In response to the Trayvon Martin shooting House Democrats are now attempting to put a clause into a Commerce Department spending bill that would withhold grants from states that have ‘stand your ground’ laws. In all truthfulness I’m surprised it took them this long to get around to pulling a stunt like this.

My personal sentiments aside, the arrest and upcoming prosecution of George Zimmerman should remain a local issue, confined to the criminal justice system having jurisdiction over the parties involved in the case. The federal government should not, unless the outcome of the trial is appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, ever become involved in it.

But of course, being the busybodies they are, and applying what Rahm Emanuel said, the federal government simply couldn’t keep their fingers out of an issue they have absolutely no business, nor authority to involve themselves in.

With the insertion of this clause into that Commerce bill the federal government is attempting to limit an unalienable right because one individual may, or may not, have overstepped his authority and abused that right. What they are attempting to do is to bribe, or bully, states into repealing “stand your ground” laws by withholding funds from them if they do not.

Have you ever heard the term coercion? In most instances it is considered a crime, and is defined as “The intimidation of a victim to compel the individual to do some act against his or her will by the use of psychological pressure, physical force, or threats.” But that is hardly relevant any more as it appears that our government seems to consider itself above the law. So what’s a little intimidation to accomplish its goals? But I digress from the issue at hand.

The goal, or endgame of this clause inserted into the Commerce Bill by House Democrats is to further limit a person’s right, and ability, to legally defend their home. By repealing stand your ground laws the government expects us all to rely solely upon law enforcement for our protection, to dial 911 and cower in the corner until police arrive, or make a mad dash for safety, hoping an intruder does not get off a lucky shot and kill us while we are fleeing.

You know, I could almost, [notice I said almost], agree with that idea if there were a policeman on every street corner, ready to respond at a moment’s notice. But unfortunately there isn’t, and in some instances police response times to burglaries take up to 30 minutes.
It is bad enough that in my home state if I use deadly force to defend my home I must be able to prove that I feared for my life, or that of my family. Am I, upon hearing a noise in my home at 2 a.m., poke my head out the bedroom door and ask, “Do you intend to simply rob me, or do you have plans to kill me” before deciding whether or not to pick up a firearm and discharge it? Sorry, and it’s not that I have no respect for human life, but if that scenario were to happen, that individual would have no right being in my house, and therefore would have forfeited all rights to live.

Have you ever heard the phrase a man’s home is his castle? While simply a phrase, the precept dates back to English common law. The Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins states, “You are the boss in your own house and nobody can tell you what to do there. No one can enter your home without your permission. In 1644, English jurist Sir Edward Coke (1552-1634) was quoted as saying: ‘For a man’s house is his castle, et domus sua cuique tutissimum refugium’ (‘One’s home is the safest refuge for all’).”

While some may see this as a Second Amendment right, it isn’t, it is much more. It boils down to the basic premise of property rights. Does your home belong to you, or does it belong to the government? If it is yours, then how can the government lay any restrictions upon YOU personally defending it?

Many of our laws have, as their origins, English Common Law, as it existed at the time our founders drafted the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. In the 18th century Sir William Blackstone wrote a treatise entitled Commentaries on the Laws of England, from which I quote, “The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defense . . .” The right of self-defense was, at the time our nation was founded, considered a fundamental, inalienable right or natural law. Our founders would have laughed in the face of anyone who told them they must first retreat to safety before defending what was rightfully theirs.

From his treatise The Law, Frederic Bastiat stated, “Each of us has a natural right—from God—to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two.”

Of all the laws my government passes which infringe upon my rights, the ones they pass which infringe upon my unalienable right to defend my family, my property, and myself, are the ones that bring my blood to a boil.
Have you ever heard the term serf? From Wikipedia I quote, “Serfdom is the status of peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to manorialism. It was a condition of bondage or modified slavery which developed primarily during the High Middle Ages in Europe and lasted in some countries until the mid-19th century.

Serfs who occupied a plot of land were required to work for the Lord of the Manor who owned that land, and in return were entitled to protection, justice and the right to exploit certain fields within the manor to maintain their own subsistence. Serfs were often required not only to work on the lord’s fields, but also his mines, forests and roads. The manor formed the basic unit of feudal society and the Lord of the Manor and his serfs were bound legally, economically, and socially. Serfs formed the lowest social class of feudal society.”
I don’t know about you, but I am not a serf, I am a freeman, with all the associated rights that go along with being a freeman. I don’t like it when my government thinks it can tell me what I can, or cannot do, with my land or my property. And I most certainly do not like it when they tell me I cannot defend what I have worked for all my life!

James Madison in writing about property, once said, “In the former sense, a man’s land, or merchandize, or money is called his property…He has a property very dear to him in the safety and liberty of his person…In a word, as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights. Where an excess of power prevails, property of no sort is duly respected. No man is safe in his opinions, his person, his faculties, or his possessions.”

I don’t know if this bill is going to pass Congress and I don’t know if the states will crumble under the pressure and infringe upon our right to defend what is ours. In Thomas Jefferson’s Commonplace Book he quotes Cesare Beccaria, “False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.”

Our government was instituted to safeguard our rights, and instead it is guilty of violating them every chance it gets. I, for one, am sick and damn tired of it. To close, I’d like to quote the opening comments from Bastiat’s The Law, “The law perverted! And the police powers of the state perverted along with it! The law, I say, not only turned from its proper purpose but made to follow an entirely contrary purpose! The law become the weapon of every kind of greed! Instead of checking crime, the law itself guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish!
If this is true, it is a serious face, and moral duty requires me to call the attention of my fellow-citizens to it.” Having said my piece I have called your attention to another attempt by your government to pervert the law. Whether or not you choose to remain silent, or idle about it is entirely up to you. But in this instance, I WILL stand my ground!

Abraham Lincoln is thought to be one of our nation’s better presidents. Although I tend to disagree, there are many things Lincoln said that, on the surface, echo the sentiments I myself feel. Among them is the following quote, taken from Lincoln’s address to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield Illinois on January 27, 1838, “Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well-wisher to his posterity swear by the blood of the Revolution never to violate in the least particular the laws of the country, and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and laws let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor…”

Yet how can a people pledge support to something they know absolutely nothing about? Last year Newsweek magazine gave the U.S. Citizenship test to 1,000 Americans. The results were both telling, and disheartening. 38% of the people failed it; 29% could not name the vice president; 63% did not know the correct number of Supreme Court Justices, let alone any of their names; 70% did not know that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land; and 40% could not explain the purpose of the Bill of Rights. In another survey it was found that one-fourth of all Americans could name all five members of the cartoon family the Simpsons, yet only one out of a thousand people could name all five rights protected by the First Amendment.

