Tag: James Madison

Honorable Rebellion, Honorable Leaders and the Naming of Army Forts

I am sure this title caught your eye. The point is that rebellion is actually GOOD once in a while. Personally, teenage rebellion is good as well, otherwise the teenager stays in one’s basement for decades and no honorable person, parent or child, wants that long term. Allowing and encouraging these young adults to “be all that they can be” is a most honorable path I would think.

Countries and cultures are similar in that there comes a time when going separate ways brings out the best for all parties.

Thomas Jefferson was one that spoke to the benefits of rebellion:

God forbid we should ever be 20. years without such a rebellion. The people can not be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. We have had 13 states independant 11 years. There has been one rebellion. That comes to one rebellion in a century and a half for each state. What country before ever existed a century and half without a rebellion? And what country can preserve it’s 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. It is it’s natural manure.- Thomas Jefferson (1787)

Rebellion is a warning shot that liberties have been violated. This is an honorable recourse when peaceful approaches have been ignored time and again. Liberty can grow in the way that the American Revolution’s conclusion was conducted, not so much how the French Revolution was conducted.

If the 1776 rebellion was honorable, why not the 1860/1861 rebellion? What might help to set the context is to compare the presidential inaugural addresses of both President Lincoln and President Davis.

Lincoln’s 1st Inaugural Address 04MAR1861

Lincoln made the strongest case ever in the defense of Southern slavery even supporting its enshrinement in the text of the constitution to be a perpetual right but on the issue of tax collections he would definitely go to war to enforce the newly doubled federal tariff.

Davis defined the South as an international trading community that sought free trade with the world and promised to resort to the sword if the North were to invade to put an end to the Confederacy’s free trade policy.

Davis also set the context for the formation of an agent to work on the principle’s (13 sovereign states) behalf when he said:

The declared purpose of the compact of the Union from which we have withdrawn was “to establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessing of liberty to ourselves and our posterity

He continued on why the seven states had voted to leave such a Union:

When in the judgement of the sovereign states now composing this Confederacy, it had been perverted from the purposes for which it was ordained, and it ceased to answer the ends for which it was established, a peaceful appeal to the ballot box declared that so far as they were concerned, the government created by that compact should cease to exist. In this they merely asserted a right that the Declaration of Independence of 1776 had defined to be inalienable .. they, as sovereigns, were the final judges, each for itself ..

What few people know is that this man was so honorable and such a Unionist up until his home state of Mississippi seceded, that his logic, actions and words were honorable to their core.

So what do we do with men like this after a War for Southern Independence is fought and lost? We honor honorable men of that day by naming military forts after them, even when they in the end were not victorious in securing an independent country against a country who secured a victory in less than honorable means.

Walter E. Williams addresses this in his article at Lew Rockwell today. He lays the groundwork as to why we have forts in the US today that bear the name of honorable Confederate generals who were fighting for their homes and families against a tyrant who violated the US Constitution left and right.

Walter addresses a statement made by an ignorant military man, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, who said in testimony before the House Armed Services Committee arguing in favor of renaming Confederate named military bases:

The Confederacy, the American Civil War, was fought, and it was an act of rebellion. It was an act of treason, at the time, against the Union, against the Stars and Stripes, against the U.S. Constitution.

Ignorance knows no bounds, as I pointed out yesterday that Lincoln himself was the one that acted treasonous and also acted violently against the US Constitution. The Southern state’s secession was NOT an act of treason, even if your feelings and emotions convince you and Gen. Mark Milley that way. He needs to find a safe space, and by renaming these forts I do hope he feels better soon.

But I digress ..

Walter E. Williams starts with context of the union in the first place:

Let’s start at the beginning, namely the American War of Independence (1775-1783), a war between Great Britain and its 13 colonies, which declared independence in July 1776. The peace agreement that ended the war is known as the Treaty of Paris signed by Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, John Jay and Henry Laurens and by British Commissioner Richard Oswald, on Sept. 3, 1783. Article I of the Treaty held that “New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be free sovereign and Independent States.”

