[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 7 (Wednesday, February 2, 2000)]
[House]
[Pages H185-H191]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
A REPUBLIC, IF YOU CAN KEEP IT, PART 2
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Paul) is recognized for
60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. Speaker, on Monday, I took a special order to discuss
the importance of the American Republic and why it should be preserved.
Today, I will continue with that special order.
When it comes to executive orders, it has gotten completely out of
hand. Executive orders may legitimately be used by a President to carry
out his constitutionally authorized duties, but that would require far
fewer orders than modern day Presidents have issued as the 20th century
comes to a close, we find the executive branch willfully and arrogantly
using the executive order to deliberately circumvent the legislative
body, and bragging about it.
Although nearly 100,000 American battle deaths have occurred since
World War II and both big and small wars have been fought almost
continuously, there has not been a congressional declaration of war
since 1941. Our Presidents now fight wars not only without explicit
congressional approval but also in the name of the United Nations, with
our troops now serving under foreign commanders.
Our Presidents have assured us that U.N. authorization is all that is
needed to send our troops into battle. The 1973 War Powers Resolution
meant to restrict presidential war powers has either been ignored by
our Presidents or used to justify war up to 90 days. The Congress and
the people too often have chosen to ignore this problem, saying little
about the recent bombing in Serbia. The continual bombing of Iraq which
has now been going on for over 9 years is virtually ignored.
If a President can decide on the issue of war without a vote of the
Congress, a representative republic does not exist. Our President
should not have the authority to declare national emergencies and they
certainly should not have authority to declare martial law, a power the
Congress has already granted to any future emergency.
Economic and political crises can develop quickly and overly
aggressive Presidents are only too willing to enhance their own power
in dealing with them. Congress sadly throughout this century has been
only too willing to grant authority to our Presidents at the sacrifice
of its own.
The idea of separate but equal branches of government has been
forgotten and the Congress bears much of the responsibility for this
trend. Executive powers in the past 100 years have grown steadily with
the creation of agencies that write and enforce their own regulations
and with Congress allowing the President to use executive orders
without restraint.
But in addition, there have been various other special vehicles that
our Presidents use without congressional oversight. For example, the
exchange stabilization fund set up during the depression has over $34
billion available to be used at the President's discretion without
congressional approval. This slush fund grows each year as it is paid
interest on the securities it holds. It was instrumental in the $50
billion Mexican bailout in 1995.
The CIA is so secretive that even those Congressmen privy to its
operation have little knowledge of what this secret government actually
does around the world.
{time} 1245
We know, of course, it has been involved in the past 50 years in
assassinations and government overthrows on frequent occasions. The
Federal Reserve operation, which works hand in hand with the
administration, is not subject to congressional oversight. The Fed
manipulates currency exchange rates, controls short-term interest
rates, and fixes the gold price, all behind closed doors.
Bailing out foreign governments, financial corporations and huge
banks can all be achieved without congressional approval. One hundred
years ago when we had a gold standard, credit could not be created out
of thin air, and, because a much more limited government philosophy
prevailed, this could not have been possible. Today it is hard to even
document what goes on, let alone expect Congress to control it.
The people should be able to closely monitor the Government, but as
our government grows in size and scope, it, the Government, seeks to
monitor our every move. Attacks on our privacy are an incessant and
always justified by citing so-called legitimate needs of the State,
efficiency and law enforcement.
Plans are laid for numerous data banks to record everyone's
activities. A national ID card using our Social Security number is the
goal of many, and even though we achieved a significant delivery in
delaying its final approval last year, the promoters will surely
persist in their efforts.
Plans are made for a medical data bank to be kept and used against
our wishes. Job banks and details of all our lending activities
continue to be of interest to all our national policy agencies, to make
sure they know exactly where the drug dealers, the illegal aliens, and
tax dodgers are and what they are doing, it is argued.
For national security purposes, the Echelon system of monitoring all
overseas phone calls has been introduced, yet the details of this
program are not available to any inquiring Member of Congress.
The Government knew very little about each individual American
citizen in 1900. But, starting with World War I, there has been a
systematic growth of Government surveillance of everyone's activities,
with multiple records being kept. Today, true privacy is essentially a
thing of the past. The FBI and the IRS have been used by various
administrations to snoop and harass political opponents, and there has
been little effort by Congress to end this abuse. A free society, that
is, a constitutional republic, cannot be maintained if privacy is not
highly cherished and protected by the Government, rather than abused by
it. We can expect it to get worse.
Secretary of Defense Bill Cohen was recently quoted as saying,
``Terrorism is escalating to the point that U.S. citizens may have to
choose between civil liberties and more intrusive forms of
protection.'' This is all in the name of taking care of us.
As far as I am concerned, we could all do with a lot less Government
protection and security. The offer of Government benevolence is the
worst reason to sacrifice liberty, but we have seen a lot of that
during the 20th century.
