concurrent resolution on whether to nullify the law or edict. Until the resolution is passed, state and county agencies would be prohibited from enforcing the law or regulation at issue.

The bill requires:

(a)  “Upon receipt of federal legislation, regulation, or an executive order, for consideration and process, the committee shall recommend whether to nullify in its entirety a specific federal law, regulation, or executive order. In making its recommendation, the committee shall consider whether the legislation, regulation, or executive order is outside the scope of the powers delegated to the federal government in the Constitution of the United States,” the bill reads.

(b)  “The committee may review all existing federal statutes, regulations, and executive orders enacted before the effective date of this section for the purpose of determining constitutionality and shall recommend whether to nullify in its entirety a specific federal statute, regulation, or executive order,” the bill said.

(c)  If passed, the State Legislature ostensibly would decide if the edict becomes the law in North Dakota.

(d)  “If the legislative assembly approves the concurrent resolution by a simple majority to nullify a federal statute, regulation, or executive order based on constitutionality, the state and the citizens of the state may not recognize or be obligated to abide by the federal law or executive order,” the bill reads.

These bills should serve as a model for all 31 GOP-controlled legislatures, especially in the 23 states where there are also Republican governors. I hear so many conservatives acting despondent and either resigned to tyranny or calling for secession or even a civil war. But the solution implied in these bills would keep the union loosely intact while peacefully maintaining a constitutional sanctuary for those who still value constitutional freedoms. This is the best way to peacefully and gradually separate blue and red America into their respective cultural, economic, and governing choices so we can live together more agreeably as a federal union.

North Dakota Republicans control the Senate 40-7 and the House 80-14. If this were a Democrat state passing a sanctuary bill for illegal aliens, the bill would pass in a day. Given that the rights of American citizens are on the line, Senate leaders Randy Burckhard and Rich Wardner should bring this bill to the Senate floor, and Speaker Kim Koppelman should bring the bill to the House floor immediately. North Dakota has an opportunity to lead the nation in liberty, if only all the Republicans in the state would govern the way they campaign.

Madison predicted in Federalist No. 46 that a federal encroachment would easily be mitigated by state action, because “the means of opposition to it are powerful and at hand.”

What is the winning formula?

“The disquietude of the people; their repugnance and, perhaps, refusal to co-operate with the officers of the Union; the frowns of the executive magistracy of the State; the embarrassments created by legislative devices, which would often be added on such occasions, would oppose, in any State, difficulties not to be despised; would form, in a large State, very serious impediments; and where the sentiments of several adjoining States happened to be in unison, would present obstructions which the federal government would hardly be willing to encounter.”   [Federalist No. 46]

In other words, public outrage, state and local officials refusing to enforce it, and correspondence with counterparts in other states together in unison would prevail over federal tyranny.

South Dakota already has a similar bill to HB 1164 targeting Biden’s executive lawmaking. Rep. Aaron Aylward of Harrisburg, South Dakota, introduced HB 1194, which would set up an executive board to review the constitutionality of executive orders pertaining to the six issues laid out in the North Dakota legislation. With a 32-3 majority in the Senate and a 62-8 majority in the House, South Dakota Republicans have the strongest majorities since the Eisenhower era. The Dakotas, as well as many other parts of the country, can easily become constitutional sanctuaries.

Let’s be very clear: The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution subordinates states to follow only laws that are pursuant to the Constitution on issues that were given over to the federal government to determine. However, if the federal government blatantly violates the Constitution, especially in a way that harms individual liberty, even Alexander Hamilton, the great supporter of a powerful national government, said that states should ignore it. “It will not follow from this doctrine that acts of the large society which are NOT PURSUANT to its constitutional powers, but which are invasions of the residuary authorities of the smaller societies, will become the supreme law of the land,” wrote Hamilton in Federalist No. 33. “These will be merely acts of usurpation, and will deserve to be treated as such.”

Well, if it was good enough for Hamilton, it should be good enough for states with strong Republican majorities in the legislature.

There is no doubt that Biden’s presidency will take a bite out of our economy, especially with his cancelation of the international pipeline going through North Dakota. But if tyranny itself takes root and grows within the boundaries of these solid red states, then we as conservatives have nobody to blame but ourselves and our own complacency.

The question is whether the members of the North Carolina General Assembly who call themselves ‘patriots’ and who deem themselves worthy of their responsibility as state leaders will pick up the mantle to question and challenge the powers and actions of the out-of-control federal government, not to mention whether representatives (Republicans and Democrats) in other states will do so as well.

[References:  (1) Daniel Horowitz, “North Dakota Legislators Introduce Bill to Block Biden’s Illegal Executive Edicts,” The Blaze, February 3, 2021.  https://www.theblaze.com/op-ed/horowitz-north-dakota-legislators-introduce-bill-to-block-bidens-illegal-executive-edicts 

(2) Jack Davis, “North Dakota Republicans Move to Wrest Control from Biden, Place Power Back with the Constitution,” The Western Journal, February 6, 2021.  https://www.westernjournal.com/north-dakota-republicans-move-wrest-control-biden-place-power-back-constitution/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=huckabee&fbclid=IwAR0PKa0CCok2J0er4JK1zaKVf3Mg7c_mcrWL8ztknpWR-TNR4ggaimIKqC4 ]   

(19).  Finally, this last item should be discussed with our DC reps:  The US Congress (of which a group of ambitious Democrats control) is currently considering a bill titled H.R. 1 [“For the People Act” of 2021’ –[https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/1/text?q={%22search%22:[%22hr1%22]}&r=1&s=1].  One of the most notable features of H.R. 1 is that it strips states of the right to set their own standards for how elections are to be conducted. Election laws will be determined at the federal level. Under this bill, states would be required to promote the use of mail-in voting, to offer online applications for voter registration, and to provide automatic and even same-day voter registration. H.R. 1 would all but eliminate voter ID laws. It would prohibit states from “requiring identification as a condition of obtaining a ballot.” However, the bill would allow a state to require “a signature of the individual or similar affirmation as a condition of obtaining an absentee ballot.” After all, we must protect the integrity of our elections. In Section 1005, the bill seeks to prohibit a state “from requiring applicants to provide more than last four digits of Social Security number.” Currently, in some states, if an individual without a driver’s license registers to vote, an applicant is required to supply the full Social Security number.  THIS WOULD BE A PERFECT TIME FOR NORTH CAROLINA TO FINALLY ENACT A NULLIFICATION BILL. It must REFUSE to enforce the particulars of this extremely tyrannical bill.

ADDENDUM I.  (NORTH CAROLINA STATE SOVEREIGNTY RESOLUTION, drafted by Diane Rufino)

NORTH CAROLINA STATE SOVEREIGNTY RESOLUTION

RESOLUTION to ADOPT a STATE SOVEREIGHTY BILL, RE-ASSERTING NORTH CAROLINA’S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

Whereas, the state of North Carolina acceded into the union of States, established by the compact that is the Constitution of the United States, as an independent and sovereign state;

Whereas, with its accession, North Carolina did not enter into a position of unlimited subordination to the general government, but ceded only certain enumerated and defined powers, reserving to itself the residuary mass of rights to self-government (which was established by the limited and express delegation of powers to the federal government and then restated in the Tenth Amendment);

Whereas, in considering for ratification of the Constitution of the United States, the conventions of a number of the States expressed concern regarding the potential for the abuse of the power to be ceded to a general government and subsequently, at the time of their adopting the Constitution of the United States, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its power, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses (ie, a Bill of Rights, and other amendments) should be added to the document (indeed, Massachusetts adopted the Constitution under the strict condition that a Bill of Rights be added, and North Carolina, New York, and Rhode Island only ratified under the promise and understanding that a Bill of Rights would be immediately added);   