Ben Franklin, in his Poor Richards Almanac, once said, “Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.” When one talks of the heroes of our nation’s war for independence, the name Nathanial Greene is not one whose name immediately comes to mind. Yet he was a leading figure and a general who served under the command of George Washington.

Greene was a Quaker whose father had no use for formal education, and the lack thereof saddened him. In fact, Greene is quoted as saying, “I lament the want of a liberal education. I feel the mist [of] ignorance to surround me…”

Noah Webster, whose name is synonymous with the Merriam-Webster dictionary, once stated, “Every child in America should be acquainted with his own country. He should read books that furnish him with ideas that will be useful to him in life and practice. As soon as he opens his lips, he should rehearse the history of his own country.”

I constantly hear people tell me that they are simply too busy to devote the time and effort that I do in studying the writings of our founding fathers, or the many pieces of legislation our Congress enacts. Yet Confucius once said, “No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance.”

When I write I find that I am often rejected and scorned by people who, in all likelihood, would be among those who failed the U.S. Citizenship test as given by Newsweek magazine. They find it inconceivable that their government could be either so completely inept, or so completely corrupt, that it is guilty of violating our unalienable rights, and destroying our way of life as envisioned by the founding fathers.

I have no idea who Michael Rivero is, but he said something I tend to agree with, “Most people prefer to believe their leaders are just and fair in the face of evidence to the contrary, because most people don’t want to admit they don’t have the courage to do anything about it.”

And Hendrik Willem Van Loon also stated, “Any formal attack on ignorance is bound to fail because the masses are always ready to defend their most precious possession-their ignorance.”

Yet James Madison clearly warned us that “Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.”

I see so many people who stand behind their government or the political party of their choice that they are blind to the flagrant violations of our rights by the government as a whole. In 1956 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, “Because of what appears to be a lawful command on the surface, many citizens, because of their respect for what only appears to be a law, are cunningly coerced into waiving their rights, due to ignorance.”

Have we become so ignorant as to the spirit of resistance to government that this country was founded upon that we cannot see that we still retain that right? In a speech before the House of Representatives in 1848, Abraham Lincoln stated, “Any people anywhere being inclined and having the power have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right…Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people that can may revolutionize and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit.”

The Supreme Court: Sixteenth American Jurisprudence, states, “The general rule is that an unconstitutional statute, though having the form and name of law, is in reality no law, but is wholly void, and ineffective for any purpose; since unconstitutionality dates from the time of its enactment, and not merely from the date of the decision so branding it. An unconstitutional law, in legal contemplation, is as inoperative as if it had never been passed. Such a statute leaves the question that it purports to settle just as it would be had the statute not been enacted. Since an unconstitutional law is void, the general principles follow that it imposes no duties, confers no rights, creates no office, bestows no power or authority on anyone, affords no protection, and justifies no acts performed under it…. A void act cannot be legally consistent with a valid one. An unconstitutional law cannot operate to supersede any existing valid law. Indeed, insofar as a statute runs counter to the fundamental law of the land, it is superseded thereby. No one is bound to obey an unconstitutional law and no courts are bound to enforce it.”

In his series The Crisis, Thomas Paine wrote, “Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death…Let them call me rebel and welcome, I feel no concern from it; but I should suffer the misery of devils, were I to make a whore of my soul by swearing allegiance to one whose character is that of a sottish, stupid, stubborn, worthless, brutish man.”

It takes a certain degree of courage to stand alone when the vast majority is more than content to follow public sentiment like a herd of cattle or sheep. Yet Einstein denounced the masses when he said, “He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice.”

Yet that is what I am faced with whenever I try to open people’s eyes to what is really happening in this country, not what they are spoon fed by the whores on the network news channels. And, as Thomas Paine once said, “To argue with a person who has renounced the use of reason is like administering medicine to the dead.” And in all fairness to the dead, they are probably more open to reason than are most registered voters in this country today…

The philosopher George Santayana once said, “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Has this country, once again, found itself at the point where its citizens must resort to taking up arms to restore their unalienable rights?

In recent history Ronald Reagan is probably best known as being the last of the true conservative presidents. While I will refrain from arguing as to whether that is in fact true, Reagan did say something that people really ought to consider; “Protecting the rights of even the least individual among us is basically the only excuse the government has for even existing.”

Andrew Jackson, our nation’s seventh President once said, “As long as our government is administered for the good of the people, and is regulated by their will; as long as it secures to us the rights of persons and of property, liberty of conscience and of the press, it will be worth defending.” Ponder that and then ask yourself if our government fits the criteria of being worth defending.

George Washington once said, “The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.”

Have we, the American people, become so apathetic, so complacent, that we have forgotten what it means to be free men? Thomas Jefferson once warned “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”

In 1785 James Madison stated, “The free men of America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise, and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle.”

From his Rights of British America, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Single acts of tyranny may be ascribed to the accidental opinion of a day; but a series of oppressions, begun at a distinguished period and pursued unalterably through every change of ministers, too plainly prove a deliberate, systematic plan of reducing [a people] to slavery.”

Because we, the American people, do not understand the nature of our rights, the purpose for which government was instituted, we have allowed our government to grow into something altogether alien to the creature our founders intended.

To again quote from Madison’s Memorial and Remonstrance, “The preservation of a free Government requires not merely, that the metes and bounds which separate each department of power be invariably maintained; but more especially that neither of them be suffered to overleap the great Barrier which defends the rights of the people. The Rulers who are guilty of such an encroachment, exceed the commission from which they derive their authority, and are Tyrants. The People who submit to it are governed by laws made neither by themselves nor by an authority derived from them, and are slaves.”

There are those of us who understand the intent of our nation’s founders and are both saddened and angered at what this country has become. We feel, as did our founders when they declared, “Honor, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them if we basely entail hereditary bondage on them.”

If history does indeed repeat itself, then the words of George Washington must surely once again apply to America today, “The time is near at hand which must determine whether Americans are to be free men or slaves.”

In a letter to William Small, Thomas Jefferson once posed the following question, “Can it be believed that a grateful people will suffer [individuals] to be consigned to execution, whose sole crime has been the developing and asserting their rights?” It saddens me to say that in a nation so frightened of its own shadow and supposed terrorists behind every bush, I would have to say the answer to that question would be yes.

This upcoming presidential election may be this nation’s last chance at halting our slide into tyranny…if it isn’t too late already. The American people need to think long and hard about whom they will cast their vote for in November. We have been promised time and time again by candidates on both sides of the aisle that they will bring about change, but what we end up with is more of the same.