Probably the most significant change in attitude that occurred in the
20th century was that with respect to life
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itself. Although abortion has been performed for hundreds, if not for
thousands, of years, it was rarely considered an acceptable and routine
medical procedure without moral consequence.
Since 1973, abortion in America has become routine and justified by a
contorted understanding of the right to privacy. The difference between
American rejection of abortion at the beginning of the century compared
to today's casual acceptance is like night and day. Although a vocal
number of Americans express their disgust with abortion on demand, our
legislative bodies and the courts claim that the procedure is a
constitutionally protected right, disregarding all scientific evidence
and legal precedents that recognize the unborn as a legal, living
entity, deserving protection of the law.
Ironically, the greatest proponents of abortion are the same ones who
advocate imprisonment for anyone who disturbs the natural habitat of a
toad. This loss of respect for human life in the latter half of the
20th century has yet to have its full impact on our society. Without a
deep concern for life and with the casual disposing of living human
fetuses, respect for liberty is greatly diminished. This has allowed a
subtle but real justification for those who commit violent acts against
fellow human beings.
It should surprise no one that a teenager delivering a term newborn
is capable of throwing the child away in a garbage dumpster. The new
mother in this circumstance is acting consistently, knowing that if an
abortion is done just before a delivery, it is legally justified and
the abortionist is paid to kill the child. Sale of fetal parts to tax-
supported institutions is now an accepted practice. This moral dilemma
that our society has encountered over the past 40 years, if not
resolved in the favor of life, will make it impossible for a system of
laws to protect the life and liberty of any citizen.
We can expect senseless violence to continue as the sense of worth is
undermined. Children know that mothers and sisters, when distraught,
have abortions to solve the problem of an unwanted pregnancy.
Distraught teenagers in coping with this behavior are now prone to use
violence against others or themselves when provoked or confused. This
tendency is made worse because they see in this age of abortion their
own lives as having less value, thus destroying self-esteem.
The prime reason government is organized in a free society is to
protect life, not to protect those who take life. Today, not only do we
protect the abortionist, we take taxpayers' funds to pay for abortions
domestically as well as overseas. This egregious policy will continue
to plague us well into the 21st century.
A free society designed to protect life and liberty is incompatible
with Government sanctions and financing abortion on demand. It should
not be a surprise to anyone that as abortion became more acceptable,
our society became more violent and less free. The irony is that Roe v.
Wade justified abortion using the privacy argument, conveniently
forgetting that not protecting the innocent unborn is the most serious
violation of privacy possible.
If the location of the fetus is the justification for legalized
killing, the privacy of our homes would permit the killing of the
newborn, the deformed and the elderly, a direction, unfortunately, in
which we find ourselves going. As government-financed medical care
increases, we will hear more economic arguments for euthanasia, that
is, mercy killing, for the benefit of the budget planners. Already we
hear these economic arguments for killing the elderly and terminally
ill.
Last year the House made a serious error by trying to federalize the
crime of killing a fetus occurring in an act of violence. The stated
goal was to emphasize that the fetus deserved legal protection under
the law, and, indeed, it should and does at the State level.
Federalizing any act of violence is unconstitutional. Essentially, all
violent acts should be dealt with by the States, and, because we have
allowed the courts and Congress to federalize such laws, we find more
good State laws are overridden than good Federal laws written.
Roe v. Wade federalized State abortion laws and ushered in the age of
abortion. The Unborn Victims of Violence Act, if passed into law, will
do great harm by explicitly excluding the abortionist, thus codifying
for the first time the Roe v. Wade concept and giving even greater
legal protection to the abortionist.
The responsibility of Congress is twofold: first, we should never
fund abortions. Nothing could be more heinous than forcing those with
strong right-to-life beliefs to pay for abortions.
Second, Roe v. Wade must be replaced by limiting jurisdiction, which
can be done through legislation, a constitutional option. If we as a
Nation do not once again show respect and protect the life of the
unborn, we can expect the factions that have emerged on each side of
this issue to become more vocal and violent. A Nation that can casually
toss away its smallest and most vulnerable members and call it a
``right'' cannot continue to protect the lives or rights of its other
citizens.
Much has changed over the past 100 years, where technology has
improved our living standards. We find that our Government has
significantly changed from one of limited scope to that of pervasive
intervention.
One hundred years ago it was generally conceded that one extremely
important function of government was to enforce contracts made
voluntarily in the marketplace. Today, government notoriously
interferes with almost every voluntary economic transaction.
Consumerism, labor laws, wage standards, hiring and firing regulations,
political correctness, affirmative action, the Americans with
Disability Act, the Tax Code, and others place a burden on the two
parties struggling to transact business.
The EPA, OSHA and government-generated litigation also interferes
with voluntary contracts. At times, it seems a miracle that our society
adapts and continues to perform reasonably well in spite of the many
bureaucratic dictates.
