Posted on 12/02/2009 10:54:13 AM PST by Loud Mime
"The subject speaks its own importance; comprehending in its consequences nothing less than the existence of the UNION, the safety and welfare of the parts of which it is composed, the fate of an empire in many respects the most interesting in the world. It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made; and a wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind."
This passage seems particularly relevant to our present state of disarray.
When they have no foundation of constitutional knowledge, they will rely on the opinion of others; that's why opinion polls are so important to todays's Democrat.
OK, you’re on!
We need to start arguing from a Constitutional foundation.
It is important that Americans understand the difference between federalism and anti-federalism. This is because all at once, they seem to overlap, state the opposite case, and state other cases entirely.
“Federalism” on its surface, means “a national government responsive to its individual States.” As such, most of the time, the national government has primacy, but at times, the States can as a group assert primacy. However, in practice it means a *balance* between the power of the federal government and that of the States. It does so with mechanisms found in the constitution. But those mechanisms go far beyond federalism.
For example, most Americans know of the balance that is supposed to exist between the three branches of the federal government. But likewise, there is supposed to be a balance between the powers *outside* of the federal government, in *creating* the federal government. And this is how we achieve “republican democracy.”
The people elect “the people’s house”, the House of Representatives. As originally intended, the individual States are supposed to appoint the United States Senators, though this power was stripped from the States with the 17th Amendment, the direct election of senators. The electoral college was created to overcome the dilemma of a close contest in the presidential election, as an “ad hoc” group of delegates *not* controlled by the US congress. And finally, the president appoints Supreme Court justices, again with the approval of the States, by their delegates, the US senators
A complicated balancing act.
Instead of calling themselves “anti-federalists”, more properly they should have been called “confederates”, because at the time of the constitution of the United States, they did not want primacy in the national government, but wanted the national government to work as the agent of the individual States.
Their idea, of an “articles of confederation” of the United States, was at the time the true opposite of a strong national government in the form of federalism, and remained so through the US Civil War.
Importantly, there was considerable legitimacy in their arguments, because even from the outset of a constitutional government in the United States, George Washington was the first president to seriously violate the constitution by using the military against the people, in the “Whiskey Rebellion”. And ever since that time, the national government has tried and succeeded in enlarging its power at the expense of the individual States and the people.
So even though today “federalists” advocating “federalism”, are calling for power to be returned from the national government to the individual States and to the people, at the onset of the republic, the “federalists”, especially Alexander Hamilton, were calling for a strong national government.
Conversely, the “anti-federalists” back then, who were truly “confederates”, continued with their criticisms of the national government and the US constitution, again all the way up to the US Civil War, when they wrote their “Constitution of the Confederate States of America”. This is a document that should be reviewed by modern federalists, because setting aside the issue of slavery, the confederates made some interesting and wise changes, such as the presidential line item veto.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederate_Constitution
(full text)
http://www.usconstitution.net/csa.html
So today, while “federalists” look for a return to the balance of power between the national government, and the State governments and the people, there is no good name for those who support an even more centralized and powerful national government.
Other than “tyrants”, I suppose.
Today’s federalists are again aligned with the anti-federalist confederates, both seeking the restoration of a constitutional government that is no longer running wild, spending beyond any sense of reason, pursuing everlasting foreign entanglements, and no longer entirely loyal to our nation, beholden to other interests.
Instead, the individual States once again need to appoint US senators, and thus we need a repeal of the 17th Amendment, and again the individual States need to stand between and protect the people from the direct power of the national government. This would be achieved by the repeal of the 16th Amendment, the Income Tax, and its replacement with a more orderly form of taxation.
We now have career politicians who are selected and funded by special interests, in an endless cycle of becoming more socialistic/in-debted/power-mad robber-barons who rape and pillage with impunity.
most Americans know of the balance that is supposed to exist between the three branches of the federal government..
I disagree. I believe most of our citizens talk about this, but have NO idea about the balance.
mee too....
Let me rephrase. Up until recent years, the balance of power that was supposedly taught in schools.
Our Founding Fathers left us with compass and charts. We have pitched them overboard. And, for what? For a boy pretender who owes no loyalty to anything but the power he can seize.
Would very much appreciate being on the Federalist Ping List.
Excellent and timely choice...add me to the ping list please!
Please add me to the list
ok, you’re on. Contribute as you wish!!
Yeah, sure, ping me. Thanks :)
The Constitution is a inviolable compact of and for the people, and not, as some leftist progressives and liberal RINOs would say, a living document.
Yes, please include me. It sounds like a good learning opportunity.
When they have no foundation of constitutional knowledge, they will rely on the opinion of others; that's why opinion polls are so important to todays's Democrat.". . . whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force."
It certainly is the system of the so-called "liberal" to exert him/her self to try to convince us that we are inadequate to handle our own affairs, let alone those of the organization of an empire, as the ratifiers of the Constitution were assaying to do.Please put me on your Federalist list; I've never read the book and I know that I should.
Sign me up too!!!
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