… not dead yet
Published Fri, Apr 16 2010 4:52 PM
If you’re wondering, no, I haven’t quit blogging. I’m still just as opinionated as ever, and I think I have even more to say now than I have had in the past. I’ve just been really busy lately.
My trip back home was worth every moment. Spending time with my wife and kids was definitely the highlight of the trip. I had a wonderful time at the National Tartan Day celebration, even though it was held a week and a half before National Tartan Day (April 6). Scottish Country Dancing on Monday nights was every bit as much fun as I remembered it, although my wife wasn’t able to attend either session. NorwesCon 33 was just as much fun as I had hoped it would be, and the people were just as different as usual. Getting to see my lovely granddaughter was a blast.
The thing was, it wasn’t a vacation. I had to work every weekday while I was home with the exception of Good Friday, and I didn’t just put in the standard 8 hour days. I averaged closer to 10.5 hours a day with two or three days running closer to 13 hours.
I’ve been back in Salt Lake now for a week. It’s still 10.5 hour days. It’s not quite as hectic as it has been from time to time, but the work just keeps coming. And I know that I’m fortunate to have it even though I don’t get paid a dime for anything past 8 hours.
I’ve just not had much time for anything outside of work and family. I have been working on a new post – ever since ObamaCare Sunday. I hope to have it up soon. While you’re waiting, you might want to read the Declaration of Independence. My new post is a contrast with the Declaration – sort of what I imagine might come from the Democratic Party leadership today – A Declaration of Dependence. I hope to have it finished this weekend – but no promises.
Once I’m done with it, I plan to take a bit of a new tone here. The actions of our governments at just about every level are too distressing for me. Instead I plan to do a series of articles on first principles and how they relate to life in the twenty-first century.
Listening to Rush’s podcast is always fun, and today as I was driving home I heard a black man talking about how hard it was to convince his friends that conservative principles were worthwhile when conservatives continue to talk about returning to our foundational principles – principles which his friends and family claim would have him and them treated as less than whole people. He was basically saying that he would lose the argument because his friends and family consider the founders to have been racist bigots and foundational principles to be racist because of that clause in the Constitution.
Yes, it’s there. It doesn’t mention race, but anyone with half a brain knows that it was talking about black people for the most part in the southern states where slavery was a way of life. So reading the following might lead you to conclude that the founders didn’t consider black people to be as good as other people…
Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons.
The thing about this is it doesn’t mention race at all, save for “Indians not taxed” – which we would take to mean “Native Americans” today in our politically correct culture. It mentions “free Persons” and includes among them those “bound to Service for a Term of Years”, by which it meant people who were not free, but were indentured into servitude for a limited time. In this context “all other Persons” obviously meant anyone that was permanently bound into service – in other words slaves. And – contrary to what you may have heard otherwise – not all slaves were black people, although by far the majority were.
It’s truly a shame that people only look that far and assume that the founders were racists and bigots. It’s a real shame that the reason for that clause is often overlooked when people are taught about our founding and about the Constitution. It’s a shame because the importance of this clause is completely misrepresented in the minds of so many people. This man, and his friends and family have either been taught a completely erroneous interpretation of this clause deliberately, or they have never been taught the context in which the Constitution was written.
Far from being the first “racist” clause in the Constitution this is the first anti-slavery clause in the Constitution. And yet, it’s not taught that way at all. When the reasons for its existence are mentioned it’s merely considered to be a compromise that allowed both the major slave-holding states in the south and the states with economies that weren’t based upon slavery to come to an agreement allowing the establishment of the Constitution – which is true as far as it goes, but only that far.
As I said, this is the first anti-slavery clause in the Constitution. When you consider that the legislature is and was intended to be the pre-eminent branch of the federal government each state’s representation in that legislature was important. The fact that the Senate was ordered so that no state would be able to have more Senators than any other makes it somewhat more difficult for any given state to take advantage of that body – but the House of Representatives is another story entirely.
Each Representative gets a single vote when it comes to legislation. The more Representatives a state can send to the House the more power that state can wield in the federal government. By basing representation in the House upon the population of the states, power within the House was skewed toward the larger and more populous states. In the non-slave-holding states this power and the representation of the state was closely related to the number of people within the state that had a voice in the selection of that representation. Not so in the slave-holding states.
If population alone were the factor in the slave-holding states then the the people able to vote, which most certainly would not have included any person bound to permanent servitude (a slave) would have a disproportionately stronger voice. Such states could simply “import” more persons (slaves) to increase their population and thereby their representation. Having a disproportionately stronger representation in the slave-holding states would have ensured the perpetuation of the institution of slavery.
Do the math – assuming one Representative for every 30,000 persons counted in the census (as the same paragraph of the Constitution recommends), all a slave-holding state would have to do to gain an additional Representative would be to import 30,000 new slaves – but under this clause of the constitution they would have to instead import 50,000 slaves for the same result. On the other hand, a slave-holding state with 150,000 slaves could gain two extra Representatives simply by freeing the slaves – without changing its population at all.
Rather than being the enshrinement of racism and slavery in the Constitution, this clause was a direct attack on the institution of slavery. Rather than looking upon this clause as evidence that the founding principles upon which our nation is based are evil and racist one has only to examine it closely to see that those foundational principles are the principles of liberty for every person, and that a return to them is in the interests of us all.
But of course, the statists in our educational system and the liberals that despise conservative principles don’t want you to know that. Do they?
Trackback URI for this post: http://perrinelson.com/track.aspx?postid=1423
Permalink URI for this post: http://perrinelson.com/2010/4/16/1423.aspx
Subscribe to this entry's
comment feed. (Atom)
David responded with:
 | "But of course, the statists in our educational system and the liberals that despise conservative principles don’t want you to know that. Do they?"
That's one way to look at it, but I'm convinced that , for the most part, today's faux liberals simply do not know and do not care to know the historical/cultural basis of the Constitution at all. It simply does not concern them one whit. They represent it and the Founders in whatever light they desire for their current goals, with no regard whatsoever for facts.
So, it's not that they do not want us to know; it's that they view reality-based knowledge as irrelevant to their fantasies. Their ignorance is irrelevant to them, and anyone who challenges them with facts is to be ignored, derided or otherwise marginalized because anyone who bases arguments on facts is, in their view, just plain stupid. Ideology, not truth, is supreme in their minds. Indeed, ideology, irrespective of facts, IS "truth" to their stunted little pea brains. |
Glenn Mark Cassel AMH1(AW) USN Retired responded with:
 | I was beginning to wonder. Glad to have you back. |
T.F. Stern responded with:
 | Nice to see you writing again as well. This same line of thought can be used to explain how so many use the separation of church and state as an excuse to ban the mention of God in government settings to include public schools.
The leftist agenda is to separate citizens from God and replace that link with government in order to do away with the constitution and bill of rights. Once that has been accomplished the Old America will have been buried. |
Angel responded with:
 | glad u had some nice family time and great to see you expounding as always!:) |