This fact is something that Lincoln himself ignored to retain his narrative that the “Union” preceded the states, which then dovetails into his own personal thought that the states should have asked permission of all the other states before leaving.

Walter continues:

Delegates from these states met in Philadelphia in 1787 to form a union. During the Philadelphia convention, a proposal was made to permit the federal government to suppress a seceding state. James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, rejected it. Minutes from the debate paraphrased his opinion: “A union of the states containing such an ingredient (would) provide for its own destruction. The use of force against a state would look more like a declaration of war than an infliction of punishment and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts by which it might be bound.”

The fact that Lincoln never acknowledged the states as having seceded, left him with the complicated aspect that he actually violated the principle above, that his making war on states still in the union meant the compact was in fact dissolved. He wanted to ask for the “divorce”, he did NOT want the spouse(s) to have that status!

With this thought, that each of the sovereign states would voluntarily join this union one at a time, each state also understood that they each could voluntarily leave this union.

During the ratification debates, Virginia’s delegates said, “The powers granted under the Constitution being derived from the people of the United States may be resumed by them whensoever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression.” The ratification documents of New York and Rhode Island expressed similar sentiments; namely, they held the right to dissolve their relationship with the United States.

Note that northern states also expressed interest in the ability to exit. Only 16 years later, there was talk of that from that section of the federation:

Many New Englanders were infuriated by President Thomas Jefferson’s Louisiana Purchase in 1803, which they saw as an unconstitutional act. Timothy Pickering of Massachusetts, who was George Washington’s secretary of war and secretary of state, led the movement. He said, “The Eastern states must and will dissolve the union and form a separate government.” Other prominent Americans such as John Quincy Adams, Elbridge Gerry, Fisher Ames, Josiah Quincy III and Joseph Story shared his call for secession.

Sparking secession talk again was the War of 1812 that hurt the New England commerce the most, rekindling this viable option:

While the New England secessionist movement was strong, it failed to garner support at the 1814-15 Hartford Convention.

By early 1861, many Northern government officials and presses were well aware of the dangers of not allowing an honorable rebellion to take place and voiced such before Lincoln took action to send armed reinforcements to Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor:

  • Rep. Jacob M. Kunkel of Maryland said, “Any attempt to preserve the union between the states of this Confederacy by force would be impractical and destructive of republican liberty.”
  • New-York Tribune (Feb. 5, 1860): “If tyranny and despotism justified the Revolution of 1776, then we do not see why it would not justify the secession of Five Millions of Southrons from the Federal Union in 1861.”
  • The Detroit Free Press (Feb. 19, 1861): “An attempt to subjugate the seceded States, even if successful, could produce nothing but evil — evil unmitigated in character and appalling in extent.”
  • The New-York Times (March 21, 1861): “There is a growing sentiment throughout the North in favor of letting the Gulf States go.”

Walter summarizes this so well in saying:

Confederate generals fought for independence from the Union just as George Washington fought for independence from Great Britain. Those who label Robert E. Lee and other Confederate generals as traitors might also label George Washington a traitor. Great Britain’s King George III and the British parliament would have agreed.

Spot on Walter, you rock as an 80-something!

Named for Confederate General Braxton Bragg, who had previously served in the United States Army in the Mexican-American War.

Should the ten forts named after Confederate officers be renamed? No. But it seems that stupid people with a lot of feelings now rule. While the name of a fort does not do anything physically, it is a part of the culture cleansing going of to remove whatever is left of this country’s honorable past.

In my mind, the past was already being erased a little at a time over the last 100+ years. I think it is the shear momentum of this now that has many feeling that it is over the top and openly wondering when if ever will it stop.

Honestly, can we start talking secession now, or is it too early yet? Asking for a friend.

Peace out.

-SF1

The Founders Knew, Why Do We Then Keep a Standing Army? Government is our God!