As the 20th century comes to a close, we see a dramatic change from a
government that once served an important function by emphasizing the
value of voluntary contracts to one that excessively interferes with
them. Although the interference is greater in economic associations
than in social, the principle is the same. Already we see the political
correctness movement interfering with social and religious
associations. Data banks are set up to keep records on everyone,
especially groups with strong religious views and anybody to be so bold
as to call himself a patriot. The notion that there is a difference
between murder and murder driven by hate has established the principles
of a thought crime, a dangerous trend indeed.
When the business cycle turns down, all the regulations and laws that
interfere with economic and personal transactions will not be as well
tolerated, and then the true cost will become apparent. It is under the
conditions of a weak economy that such government interference
generates a reaction to the anger over the rules that have been
suppressed.
To the statist, the idea that average people can and should take care
of themselves by making their own decisions and that they do not need
Big Brother to protect them in everything they do is anathema to the
way they think.
The bureaucratic mindset is convinced that without the politicians'
effort, no one would be protected from anything, rejecting the idea of
a free market economy out of ignorance or arrogance. This change in the
20th century has significantly contributed to the dependency of our
poor on Government handouts, the recipients being convinced that they
are entitled to help and that they are incapable of taking care of
themselves. A serious loss of self-esteem and unhappiness results, even
if the system in the short run seems to help them get by.
There were no Federal laws at the end of the 19th century dealing
with drugs or guns. Gun violence was rare and abuse of addictive
substances was only a minor problem. Now, after 100 years of
progressive Government intervention in dealing with guns and drugs,
with thousands of laws and regulations, we have more gun violence and a
huge drug problem.
Before the social authoritarians decided to reform the gun and drug
culture, they amended the Constitution enacting alcohol prohibition.
Prohibition failed to reduce alcohol usage and
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a crime wave resulted. After 14 years, the American people demanded
repeal of this social engineering amendment, and got it.
Prohibition prompted the production of poor quality alcohol with
serious health consequences, while respect for the law was lost as it
was flagrantly violated. At least at that time the American people
believed the Constitution had to be amended to prohibit the use of
alcohol, something that is entirely ignored today in the Federal
Government's effort to stop drug usage.
In spite of the obvious failure of alcohol prohibition, the Federal
Government, after its repeal, turned its sights on gun ownership and
drug usage. The many Federal anti-gun laws written since 1934, along
with the constant threat of outright registration and confiscation,
have put the FBI and the BATF at odds with millions of law abiding
citizens who believe the Constitution is explicit in granting the right
of gun ownership to all nonviolent Americans.
{time} 1300
Our government pursued alcohol prohibition in the 1920s and
confiscation of gold in the 1930s, so it is logical to conclude that
our government is quite capable of confiscating all privately-owned
firearms. That has not yet occurred; but as we move into the next
century, many in Washington advocate just that and would do it if they
did not think the American people would revolt, just as they did
against alcohol prohibition.
Throughout this century, there has been a move toward drug
prohibition starting with the Harrison Act of 1912. The first Federal
marijuana law was pushed through by FDR in 1938, but the real war on
drugs has been fought with intensity for the past 30 years.
Hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent and not only is there
no evidence of reduced drug usage, we have instead seen a tremendous
increase. Many deaths have occurred from overdoses of street drugs
since there is no quality control or labeling. Crime as a consequence
of drug prohibition has skyrocketed and our prisons are overflowing.
Many prisoners are nonviolent and should be treated as patients with
addictions, not as criminals. Irrational mandatory minimum sentences
have caused a great deal of harm. We have nonviolent drug offenders
doing life sentences, and there is no room to incarcerate the rapists
and murderers.
With drugs and needles illegal, the unintended consequence of the
spread of AIDS and hepatitis through dirty needles has put a greater
burden on the taxpayers who are forced to care for the victims.
This ridiculous system that offers a jail cell for a sick addict
rather than treatment has pushed many a young girl into prostitution to
pay for the drugs priced hundreds of times higher than they are worth,
but the drug dealers love the system and dread a new approach.
When we finally decide that drug prohibition has been no more
successful than alcohol prohibition, the drug dealers will disappear.
The monster drug problem we have created is compounded by moves to tax
citizens so government can hand out free needles to drug addicts who
are breaking the law in hopes that there will be less spread of
hepatitis and AIDS in order to reduce government health care costs.
This proposal shows how bankrupt we are at coming to grips with this
problem, and it seems we will never learn.
Tobacco is about to be categorized as a drug and prohibition of sorts
imposed. This will make the drug war seem small if we continue to
expand the tobacco war. Talk about insane government policies of the
20th century, tobacco policy wins the prize. First, we subsidize
tobacco in response to demands by the special interests, knowing full
well even from the beginning that tobacco had many negative health
consequences. Then we spend taxpayers' money warning the people of its
dangers, without stopping the subsidies.
