Legislative Tyranny: Commentary on a John Locke quotation

So, my mom sent me a link to a Free Republic post, which quotes several sections of John Locke's Two Treatises on Government: sections 221-225. The Free Republic post is here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2474248/posts


Section 221:

The "contrary to their trust" clause is very important, but the next line quoted is the real meat, because Locke is suddenly so much more specific there. Basically, if a legislature or the executive makes itself, the community (whatever that is), or some other person the invader of property and the disposer of life, liberty, or fortune of the People, then the legislative or executive is ripe to be dissolved. (I wonder if Locke considers ignoring such a branch of government to be dissolution?)

I bet if you mention that to anyone in the Federal government, you might get your name put on a list, just in case the Federal government actually becomes tyrannical, so that SWAT teams can scoop you up for your treachery.

Since Socialized Medicine means that the State has a vested interest in how you and I live, the State would then come to your house and demand that you take any test or any medicine or any treatment, regardless of your being a free human being or how safe the intake actually is. Since every Fiat Government in human history likes using the threat of force to get what it wants, you can be rest assured that Socialized Medicine will lead to the Federal government to start threatening people if they don't pay. Oh wait, the IRS already does that. Fiat Government always justifies its actions by the outcomes it wants, regardless of actual outcome. I expect that the most prominent outcome the Federal government will seek is to make everyone in America healthy, but to lower costs first. Money is too important, you know, for the Feds to worry about your genuine safety as a child of God. Then again, the Feds probably should be worrying about foreign threats rather than whether or not I took my medication this morning.

Section 222:

Locke, having a deep interest in property as the most important liberty, focuses on the value of property when a man enters into society.

Locke is right that men look to legislative bodies to protect their property, and that makes sense only as long as that man trusts the legislative. However, history shows that legislatures are the worst entities to go to seeking protection, because they are slow and constantly passing new laws to replace the old laws. I would rather pay a thief to protect my property, because I could at least hold him accountable if he steals something, whereas the legislature could ban something I own and the police, and maybe the National Guard too, would come and take that property of mine and I would then have to fight dozens of jerks rather than one jerk. (However, Governments only lose by suicide, though I will get into that in a later post.)

The first emboldened part of the quote is obviously the most important, and probably because the guy put it in bold when Locke did not (Sarcasm, how original, eh?):

"whenever the legislators endeavour to take away, and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, [the legislators] put themselves into a state of war with the people, who are thereupon absolved from any farther obedience, and are left to the common refuge [defensive force?], which God hath provided for all men, against force and violence."

I don't know any better quote that should be plastered all over the walls of Congress, because the Legislature needs to read it before voting on any bill. Not even the Ten Commandments are this important when considering whether a bill ought to be passed, because the irreligious only listen to the threat of force, just like a typical Statist.

Ought we then to show up at Congress with our rifles and shoot the lot for their crimes? My answer is no. The American People ought to ignore the legislative fiat, because such does not apply to us who can consent only to so much. If they come for our children, offer hot lead. If they come for our guns, offer them all of the hot lead they want. If they come for our lives, get your neighbors to offer them hot lead as you call your relatives for more hot lead.

If the Legislature in DC wants war, they can have it from after they start demanding what they ought not have. We Americans are a people of prudence, killing only in defense of good people . . . and twice for the French. If you have not gone against the Ten Commandments, then how can the Legislators punish you? The Ten commandments are the justification for government, and the limit on government. Every other document is merely redundant for the sake of those who have darkened intellects due to Original and Actual sin, me included.

The next emboldened lines of the quotation speak of the contractual breach that the Legislature commits when it does as Locke describes beforehand. Locke is just being redundant, but only to make sure that the reader understands the implications of oppressive government. I won't go into any more of Locke, because I see this as Locke's most important point. I just wish that he could have not written so much just to get to it. If you haven't read it yet, read it all; it is good moral support in the face of tyranny.

Now, to apply the quotation to America, you would first have to figure out how you could dissolve all of the legislatures of the states and of the Federal government, because, by Locke's standard, each is in violation of their contract and deserving of dissolution. I do realize that some states are better than others, mostly just Texas, but John Locke is defining the principle of government, and that we ought to adhere to that principle. Locke probably did not expect what we have now to come about, but, in his defense, statism requires our kind of technology to procreate (or is that defecate?) at a noticeable speed. I advocate that the legislatures purge the statutes they created and only meet once a year or less.

