Individual Liberty — Individual Responsibility 

Three years of being un-American

Yesterday, October 13, 2009 marked the third anniversary of this blog. The very first posting to this blog remarked upon the alleged “right wing smear job” perpetrated by a Democrat against a Democrat. My second posting was about the call for “some sort of climate Nuremberg” by people who seem to think that the tobacco industry is somehow behind the so-called climate-change “denial industry.”

A couple of days later I pointed out the hypocrisy of the Democrats for going after Mark Foley. It seems that his e-mail and text messages were considered by them to be a worse crime than the actual rape and sodomy practiced by one of their own in Congress. After all, the senior senator from New York considered it so bad that he called for Mark Foley’s head. That’s right, the very same Charles E. “Chuck” Schumer that voted against the censure of Gerry Studds.

So what happened in the wake of the Mark Foley scandal? Apparently people were so outraged over behavior that they’re vigorously trying to promote in California, Maryland and other bastions of the “gay marriage” movement that they threw control of Congress over to the left. This was supposed to teach conservatives a “lesson.”

If you're a Democrat and you're caught in a sexual scandal it can be a career enhancement. Look at Gerry Studds and William Clinton. Even the mass media will gloss over it and find some way to praise your wonderful career of "public service." On the other hand, if you're a Republican and you're caught in a sexual scandal, not only will it cost you personally, but the Democrats and the mass media will go out of their way to try to hound you and your leadership out of office.

And of course, if some member of the mass media doesn’t go along with it, why they must be right wing hacks engaged in a smear job against the left, even if they’re actually registered Democrats. Why now, if you happen to agree President Obama that his Nobel prize was not awarded for anything he’d actually accomplished, but only for his intentions – why you must be one with the Taliban.

Three years and nothing really has changed. Nothing that is except the consequences of a continued erosion of our liberties, our sovereignty, and our security. And truth to tell, that erosion doesn’t seem to be much different when the Democrats are in power or the Republicans.

Conservatives are fighting a losing battle, and they have been for as long as I can remember. Every now and then we have a short period of victory, such as the time of Ronald Reagan or Newt Gingrich, but by and large we’re losing.

We’re losing because we continually give ground. We’re losing because tolerance erodes into acceptance. We’re losing because each and every time we compromise our principles we end up resetting the “center point” in the debate in the minds of the people. We’re losing because we overreach and we’re losing because we don’t go far enough.

Take for example our federal “entitlement” programs. Today, one of the central points of the argument over the expansion of these programs is the accepted need for a “social safety net.”

We all recognize that times are hard, harder for some than for others, but generally not as easy as they were even a few years ago. Some people despite years of hard work and sacrifice have fallen upon very hard times indeed. In Oregon the unemployment rate is 11.5%. Just slightly more than one out of every ten people able to work in that state cannot find work. Without work, how do you earn money? Without money, how do you pay for food and shelter? Without food and shelter, how do you survive? Yes, it’s true that some of the people without work simply won’t work, but that’s not true for most of them. These people (the ones willing, but unable to find work) need a social safety net.

Once providing that safety net was the job of the church – and the individual in our society. Today though the government has stepped in to provide it. But – is that the job of government? Can you tell me where in the Constitution of the United States, or in the constitutions of any of the states themselves where those governments are authorized to provide “insurance services?”

Let’s just start with Social Security… and the powers granted to Congress in the United States Constitution. Social Security is an “insurance program” – at least that’s what the law defining it says. So, which of these powers grants the federal government the right to enact this law?

The Congress shall have 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; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

So taxes, duties, imposts and excises can be collected to pay the debts of the United States. They can be used to provide for the common defense of the United States. And they can be used to provide for the general welfare of the United States. The typical excuse given for government excess depends on that last – the “general welfare” of the United States. But – is it the general welfare of the people, or of the United States. I submit that the people are not the United States. Instead, there are 50 states that are united to form the United States, and it is the welfare of that union that this clause applies to. Other language in the Constitution and its amendments supports this view, that the United States refers to the States and not to the people. For example, the eleventh amendment…

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.

Clearly here, the amendment refers to “one of the United States,” a concept separate from the citizens of the states.

Otherwise, I think it’s time to talk to my Congressman and see to his ensuring that the federal government pays my mortgage – oh wait – If I was stupid enough to buy a house I couldn’t afford and the bank was stupid enough to lend me the money to do it with without even checking to see if I could afford it that’s what they’re trying to do isn’t it? How about my car then?

Can you imagine John Adams demanding that the government pay for his farm? Heck, he disowned his own son because he was a dissolute drunkard. I just can’t imagine him expecting the federal government to see to it that Charles Adams had a comfortable living?

And yet, today we expect the government to do just that. Democrats at the very least expect it as a right. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, that icon of the Democrats, to whom President Obama has been compared… put it this way in 1932.