Adrift in a sea of feelings is where this country’s society is now. Principles do not matter, faith does not matter, it is most about what we can get for little or no effort or how can we feel safe both physically and emotionally.

A society like this should expect to be slaves, good compliant tax slaves on the government plantation. The elites love this.

In light of the approaching celebration of what was called Armistice Day, since WWII called Veterans Day, it is worth revisiting what some of the founders KNEW as a result of their own experiences:

A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defense against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.- James Madison

From a 2005 post by Jacob Hornsberger, he rightly predicts what our future holds:

Imagine that the president issues the following grave announcement on national television during prime time: “Our nation has come under another terrorist attack. Our freedoms and our national security are at stake. I have issued orders to the Joint Chiefs of Staff to immediately take into custody some 1,000 American terrorists who have been identified by the FBI as having conspired to commit this dastardly attack or who have given aid and comfort to the enemy. I have also ordered the JCS to take all necessary steps to temporarily confiscate weapons in the areas where these terrorists are believed to be hiding. These weapons will be returned to the owners once the terrorist threat has subsided. I am calling on all Americans to support the troops in these endeavors, just as you are supporting them in their fight against terrorism in Iraq. We will survive. We will prevail. God bless America.”

Now ask yourself: How many of the troops would disobey the orders of the president given those circumstances, especially if panicked and terrified Americans and the mainstream press were endorsing his martial-law orders?

The answer: Almost none would disobey. They would not consider it their job to determine the constitutionality of the president’s orders. They would leave that for the courts to decide. Their professional allegiance and loyalty to their supreme commander in chief would trump all other considerations, including their oath to “support and defend the Constitution.”

Therefore, if the federal government is the primary threat to our freedom, then so are the troops: their unswerving loyalty to their commander in chief makes them the primary instrument by which the federal government is able to destroy or infringe the rights and freedoms of the citizenry.

Jacob also offers a solution, one that will never be taken seriously since our trust as a society is in government and not in the founding father’s Providence:

There is one — and only one — solution to this threat to our freedoms and well-being: for the American people to heed the warning of our Founding Fathers against standing armies before it is too late, and to do what should have been done at least 15 years ago: dismantle the U.S. military empire, close all overseas bases, and bring all the troops home, discharging them into the private sector, where they would effectively become “Citizen-soldiers” — well-trained citizens prepared to rally to the defense of our nation in the unlikely event of a foreign invasion of our country. And for the American people to heed the warning of President Eisenhower against the military-industrial complex, by shutting down the Pentagon’s enormous domestic military empire, closing domestic bases, and discharging those troops into the private sector.

How will our society ever have a faith that could help them have hope while being attacked by a foreign empire? More importantly, how did the founders and militias have such faith in the  1770s?

What remains to be seen is how of if the various parts of American society can once again trust God instead of government for a free future. I guess time will tell.

-SF1

Long Term Effects of Hamiltonianism: St. George Tucker’s Antidote – Jeffersonianism

The pendulum swing of politics has revealed much as to the gullibility of the masses who are swept up by emotion but rarely have principles by which to live by when the going gets tough.

It seems that Thomas Paine’s writings in 1776 helped put people in a position to better understand the battles, the war and the cause for which thirteen British colonies aligned with each other, for a moment in time, to repel the British Empire from their midst. By the end of this conflict, there were many who were disillusioned with the cause, either by British tactics used by Patriot forces or even having their property pillaged by the Whig faction that made them choose to be a Tory. The pendulum swung in villages, colonies as well as on this continent as people heard the news, fake or not.

At the end of the day, one wonders if those with power can be trusted to make decisions on their behalf, which is at its root, representative government. We have seen ourselves where HOAs and churches can become hotbeds of contention and power moves that can swiftly cripple the week and the meek. I believe this is why many founding fathers, but definitely not all, preferred the grass roots approach. Keeping the “representative” local, so someone could have the proximity to put a boot up their a** if need be, is essential for accountability.