Whereas, a Bill of Rights was incorporated as the first ten amendments to the Constitution, with amendments one thru eight (1-8) recognizing certain liberty rights that the federal government would be bound to respect and would not be permitted to regulate (ie, to deny, abridge, burden, or chill), amendment nine recognizing that the People have other liberty rights not specifically articulated, and amendment ten re-affirming the federal nature of the government system and re-affirming that the federal government is one of limited and express powers while the States retain all others (the “reserved powers”);

Whereas, by its very words and intention, the Constitution represents a federal system whereby the powers of government are split between the States and the federal government., and just to make sure the federal government never mischaracterized the system or misconstrued this intent, the Tenth Amendment was added by a demand of the states;

Whereas, the Preamble to the US Bill of Rights explains the great importance of our first ten amendments. It states: “The Conventions of a number of the States having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best insure the beneficent ends of its institution;

Whereas, the “beneficent ends” included in the Preamble refer to the intention of the States to respect their sovereignty and to preserve Liberty, the very thing they fought the Revolution for;

Whereas, our Founders warned of the tendency of governments to become ambitious, to consolidate their powers, and in doing so, to burden the liberty rights of their citizens, and they advised and tasked the States to be eternally vigilante with respect to the actions of the federal government, to call out every abuse and infraction of its powers and demand redress, and to be eternally protective of their reserved sovereign powers;

Whereas, Thomas Jefferson, in addressing the first glaringly unconstitutional acts of the federal government (the Alien & Sedition Acts, most obviously the Sedition Act), drafted the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798 (and then James Madison drafted a companion, the Virginia Resolutions of 1798). In the Kentucky Resolutions, Jefferson characterized the nature of the relationship between the States and the federal government as follows: “That the several States composing, the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a general government for special purposes — delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force: that to this compact each State acceded as a State, and is an integral part, its co-States forming, as to itself, the other party: that the government created by this compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to itself; since that would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among powers having no common judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of infractions as of the mode and measure of redress”;

Whereas, Thomas Jefferson explained, in his Kentucky Resolves of 1799, why the States had the right to judge for themselves when the federal government assumes undelegated powers: “That if those who administer the general government be permitted to transgress the limits fixed by that compact, by a total disregard to the special delegations of power therein contained, annihilation of the state governments, and the erection upon their ruins, of a general consolidated government, will be the inevitable consequence: That the principle and construction contended for by sundry of the state legislatures, that the general government is the exclusive judge of the extent of the powers delegated to it, stop nothing short of despotism; since the discretion of those who adminster the government, and not the constitution, would be the measure of their powers: That the several states who formed that instrument, being sovereign and independent, have the unquestionable right to judge of its infraction; and that a nullification, by those sovereignties, of all unauthorized acts done under colour of that instrument, is the rightful remedy….. “;

Whereas, time has shown that the limited language of the Constitution, and even the “further declaratory and restrictive clauses,” have failed to achieve their specified intent, which is the constraint of the federal government;   

Whereas, since the ratification of the US Constitution, the language and intent of its various articles, sections, and clauses have been incrementally and systematically misinterpreted, reinterpreted, misconstrued, malapplied and or simply ignored through federal executive, legislative, and judicial usurpative action (resulting in a transformation that should have been legally accomplished according to the amendment process of Article V);

Whereas, the actions of one truly tyrannical US president (Abraham Lincoln), assuming powers not delegated and for purposes not within the purview of the federal government, and commandeering the full force and power of the federal government for unconstitutional ends, is not sufficient to justify the legality of those ends;

Whereas,  despite the war of 1861-65, the US Constitution has not been amended to alter the relationship between the federal government and the States nor to alter and/or enlarge the powers of the federal government;

Whereas, the result has been the transformation of the government in DC into one much different than what was created by the States (the parties to the compact which was the US Constitution), and one that no longer serves the States as it was intended;

THEREFORE, in consideration of all of the above, We the People of Craven County (the Coastal Carolina Taxpayers Association), from which all power is vested and consequently derived from in our governance, recognizing that the federal government is unable or unwilling to discharge faithfully the enumerated powers of the Constitution and amendments, or abide by the restrictions contained therein in accordance with the contemporary understanding of the respective article, section, or clause,  duly charge the General Assembly of North Carolina to assert the sovereignty guaranteed under The Constitution of the United States, as understood at the time of ratification and jealously protect and defend the inherent rights of its Citizens.

NC STATE SOVERIGNTY BILL

A Bill to Re-Assert State and Individual Sovereignty under the 10thand 11th Amendments and According to the Conventional Wisdom and Understanding of the Constitution as ratified by the State Convention

SECTION I.  GENERAL

On May 20, 1775, the North Carolina Assembly, meeting in convention in Mecklenburg County, in outright defiance of the Royal Governor, signed a set of resolutions – called the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence and Resolves, or more commonly referred to as The “Mecklenburg Resolves” – declaring North Carolina free and independent from Great Britain. It was the first official declaration of American independence from Britain. The Resolves were delivered to North Carolina’s delegates who were attending the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia.

On April 12, 1776, North Carolina adopted the Halifax Resolves, in with which the North Carolina Provincial Congress empowered its delegates to the Continental Congress to vote in favor of independence from Britain. Again, North Carolina was the first to do so. 

On August 2, 1788, delegates to the Ratifying Convention in Hillsborough, voted 184-to-82 NOT to ratify the US Constitution because it did not contain a Bill of Rights. Without a declaration of rights and with the laws of the general government being supreme to the laws and constitutions of the several states, the delegates to the NC ratifying convention, elected by the People, understood that the sovereign rights of the several states and the liberties of the people were not secure.

It was only after assurances were given by James Madison, as a representative to the first US Congress, and others, that a Bill of Rights would be added, that North Carolina met again in convention, held in Fayettewille on November 21, 1789, and ratified the Constitution and joined the union. 

In response to the demand by North Carolina and other states for a Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments were added to the Constitution. They were – are – introduced by the words: “The Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire for further declaratory and restrictive clauses be added, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of the government’s powers.”  The Bill of Rights was adopted by the first US Congress on September 25, 1789 and ratified on December 15, 1791. 

North Carolina holds a distinguished place in American history for being a leading force for freedom and liberty and the ideals upon which the independent united States were established. 

This bill intends to re-affirm North Carolina’s commitment to freedom and liberty, as envisioned at our Founding, and as proclaimed in the plain language of our nation’s Declaration of Independence:

“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.  –That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; 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…..   “

The bill also intends to re-affirm the following:

(1)  The federal nature of our government system.  By its very words and intention, the US Constitution represents a federal system whereby the sovereign powers of government are split between the States and the federal government. With respect to the express and limited responsibilities listed in the US Constitution, the federal government is sovereign and supreme, and in all other respects, the States and the People are sovereign.  This critical balance provides the foundation of the Constitution, is the most important of our Checks and Balances, and essential for the preservation and security of individual liberty. 

(2)  The division of powers delegated to the federal government versus those retained by the States as explained by James Madison in Federalist No. 45, written to assure states of the limitations of the government created by the Constitution to the states in their deliberations regarding ratification:

        “The powers delegated to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the state governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, [such] as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce. The powers reserved to the several states will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people.”

(3)  The Tenth Amendment, which states: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

(4)  The Ninth Amendment, which states: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”  As the Preamble of the Bill of Rights explains, these amendments, as well as the other eight amendments, are additional “declarations” and “restrictive clauses” intended to further limit the reach of the federal government.