Every man has a right to life; and this means that he has also a right to make a comfortable living.

This became the new starting point in the debate. No longer did a man have a mere right to life, it was a right to a comfortable life. And, as a right, it’s up to the government to preserve it.

Back to the powers granted to Congress.

To borrow Money on the credit of the United States;

OK. I can see that happening all the time. We’re borrowing trillions of dollars every year on the credit of the United States. Why? Because our entitlement programs have grown out of control, because our government has its fingers in so many pies that it cannot afford to pay for them all even with the taxes, duties, imposts and excises it collects. But the power to borrow money is not the power to establish entitlement programs. Is it?

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;

Hm… that doesn’t exactly seem to be the power to establish a social security or health care program now does it? By the way. how does this authorize the federal government in any way to regulate a business that only ever operates locally? Say the espresso stand on the corner? Or a wheat farmer that only sells his wheat locally? Or is that a silly question? Apparently it is, because the U.S. Supreme Court once decided that the wheat farmer in question was engaging in interstate commerce despite not selling his product outside his state.

To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States;

Nope, nothing there about health care or retirement programs. At least not that I can see.

To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;

To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;

To establish Post Offices and post Roads;

To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;

To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court;

To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;

To provide and maintain a Navy;

To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces;

I’m still not seeing it. Are you? Can you tell me how ANY OF THAT that authorizes any entitlement program?

To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

I’ve talked about that power before. In these modern days when we consider the National Guard to be the militia (rather than the older, more traditional definition: all able-bodied males considered by law eligible for military service) it seems to be clear that Congress can call upon the National Guard to enforce federal law, to quell uprisings, and to secure our borders (i.e. repel Invasions). Yet, when it was suggested that the National Guard reinforce the border patrol to prevent the unlawful entry of terrorists into this country the left was outraged at this clearly constitutionally authorized use of the militia? But, once again, I digress.

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings;--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.

There you have it – the enumerated powers of Congress. Nowhere in there do I see an authorization for Social Security, Medicare, Welfare, government ownership of banks or automobile manufacturers, caps on executive salaries, or the current notion of “health care reform.”

Yet, to suggest that we should eliminate the Social Security program – just as an example, is to commit political suicide these days. To do so brands you as an evil person preying upon old people. Social Security has become an accepted fact of life in the United States and our legislators don’t argue from the premise that it is not the government’s business to even be providing the program, but rather about what must be done to fix it.

The Constitution nowhere authorizes the government to be in the health care business. Instead we argue about how to reform the system – with the tacit assumption that only government can do it right. We ignore the failures of other government run health care systems. We ignore the fact that when the government run health care systems of Canada and the United Kingdom fail their citizens those citizens come to the United States to get the care they need. All because somehow we have a “right” to health care – and it’s up to the government to furnish the entitlement.

But… to say that the federal government shouldn’t be involved at all? Why that’s ludicrous. You must be heartless. You must want people to be sick.

But there is an alternative to having the federal government running our daily lives in exchange for entitlement programs. It’s called the tenth amendment.

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.

The power to create a “social safety net” is not one delegated to the United States by the Constitution. The Constitution does not authorize Congress to establish a social security “insurance” program or a national “health care system.” So the question now becomes – is this power prohibited by the Constitution to the States? What exactly does the Constitution prohibit the States from doing?

No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.

No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it's inspection Laws: and the net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the United States; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision and Controul of the Congress.

No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.

…

A Person charged in any State with Treason, Felony, or other Crime, who shall flee from Justice, and be found in another State, shall on Demand of the executive Authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having Jurisdiction of the Crime.

…

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

…

…No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

…

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude

…

The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.

…

The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

That’s it. That’s the list of Constitutional prohibitions on the actions of States. Nowhere there do I see a prohibition against the states providing their own social safety nets. If a state wants to provide its citizens with a government sponsored retirement program or health care program, that’s a power that is reserved to the States and it may lawfully do so – that is, unless it’s own constitution prohibits such a thing. Personally, I think it’s a bad idea for a state to get involved in such things as well – securing your retirement and your health care ought to be your own responsibility rather than something the government coerces others to do for you under penalty of law, but the federal Constitution does reserve that power to the states, or to the people.

So why do people think it’s necessary that the federal government usurp this power of the states? At the risk of being called a racist, I’m thinking that South Carolina was right in 1852 and in 1860. The federal government has long violated the rights of the states. The war of 1861 settled that notion though. The tenth amendment isn’t worth the paper it was printed on.

Conservatives are fighting a losing battle.  All we can do is slow down the dissolution of our republic as it moves closer and closer to a monolithic despotic government. There’s no going back to the system of limited government our founders established and intended.

Such an idea – it’s Un-American!