As the War for Independence concluded, and the Articles of Confederation gave way to the Constitution that was created in Philadelphia in 1787, in secret, many “grassroot” promoters found themselves in the minority.

A recent article about St. George Tucker helps shed light not only on the two types of dreams for America that the “cause” help birth, but also the prophetical vision that this man had for seeing the end of the line for either of these visions. Allen Mendenhall’s article “St. George Tucker’s Jeffersonian Constitution” helps to frame my thoughts on what we gained, and what we lost, after the fight for independence from 1775-1783:

One could argue that there are two basic visions for America: the Hamiltonian and the Jeffersonian. The former is nationalist, calling for centralized power and an industrial, mercantilist society characterized by banking, commercialism, and a robust military. Its early leaders had monarchical tendencies. The latter vision involves a slower, more leisurely and agrarian society, political decentralization, popular sovereignty, and local republicanism. Think farmers over factories.

Both were birthed in the message of liberty. Both indicated the support of the common person in their leadership to create something new here in America that was different from the ways of the Old World, especially in Europe. You can see the thread by who you might consider our heroes:

Hamiltonian:

  • John Adams, John Marshall, Noah Webster, Henry Clay, Joseph Story, and Abraham Lincoln

Jeffersonian:

  • George Mason and Patrick Henry (who, because they were born before Jefferson, could be considered his precursors), the mature (rather than the youthful) James Madison, and then John Taylor of Caroline, John C. Calhoun, Abel Upshur, and Robert Y. Hayne.

So the Federalists (who were not really federalists, but as you know with political parties, their name does not always reveal their core) surged into power on the tails of the Constitution that helped assure a more powerful centralized general government but then over played their hand especially during “Alien and Sedition Act” John Adams administration. The Anti-Federalists, called the Democratic-Republican Party (or simply the Republican party) by the time Thomas Jefferson sought the presidency would sweep into office and would change the political landscape some for the next 30 years or so before the Whigs would emerge and eventually the Republican party that nominated Abraham Lincoln in 1860.

From St. George Tucker’s time, he could see the years and the decades unfolding in his mind. Here are a few of his thoughts:

Under this [Compact Theory of the US Constitution] model, each sovereign, independent state is contractually and consensually committed to confederacy, and the federal government possesses only limited and delegated powers—e.g., “to be the organ through which the united republics communicate with foreign nations.”

That is indeed one way to interpret the US Constitution, as even Alexander Hamilton would talk this way about it, until it passed and until he was in power with George Washington.

.. summarizing competing contentions about the Sedition Act, Tucker subtly supported the position that “the United States as a federal government have no common law” and that “the common law of one state . . . is not the common law of another.” The common law, in Tucker’s paradigm, is bottom-up and home-grown; it’s not a formula that can be lifted from one jurisdiction and placed down anywhere else with similar results and effects.

This is another core principle that IF had been understood by the political elite of the 20th/21st century, it would not have thought that the USA could bring “democracy” to any other nation in the world.  Even in the United States, the STATES represent different cultures, morals and standards. We would have done well in keeping it that way, but our ancestors believed Hamilton and Lincoln over Jefferson and Calhoun.

Allen ends his article with the wisdom that can be gained in understanding what we lost after the War for Independence:

Reading Tucker reminds us that for most of our country’s formative history the principal jurisprudential debates were not about natural law versus positivism, or originalism versus living constitutionalism, but about state versus federal authority, local versus national jurisdiction, the proper scale and scope of government, checks and balances, and so forth. To the extent these subjects have diminished in importance, Hamilton has prevailed over Jefferson. Reading Tucker today can help us see the costs of that victory.

It seems that only the recovery of the wisdom and the thoughts of these 18th century thinkers can lead this land towards a better day for us, our kids and our grand-kids. The US Empire’s current trajectory is self-defeating in the long term and not sustainable.

Local city-state and region-state philosophy is a much needed idea, but the powers residing in the political elites funded by an evil moneyed elites will not give up their multi-century grasp for total control and power easily.

Something will have to give.