(5)  The US Constitution is a compact between and among the states, on behalf of its People, creating a general government to provide for the common defense and a regular and free trade zone among the states, with limitations on its powers that are defined, consistent, and predictable, for the free exercise of individual freedoms (which is the definition of liberty). The general government created by the compact is not a party to the compact but a “creature.”  As such, and aside from the federal courts’ duty to offer an “opinion” to the other branches on the constitutionality of bills, the States, as parties to the compact, have an equal right to judge for themselves the administration or maladministration of the government’s delegated powers or its assumption of powers not specifically delegated and thus usurped.  “The question is not what power the Federal Government ought to have but what powers in fact have been given by the people.”  [United States v. Butler, 297 U.S. 1, 63 (1936)].

(6)  The state of North Carolina acceded into the union of States, established by the compact that is the Constitution of the United States, as an independent and Sovereign State.  With its accession, North Carolina did not enter into a position of unlimited subordination to the general government, but ceded only certain enumerated and defined powers, reserving to itself the residuary mass of rights to self-government.

(7)  The federal government, through its consolidation of power, instrumentalities, and monopoly over the federal courts, has increasingly entrenched upon the essential balance of sovereign power among itself, the States, and the People, to the great disservice of the latter two.  The balance of power has tilted too far and for too long in the direction of the federal government and it is time to restore that balance. The result has been the usurpation of sovereign power from the States and the People, and that usurpation has become palpable.  The question has never been “The question is not what power the Federal Government ought to have but what powers in fact have been given by the people.” United States v. Butler, 297 U.S. 1, 63 (1936).

(8)  That the federal government, as an agent to each of the States, has no legal authority to impose legislation or policy upon the people of North Carolina that is beyond the scope of its constitutionally-delegated powers (as per the clear and common-sense wording and intent of the Constitution).

Based on all of the above, the state of North Carolina re-asserts its sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment, re-asserts the sovereignty of its People under the Ninth Amendment, acknowledges the limited nature of the federal government, and asserts the right and duty to negate federal law when it is not grounded in constitutionally-delegated powers and ensure that they are not enforced within its jurisdiction.  It is the duty of this State to apply all measures appropriate to preserve and protect the inalienable Rights of the good People of North Carolina, endowed by our Creator, from abuse by any branch, department or agency of the government of the United States; and to preserve and protect the Sovereignty of North Carolina from all unlawful usurpation and interference by the government of the United States, its agents or assigns.

Any law, statute, treaty, executive order, or judicial order of the government of the United States deemed unconstitutional by declaration by the Governor of North Carolina or by majority of the NC General Assembly, or referendum of the People, shall be deemed moot and unenforceable in the state.

SECTION II:  ACKNOWLEDGEMENT AND COMPLIANCE WITH THE CONSTITUTION OF NORTH CAROLINA 

(1)  The State of North Carolina acts in good faith and to always further good will with its fellow states.  It also acknowledges the supremacy of the federal government in those areas that it is specifically delegated with legal authority.

(2)  The state of North Carolina, through the actions of its General Assembly, other legislating bodies, and its enforcement agencies, shall establish and enforce laws that are in strict compliance with the Constitution of North Carolina, fully acknowledging said Constitution to be the Supreme Law of the State.  No law, statute, regulation, ruling or other governing provision shall be enacted, established, enforced or otherwise implemented or applied contrary to the provisions, purposes, or intent of the Constitution of North Carolina, or which does not clearly and succinctly identify with particularity its purposes and upon whom said provisions shall operate, without ambiguity or open limitations. No law, statute, regulation, etc shall be established or enforced in the State which encroaches upon the express powers of the federal government that were delegated to it pursuant to the Ratifying Convention of November 21, 1789.  Respecting the proper division of sovereign power addressed by the Ninth and Tenth Amendments to the US Constitution, the NC state constitution and all laws, rules, regulations and other governing provisions within the State, shall be interpreted and applied in favor of the People and against the government.

SECTION III:  PROTECTION OF THE PEOPLE

The state of North Carolina shall protect its People from the illegal assumption of power by the federal government.  It will protect its people from prosecution by agents of the government of the United States attempting enforcement of laws, statues, regulations, rulings and other governing provisions which have been identified as unconstitutional by the government of North Carolina.  Actions that shall be taken by the State include, but are not limited to, preventing seizure of assets or property, collection of taxes or fines, or imprisonment.  No enforcement action shall be taken by any federal or foreign agent against the people in North Carolina except through the county Sheriff and upon presentment of a valid judicial warrant, in which instance said Sheriff shall apprehend and deliver the accused to the appropriate authority at the county jail.  The Sheriff may rely on assistance from other county Sheriffs, the NC State Police, and/or relevant federal or foreign agents, at his sole discretion.

ADDENDUM II.  MONTANA STATE SOVEREIGNTY RESOLUTION

MONTANA STATE SOVEREIGNTY RESOLUTION

MONTANT HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION No. 26 AFFIRMING STATES’ RIGHTS 

2009 Montana Legislature

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 26

INTRODUCED BY M. MORE

A JOINT RESOLUTION OF THE SENATE AND THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE STATE OF MONTANA AFFIRMING STATES’ RIGHTS AND CONDEMNING ENCROACHMENT OF THOSE RIGHTS BY THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND EXECUTIVE ORDERS.

     WHEREAS, The Constitution of the State of Montana declares that the people of this state have the sole and exclusive right to govern themselves as a free, sovereign, and independent state and that the people of this state shall exercise and enjoy every power, jurisdiction, and right pertaining to that right; and

     WHEREAS, that right may never be expressly delegated to the United States Congress; and

     WHEREAS, The Constitution of the State of Montana declares that the people of Montana solemnly and mutually agree to form a free, sovereign, and independent body politic, or state, by the name of “The State of Montana”; and

     WHEREAS, the people of the State of Montana agree that all powers not expressly delegated to the federal government in the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights must be reserved and exercised by individual states; and

     WHEREAS, when Montana entered into statehood in 1889, that entrance was accomplished by a contract between Montana and the several states, with Congress and the President concurring and acting as the agent for the several states, a contract known as the “Compact With the United States”, archived as Article I of the Montana Constitution; and

     WHEREAS, a contract, compact, or treaty must be implemented consistent with the terms and understandings in place at the time it is entered into; and

     WHEREAS, the protection of these states’ rights is enumerated in amendments to the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights, which state that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people”.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE SENATE AND THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE STATE OF MONTANA:

     (1) That the several states of the United States are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to general government, but by ratifying the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights, they constituted a general government for special purposes and delegated to that government certain definite powers, while reserving all other rights.

     (2) That when the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are void and of no force.

     (3) That the government created by the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights was not granted the right to determine the extent of the powers delegated to itself, since that would have made its discretion, and not the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights, the measure of its powers.

     (4) That the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights delegated to Congress a power to punish treason, counterfeiting of the securities and current coin of the United States, piracies, felonies committed on the high seas, offenses against the law of nations, slavery, and no other crimes.

     (5) That all acts of Congress that assume to create, define, or punish crimes, other than those enumerated in the federal constitution and Bill of Rights, are void and of no force.

     (6) That the power to create, define, and punish other crimes is reserved by the states.

     (7) That power over the freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and freedom of the press remains and is reserved by the states or the people, allowing states the right to judge how far the licentiousness of speech and of the press may be abridged without lessening their useful freedom and how far those abuses, which cannot be separated from their use, should be tolerated, rather than allowing the use to be destroyed.

     (8) That states are guarded against all abridgment by the United States of the freedom of religious opinions and exercises and retain the right of protecting the same.

     (9) That all acts of Congress that abridge freedom of religion, freedom of speech, or freedom of the press are not law and are void.

     (10) That power over the freedom of the right to keep and bear arms was reserved to the states and to the people, allowing states the right to judge how far infringements on the right to bear arms should be tolerated, rather than allowing that exercise to be defined by Congress.