I will just cut to the chase. Who do you trust more, the government or the People? The Declaration of Independence and Constitution say the People. Therefore, I answer: the People. Fie upon they that threaten my for not giving up what is God-given rightfully mine to keep. I'll keep what God gave to me, thank you very much.


In the Future, I will have to describe how I imagine a government by the consent of the governed would deal with crime, while needing no legislature to define crimes. I will name that Means later in its own post.

In the Future, I will answer the first question in parentheses that I ask regarding whether ignoring part of government equals, to any degree, dissolving that part of government.


Thanks and enjoy what you have because you only have today,
Joe

How to Slow the Inevitable Approach of Tyranny

I have sometimes wondered how we could have come so far here in America and yet tyranny is approaching the proverbial Front Door of America. Tyranny is not quite knocking, but he (Satan) is certainly getting pretty close.

America is not necessarily on the brink of tyranny, and that ought to be debated, but she is nonetheless embracing quite a few principles of, for instance, the Ten Planks of Communism, as presented by Karl Marx in his Communist Manifesto. You can look them up on Wikipedia or Google (a.k.a. The Oracle) if you are curious.

Look at American political history. First, the Founding Fathers, in my opinion, sought to preserve the principles of the Declaration of Independence as long as possible in America. Therefore, they wrote and successfully had ratified the Constitution. The Constitution cannot prohibit tyranny in the long term, because the People can always be fooled inch by inch into accepting such tyranny as Social Security and the Draft. Propaganda is most certainly present today in American government schools (a.k.a. "public schools"), which the Constitution cannot prohibit on its own. God, working through good people, is the real source of our continued freedom.

Second, during Roosevelt''s Devus-Caesar-like reign of three terms as President, the Republicans were establishing beaucracies to slow him down. If an agency is ordered to do something by the President, the agents will first have to fill out all of this crap-to-prove-lawfulness, known as forms. I cannot at this time give you a detailed account, though I am sure that Wikipedia or some real researcher will be able to give the details. Again, The Oracle is your bestest of friends on the Interweb.

Now that we effectively have two governments, the Constitutionally set-up government and the Agentive/Beareaucratic/Departmental government, each has to agree before anything can get done. I will hereafter call the Constitutionally set-up government as the US government and the other as the Federal government. Think of it this way, the Feds can shoot everything that moves, whereas your US representatives can subsidize everything that moves. In either case, they both can kill things, but the second is the less violent and can actually claim Constitutionality as to its existence.

If I sounds a bit pessimistic, consider this. The Founding Fathers created the US government with interdependency-type restraints based on the principles of republicanism. The Republicans of Caesar's, I mean, Roosevelt's reign created the Federal government with independent restraints based on Collectivism, or better known as Slow Tyranny. Statism is Fast Tyranny.

While that accusation against Republicans may seem offensive to Republicans, it ought not be so. Republicans of Roosevelt's time did what they thought was appropriate, with the same concerns as the Mug Wumps (Republicans) of post-Civil War America had as the South was militarily occupied by the Union Army. Republicans have historically been a lot better than Democrats since Lincoln (a Republican) was in office. I hope that is sufficient to nullify any notions that I might somehow hate the Republican Party.


In the future, I will have to eventually define, in toto, the principles of republicanism as I see them. And no, I am not referring to the principles of the Republican party, because that would be irritatingly redundant for me; you can look those up via the GOP's website.

In the future, I will also have to write something on the division of the American government, regardless of how non-CC it may be.

In the future, I need to discuss the phrase, "consent of the governed", as used in the Declaration of Independence.



In Texas, the land of the free and home of the brave,
Joe

Thinking about writing about Republicanism

I have been thinking about what topic I would most enjoy researching and then writing on such in a book. I have been fascinated by how governments function for some time. Lately, I have been finding that such particulars of how a government runs is less important than the principles of why the government functions the way it does.

Always wanting to be somewhat different and yet relevant, I believe that I ought to look into the idea of republicanism. By republicanism, I mean the principles that define the perfect form of republican government; that which makes the ideal republic. I would have to pose the principles of the republic against some current and dominant form of government that if most clearly in opposition to republicanism. As a spoiler, I would like to compare republicanism to statism. The differences may seem obvious, but when you get Communist China and Muslim Iran calling themselves republics, we certainly need to differentiate between false republics and true republics.

Eventually, I will type up a list of what I see as the principles upon which the ideal republic would stand, in contrast to the principles of statism. I guess my argument will revolve around the idea that statism is built on sand and republicanism is build on granite.


Thanks and enjoy life while its easy,
Joe