In 1985 John Mellencamp released his album Scarecrow which contained a song entitled Stand For Something, from which I quote, “You’ve got to stand for something Or you’re gonna fall for anything.” For far too long we have fallen for anything, not really knowing where we stand. Where I stand can best be summed up by what Patrick Henry said in March of 1775, “For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery…” And in closing I echo the words with which he ended that famous speech, “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

In doing the research for this article I came across a quote I’d like to share. In an address at Harvard University on September 8, 1836 Judge Joseph Story said, “No one appreciates more fully than myself the general importance of the study of the law. No one places a higher value upon that science as the great instrument by which society is held together and the cause of public justice is maintained and vindicated. Without it, neither liberty, nor property, nor life, nor that which is even dearer than life, a good reputation, is for a moment secure.”

Samuel Adams once declared “The natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on Earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man, but only to have the law of nature for his rule.”

Our Declaration of Independence states that “…all men are created equal…” Therefore if what Adams said was true, that all men are to be free from the legislative authority of man, how is it that a group of men may pass laws which limit our rights or take the fruits of our labors to give to others who are less fortunate?

The other day I had the rare opportunity to speak to a man running for the position of superior court judge on this matter. He had dropped by my home asking if I’d allow him to place a sign in my yard supporting him. I told him that I’d first have to study his positions on the issues before making a decision.

After reading the flyer he gave me I decided I would like his answer to a question. So on his Facebook page I sent him a message asking, “Why is it that if the Second Amendment applies equally to all, that some states, such as California, may pass laws prohibiting the possession of certain type firearms when in neighboring states those same weapons are perfectly legal?”

He responded by sending me his cell phone number, suggesting I call him so he could explain the matter in greater detail than Facebook would allow. So I did. I am paraphrasing now, but his basic premise was that in the case of D.C. v Heller the Supreme Court had left it up to the states to determine what is in their best interests regarding what type guns they will allow their citizens to possess.

We ended up talking about 20 minutes, with me arguing my position, and he arguing from a legal standpoint. He mentioned that is was nice to find someone who was, so obviously well read, but that he and I do not see eye to eye on the matter. But I did learn one thing that I was not aware of, when the Supreme Court takes on a case they argue it on the narrowest possible scope. For instance, in D.C. v Heller they only argued as to whether the Second Amendment applied to an individual’s right to own firearms, or whether it was associated with service in the militia.

I then asked if I wanted to contest a state law which infringes upon my right to own a prohibited firearm I would first have to buy, and then be arrested and convicted for possession of that firearm. I would then have to appeal and appeal until hopefully the Supreme Court took, and then ruled favorably upon the matter. He agreed, but suggested it would not be a wise course of action.

Although the purpose of laws has been on my mind for a while now, it was only after my conversation with the candidate for judge that I decided to begin researching for this article. What follows are some of the things I discovered with my own thoughts tossed in for good measure.

In his Novanglus Essay No. 7, John Adams wrote “A government of laws, and not of men.” But what is law, what is its purpose, and what happens when those empowered to make and uphold the law either abuse it, or adopt unconstitutional laws?”

That, my friends, is the question we should all be asking ourselves. When a law is passed, be it at the federal, state, or local level, it affects each and every one of us. By passing that law government somehow limits our freedom by imposing restrictions on our ability to do certain things, making the violation of that law a criminal act.

Our founders realized that to form our system of government we would have to cede some of our sovereignty to the newly created government. They therefore put limits upon the power of the federal government, and included a Bill of Rights to place certain rights out of the reach of governmental interference.

John Locke once said, “The end of law is not to abolish or restrain, but to preserve and enlarge freedom.” Can you honestly say that with all these laws regulating and controlling your life that you are freer than you would have been without them?

In the Supreme Court case of West Virginia Board of Education vs. Barnette, Justice Robert Jackson stated, “The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyind the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One’s right to life, liberty and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend upon the outcome of no elections.”

To carry that one step further, Justice Hugo Black once said, “It is my belief that there are ‘absolutes’ in our Bill of Rights, and that they were put there on purpose by men who knew what the words meant and meant their prohibitions to be ‘absolutes.’”

In the Supreme Court’s ruling on Ex Parte Grossman, they state, “The language of the Constitution cannot be interpreted safely, except where reference to common law and to British institutions as they were when the instrument was framed and adopted. The statesmen and lawyers of the convention who submitted it to the ratification of conventions of the thirteen states, were born and brought up in the atmosphere of the common law and thought and spoke in its vocabulary…when they came to put their conclusions into the form of fundamental law in a compact draft, they expressed them in terms of common law, confident that they could be shortly and easily understood.”

In his Commentaries on the Laws of England, Sir William Blackstone states, “This law of nature, being coeval with mankind and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other-It is binding over all the globe in all countries, and at all times; no human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this: and such of them as are valid derive all their force, and all their authority, mediately or immediately, from this original.”

In 1850 Frederic Bastiat wrote a short book entitled The Law, from which we find, “What, then, is law? It is the collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense. Each of us has a natural right—from God—to defend his person, his liberty, and his property. These are the three basic requirements of life, and the preservation of any one of them is completely dependent upon the preservation of the other two…If every person has the right to defend—even by force—his person, his liberty, and his property, then it follows that a group of men have the right to organize and support a common force to protect those rights constantly .”

Bastiat goes on to say, “We must remember that law is force, and that, consequently, the proper functions of the law cannot lawfully extend beyond the proper functions of force. When law and force keep a person within the bounds of justice, they impose nothing but a mere negation. They oblige him only to abstain from harming others. They violate neither his personality, his liberty, nor his property. They safeguard all of these. They are defensive; they defend equally the rights of all.”

Our system of government, and remember this, we are not a democracy where the majority rules, we elect men and women to office to represent us within the limits imposed upon them by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. We the people are still the sovereigns.

In the case of Yick Wo v. Hopkins the Supreme Court stated, “Sovereignty itself is, of course, not subject to law, for it is the author and source of law; but in our system, while sovereign powers are delegated to the agencies of government, sovereignty itself remains with the people, by whom and for whom all government exists and acts.”

Read that as many times as you must for it to sink in, but it is of the utmost importance that you understand that principle, we are the boss, and our government has absolutely no legal authority to enact laws which violate any of our rights.

I talk much about tyranny and oppression by our government, but there is something I’d like for you to consider. The famous French philosopher Montesquieu once said, “There is no crueler tyranny than that which is perpetuated under the shield of law and in the name of justice.”

Yet because we do not understand the purpose for which our legislators were granted the authority to enact law, in short, because we have become ignorant, we tolerate laws which violate and infringe upon all our rights.

In the case of U.S. vs. Minker, page 187, the Court stated, “Because of what appears to be a lawful command on the surface, many citizens, because of their respect for what only appears to be a law, are cunningly coerced into waiving their rights, due to ignorance.”

In a 1911 edition of the North American Review, former Supreme Court Justice Horace H. Lurton stated, “The contention that…the Constitution is to be disregarded if it stands in the way of that which is deemed of the public advantage…is destructive of the whole theory upon which our American Commonwealths have been founded.”