     (11) That states and the people are guarded against all abridgment by the United States of the right to keep and bear arms and retain the right of protecting that right.

     (12) That all acts of Congress that abridge the right to bear arms are not law and are void.

     (13) That Congress’s interpretation of those parts of the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights that delegate to Congress a power “to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States” and “to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof” has attempted to destroy the limits of its power.

     (14) That those parts of the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights, detailed in subsection (13), must not be construed to give unlimited powers to the federal government, and that Congress’s inappropriate interpretation must be revised and corrected.

     (15) That if Montana accepts these inappropriate interpretations and continues to allow Congress to exercise unbridled authority, it would be surrendering its own form of government.

     (16) That the people of this state will not submit to undelegated and consequently unlimited powers.

     (17) That every state has a right to nullify all assumptions of power by others within their limits, and that without this right, states would be under the dominion and power of anyone who might try to exercise that power.

     (18) That it would be a dangerous delusion to silence people’s fears for the safety of their rights.

     (19) That this state calls on its costates for an expression of their sentiments on acts not authorized by the United States Constitution.

     (20) That the rights and liberties of Montana and its costates must be protected from any dangers by declaring that Congress is limited by the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights.

     (21) That any act by the Congress of the United States, Executive Order of the President of the United States, or Judicial Order of the United States that assumes a power not delegated by the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights diminishing the liberty of this state or its citizens constitutes a nullification of the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights by the government of the United States, which would also breach Montana’s “Compact With the United States”. Acts that would cause a nullification and a breach include but are not limited to:

     (a) establishing martial law or a state of emergency within a state without the consent of the legislature of that state;

     (b) requiring involuntary servitude or governmental service other than a draft during a declared war or pursuant to or as an alternative to incarceration after due process of law;

     (c) requiring involuntary servitude or governmental service of persons under the age of 18 other than pursuant to or as an alternative to incarceration after due process of law;

     (d) surrendering any power delegated or not delegated to any corporation or foreign government;

     (e) any act regarding religion, further limitations on freedom of political speech, or further limitations on freedom of the press; or

     (f) any act regarding the right to keep and bear arms or further limitations on the right to bear arms, including any restrictions on the type or number of firearms or the amount or type of ammunition any law-abiding citizen may purchase, own, or possess.

     (22) That if any act of Congress becomes law or if an Executive Order or Judicial Order is put into force related to the reservations expressed in this resolution, Montana’s “Compact With the United States” is breached and all powers previously delegated to the United States by the federal Constitution and Bill of Rights revert to the states individually.

     (23) That any future government of the United States shall require ratification of three-fourths of the states seeking to form a government and shall not be binding upon any state not seeking to form a government.

     (24) That the Secretary of State send copies of this resolution to the President of the United States and to each member of the United States Congress.

– END –

References: 

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 26  –   http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2009/billhtml/HJ0026.htm

HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 26  –   http://stewart-rhodes.blogspot.com/2009/02/montana-house-joint-resolution-no-26.html

Mecklenburg Resolves (May 20, 1775) – http://www.ruralhill.net/Declaration.asp

Where Are Today’s Revolutionary Patriots – Ones like Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, George Mason – And Where are Today’s Rabble Rousers Like the Colonial Sons of Liberty?

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].

The Federal Judiciary is Most Responsible for the Government Tyranny that so Clearly Threatens Our Liberty

by Diane Rufino, January 13, 2020

This article comes from a few remarks I made to introduce my last TEA Party meeting. The ultimate topic, to be discussed by a few candidates running for state office, was the problem they see (if any) with our state court system and our federal court system. I wanted to provide an introduction, making sure our members were clear as to the power the courts have managed to assume and exert over the many years.

For those who live in North Carolina, both tracts of the court system have done great damage to the conservative values that we hold dear in this state and have terribly and recklessly undermined and eroded the notions of “democracy” that we are not only entitled to but which rely on. To many who live here, the courts are seen as progressive rogue elements who operate outside the constitution, outside any sense of oath or loyalty to the country, absent any sense of duty, and for the sole purpose of using their positions to make the types of changes that THEY, in their personal and political views, think it necessary to make. In other words, we see the courts as independent agents who are more self-interested than anything else. Just as law schools have morphed into centers of “Social Justice’ (teaching its students to find social justice and racial justice issues everywhere, including where there are none), the judges they turn out are on a quest to seek and effect changes to further social justice. If they can find an explanation that can be interpreted as “racist” or “discriminatory,” that is what they will hang their ruling on. If they alone see such an interpretation, again that will be the basis of their ruling. The discrimination (which was bad, I’m not denying it) of African-Americans in North Carolina post-Civil War and during the Jim Crow era, and the inhumane treatment of them in the 50’s and early 60’s when they dared to protest for voting rights is long gone. That era is clearly gone. But certain social justice warriors (ie, judges) seem to want to make sure that it lives on.

The North Carolina state constitution outlines the powers of our state government and in Article I (“Declaration of Rights”) lists the rights that government must respect for each individual (plus a few that are clearly unconstitutional but remain as a result of the coercion of the victorious northern invaders after the Civil War via the Reconstruction Acts). Article IV of the US Constitution reads: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.”

Wow, that Article IV is powerful. And it sort of shows rather clearly how deranged President Abraham Lincoln was and how overly ambitious he was to keep the money flowing from the agricultural southern states to the northern businessmen.

A “republican form of government” is defined as one in which the powers of sovereignty are vested in the people and are exercised by the people, either directly, or through representatives chosen by the people, to whom those powers are specially delegated. Each southern state seceded from the Union after first calling a convention (just as they did to consider and debate the proposed US Constitution) and selecting delegates from among the people themselves to consider that sole issue, and then issuing a Declaration of Secession. They followed up by writing new state constitutions, if necessary, and then meeting to decide the question of whether to form into a new union (The Confederate States of America), which they agreed to, and finally wrote up a new national constitution. Most legal and constitutional scholars will comment that the Constitution of the Confederate States of America was a better constitution than our US Constitution (and that opinion has nothing to do with slavery). So, we see that Lincoln violated Article IV by making sure that the United States government did NOT guarantee a republican form of government to the 11 southern states that chose to secede. Next, Article IV guarantees that the federal government will protect them against invasion. But again, Lincoln ignored that promise as well. The only invasion that the South suffered was from the federal government itself. If Lincoln thought the Southern states were merely victims of domestic violence and insurrection, there was nothing to support such an assertion. There was no application by the legislatures of the states to the federal government for protection. Lincoln simply promoted a fake view of southern secession, characterizing it in terms that inflamed the passions of those in the north into taking the action he alone deemed absolutely necessary. (Well, there were others who agreed with him, such as his Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton – an evil and ambitious man).

It’s important – very important – to remember that Lincoln never accepted the fact that the southern states willfully and thoughtfully left the Union, exercising a natural right RESERVED to every sovereign, a right articulated in our Declaration of Independence, and a right correctly characterized as an “extra-constitutional right” (reserved to every state under the Tenth Amendment). In fact, they did everything exactly as the original 13 colonies did when they separated (ie, seceded) from Great Britain and organized into a union of states for mutual protection, strength, and bargaining power with the countries of Europe and Asia. Lincoln characterized the action of the 11 southern states as a collective act of rebellion – of domestic upheaval. Of course, nothing could have been farther from the truth. Those states took the calculated steps they took because they chose NOT to act in rebellion against their fellow northern states but rather to simply leave, peacefully, and to re-form a Union based on a government that serves their interests far better (and without open hostility).