Government then pays for the care of those who choose to smoke,
despite the known dangers and warnings. But it does not stop there. The
trial lawyers' lobby saw to it that the local government entities could
sue tobacco companies for reimbursement of the excess costs that they
were bearing in taking care of smoking-related illnesses, and the only
way this could be paid for was to place a tax on those people who did
not smoke.
How could such silliness go on for so long? For one reason. We as a
nation have forgotten the basic precept of a free society, that all
citizens must be responsible for their own acts. If one smokes and gets
sick, that is the problem of the one making the decision to smoke or
take any other risk for that matter, not the innocent taxpayers who
have already been forced to pay for the tobacco subsidies and
government health warning ads.
Beneficiaries of this monstrous policy have been tobacco farmers,
tobacco manufacturers, politicians, bureaucrats, smokers, health
organizations, and physicians, and especially the trial lawyers. Who
suffers? The innocent taxpayers that have no choice in the matter and
who acted responsibly and chose not to smoke.
Think of what it would mean if we followed this simple logic and
implemented a Federal social program, similar to the current war on
smoking, designed to reduce the spread of AIDS within the gay
community. Astoundingly, we have done the opposite by making AIDS a
politically correct disease. There was certainly a different attitude a
hundred years ago regarding those with sexually transmitted diseases
like syphilis compared to the special status given AIDS victims today.
It is said that an interventionist economy is needed to make society
fair to everyone. We need no more government fairness campaigns.
Egalitarianism never works and inevitably penalizes the innocent.
Government in a free society is supposed to protect the innocent,
encourage self-reliance and impose equal justice while allowing
everyone to benefit from their own effort and suffer the consequences
of their own acts. A free and independent people need no authoritarian
central government dictating eating, drinking, gambling, sexual, or
smoking habits.
When the rules are required, they should come from the government
closest to home as it once did prior to America's ill-fated 20th
Century experiment with alcohol prohibition. Let us hope we show more
common sense in the 21st Century in these matters than we did in the
20th.
A compulsive attitude by politicians to regulate nonviolent behavior
may be well intentioned but leads to many unintended consequences.
Legislation passed in the second half of the 20th Century dealing with
drugs and personal habits has been the driving force behind the
unconstitutional seizure and forfeiture laws and the loss of financial
privacy.
The war on drugs is the most important driving force behind the
national police state. The excuse given for calling in the Army
helicopters and tanks at the Waco disaster was that the authorities had
evidence of an amphetamine lab on the Davidian property. This was never
proven, but nevertheless it gave the legal cover but not the proper
constitutional authority for escalating the attack on the Davidians
which led to the senseless killing of so many innocent people.
The attitudes surrounding this entire issue needs to change. We
should never turn over the job of dealing with bad habits to our
Federal Government. That is a recipe for disaster.
America has not only changed technologically in the last 100 years
but our social attitudes and personal philosophies have changed as
well. We have less respect for life and less love for liberty. We are
obsessed with material things, along with rowdy and raucous
entertainment. Needs and wants have become rights for both poor and
rich. The idea of instant gratification too often guides our actions,
and when satisfaction is not forthcoming anger and violence breaks out.
Road rage and airline passenger rage are seen more frequently.
Regardless of fault, a bad outcome in almost anything, even if beyond
human control, will prompt a lawsuit. Too many believe they deserve to
win the lottery and a lawsuit helps the odds.
Unfortunately, the only winners too often are the lawyers hyping the
litigation. Few Americans are convinced anymore that productive effort
is the most important factor in economic success and personal
satisfaction. One did not get rich in the 1990s investing
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in companies that had significant or modest earnings. The most
successful investors bought companies that had no earnings and the
gambling paid off big. This attitude cannot create perpetual wealth and
must some day end.
Today, financial gurus are obsessed with speculation in the next
initial public offering and express no interest in the cause of liberty
without which markets cannot exist.
Lying and cheating are now acceptable by the majority. This was not
true 100 years ago when moral standards were higher. The October 1999
issue of U.S. News and World Report reveals that 84 percent of college
students believe cheating is necessary to get ahead in today's world,
and 90 percent are convinced there is no price to pay for the cheating.
Not surprisingly, 90 percent of college students do not believe
politicians, and an equal number of percentage believes the media
cheats as well.
There is no way to know if this problem is this bad in the general
population, but these statistics indicate our young people do not trust
our politicians or media. Trust has been replaced with a satisfaction
in the materialism that speculative stock markets, borrowing money, and
a spendthrift government can generate.
What happens to our society if the material abundance which we enjoy
is ephemeral and human trust is lost? Social disorder will surely
result and there will be a clamor for a more authoritarian government.
This scenario may indeed threaten the stability of our social order and
significantly undermine all our constitutional protections, but there
is no law or ethics committee that will solve this problem of
diminishing trust and honesty. That is a problem of the heart, mind and
character to be dealt with by each individual citizen.