In his dissenting argument on the case of Poulos v. New Hampshire, Justice William O. Douglas stated, “When a legislature undertakes to proscribe the exercise of a citizen’s constitutional right to free speech, it acts lawlessly; and the citizen can take matters in his own hands and proceed on the basis that such a law is no law at all.”

Ever since 9/11 our government has enacted laws designed to protect us from terrorism. Remember, Justice Lurton said, that even though it may be deemed in the public interest it is destructive of the theory upon which this country was built.

James Madison once warned “If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.” Furthermore, Thomas Jefferson said, “Single acts of tyranny may be ascribed to the accidental opinion of the day; but a series of oppressions, begun at a distinguished period, and pursued unalterably through every change of ministers (administrators) too plainly proves a deliberate, systematic plan of reducing us to slavery.”

Now consider the words of William Douglas from the case of Osborn v. United States, “These examples and many others demonstrate an alarming trend whereby the privacy and dignity of our citizens is being whittled away by sometimes imperceptible steps. Taken individually, each step may be of little consequence. But when viewed as a whole, there begins to emerge a society quite unlike any we have seen — a society in which government may intrude into the secret regions of man’s life at will.”

It would behoove us all to make the effort to understand the purpose for which our government was instituted, and the purpose for which laws were to be enacted…that is if you even remotely value your freedom.

I for one, take Justice Potter Stewart’s words seriously, “The right to defy an unconstitutional statute is basic in our scheme. Even when an ordinance requires a permit to make a speech, to deliver a sermon, to picket, to parade, or to assemble, it need not be honored when it’s invalid on its face.”

But then again, as Voltaire once said, “It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.”

When people get home from work in the afternoon/evening, what is it they normally do? Usually they will take a shower or bath, grab some supper, then sit down and watch the evening news. What exactly is the news? News is defined as “a report of recent events; previously unknown information.”

People watch the news to become informed, and it follows that they form opinions based upon the information provided them. If the information is incomplete, or incorrect, then it also follows that the ensuing opinions will be flawed due to lack of factual information.

The Society of Professional Journalists has a code which all journalists are supposed to adhere to. From their Preamble I quote, “Members of the Society of Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist’s credibility. Members of the Society share a dedication to ethical behavior and adopt this code to declare the Society’s principles and standards of practice.”

But do they actually adhere to that code? As with all codes and oaths, people are often predisposed to violate them rather than uphold them. Just take a look at how many people violate their marriage vows, or how many of our elected representatives fail to uphold their oath to support and defend the Constitution.

I can see how it would be hard for a professional journalist to leave their personal biases out of their reporting, but what if they were intentionally misleading the public by inserting a certain angle to a story, or leaving out crucial information to manipulate the sentiments of the public?

To give you a quick example of what I suggest, let me ask you why the news media continues to ignore Ron Paul, going so far as to call him unelectable, when every campaign rally he holds is packed to the gills with supporters? I am not stumping for Ron Paul, merely asking why the news media refuses to report on something factual, yet they do report that he is unelectable, which clearly may not be the case if they would report the truth and let the viewer’s decide for themselves?

In 1917, Representative Oscar Calloway of Texas stated in Congress “In March, 1915, the J.P. Morgan interests, the steel, shipbuilding, and powder interest, and their subsidiary organizations, got together 12 men high up in the newspaper world and employed them to select the most influential newspapers in the United States and sufficient number of them to control generally the policy of the daily press. … They found it was only necessary to purchase the control of 25 of the greatest papers. An agreement was reached; the policy of the papers was bought, to be paid for by the month; an editor was furnished for each paper to properly supervise and edit information regarding the questions of preparedness, militarism, financial policies, and other things of national and international nature considered vital to the interests of the purchasers.”

Hmmm, “…an editor was furnished for each paper to properly supervise and edit information… vital to the interests of the purchasers.” Could it possibly be true that the news media is censoring what information you receive and that therefore the opinions you form based upon that information are subsequently faulty?

Richard Salent, former president of CBS News once said, “Our job is to give people not what they want, but what we decide they ought to have.” Richard M. Cohen, Senior Producer of Political News for CBS also said, “We are going to impose our agenda on the coverage by dealing with issues and subjects that we choose to deal with.”

In a room packed full of journalists, John Swinton, former editor of the New York Tribune stated, “There is no such thing as an independent press in America, unless it is in the country towns. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid $150.00 a week for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for doing similar things. If I should permit honest opinions to be printed in one issue of my paper, like Othello, before twenty-four hours, my occupation would be gone. The business of the New York journalist is to destroy truth; to lie outright; to pervert; to vilify, to fawn at the feet of Mammon; to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. We are the tools and vessels for rich men behind the scenes. We are intellectual prostitutes.”

Albert Einstein once said, “The ruling class has the schools and press under its thumb. This enables it to sway the emotions of the masses.” Think back to what Representative Calloway said, and you will see that the news you are being told in the papers, and on the TV, regardless of whether you watch FOX, CNN, or any of the other network channels, is designed to guide you, manipulate you in the way you view stories. You are being BRAINWASHED, when you THINK you are being given the whole story and are therefore making sound decisions based upon fact.

Why else would David Rockefeller state “We are grateful to the Washington Post, the New York Times, Time Magazine, and other great publications whose directors have attended our meetings and respected their promises of discretion for almost 40 years.”? What was it that Rockefeller had to hide, and what was it that the media promised not to report upon?

The truth is that the news media routinely lies or distorts the truth when it reports. In fact, in 2003 a Florida appeals court ruled that there is absolutely nothing illegal about lying, concealing, or distorting information by a major press organization. This came about when journalist Jane Akre charged she was pressured by the Fair and Balanced FOX news to air what she knew to be false information.

In more recent news, sorry for the pun, NBC launched an internal investigation to see if someone had aired an edited version of the 911 call made by George Zimmerman in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin. According to reports, the edited version made it appear that Zimmerman had profiled Martin as a black man, when it was, in fact the 911 operator who had asked Zimmerman about the suspects race. I am not taking sides on the Zimmerman case, merely showing how the news media can distort the truth so as to inflame public opinion to further some sort of an agenda.

How many people heard, or recall, the statement made by Nancy Pelosi prior to the passage of the Health Care legislation? Pelosi is quoted as saying that Congress “…”[has] to pass the bill so you can find out what’s in it, away from the fog of controversy.”

Our government operates on fear, the more fear you have the more you look to them to solve all sorts of problems. The more fearful you are, the more power they get. They don’t want you to think, to understand the issues. If you did, they would lose their power. That is why Pelosi said that, just pass the damn bill, then find out what’s in it. That’s like saying go have sex with a prostitute, then find out if she has AIDS.