The cornerstone of the united States of America is the US Constitution. It is the cornerstone, along with state constitutions, of our Rule of Law. Each constitution memorializes what the People expect from government – the powers delegated to it, the powers denied to it, and the essential individual rights that it is obligated to respect and forbidden to violate or burden. The equal application of the Rule of Law and the memorialization of individual rights guarantees persons in our country that they can live freely. It is this understanding that she reinforce to all of us the immeasurable importance of the US Constitution (and then the individual state constitution). The Constitution is OUR document. It was written for us and continues to provide as best as possible a shield to keep government at bay and out of our lives as much as possible. It is one of enumerated powers only, and therefore any additional power the government assumes or has assumed over the years has been done by abusing power, “usurping” powers during times of national emergencies, and most commonly, with the blessing of the federal judiciary. Since government has grown abusive and tyrannical over the years, the Constitution protects us far less than it did in the years post Founding and pre-Civil War. Yet, it continues to be all we have to keep the government within certain boundaries in our lives, with our liberties, and relating to our property.

This is why conservatives fight so hard to make sure the Constitution is understood and upheld. This was one of the main reasons why the TEA Party was formed back in 2009.

The TEA Party movement was founded for absolutely all the right reasons. I hear people mock the TEA Party movement, mock TEA Party principles, mock TEA Party folks as loonies, call TEA Partiers “racists,” and, chide groups into changing their name so as “not to offend” folks. I don’t fall for this. Anyone who has a bad opinion of the TEA Party and of the movement in general needs to submit to an intense course on American history and an intense course on US Government and Civics (not the progressive-type course that indoctrinates liberals). The origins of the TEA Party go back to an appreciation for the Constitution given to us by our Founding Fathers and its framers. All of a sudden, people all over the country realized that the Constitution had been framed with great genius and wisdom. And they also realized that all of the country’s problems stemmed from the all-too-obvious fact that the federal government had perverted our republic by unilaterally expanding its powers beyond the boundaries and limitations specified in the Constitution, and including the Bill of Rights, and adding usurped powers to its list of legitimate powers.

Every time the federal government ignores the Tenth Amendment (“the powers not delegated to the federal government by the Constitution nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the State or to the People””) and the Ninth Amendment (“the enumeration of certain rights in the Constitution shall not be construed to deny others retained by the People”) and assumes powers NOT specifically delegated to it by the Constitution, it USURPS or TAKES those powers away from the one they rightfully belong to. For example, the federal government (thru the Supreme Court, a federal court) took control of marriage in the Obergefell v. Hodges case, claiming it alone had the power to declare gay marriage equivalent to heterosexual marriage. In doing so, it usurped the power to regulate marriage from the States, where it belonged and had belonged for ages. When the federal courts continue to strike down our legitimate Voter ID laws, as they have been doing (continually crying “racism,” “racism,” “racism”), they USURP the rightful power of the state to regulate elections for a rightful purpose. They continue to substitute their personal opinions and views for those of our elected state legislators and they continue to ignore how the issue of voter and election fraud permeated the 2010 election and was almost single-handedly responsible for ushering in the historic Republican majority (first since Reconstruction).

Remember the story of Ben Franklin leaving the Philadelphia Convention back in September 1787… A woman asked him: “What type of government have you given us?” And he responded: “A republic ma’am, if you can keep it.” When we look at how far out of control the federal government has gotten, we must go back to that afternoon and back to that comment and ask if we are doing what we need to do to keep our republic. We know that everything the Democrats are doing, everything they stand for, is designed to transform our republic from one based on individual freedom to one based, at least in good part, on socialist principles.

What is a REPUBLIC? Do we really know what is meant when our Founders gave us a form of government known as a Republic?

A Republic is essentially a government system whereby supreme power is held by the people and they exercise their influence and their interests and views through their elected representatives. In other words, a republic has a democratic element but that element is exercised at the ballot box. It is also exercised by citizens attending public meetings and legislative sessions, taking notes and publishing them to inform the community and by making their voices heard through comments at the session and through peaceful protests. Demonstrations, protests, acts of civil disobedience… these are further ways to exercise democratic influence in our republic system.

The TEA Party movement was started for concerned citizens to get active and to get involved in the government. Reminding government that it belongs to the people, to serve them and their interests is what we must do. After all, if we want “a government of the people, by the people, and for the people,” we must be vigilante – especially when it comes to the selection of our representatives.

The word “republic” derives from the Latin phrase res publica, or “the people’s concern.” It suggests a measure of popular involvement in government. And the authors of the Constitution were radically republican and believed that the only legitimate form of government was one in which public authority derived entirely from the people. We saw this very language in the Declaration of Independence.

And so we look at some of the ways our republic has lost its original character and how our government system has been transformed from one of limited power to one of concentrated power, and almost all of them involve recklessness, disloyalty, and complicity by the federal judiciary. Yes, what I am saying is that our government has become tyrannical and it has become so, to a great extent, because the federal courts have sanctioned such abusive powers.

A government is tyrannical when it passes and enforces laws without proper constitutional authority. It is tyrannical when it imposes mandatory duties upon its citizens without legal authority or when it treats groups of citizens unequally. It has become tyrannical because the federal courts have re-interpreted language in the Constitution, ignored other language, or inserted new language unilaterally into it. (This is what the “living, breathing document” justices have done over the years). It has become tyrannical after years and years of illicit changes to the Constitution sanctioned by progressive courts not wanting to faithfully interpret the Constitution as much as they wanted to bring about social change in our country. It has become tyrannical each time the federal government wished to assume new powers or to claim “preemption” over an area belonging to the States and the federal courts provided support by using fancy sophistry (or as Scalia used to call it – “legal gymnastics – lacking any foundation in law”) in its rulings to make it so. We saw a prime example of this in Chief Justice John Roberts’ opinion in the Obamacare ruling. It was the most horrific and tortuous example of legal reasoning. It has become tyrannical when it uses its branches not effect the powers articulated in the Constitution but rather to make sweeping social change in the country, even when it goes against the very fabric of society in the individual states. We saw this when the Supreme Court ignored the entire history of abortion laws and policies to find a right in the Constitution for a woman to murder her unborn child. This ruling, Roe v. Wade, ushered in a new age of Women’s Rights – the right of a woman to rid her body of a growing child for any reason at all, including because the pregnancy is causing her stress, giving her a headache or causing her to lose sleep, or because it is giving her anxiety. The government has become tyrannical because the one body constitutionally tasked with passing laws (the US Congress) has been allowed to outsource certain legislative powers to unelected, un-accountable agencies, and the courts have sanctioned them. It has become tyrannical because the courts have asserted a power they were not intended to have – the power to compel, or force compliance with their rulings. We saw this in the court orders forcing the South to establish school districts and to show that such districts have been drawn to establish acceptable racial quotas. Some such court orders are still in effect today – approximately 65 years after the Brown v. Board of Education ruling. The government has become tyrannical because judges have the ability to force or compel individuals to do something that they themselves think should be done. The Constitution does not empower courts to fashion remedies, yet they do it all the time. We saw this with the infamous “school bussing” ruling in 1971, where school districts would be required to bus students around to actively and affirmatively achieve court-required racial quotas. Another example – a school official can be forced to admit certain students or to retain certain students even though they may pose a risk to the safety of other students. In other words, judges know better. And finally, the government is tyrannical because judges and justices have now become legislators from the bench, thus blurring the separation of powers, and allowing unelected, un-accountable men in black robes to make law, make policy, and to dictate what the other branches can do (depending on how it affects their political beliefs). We call this Judicial Activism.

What’s worse is that the federal judiciary follows the policy of “stare decisis” which means that once the Supreme Court has ruled on an issue, the Court must continue to follow it. Essentially what this policy says is that the objective of the federal judiciary is to defend its own past decisions – including ones that are illegal, unconstitutional. abusive, outside the scope of judicial power, ridiculous, have no basis in constitutional interpretation, or amount to Judicial Activism.