The importance of the family unit today has been greatly diminished
compared to the close of the 19th Century. Now, fewer people get
married, more divorces occur and the number of children born out of
wedlock continues to rise. Tax penalties are placed on married couples.
Illegitimacy and single parenthood are rewarded by government
subsidies, and we find many authoritarians arguing that the definition
of marriage should change in order to allow non-husband and -wife
couples to qualify for welfare handouts.
The welfare system has mocked the concept of marriage in the name of
political correctness, economic egalitarianism, and heterophobia.
Freedom of speech is still cherished in America but the political
correctness movement has seriously undermined dissent on our university
campuses. A conservative or libertarian black intellectual is clearly
not treated with the same respect afforded an authoritarian black
spokesman.
We now hear of individuals being sent to psychiatrists when personal
and social views are crude or out of the ordinary. It was commonplace
in the Soviet system to incarcerate political dissenters in so-called
mental institutions. Those who received a Soviet government designation
of socially undesirable elements were stripped of their rights. Will
this be the way we treat political dissent in the future?
We hear of people losing their jobs because of socially undesirable
thoughts or for telling off-color jokes. Today, sensitivity courses are
routinely required in America to mold social thinking for the simplest
of infractions. The thought police are all around us. It is a bad sign.
Any academic discussion questioning the wisdom of our policies
surrounding World War II is met with shrill accusations of anti-
Semitism and Nazi lover. No one is ever even permitted, without
derision by the media, the university intellectuals and the
politicians, to ask why the United States allied itself with the
murdering Soviets and then turned over Eastern Europe to them while
ushering in a 45-year saber-rattling, dangerous Cold War period.
Free speech is permitted in our universities for those who do not
threaten the status quo of welfarism, globalism, corporatism, and a
financial system that provides great benefit to the powerful special
interests. If a university professor does not follow the party line, he
does not receive tenure.
We find ourselves at the close of this century realizing all our
standards have been undermined. A monetary standard for our money is
gone. The dollar is whatever the government tells us it is. There is no
definition and no promise to pay anything for the notes issued ad
infinitum by the government. Standards for education are continually
lowered, deemphasizing excellence. Relative ethics are promoted and
moral absolutes are ridiculed. The influence of religion on our
standards is frowned upon and replaced by secular humanistic standards.
The work ethic has been replaced by a welfare ethic based on need, not
effort. Strict standards required for an elite military force are gone
and our lack of readiness reflects this.
Standards of behavior of our professional athletes seem to reflect
the rules followed in the ring by the professional wrestlers where
anything goes. Managed medical care driven by government decrees has
reduced its quality and virtually ruined the doctor-patient
relationship.
Movie and TV standards are so low that our young people's senses are
totally numbed by them. Standards of courtesy on highways, airplanes,
and shops are seriously compromised and at times leads to senseless
violence.
With the acceptance of abortion, our standards for life have become
totally arbitrary as they have become for liberty. Endorsing the
arbitrary use of force by our government morally justifies the direct
use of force by disgruntled groups not satisfied with the slower
government process. The standards for honesty and truth have certainly
deteriorated during the past 100 years.
{time} 1315
Property ownership has been undermined through environmental
regulations and excessive taxation. True ownership of property no
longer exists. There has been a systematic undermining of legal and
constitutional principles once followed and respected for the
protection of individual liberty.
A society cannot continue in a state of moral anarchy. Moral anarchy
will lead to political anarchy. A society without clearly understood
standards of conduct cannot remain stable any more than an architect
can design and build a sturdy skyscraper with measuring instruments
that change in value each day. We recently lost a NASA space probe
because someone failed to convert inches to centimeters, a simple but
deadly mistake in measuring physical standards. If we as a people
debase our moral standards, the American Republic will meet a similar
fate.
Many Americans agree that this country is facing a moral crisis that
has been especially manifested in the closing decade of the 21st
century. Our President's personal conduct, the characters of our
politicians in general, the caliber of the arts, movies, and
television, and our legal system have reflected this crisis.
The personal conduct of many of our professional athletes and movie
stars has been less than praiseworthy. Some politicians, sensing this,
have pushed hard to write and strictly enforce numerous laws regarding
personal nonviolent behavior with the hope that the people will become
more moral.
This has not happened, but has filled our prisons. This year it will
cost more than $40 billion to run our prison system. The prison
population, nearing 2 million, is up 70 percent in the last decade, and
two-thirds of the inmates did not commit an act of violence. Mandatory
minimum drug sentencing laws have been instrumental in this trend.
Laws clearly cannot alter moral behavior, and if it is attempted, it
creates bigger problems. Only individuals with moral convictions can
make society moral. But the law does reflect the general consensus of
the people regarding force and aggression, which is a moral issue.