-SF1

Amexit: Post War of Independence from British Empire – Politically Hijacked

[A] large group of soldiers who saw the goal of the Revolution as getting rid of the power of a centralised government to rule over Americans. They had a fellow American feeling with comrades in other states for shared sacrifices and they were willing to entertain a federal (not national) government to handle some of the joint affairs of the States, but insisted that such a government must be kept within a strictly circumscribed role.

Yes, even Francis Marion, as you shall see, was himself marginalized at the end of the War for Independence from the British Empire. There were efforts already in the works politically to turn this “win” into something of their own choosing that was much different than what the soldiers and militias were fighting for.

The above quote is from a 2014 article about James Jackson who immigrated to the Georgia colony as a 15 year old. My guess is that you never heard of him. Maybe some of these names you will recognize from your academic experiences:

Nicholas Gilman of New Hampshire, John Lansing of New York, Thomas Mifflin of Pennsylvania, John Francis Mercer of Maryland, Nathaniel Macon of North Carolina, Thomas Sumter of South Carolina, and James Monroe, St. George Tucker, and John Taylor of Virginia.

Well maybe you have heard of Thomas Sumter and possibly John Taylor, but the others have been obscured by the academic history books for some time. The likes of these people had the following qualities:

A patriot did not seek public fame and fortune. His task was alertness to preserve the principles of free government against all comers. He did not seek power, but if called to public office he took it as a duty to his society, not as an opportunity for self-advancement. His ambition was for his country, not himself. The example here was the Roman hero Cincinnatus, who was called from his farm to lead an army and having won the victory went home and resumed his plowing.

This type of person was one that could see quickly into an existing situation and rightly identify the bad actors behind the scenes. These men, with their prophetic ability, typically would see the red flags much sooner than someone like Thomas Jefferson or James Madison as explained here:

[James] Jackson was nearly alone in 1790 in discerning and exposing the implications of what was afoot; joined only by William Maclay of Pennsylvania in the Senate. As one historian has put it:

The astonishing thing is that the comparatively crude Maclay from the wilds of Pennsylvania and the leather-lunged James Jackson from sparsely settled Georgia should have caught the full significance of it all before it dawned on Jefferson and Madison.

So even three years after the coup d’etat at Philadelphia where the “perpetual” Articles of Confederation was shredded in favor of a NEW document formed in secret called a constitution, there were two yet in the government who saw this new direction for the union for what it was. Patrick Henry had rightly said “I smell a rat” in 1787 as he was the most prophetic of all.

So what helps to form such an honest sort of individual. A mixture of nature and nurture no doubt, as can be seen in a quick biographical sketch here below:

James Jackson was born in 1757 in Devonshire, England. At the age of fifteen he sailed the Atlantic unaccompanied and landed in 1772 at Savannah, Georgia, where some family friends were living. Despite his youth and his recent arrival from the mother country, Jackson enthusiastically joined the cause of American independence. Throughout the war he was active in military service. After the British capture of Savannah, Jackson escaped, reportedly swam the Savannah River, and arrived barefoot and in tatters to join the South Carolina patriot forces as a private, serving 17 months with Thomas Sumter’s partisans. He took part in most of the fighting in the Southern colonies and in expeditions into Florida and to the Indian frontier. He was wounded at least once and repeatedly cited for gallantry and enterprise. Jackson ended the war as a twenty-four-year-old lieutenant colonel in command of his own battalion and was selected to receive the official surrender of Savannah from the departing British, July 11, 1782.