In explaining the powers articulated in the Constitution, in such a way that the ratifying conventions in each state could understand and rely upon in their debates, Alexander Hamilton and James Madison wrote a series of essays titled the Federalist Papers. In one of the most famous of these essays, Federalist No. 78, Hamilton wrote that the people would have nothing to fear from the federal judiciary. He wrote that it would always be the weakest branch, tasked with only an opinion, as opposed to the legislature which the power to enact laws and the executive which has the explicit power to enforce laws. Others have echoed the same general theme and have warned that we would have nothing to fear from a federal judiciary that acts on its own – as an independent branch. However, if the judiciary sets out to support the legislative branch or sets out to support the executive branch, then the judiciary should be feared. In such instances, the courts have already decided what the outcome will be, or should be.

Yet, we see the federal courts, acting on their own, have become the most powerful of the three branches, able to bring down both the president and the Congress – with no authority above it to check any abuse.

Why do I bring this up? Because if we ever hope to hold onto our republic – the one our Founders gave us; the one that Benjamin Franklin praised to the woman outside the state house in Philadelphia – we must be willing to recognize that the judiciary is the branch that has been most responsible for the large, bloated, tyrannical government that we have now and the one that has been too timid and reckless to keep it confined within the confines of the Constitution. We must be willing to speak out truthfully and boldly against every bad court ruling. We must expose the abuse. And we must take the action necessary to make sure such rulings are corrected by other branches of government, corrected by judicial impeachment charges, and otherwise not enforced upon We the Free People of the United States.

After all, the government of the United States is still a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” We lost hope of this for many years but for the past 4 years, we have been feeling a bit more encouraged. It started when Donald J. Trump said these words in his inaugural address:

Today’s ceremony has very special meaning. Because today we are not merely transferring power from one Administration to another, or from one party to another – but we are transferring power from Washington, D.C. and giving it back to you, the American People…….

What truly matters is not which party controls our government, but whether our government is controlled by the people. January 20th 2017 will be remembered as the day the people became the rulers of this nation again. The forgotten men and women of our country will be forgotten no longer.

As long as we continue to remain active and we continue to stand for the Constitution and for the rightful role of government, as long as we remain vigilante and critical of judicial rulings, and as long as we fight for the man who fights every day for all of us, we can never be forgotten. We will be remembered for helping to take our country back.

The English Roots of American Liberty

by DIane Rufino, January 20, 2018

From the Declaration and Resolves (petition to King Charles listing the colonies’ grievances against the King and Parliament), the Declaration of Independence, to the Bill of Rights / Declaration of Rights adopted by the individual states, to the US Constitution, and to the US Bill of Rights, the Founding Fathers looked to English history for the words and templates to navigate the colonies towards independence and then into a republic. They reflected on the abuses of the Kings and the compacts demanded by the people to check those abuses, as well as the Enlightenment era philosophy on government in building a lasting republic. It is said that our Founding Fathers were wise and extremely well-read, but moreso, they were keenly aware of England’s history, which was, of course, also the history of the American colonies.

The colonists certainly embraced the liberty they found in the American colonies and the chance they had to self-govern as they saw fit. They worshipped according to their conscience, they engaged in trade freely, and they established their own colonial governments. But then they began to see that new-found liberty in jeopardy. The historic abuses of the English monarchy on its subjects now turned to the colonies. The colonists were taxed without their representation in Parliament (a right listed in the Magna Carta and English Bill of Rights of 1689), their trade interfered with (Tea Act), their colonial assemblies suspended (violation of their colonial charters), they had standing armies kept among them (in violation of the English Bill of Rights), they were forced to quarter troops (in violation of the Petition of Right of 1628 and English Bill of Rights), and their firearms and ammunition were confiscated (in violation of the English Bill of Rights). And when they protested and remonstrated these violations of their rights as English subjects, as those of centuries earlier had done, King Charles III ignored and mocked them. To the King, the colonists were crude, almost laughable in their simpler ways. He accused them of acting like petulant children and essentially being bothersome. He did not answer their written complaints, nor was swayed when they pleaded to him, “as loyal subjects,” to please intervene on their behalf to Parliament (for such things as the Intolerable Acts). By 1774, the King had had enough of them and accused them of being in active rebellion against Great Britain. All the colonists wanted was to have their rights respected. [Watch the DVD Set “Liberty – The American Revolution” (PBS) to feel the frustration the colonists felt in the years leading up to the American Revolution].

The question was this: How would the colonists respond?

Well, we know how they responded. Looking at the totality of the situation (“The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States…”), the colonists, assembled in the Second Continental Congress, felt it had no other meaningful course but to seek its independence. In asserting what they believed was their natural right of self-determination and right of self-governance, they took a cue from their English roots (the Grand Remonstrance of 1640) and set forth a list of grievances against the King. In the Declaration of Independence, they listed 27 grievances – abuses of their rights – which, as the colonies declared, justified their separation from Great Britain.

When the fighting began the colonies weren’t seeking their independence; they were merely rebelling against tyranny. But North Carolina and then Virginia, and then others, began to call for independence, and on July 2, 1776, the resolution declaring independence was adopted and on July 4, Jefferson’s formal Declaration was issued – “to a candid world. The rebellion turned into a war for independence. Luckily, trust in George Washington paid off and friendship with France paid off as well. After our victory at Saratoga, France sent troops and its naval forces. British General Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown, VA on October 19, 1781 and on September 3, 1783, representatives of King George III of Great Britain and representatives of the United States of America signed the Treaty of Paris to officially end the American Revolutionary War. Article I of the Treaty read: “His Brittanic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz., New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be free sovereign and independent states…” The colonies were free.

But then next question was perhaps more important: How would they secure the liberty and individual rights they had just fought for? What kind of government system would best suit that goal?

Luckily our Founding Fathers were students of history and philosophy. They studied the Greek and Roman republics and knew what made them great and what led to their demise. They knew the history of England – a monarchy – and knew that although the great charters of liberty were written by the English to limit the conduct of the King and then to include Parliament, they also knew that those protections often went unnoticed. There were several attempts in England’s history to limit (forever) the rights of kings to place themselves above the law, but in some cases, the king took the “Divine Right of Kings” doctrine far too seriously. The Divine Right of Kings was the political/ religious doctrine in England that asserted that a monarch is subject to no earthly authority, deriving the right to rule directly from the will of God. Indeed, the history of England was a series of repeated events – abuses of the King over his subjects followed by a charter or petition demanding that their rights be acknowledged and that the King recognize limits to his power, followed by periods where the King or Kings ignored the charter/petition and subjects were again abused, followed by another petition, etc. For example, King John (1199-1216) signed the Magna Carta in 1215 after his barons took up arms against him, but almost immediately, he broke those promises. In 1928, Parliament presented King Charles I with the Petition of Right, complaining of a series of breaches of law and the Great Charter (Magna Carta) he had committed. The violations were of four general types – unfair and illegal taxation, as well as imposing taxes without the action of Parliament, many due process violations, including imprisonment without cause, quartering of soldiers on subjects, and imposing martial law in peacetime. The remainder of his reign would be marked with such extreme abuses that he would eventually be brought to trial and executed. James II, his son, would be another abusive king. With James II, the people (and Parliament) had had finally enough. He was removed by a bloodless revolution and the new King and Queen, William and Mary (Mary being James II’s daughter) signed the English Bill of Rights in 1689. Drafted by Parliament, the Bill of Rights officially set limits to the right of kings to put themselves above the law. The statute which offered the throne to William and Mary legally conditioned their rule on signing and respecting it. And subsequent kings would thus be limited as well.