Government can be directed to restrain and punish violent aggressive
citizens, or it can use aggressive force to rule the people,
redistribute wealth, and make citizens follow certain moral standards,
and force them to practice certain personal habits.
Once government is permitted to do the latter, even in a limited
sense, the guiding principle of an authoritarian government is
established, and its power and influence over the people will steadily
grow, at the expense of personal liberty. No matter how well-
intentioned, the authoritarian government always abuses its powers. In
its effort to achieve an egalitarian society, the principle of
inequality that freedom recognizes and protects is lost.
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Government, then, instead of being an obstruction to violence,
becomes the biggest perpetrator. This invites all the special interests
to manipulate the monopoly and evil use of government power. Twenty
thousand lobbyists currently swarm Washington seeking special
advantage. That is where we find ourselves today.
Although government cannot and should not try to make people better
in the personal, moral sense, proper law should have a moral,
nonaggressive basis to it: no lying, cheating, stealing, killing,
injuring, or threatening. Government then would be limited to
protecting contracts, people, and property, while guaranteeing all
personal nonviolent behavior, even the controversial.
Although there are degrees in various authoritarian societies as to
how much power a government may wield, once government is given the
authority to wield power, it does so in an ever-increasing manner. The
pressure to use government authority to run the economy in our lives
depends on several factors. These include a basic understanding of
personal liberty, respect for a constitutional republic, economic
myths, ignorance, and misplaced good intentions.
In every society there are always those waiting in the wings for an
opportunity to show how brilliant they are as they lust for power,
convinced that they know what is best for everyone. But the defenders
of liberty know that what is best for everyone is to be left alone,
with a government limited to stopping aggressive behavior.
The 20th century has produced socialist dictators the world over,
from Stalin, Hitler, and Mao to Pol Pot, Castro, and Ho Chi Minh. More
than 200 million people died as a result of bad ideas of these evil
men. Each and every one of these dictators despised the principle of
private property ownership, which then undermined all the other
liberties cherished by the people.
It is argued that the United States and now the world have learned a
third way, something between extreme socialism and mean-spirited
capitalism. But this is a dream. The so-called friendly third way
endorses 100 percent the principle that government authority can be
used to direct our lives and the economy. Once this is accepted, the
principle that man alone is responsible for his salvation and his life
on Earth, which serves as the foundation for free market capitalism, is
rejected.
The third way of friendly welfarism or soft fascism, where government
and businesses are seen as partners, undermines and sets the stage for
authoritarian socialism. Personal liberty cannot be preserved if we
remain on the course at which we find ourselves at the close of the
20th century.
In our early history, it was understood that a free society embraced
both personal civil liberties and economic liberties. During the 20th
century this unified concept of freedom has been undermined. Today we
have one group talking about economic freedom while interfering with
our personal liberty, and the other group condemning economic liberty
while preaching the need to protect personal civil liberties. Both
groups reject liberty 50 percent of the time. That leaves very few who
defend liberty all the time. Sadly, there are too few in this country
who today understand and defend liberty in both areas.
A common debate that we hear occurs over how we can write laws
protecting normal speech and at the same time limiting commercial
speech, as if they were two entirely different things. Many Americans
wonder why Congress pays so little attention to the Constitution and
are bewildered as to how so much inappropriate legislation gets passed.
But the Constitution is not entirely ignored. It is used correctly at
times when it is convenient and satisfies a particular goal, but never
consistently across-the-board on all legislation.
Two, the Constitution is all too frequently made to say exactly what
the authors of special legislation want it to say. That is the modern
way language can be made relative to our times, but without a precise
understanding and respect for the supreme law of the land, that is, the
Constitution, it no longer serves as the guide for the rule of law. In
its place, we have substituted the rule of man and the special
interests.
That is how we have arrived at the close of this century without a
clear understanding or belief in the cardinal principles of the
Constitution: the separation of powers and the principle of Federalism.
Instead, we are rushing toward a powerful executive, centralized
control, and a Congress greatly diminished in importance.
Executive orders, agency regulations, Federal court rulings,
unratified international agreements, direct government, economy, and
foreign policy. Congress has truly been reduced in status and
importance over the past 100 years. When the people's voices are heard,
it is done indirectly through polling, allowing our leaders to decide
how far they can go without stirring up the people.
But this is opposite to what the Constitution was supposed to do. It
was meant to protect the rights of the minority from the dictates of
the majority. The majority vote of the powerful and influential was
never meant to rule the people.
We may not have a king telling us which trees we can cut down today,
but we do have a government bureaucracy and a pervasive threat of
litigation by radical environmentalists who keep us from cutting our
own trees, digging a drainage ditch, or filling a puddle, all at the
expense of private property ownership.
The key element in a free society is that individuals should wield
control of their lives, receiving the benefits and suffering the
consequences of all their acts. Once the individual becomes a pawn of
the state, whether a monarch- or a majority-ruled state, a free society
can no longer endure.