And it’s not just the news media who uses information to push forth an agenda, or influence you in your thinking. Hell, I do it all the time by providing quotes which support my point of view. But I never once asked you to take my word for it. I always ask that you go out and seek the truth yourself. They always say, the truth will set you free. Unfortunately too many people lack the motivation to put in the time and effort to find the truth. They would rather have the truth spoon fed to them.

A perfect example of this is a video making its way around the internet. It begins with some quotes by Barack Obama, in which he sounds as if he is saying the Constitution is a flawed document. People know how much I despise Obama, how I’d like to see him at the end of a rope right next to George W. Bush. But in all fairness the person who created this video is just as guilty of editing Obama’s words as did NBC when they edited Zimmmermans 911 call.

What Obama was discussing was the colonial culture in regards to the worth and value of African Americans as slaves and how the Constitution reflected that flaw in thought. While I disagree, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are not flawed, it is men who are flawed, I cannot condone the convenient editing of a person’s words to influence opinion, no matter how much I despise that person.

What I am trying to say is that you don’t have to completely stop watching the news, but if you do watch it realize that they have an agenda, and that they are not giving you the full story. If you want the truth, you are going to have to get off your ass and go out and look for it.

As the title of this article implies, I believe the news media are nothing more than prostitutes whose pimps are the special interests groups who own and control them. If that be the case, then the public who buys into the lies they are being told are the Johns who are serviced by these presstitutes. And you know what happens if you continue visiting a prostitute; you get a venereal disease? Well if you continue to believe everything the news media tells you, then something far worse is going to happen; you are going to wake up one day and find that your country has fallen into socialism and that you have been lied to by people you trusted.

As Morpheus tells Neo in the Matrix, you can either take the red pill and see how deep the rabbit hole goes, or you can take the blue pill and go back to your life. Your choice, I’m just here to let you know that the truth is out there, if you have the desire to seek it.

Monsanto once told the New York Times “Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food…” They went on to say, “Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the FDA’s job.”

Isn’t it interesting that the FDA official who decided not to label Monsanto’s milk was Michael Taylor, who once worked as a corporate lawyer for Monsanto, and now works for the Obama administration in charge of food safety?

What is happening in Vermont is just a mirror image of what is happening on a larger scale across the nation. Our elected representatives, and the people they select to key positions, are either influenced by, or directly working for corporations and special interests, and not for the best interest of the people whom they are supposed to represent.

These people are passing laws which are bringing us closer and closer to slavery. Under the banner of the war on terror they have passed numerous laws which label dissidents, such as myself, as potential domestic terrorists, they have given themselves the authority to curtail our free speech, to incarcerate, and even assassinate those whom they fear to be serious threats to their control over us.

Benjamin Franklin once said, “They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” That sentiment applies equally to those who either actively support these laws infringing upon our rights, or those who are so ignorant and apathetic that they care not to seek out the truth.

Although I am not that big a fan of Ronald Reagan, he 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.”

Look at our nation today, our government, and the media, find all manner of ways to label those who seek out and speak of the corruption in government as conspiracy theorists or threats to our democracy, ‘our way of life.’ They do not even realize that we are not a democracy; we are a representative republic in which our lawmakers are bound by the constraints of the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Winston Churchill once said, “If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival. There may even be a worse case: you may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.”

Make no mistake, this is a fight; a fight between those who wish to see us deprived of all the rights and liberty which our founders bequeathed to us, and those who understand this and are struggling to awaken whatever remaining spark of liberty that remains in the people of this country.

It is claimed that there is a distinct difference between the United States of the 1700’s and the U.S. of 2012; that the colonists were fighting for, not only their rights, but the ability to be represented by officials of their own choosing, while we already have representatives in government who are duly elected by the people. But our Declaration of Independence clearly states, “That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it…”

Should we elect another puppet of the special interests into the Oval Office, and our nation continues on its current course, do you honestly believe that our rights and our economic future will be in better hands than they are now?

Going back to this Monsanto issue in Vermont once again, in 1773 a group of patriots disguised themselves as Indians and dumped tea belonging to the East India Company into Boston Harbor. This iconic event we now know as the Boston Tea Party. Were an event of the same scale, say the hijacking of a Monsanto truck, and the subsequent burning of all the goods inside, be committed today, the patriots committing it would be hunted down, labeled domestic terrorists.

Founder James Wilson once said, “The enemies of liberty are artful and insidious … liberty herself is treated as a traitor and an usurper … Against these enemies of liberty, who act in concert … the patriot citizen will keep a watchful guard.”

Our nation was founded upon this very spirit of resistance and Jefferson once said, “The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive. It will often be exercised when wrong, but better so than not to be exercised at all.”

In his Second Treatise of Civil Government, John Locke states, “…whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they 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, which God hath provided for all men, against force and violence. Whensoever therefore the legislative shall transgress this fundamental rule of society, and either by ambition, fear, folly or corruption, endeavor to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other, an absolute power over the lives, liberties, and estates of the people; by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the people, who have a right to resume their original liberty…”

In Federalist 28, Alexander Hamilton states, “If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense… The obstacles to usurpation and the facilities of resistance increase with the increased extent of the state, provided the citizens understand their rights and are disposed to defend them.” The key issue then is do the vast majority of the people in this country understand their rights, and are they disposed to defend them? From what I have seen, the answer is an overwhelming no.

The movie V for Vendetta opens with the following poem; Remember remember the Fifth of November, the gunpowder, treason and plot. I see no reason why the gunpowder, treason should ever be forgot.”

I say we should grow a set and begin standing up for our rights. I say, remember December 16, 1773 and the spirit of the men who took direct action against those who would impose restrictions upon their freedom.

Thomas Jefferson declared, “…what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

In his Flag Day speech in 1915 President Woodrow Wilson stated, “The lines of red are lines of blood, nobly and unselfishly shed by men who loved the liberty of their fellowmen more than they loved their own lives and fortunes. God forbid that we should have to use the blood of America to freshen the color of the flag. But if it should ever be necessary, that flag will be colored once more, and in being colored will be glorified and purified.”

I do not believe that by installing Ron Paul into the Oval Office that we can make that big a change. In saying that I have no problems with what Ron Paul stands for, I merely believe that the powers that control our governments are so entrenched and so powerful that even a four year presidency of Ron Paul could not slow them down in their plans to enslave us. I also believe, that we have reached the point, as Churchill stated were we may “…may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.”

After Jefferson’s initial draft was amended, it was presented to the Continental Congress for consideration. After much debate, and further amending, it was finally agreed upon, and eventually signed by 56 men, who knew that in affixing their signatures to this historic document, had quite possibly signed their own death warrants.

Yet the Declaration of Independence is much more than a statement saying that the colonies were declaring their independence from Britain, it is probably the most eloquent statement regarding the origin of our rights, and the purpose for which governments are instituted.