All of our Founding Fathers knew that history very well. Again, England’s history was the history of the American colonies. But it was, after all, a monarchy. And a monarchy, as shown, was incapable of truly securing the inalienable rights of the individual. A democratic form of government would work either. True democracy is mob rule. It is always a rule by the majority. It could easily be tyranny by the majority.

In drafting the Constitution, which created our system of government here in the United States, our founders decided the best form of government would be a republic. Their study of history taught them that. As James Madison, author of the Constitution, wrote in Federalist No. 10: “Hence it is that democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and in general have been as short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths … A republic, by which I mean a government in which a scheme of representation takes place, opens a different prospect and promises the cure for which we are seeking.”

Article IV Section 4, of the Constitution: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of government … ”

At the Philadelphia Convention in 1787, the task of the delegates was to design the new republic as wisely as possible. like what Dr. Joe Wolverton II wrote in a 2004 article for The New American: “They believed they could find the key to inoculating America against the diseases that infected and destroyed past societies. Indeed, it has been said that the Founders were coroners examining the lifeless bodies of the republics and democracies of the past, in order to avoid succumbing to the maladies that shortened their lives.”

The Constitution was signed by the delegates on September 17, 1787 and then it was sent to each state to be ratified or rejected. Several of the delegates were unhappy with the final draft because it did not include a Bill of Rights and some, including the powerful George Mason from Virginia, promised to try to defeat its ratification in the state conventions. (Patrick Henry planned to help Mason do so). Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, believed strongly that a Bill of Rights needed to be added, but Madison, author of the Constitution, did not. Jefferson wrote: “A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.” States like Virginia and North Carolina and Rhode Island would not ratify unless a Bill of Rights was added, and New York was up in the air. Although it may have been likely that 9 states (as required by Article VII) would have ratified so that the Constitution would have done into effect, the states couldn’t imagine a union without the large powerful states of VA, NY, and NC. And so a deal was made with Madison at the VA Ratifying Convention. He would submit a Bill of Rights as amendments to the Constitution in the first session of the first US Congress. Madison was an honorable man. The rest is history.

Before the deal was made, however, Patrick Henry got up before the Convention to make the case that a Bill of Rights was necessary to secure the blessings of liberty from a government that (as history has always shown) will eventually become too powerful. He spoke these words: “Liberty, the greatest of all earthly blessing — give us that precious jewel, and you may take everything else!….. 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.”

Madison introduced his proposed amendments to the Constitution (a Bill of Rights) to Congress on June 8, 1789, and after a committee put them in final form and Congress adopted them, they were sent to the states on September 25 for ratification. Out of the twelve proposed amendments, the states ratified ten. There are approximately 26 individual rights identified in the Bill of Rights (excluding the unenumerated possibilities in the Ninth Amendment). Of those 26 individual rights, 9 can be traced back to Magna Carta, 7 can be traced to the English Petition of Rights of 1628, and 6 can be traced to the English Bill of Rights of 1689.

I used to think our Founders were divinely inspired to write some of the documents that they wrote….. the words, the themes, the ballsy language. But when you go back and study England’s illustrious history and you read the great charters and documents of liberty – the 1100 Charter of Liberties, the Magna Carta (1215), the Petition of Rights (1628), the Grand Remonstrance (1641), and the English Bill of Rights of 1689 – you realize that our Founders had all the templates they needed. In many cases, they followed in the very footsteps of their forefathers – English subjects – who petitioned every hundred years or more for their rights and for the King to limit his jurisdiction over their lives. For example, the Grand Remonstrance listed a series of grievances against Charles I, from the beginning of his reign, explaining why he needed to answer for his actions. In drafting the Declarations & Resolves of Oct. 14, 1774 (series of petitions and resolutions to King Charles I and Parliament in response to the Intolerable Acts), the First Continental Congress adopted the same petition formats that the English used to their King to petition for the rights that were being violated. In drafting the formal Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson used the same format in order to condemn King Charles III and to make the case to a candid world why the people of the American colonies were seeking their political and legal separation from Great Britain. And so history lessons like this are so important because they serve to remind us that our system rests on a very distinguished history of standing up for liberty against tyranny and that the principles embedded in our documents are ones designed to withstand the abuses of those in power, in any branch. And that is why it is so important that those principles should not be taken for granted, maligned just because our fore-fathers were products of another era, or happened to own slaves or represented social norms of the day or happened to sneeze the wrong way, or “legislated” away from the bench by activist judges. Charles I was a miserable, ambitious King who, perhaps more than any other King of England, embraced the notion of the Divine Right of Kings and hid behind the artificial status it created. He quarreled with Parliament (the people’s body established by the Magna Carta to give them representation when it came to taxation) over taxes. He wanted more and more to finance his endless wars. When Parliament wouldn’t give him the funds he demanded, he merely dissolved the body. He did so three times from 1625-1629. When he dissolved Parliament in 1629, he resolved to rule alone and to get the money he needed. And so he raised revenue through non-Parliamentary means – including Ship Money (taxing those who lived along the coast). Most of these things helped to lead to his demise, which followed after he waged a civil war on Parliament itself, which he lost. Charles was tried, convicted, and executed for high treason by (a rump) Parliament in January 1649. He was beheaded. I point to Charles I because he was so abusive and dismissive of the rights of the people that the damage he did signaled the end of British system. After he was executed, Oliver Cromwell served as Lord Protector over England until his death in 1658. The monarchy was restored two years later, at which time, Charles II took the throne. He ruled until 1685 and when he died, his brother James II took the throne. He was deposed less than 3 years later. William and Mary were offered the throne and England got an official Bill of Rights at their coronation.

But one good thing came out of Charles’ reign. He cracked down quite heavily on the Puritans in England, and as a result, they emigrated (ultimately) to New England to found colonies based on religious liberty and eventually to establish the commonwealth of Massachusetts. The history of England is also one of religious tyranny and persecution, and no doubt provided the passion that certain Founders, such as Thomas Jefferson, had to secure religious freedom in the colonies.

England’s history is vital to our education because in her 600-year-or-so history, her people have stood up for their rights – rights they believed were fundamental and essential to their humanity and dignity – and in the end, their petitions, once merely requesting for the recognition of certain rights, became a Bill of Rights (1689), officially recognizing essential rights belonging to the individual that government was obligated to respect. While England does not have an official Constitution, per se, it considers a group of documents (including the English Bill of Rights) as being its “constitution” or governing document. But those documents, which represented the plight of the English for their rights to be free and to be free from government made it to the minds of our American Founders who then incorporated it into our nation’s founding documents. Our founding documents are superior to England’s because in this country, there is an “official” Constitution and an “official” Bill of Rights and both are predicated on something the English system is not – that government power originates from the individual. Those documents memorialize not only the formal recognition of inalienable individual rights, but they set important limits and boundaries on government. If you don’t think the English system of protest and petition didn’t work and if you don’t think it SHOULD be the model we embrace here – consider this: Each time the English people petitioned for their rights, those rights were enlarged, as mentioned above. Also consider this: The ability to have and bear arms originated as a “duty” in England, under the Militia laws. But after many years of the Crown confiscating guns and leaving England’s subjects undefended and vulnerable in the face of despotic Kings (willing to arrest and imprison them merely for political reasons or belonging to the wrong religion), that duty became a “right” in the English Bill of Rights. We have our Right to Have and Bear Arms (Second Amendment) because of the will and determination of the English people.