We are dangerously close to that happening in America, even in the
midst of plenty and with the appearance of contentment. If individual
liberty is carelessly snuffed out, the creative energy needed for
productive pursuits will dissipate. Government produces nothing, and in
its effort to redistribute wealth, can only destroy it.
Freedom too often is rejected, especially in the midst of plenty,
when there is a belief that government largesse will last forever. This
is true because it is tough to accept personal responsibility, practice
the work ethic, and follow the rules of peaceful coexistence with our
fellow man.
Continuous vigilance against the would-be tyrants who promise
security at minimum cost must be maintained. The temptation is great to
accept the notion that everyone can be a beneficiary of the caring
state and a winner of the lottery or a class action lawsuit. But
history has proven there is never a shortage of authoritarians,
benevolent, of course, quite willing to tell others how to live for
their own good. A little sacrifice of personal liberty is a small price
to pay for long-time security, it is too often argued.
I have good friends who are in basic agreement with my analysis of
the current state of the American republic, but argue it is a waste of
time and effort to try and change the direction in which we are going.
No one will listen, they argue. Besides, the development of a strong,
centralized, authoritarian government is too far along to reverse the
trends of the 20th century. Why waste time in Congress when so few
people care about liberty, they ask? The masses, they point out, are
interested only in being taken care of, and the elite want to keep
receiving the special benefits allotted to them through special
interest legislation.
I understand the odds, and I am not naive enough to believe the
effort to preserve liberty is a cake walk. I am very much aware of my
own limitations in achieving this goal. But ideas based on sound and
moral principles do have consequences, and powerful ideas can make
major consequences beyond our wildest dreams.
Our Founders clearly understood this, and they knew they would be
successful, even against the overwhelming odds they faced. They
described this steady confidence they shared with each other when hopes
were dim as ``divine Providence.''
Good ideas can have good results, and we must remember, bad ideas can
have bad results. It is crucial to understand that vague and confusing
idealism produces mediocre results, especially when it is up against a
determined effort to promote an authoritarian system that is sold to
the people as conciliatory and nonconfrontational, a compromise, they
say, between the two extremes.
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But it must be remembered that no matter how it is portrayed, when
big government systematically and steadily undermines individual rights
and economic liberty, it is still a powerful but negative idea and it
will not fade away easily.
Ideas of liberty are a great threat to those who enjoy planning the
economy and running other peoples' lives. The good news is that our
numbers are growing. More Americans than ever before are very much
aware of what is going on in Washington and how, on a daily basis,
their liberties are being undermined. There are more intellectual think
tanks than ever before promoting the market economy, private property
ownership, and personal liberty.
The large majority of Americans are sick and tired of being
overtaxed, and despise the income tax and the inheritance tax. The
majority of Americans know government programs fail to achieve their
goals and waste huge sums of money. A smoldering resentment against the
unfairness of government and efforts to force equality on us can
inspire violence, but instead, it should be used to encourage an honest
system of equal justice based on individual, not collective, rights.
Sentiment is moving in the direction of challenging the status quo of
the welfare and international warfare state. The Internet has given
hope to millions who have felt their voices were not being heard, and
this influence is just beginning. The three major networks and
conventional government propaganda no longer control the information
now available to everyone with a computer.
The only way the supporters of big government can stop the Internet
will be to tax, regulate, and monitor it. Although it is a major
undertaking, plans are already being laid to do precisely that. Big
government proponents are anxious to make the tax on the Internet an
international tax, as advocated by the United Nations, apply the
Eschelon principle used to monitor all overseas phone calls to the
Internet, and prevent the development of private encryption that would
guarantee privacy on the Internet.
These battles have just begun. If the civil libertarians and free
market proponents do not win this fight to keep the Internet free and
private, the tools for undermining authoritarian government will be
greatly reduced. Victory for liberty will probably elude us for
decades.
The excuse they will give for controlling the Internet will be to
stop pornography, catch drug dealers, monitor child molesters, and do
many other so-called good things. We should not be deceived. We have
faced tough odds, but to avoid battle or believe there is a place to
escape to, someplace else in the world, would concede victory to those
who endorse authoritarian government.
The grand experiment in human liberty must not be abandoned. A
renewed hope and understanding of liberty is what we need as we move
into the 21st century. A perfectly free society we know cannot be
achieved, and the ideal perfect socialism is an oxymoron. Pursuing that
goal throughout the 20th century has already caused untold suffering.
The clear goal of a free society must be understood and sought, or
the vision of the authoritarians will face little resistance and will
easily fill the void.
There are precise goals Congress should work for, even under today's
difficult circumstances. It must preserve in the best manner possible
voluntary options to failed government programs.
{time} 1330
We must legalize freedom to the maximum extent possible.
1. Complete police protection is impossible; therefore, we must
preserve the right to own weapons in self-defense.