In my writings I have used bits and pieces of the Declaration of Independence to support my position, but never have I provided the entire text concerning the subject matter currently being discussed. Therefore, for your enlightenment, I provide, unedited, the entire paragraph of which I now speak.

“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.”

The Declaration of Independence closes by saying, “And 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.”

Our nation’s Constitution and Bill of Rights was written, and ratified, by men who shared the belief that our rights come from our Creator, and that they were inherent, unalienable, and that it was the function of government to protect them from infringement.

It is now two hundred thirty six years since a brave group of men declared their independence from tyranny, stating that their rights were a gift from their Creator, not to be tampered with, or infringed by their government, and once again we find the heavy hand of government doing just that.

People no longer understand the nature of their rights, and due to their ignorance government, once again, has amassed powers far beyond those which it was intended they ever possess. And since they are ignorant, they are easily misled by the forces which act in concert to ridicule, denigrate, and condemn anyone who stands up for their rights.

We, those of us, who are fortunate enough to understand the origin of our rights, and the fact that no body of men has the authority to infringe upon them, are now considered to be threats to society because we merely want the same thing our founders did in 1776…freedom from tyranny.

Journalist H.L. Mencken once said, “The average man does not want to be free. He simply wants to be safe.” That is so true, all the government has to do is say that a law, which infringes upon a right, is designed to make us safer, and the majority of the people will gladly surrender that right just to feel a bit safer.

By the very nature of rights, you may choose not to exercise it, but it can never be taken from you. If you meekly go about your life without standing up for your rights, it does not mean that those rights have been taken from you, it merely means that you do not have the courage to stand up for them.

Our nation’s founders realized that their rights were such precious gifts that they placed their very lives on the line to stand up against oppression by their government. Walter Lippmann once said, “He has honor if he holds himself to an ideal of conduct though it is inconvenient, unprofitable, or dangerous to do so.” Those of us who understand the nature of our rights, and are ready, and willing to fight for them, are, with increasing frequency, placing ourselves in danger as our government continues to pass legislation which labels us threats to the nation, simply because we want what is rightfully ours…freedom.

We do not wish to overthrow the government, we simply want to the government to confine itself to the powers granted it by the Constitution. We simply ask that the government uphold their sacred oath to support and defend the Constitution, and in so doing, safeguard our unalienable rights.

Just as the Declaration of Independence says, “In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. 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…” we too have petitioned our government to halt all further attacks upon our rights and our liberty…only to have our petitions to fall upon deaf ears, and further violations of our rights.

I ask of you, how long would YOU sit back while your government reduced you to servitude? On the 23rd of March, 1775, Patrick Henry declared, “This is no time for ceremony. The question before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfil the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offence, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the majesty of heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings.

Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it.”

Our country is divided, not only along the lines of Republican versus Democrats, but also among those who have come to see that our government has way overstepped the limits which the Constitution imposes upon them.

It is believed by many, myself included, that government now serves masters who sit behind the scenes and dictate policy. This ‘shadow government’ is so entrenched, so powerful, that it is not likely to give up its control over our government without a fight.

Yet Rousseau once said, “Force does not constitute right… obedience is due only to legitimate powers.” So, if government is given the order to subdue opposition to its continued infringement of our rights, does that make it justified simply because the order is given by a duly elected president?

I ask this thing because I feel the time is quickly approaching when the government has finally pushed too far, and that people are going to push back. When that time comes, which side of the fight are you going to be on; will you stand by your government, or will you stand for freedom and liberty?

Just let it be known that we, being those of us who value our rights and liberty, will not have fired the first shot. The war may not have turned violent yet, but it was started long ago by our government. Consider what John Locke once said, “…whenever the legislators endeavour to take away, and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they 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, which God hath provided for all men, against force and violence.”

I think, by the tone of this article, you know which side I’ll be on. But to make it clear, I’ll leave you with a quote from the movie Braveheart, “Aye, fight and you may die. Run and you’ll live — at least a while. And dying in your beds many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days from this day to that for one chance, just one chance to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they’ll never take our freedom!!!”

I look at the state this country is in, the non-stop war going on against our rights, the continued usurpation of powers by our government, and the apathy and ignorance of most people, and all I see is the mangled wreckage of what once was. It is my belief that too much damage has been done to every fully restore our country to one in which we are governed by men/women who obey the limits imposed upon them by the Constitution, and who regard the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights as inviolate. Our country is akin to the mangled wreckage of a vehicle which we cherish and take to a body shop, pleading that it be restored to its former glory; in this instance the body shop being Ron Paul. The damage, in my opinion, is just too extensive to be repaired.

What got me back behind this keyboard again was a post I saw on Facebook of a graphic which simply said; “Common sense is so rare that it should be classified as a superpower.” That is so true. I’ll admit, much of what I have learned has taken a great deal of time, and effort, to understand, but the crux of the matter, an understanding of our Constitution and the nature of our rights, is simple common sense. And if people can’t understand that, what the hell’s the use in trying to get them to understand more complicated matters?

Whether you believe in the Biblical version, that God created man, or if you believe that man evolved from lower life forms, the fact remains that at one time man came into existence. At that instant man possessed all their inherent and unalienable rights. Government came into existence much later, and therefore man, along with their rights, predate government.

There are many ways in which governments come into existence, but in our case we the people created it. Remember, our founders believed that our rights were inherent and unalienable, that being that they were part of man’s nature and could not be violated by any other man, or body of men.

Our founders created state governments to manage the affairs of the states in which they lived. They drafted state constitutions which dictated the powers to be granted these assemblies. The states, through the power vested in them by the people, ratified the proposed Constitution which created the federal government. The states surrendered a bit of their power and authority so that the federal government could manage the affairs of the nation.

The Constitution limited the function of our government to certain specifically listed items. There were no all-encompassing clauses which could be interpreted to grant the government powers beyond those specifically listed. I don’t care what YOU think, or what YOU have been taught, the government cannot do ninety percent of the things it currently does, not legally anyway. People misconstrue the Constitution, and its many clauses to justify the government’s usurpation of powers beyond those enumerated.

Take for instance the necessary and proper clause. Say I commission you to build me a house, but I make no mention of whether you can buy lumber, nails, paint, and all the other items required to build that house, how would you accomplish the task I gave you? That is the purpose of the necessary and proper clause. For instance the Constitution grants Congress the power to provide and maintain a navy. How could Congress do that if they were not granted the unmentioned power to build shipyards?

Let me ask you a simple question before I continue. We all hear the term government land, don’t we? Well how did that land become the property of the government? The land, and all its resources, existed BEFORE government was created; therefore it belongs to the people. Did the government purchase this land; if so, with whose money?