References:

“English and Colonial Roots of the US Bill of Rights – http://teachingamericanhistory.org/bor/roots-chart/

Virginia Ratifying Convention, Thursday, June 5, 1788 – http://www.constitution.org/rc/rat_va_04.htm

Federalist No. 6 (Alexander Hamilton), Avalon Project (Yale Law School) – http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed06.asp

“Liberty – The American Revolution” (3 disc, DVD set), PBS – https://shop.pbs.org/

The Petition of Right of 1628 – http://www.constitution.org/eng/petright.htm

The Grand Remonstrance of 1640 – http://www.constitution.org/eng/conpur043.htm

The English Bill of Rights of 1689 – http://avalon.law.yale.edu/17th_century/england.asp

Dr. Joe Wolverton II, “The Founding Fathers & the Classics,” The New American, September 20, 2004. Referenced at: https://21stcenturycicero.wordpress.com/tyrrany/the-founding-fathers-the-classics/

2017 Independence Day Reflection

by Diane Rufino, July 4, 2017

“My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died; Land of the Pilgrims’ pride, from ev’ry mountainside, Let freedom ring!”

Every successful experiment starts with a great hypothesis.  A hypothesis is a testable answer to a scientific question; an educated guess. One can say that our great American experiment started with a profound hypothesis. That hypothesis held that liberty is most secure when it is recognized and accepted that human rights are endowed by the Creator — not by government — and are therefore inalienable; that governments are creations or creatures of the People, instituted primarily to secure their rights and to serve them as they seek to establish an ordered society; and that once government becomes destructive of its ends, the People have the natural and inherent right to alter or abolish it and establish another form of government in its place.

That hypothesis was our Declaration of Independence.

Those who read the Declaration and think it stands merely for the notion 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…” are missing the bigger picture. They are missing out on perhaps the most revolutionary, the most profound, the most important political statement ever made. It is the document that has changed the world.

And yet, in planning to declare independence from Great Britain, our Founders could not know that this document, in all its grandeur and espousing such profound and enlightened principles, would be the vehicle. Perhaps history put the right man in the right place at the right time, for the right purpose.

Once hostilities broke out between the colonies and Great Britain, the colonies sought to use the opportunity to issue a simple declaration, stating that they regarded themselves as no longer a part of the British Empire but rather as free and independent States.  Thomas Jefferson would give us much more than a simple declaration.

On June 7, 1776, acting under the instruction of the Virginia Convention and particularly its presiding officer Edmund Pendleton (who had served as the President of the First Continental Congress), Richard Henry Lee on introduced a resolution in the Second Continental Congress proposing independence for the colonies. The Lee Resolution contained three very simple parts: a declaration of independence, a call to form foreign alliances, and “a plan for confederation.”

Resolved, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.

That it is expedient forthwith to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign Alliances.

That a plan of confederation be prepared and transmitted to the respective Colonies for their consideration and approbation.

On June 11, the Second Continental Congress appointed three concurrent committees to address Lee’s Resolution – one to draft a declaration of independence, a second to draw up a plan to form foreign alliances, and a third to plan a form of a confederation for the colonies. To draft the declaration, Congress named a five-member committee comprised of John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, Robert Livingston of New York, and Roger Sherman of Connecticut. Although Adams was deemed best qualified to write the draft, he urged Jefferson to write it. Jefferson had approached his friend Adams to confirm that he would be drafting the declaration. But Adams responded: “I will not. You should do it. You ought to do it.”  When Jefferson asked why, Adams explained: “Reason first, you are a Virginian, and a Virginian ought to appear at the head of this business. Reason second, I am obnoxious, suspected, and unpopular. You are very much otherwise. Reason third, you can write ten times better than I can.”  [Adams was indeed unpopular; he had represented the British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre

That very day, Jefferson would begin work on the Declaration of Independence. He moved into a small house -two blocks from Independence Hall in Philadelphia, where the Continental Congress had been meeting – in order to write in seclusion. Because several members of the Congress wanted to seek instruction from their colonies before addressing such an extreme measure, the vote was deferred until July 2.

On July 2, the Congress voted on independence. It adopted the Lee Resolution, which, as reproduced above, declared the individual states independent from Great Britain. “Resolved, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.”   But the Congress decided it needed to draft a document explaining the move to the public (“The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world…”)  Such a draft had been proposed and submitted by the Committee of Five (written by Jefferson), and it took two days for the full Congress to agree on the edits. That is why we see the words “IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776,” at the top of the Declaration, because that is the day the last version was approved and signed in Philadelphia, at Independence Hall.

Once the final version was approved, the actual Declaration on Independence document that was signed on July 4 was sent to a printer named John Dunlap. About 200 copies of the Dunlap Broadside were printed and sent to the states, including to General George Washington.

The document was not titled “Declaration of Independence” nor does the term appear anywhere in the document, yet that was clearly its intention. The declaration justified the independence of the colonies by first asserting their collective understanding of the relationship between the individual and government, as well as the purpose and limits of government, then listing the colonists’ grievances against King George III (summing up with the line: “A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people”), and finally asserting certain natural and legal rights, including the right of secession (“That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved”).

The Declaration of Independence was a transformative document.  No longer would individuals have to petition or plead with government to respect their rights. Going forward, government would be established for the primary purpose of securing and enlarging their rights, guaranteeing that an ordered society would be possible while still allowing individuals to exercise the rights that they were born with; governments would no longer treat individuals like “subjects.” They would not be subject to the good graces or generosity of a King or his wrath or insecurity. “Inalienable” would now characterize the rights that their forefathers, Englishmen, could only enjoy if the King allowed it.

I love how exquisitely the Declaration of Independence explains how government is grounded in God’s Law and Nature’s Law and that it is always a creature of the people, for the people. For that reason, governments are always “temporary” in nature, enduring only as long as they protect and secure certain essential individual rights and as long as they serve productive ends. When a government ceases to serve either end, nature and Thomas Jefferson tell us that people have the right, the natural right (the right of self-determination, which is equally as “inalienable” as the right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”) to alter or abolish it. And that is what the people of the American colonies, chose to do. The Declaration made the case for that decision, explaining that the “government” of Great Britain – the King and Parliament – had become destructive and abusive of their rights, which had been set forth in the great Magna Carta and solidified in the English Bill of Rights of 1689. As Jefferson made clear, because “the history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States,” it was their natural right to sever political bonds with it, declare independence, to secede from Great Britain), and to establish a new government better suited to serve them and to respect and exemplify their ideals. The founding principles so brilliantly laid out in the Declaration form a foundation as strong as bedrock for our individual rights. If they are endowed by the Creator, who dare have the authority to take them away?  Similarly, if they are natural rights, belonging to us at our birth, we don’t lose them – just as we don’t lose the ability of our bodies to reproduce and have children and just as a falling body will always be acted on by the force of gravity. Some things are simply absolutes. Nature dictates life since it is from nature that we exist.  Jefferson grounded our rights in both God’s Law and Nature’s Law (some will argue that they are, in fact, one and the same), as the first paragraph of the Declaration makes clear: “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.”

If we only took the time to read this magnificent document, to study it, and to truly understand and appreciate every phrase that Jefferson included, we would have a far deeper sense of gratitude for our Founders and their inspired wisdom and foresight and a far deeper appreciation for what this country stands for (or “stood for”). Perhaps people might even realize that being an American is a far greater privilege that they had ever bothered to contemplate and that maybe, just maybe, such a privilege carries an obligation to conduct oneself in a respectful and dignified manner, always mindful of what he or she represents as a citizen and always ready to defend and exemplify the best that the country stands for. I love our Declaration of Independence, and to me, it is, and has always been, the most important of all founding documents – serving as our nation’s moral compass and forever shining a light on the reasons and principles of our existence.

Jefferson’s profound hypothesis still stands. But has our experiment steered away from hypothesis so that the ultimate question can no longer be answered?  That is the question.  What does the future hold when we’ve loosened the moorings that once tied Liberty to the principles in the Declaration?