2. In order to maintain economic protection against Government
debasement of the currency, gold ownership must be preserved, something
taken away from the American people during the Depression.
3. Adequate retirement protection by the Government is limited, if
not ultimately impossible. We must allow every citizen the opportunity
to control all of his or her retirement funds.
4. Government education has clearly failed. We must guarantee the
right of families to home school or send their kids to private schools
and help them with tax credits.
5. Government snoops must be stopped. We must work to protect all
privacy, especially on the Internet, prevent the national ID card, and
stop the development of all Government data banks.
6. Federal police functions are unconstitutional and increasingly
abusive. We should disarm all Federal bureaucrats and return the police
function to local authorities.
7. The Army was never meant to be used in local policing activities.
We must firmly prevent our Presidents from using the military in local
law enforcement operations, which is now being planned for under the
guise of fighting terrorism.
8. Foreign military intervention by our Presidents in recent years to
police the American empire is a costly failure. Foreign military
intervention should not be permitted without explicit congressional
approval.
9. Competition in all elections should be guaranteed, and the
monopoly powers gained by the two major parties through unfair
signature requirements, high fees, and campaign donation controls
should be removed. Competitive parties should be allowed in all
government-sponsored debate.
10. We must do whatever is possible to help instill a spirit of love
for freedom and recognize that our liberties depend on responsible
individuals, not the group or the collective or the society as a whole.
The individual is the building block of a free and prosperous social
order.
The Founders knew full well that the concept of liberty was fragile
and could easily be undermined. They worried about the dangers that lay
ahead. As we move into the new century, it is an appropriate time to
rethink the principles upon which a free society rest.
Jefferson, concerned about the future wrote, ``Yes, we did produce a
near-perfect republic, but will they keep it? Or will they, in the
enjoyment of plenty, lose the memory of freedom? Material abundance
without character is the path of destruction.''
``They,'' that he refers to are ``we.'' And the future is now.
Freedom, Jefferson knew, would produce plenty, and with material
abundance it is easy to forget the responsibility the citizens of a
free society must assume if freedom and prosperity are to continue.
The key element for the Republic's survival for Jefferson was the
character of the people, something no set of laws can instill. The
question today is not that of abundance, but of character, respect for
others, and their liberty and their property. It is the character of
the people that determines the proper role for government in a free
society.
Samuel Adams, likewise, warned future generations. He referred to
``good manners'' as the vital ingredient that a free society needs to
survive. Adams said, ``Neither the wisest Constitution nor the wisest
laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners
are universally corrupt.''
The message is clear. If we lose our love of liberty and our manners
become corrupt, character is lost and so is the Republic. But character
is determined by free will and personal choice by each of us
individually. Character can be restored or cast aside at a whim. The
choice is ours alone, and our leaders should show the way.
Some who are every bit as concerned as I am about our future and the
pervasive corrupt influence in our Government in every aspect of our
lives offer other solutions. Some say to solve the problem all we have
to do is write more detailed laws dealing with campaign finance reform,
ignoring how this might undermine the principles of liberty. Similarly,
others argue that what is needed is merely to place tighter
restrictions on the lobbyists in order to minimize their influence. But
they fail to realize this undermines our constitutional right to
petition our Government for redress of grievances.
And there are others with equally good intentions that insist on
writing even more laws and regulations punishing nonviolent behavior in
order to teach good manners and instill character. But they fail to see
that tolerating nonviolent behavior, even when stupid and dangerous to
one's own self, is the same as our freedom to express unpopular
political and offensive ideas
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and to promote and practice religion in any way one chooses.
Resorting to writing more laws with the intent of instilling good
character and good manners in the people is anathema to liberty. The
love of liberty can come only from within and is dependent on a stable
family and a society that seeks the brotherhood of man through
voluntary and charitable means.
And there are others who believe that government force is legitimate
in promoting what they call ``fair redistribution.'' The proponents of
this course have failed to read history and instead adhere to economic
myths. They ignore the evidence that these efforts to help their fellow
man will inevitably fail. Instead, it will do the opposite and lead to
the impoverishment of many.
But more importantly, if left unchecked, this approach will destroy
liberty by undermining the concept of private property ownership and
free markets, the bedrock of economic prosperity.
None of these alternatives will work. Character and good manners are
not a government problem. They reflect individual attitudes that can
only be changed by individuals themselves. Freedom allows virtue and
excellence to blossom. When government takes on the role of promoting
virtue, illegitimate government force is used and tyrants quickly
appear on the scene to do the job. Virtue and excellence become
illusive, and we find instead that the government officials become
corrupt and freedom is lost, the very ingredient required for promoting
virtue, harmony, and the brotherhood of man.
Let us hope and pray that our political focus will soon shift toward
preserving liberty and individual responsibility and away from
authoritarianism. The future of the American Republic depends on it.
Let us not forget that the American dream depends on keeping alive the
spirit of liberty.
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