A pioneer, a survivor, a fighter .. “.. a tough, independent citizen ready to defend his society against foreign threats. Equally important, it was characterized by the wisdom to discern and the courage to oppose threats to liberty from inside. History furnished many examples of the undermining of free governments by plausible, designing men ambitious for power and profit. This is why Thomas Jefferson said that eternal vigilance is the price of liberty and that the tree of liberty needs to be watered from time to time with the blood of tyrants and patriots. A virtuous republican had the makings of such a patriot.” – Clyde Wilson & Brion McClanahan

In 1782, with the War for Independence almost over, James goes back to the plow:

After the war Jackson established himself as a successful lawyer and planter. Georgia was the smallest of the States in population and settled territory (though already filling fast with new settlers) and had an exposed frontier. It quickly ratified the proposed Constitution for the United States without the reservations that concerned many and kept North Carolina out of the Union for several more years. In 1788 the George legislature elected Jackson Governor. He declined on grounds that he was too inexperienced for the august position. The next year he was elected as one of Georgia’s two Representatives to the First Congress. Shipwrecked on his way to New York, he arrived too late for the inaugural day but was soon an outspoken member of the House.

Notice the humble nature of this man, declined his election as governor of Georgia because he felt himself too inexperience! More of this please!

What he found a year later in New York, NY, the first capital of the united States drove him toward using “straight” language:

Jackson found the House discussing the proper way to address the President, with proposals like “His Excellency,” “His Grace,” and “His Serene Highness” being offered by those who wanted to endow the new government with dignity and awe.

He lamented that the probably source of this trend toward having a god in government on earth to displace the God in Heaven was most likely Boston, where as he rightly explains:

.. a town which, fifteen years ago, would have acknowledged no Lord but the Lord of hosts ..

Cutting, but so very true. In fact, after a miraculous win by 13 united colonies against a world power like the British Empire, one can only see that as the Israelites of old, they still could not trust a God that delivered them and proceeded to form a central government that would guarantee this independence for years to come. The downside was that liberty itself would be sacrificed for this perceived safety.

Typical of the pioneer reluctant hero and patriot of the day, his opponents ridiculed his character and speech:

.. some opponents hinted that the Representative from Georgia was too loud and crude. “I have accustomed myself to a blunt integrity of speech,” Jackson told the House, “which I hope the goodness of my intentions will excuse.” The more serious criticisms of the Representative from Georgia were uttered in private. It was known that Jackson had more than once taken his stand on the Savannah dueling ground and had always walked away.

But the disgust for the words to be used in this new republic was pale compared to Alexander Hamilton’s intentions that made the rich richer and the poor/soldier poorer:

The first move came in Hamilton’s proposal to pay off the Continental debt of the Revolution. Everyone agreed that the debt had to be retired, but the devil was in the details. Hamilton’s plan was to pay the holders of the debt in interest-bearing government bonds, thus to create a permanent public debt, which would in turn require tax revenue.

There was an even more serious kicker. The debt was to be funded at face value. The debt, aside from loans from European allies, consisted of paper that had been issued by the Continental Congress for soldiers’ pay and bounties and army supplies. Almost all of it was now in the hands of Northern and European capitalists who had acquired it at cents on the dollar when it was “not worth a Continental.” Jackson pointed out that there were not twenty of the original receivers of Continental paper left in Georgia and that soldiers had invariably been forced by necessity to sell their paper at a large discount.

.. and, there’s more!

Hamilton’s proposal was soon followed by another—the government should assume the remaining debts of the States, now also in the hands of speculators, and fund them in the same way. A proposal in the House to pay some of the proceeds to the original holders was roughly quashed by what was beginning to look like an organized party. Not only that, but, Jackson pointed out, certain money men who obviously had advanced knowledge of Hamilton’s plans had been in Georgia very recently buying up debt certificates.

Yes, by this time the ’cause’ had been fully hijacked by a new political machine that would give Lincoln everything he needed to permanently change this nation into something so much different. The balance of this article show the emergence of government scandals that have unfortunately continued to this day, sucking the life out of taxpayers at every revolution of the sun.

Here in 2019 we can see the fruits of the labors of Hamilton and Lincoln that were seasoned by the likes of Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, FDR, Johnson, Nixon, Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2, Obama and even Trump today. The American Empire is the “same thing only different” from the British one that the American colonies sought to remove themselves from. Now we (US government/empire) are the global and domestic oppressors that operate above the law.

Not cool.

-SF1