The reason I ask is this, if we are even allowed to, we have to obtain permits or licenses to hunt or fish these so-called government lands. Did the first men who walked this earth need a permit or a license to go out and seek food? No, it was their right to do so. I can understand the need for an agency to ensure that no one goes out and senselessly slaughter wildlife; but if you wish to go out and hunt, or fish, to feed your family, that is your unalienable right, and when you allow government to require a permit to exercise a right, it ceases being a right and becomes a privilege which can be revoked!

If people can’t THAT simple fact through their thick skulls, what’s the use in me ever writing again? Honestly, you tell me, because I can’t see the sense in me continually banging my head against a wall of ignorance, and stupidity. If you still think that YOUR government obeys the Constitution, if it still respects your rights, that it is benevolent and has your best interests in mind, then you are a fool!

Our government spies on us, and monitors us like we are criminals and they are the guardians of society, when in fact they are the ones whose actions are criminal and should be watched very, VERY closely.

Our government has granted itself so much power that all it would have to do is declare some sort of national emergency and it could assume control of almost everything, making us slaves to be moved around to serve its needs. And when that does happen, whatever remaining rights you think you may have, will vanish in the snap of a finger.

Look at all these government agencies that have fully militarized enforcers, simple goons, and thugs who go around enforcing the laws they write, while infringing upon YOUR rights. Yet you sit back and say everything is okay in the land of the free? Can’t you see what’s happening before your very eyes, or are you so involved in what’s on your television that you don’t even see it?

People still think that there is this huge difference between the Democrats and the Republicans. They look at the small trivial matters they bicker over, while totally ignoring all the things they accomplish in ‘bipartisan’ manner. What fools!

George Bush gave us two wars and the Patriot and Military Commission Acts, all under the banner of a war on terror, AND with bipartisan support. Sure, after a while the Democrats got tired of these never ending wars and campaigned against them. So we got Mr. HOPE & CHANGE who promised to bring our troops home.

Well, the liar in chiefs first term is coming to an end and we still have boots on the ground fighting, and dying, for the wars he promised to end. We have also seen him sign into law the National Defense Authorization Act, the Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement, and more recently an Executive Order entitled National Defense Resources Preparedness. Of course nary a peep from the Republicans on these acts granting the government MORE power to control our lives. And if you think that Newt Gingrich or Mitt Romney are any better, your nuts. And none of what I have discussed has even touched upon what they have done to our economy and the value of the money we have in our wallets.

People are starting to wake up, and that does concern the powers that be. But the people are still fractured and divided over what needs to be done. Some call for open revolution, some still think we can work within the system to steer it back onto course, while others think we need to focus on state’s rights, and the possibility of secession.

I say the government only has whatever power that you, YOU as an individual, allow it to have. If you, and you, and you, and YOU, stand up for your rights, and not let the government push you around, it would have no power. YOU are going to have to decide whether you want to stand up, and possibly fight and die, as a free man, or live as a slave. And you know what, from what I have seen of MOST people, as long as they have cable TV in their cells; most people would be content to be slaves.

So, again I ask, why the hell do I even bother trying to educate a bunch of people who simply don’t give a damn?

However the penalty for stealing one of our founding documents is not what I wish to discuss, it is how people would react were it to actually happen. I’m pretty certain that people would be outraged were someone to steal any of our founding documents. I find it absurd that people would care whether someone stole a document most of them had never taken the time to read. It is a sad truth that the average American understands little to nothing about the document that outlines their government, and is functionally illiterate when it comes to understanding the origin and nature of their unalienable rights.

However, it is not my intent to discuss Disney movies, or the theft of our founding documents. My purpose is to, once again, explain the purpose for which government was instituted, and why I believe that all government, be it local, state, or federal, is guilty of infringing upon the inherent and unalienable rights of man, and by their actions make them guilty of a crime against the people they were elected to represent.

In preface to what follows I would like to quote Thomas Paine, from his pamphlet Common Sense, “IN the following pages I offer nothing more than simple facts, plain arguments, and common sense: and have no other preliminaries to settle with the reader, than that he will divest himself of prejudice and prepossession…”

I cannot speak for every American, but from my own personal experience and from conversations I have had with people I associate with, I think that most people believe that their government has an almost unlimited grant of power and is authorized to do just about anything they feel is in the public interest.

One thing is for certain, most people are unaware that one of the primary functions for which our system of government was created was to secure our unalienable rights. The Declaration of Independence says “That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”

James Wilson, whose signature can be found on the Declaration of Independence, who was one of the drafters of the Constitution, and who also served as one of the six original justices to the Supreme Court, once said, “Government … should be formed to secure and enlarge the exercise of the natural rights of its members; and every government which has not this in view as its principal object is not a government of the legitimate kind.”

When it comes to the purpose for which government exists, you can choose to believe those in power who tell you that they are passing these laws for your benefit, or you can choose to believe me. But let me ask you something first; if a con man or a swindler decides to take something valuable from you, do you think they are going to tell you they that is their purpose? Of course not, they are going to convince you that you will somehow profit, or benefit, from the venture and then, only after you have been robbed of your possession, will you realize the truth.

Our nation’s capital, and our state capitals, are filled to the gills with the best of the best when it comes to con men, and con women. They are expert at telling you that the things they do are for your benefit, when they are actually designed to deprive you of your rights and put you under THEIR control.

Although people would be outraged where our Constitution to be stolen, do they actually know what purpose it serves? The best definition for a constitution I have read can be found in Thomas Paine’s The Rights of Man, “A constitution is not a thing in name only, but in fact. It has not an ideal, but a real existence; and wherever it cannot be produced in a visible form, there is none. A constitution is a thing antecedent to a government, and a government is only the creature of a constitution. The constitution of a country is not the act of its government, but of the people constituting its government. It is the body of elements, to which you can refer, and quote article by article; and which contains the principles on which the government shall be established, the manner in which it shall be organised, the powers it shall have, the mode of elections, the duration of Parliaments, or by what other name such bodies may be called; the powers which the executive part of the government shall have; and in fine, everything that relates to the complete organisation of a civil government, and the principles on which it shall act, and by which it shall be bound.”

Thomas Jefferson once said, “The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first.”
It is clear from these quotes that our nation’s Constitution placed limits upon the power and authority of our government. But there’s more to it than that. As our government was established to secure our rights, many of the founders did not feel it provided adequate protection for those rights, and therefore refused to accept it until further protections were included.

Therefore a Bill of Rights was agreed upon and after being agreed upon by the requisite number of states, ten amendments were added to the Constitution to define certain rights as being off limits to government, at all levels. The preamble to the Bill of Rights states as much by saying, “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…”

So basically, here’s how it all happened. The people created government and gave to that government certain define powers, and placed upon them certain restrictions to those powers. The question then arises; when government oversteps its authority and exercises powers not granted it by the Constitution, and in so doing infringes upon the rights safeguarded by the Bill of Rights, are we obligated to obey such laws?

The answer can be found in John Locke’s Second Treatise on Civil Government, “…whenever the legislators endeavor to take away and destroy the property of the people, or to reduce them to slavery under arbitrary power, they 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, which God hath provided for all men, against force and violence. Whensoever therefore the legislative shall transgress this fundamental rule of society, and either by ambition, fear, folly or corruption, endeavor to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other, an absolute power over the lives, liberties, and estates of the people; by this breach of trust they forfeit the power the people had put into their hands for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the people, who have a right to resume their original liberty…”

When President John Adams signed into law the Alien and Sedition Acts, he violated the rights of the people to speak freely against the actions of their government. His signing of these laws prompted Thomas Jefferson to draft the Kentucky Resolutions, which in part states, “Resolved, That the several States composing, the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their general government…that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force…”

It was the infringement of an unalienable right which caused Jefferson to oppose the legislation passed by President Adams. Former Justice to the Supreme Court, Robert H. Jackson, clearly stated, “The very purpose of a Bill of Rights was to withdraw certain subjects from the vicissitudes of political controversy, to place them beyond the reach of majorities and officials and to establish them as legal principles to be applied by the courts. One’s right to life, liberty, and property, to free speech, a free press, freedom of worship and assembly, and other fundamental rights may not be submitted to vote; they depend on the outcome of no elections.”

Furthermore, in the case of Bell v Hood, the Court ruled, “History is clear that the first ten amendments to the Constitution were adopted to secure certain common law rights of the people, against invasion by the Federal Government.”

In the case of State v Board of Examiners, the court ruled, “Disobedience or evasion of a constitutional mandate may not be tolerated, even though such disobedience may, at least temporarily, promote in some respects the best interests of the public.”
Finally, although the majority of the people may support a law which violates the rights of others, their legislators are still prohibited from acting solely upon the wishes of the majority, as proved by the following quote from Albert Gallatin, “The whole of the Bill (of Rights) is a declaration of the right of the people at large or considered as individuals …. It establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of.”

Our rights predate government, that is to say they existed before government did, and therefore, as the Bill of Rights was instituted to protect those rights, the government, no matter how many people ask it to do so, may not enact legislation which infringes upon any of those rights.

In the case of People v. Berberrich we read, “By the “absolute rights” of individuals is meant those which are so in their primary and strictest sense, such as would belong to their persons merely in a state of nature, and which every man is entitled to enjoy, whether out of society or in it. The rights of personal security, of personal liberty, and private property do not depend upon the Constitution for their existence. They existed before the Constitution was made, or the government was organized. These are what are termed the “absolute rights” of individuals, which belong to them independently of all government, and which all governments which derive their power from the consent of the governed were instituted to protect.”

Alexander Hamilton once said, “The fundamental source of all your errors, sophisms, and false reasonings, is a total ignorance of the natural rights of mankind. Were you once to become acquainted with these, you could never entertain a thought, that all men are not, by nature, entitled to a parity of privileges. You would be convinced, that natural liberty is a gift of the beneficent Creator, to the whole human race; and that civil liberty is founded in that; and cannot be wrested from any people, without the most manifest violation of justice.”
Though these elected representatives, at all levels of government, may act in our behalf, we the people still retain the ultimate authority. In their decision on Chisholm v. Georgia, the Supreme Court ruled, “In the United States, Sovereignty resides in the people, who act through the organs established by the Constitution.”

Furthermore, in the case of Gaines v Buford, the courts ruled “I do not admit that there is any sovereign power, in the literal meaning of the terms, to be found anywhere In our system of government… sovereign power, or, which I take to be the same thing, power without limitation, is nowhere to be found in any branch or department of the government, either state or national, nor indeed of all of them put together.”

Thomas Paine, in the Rights of Man, writes, “The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man; and these rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression.”

Oppression is defined as something that oppresses especially in being an unjust or excessive exercise of power. Oppression can come in many forms, it may be a federal law which grants government the authority to monitor my phones, my e-mail, and my Facebook posts, or it may come in the local police arresting a person who films a public event, such as has occurred on numerous occasions recently. It also can come in a state government telling me that my Second Amendment right is not as secure as that of someone who lives in a neighboring state because I am restricted from purchasing a firearm which is perfectly legal in a neighboring state.

Every law passed, be it state or federal, which infringes upon your rights puts you into a state of oppression, and it has been proven that you have the right to resist these infringements of your other unalienable rights.

People don’t realize how much of a police state we already live under. When an agency, whose existence has no constitutional basis, can send armed thugs to confiscate your property, impose fines, or jail sentences upon you, and you can be shot for resisting these unconstitutional laws, we live in a police state. To quote James Wilson once again, “The enemies of liberty are artful and insidious … liberty herself is treated as a traitor and an usurper … Against these enemies of liberty, who act in concert … the patriot citizen will keep a watchful guard.”

Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black once said, “In my judgment the people of no nation can lose their liberty so long as a Bill of Rights like ours survives and its basic purposes are conscientiously interpreted, enforced and respected so as to afford continuous protection against old, as well as new, devices and practices which might thwart those purposes.”

The French philosopher Voltaire once said, “It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.” By me, or anyone else, standing up for our rights, and for demanding that our government adhere to the limits imposed upon it by the Constitution, we are labeled as a threat to government, and to the nation.

Remember now, the Constitution is, as Article Six declares, the Supreme Law of the land. So therefore, who are the criminals, who are the threat to society? Is it people like me who speak the truth, or is it government who tries to oppress the truth and bind you into slavery?

You may not agree with everything I’ve just said, but I would ask, by what do you base your opinion? Is it based upon what you have been told by those who represent you; by the media, by your school teachers; or by your own personal feelings? If you are of an open mind, and willing to look the truth in the eye, and accept it, you will not be able to say that you support the actions of your government.

Thomas Jefferson, in his Notes on Virginia, stated, “[The purpose of a written constitution is] to bind up the several branches of government by certain laws, which, when they transgress, their acts shall become nullities; to render unnecessary an appeal to the people, or in other words a rebellion, on every infraction of their rights…”

We do not need a rebellion to take back this country; we only need a group of informed and dedicated persons who are willing to stand up for their rights. But as Mark Twain once said, “In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot.”

I do not see things getting any better, in fact I see them getting much, much worse. I suppose my purpose has ceased being to educate and inform the mass of society who choose to remain ignorant and blind to the truth. I suppose my purpose is to eulogize the death of our nation’s Constitution, and our Bill of Rights.

Just remember this, when the chains of slavery are firmly bound around your wrists and ankles, when your last remaining right has gone by the wayside, remember that I tried to warn you. Hopefully when it all happens, I’ll have long since died and been buried, and you will then be able to enjoy the fruits of your apathy and indifference without my incessant nagging