Posted on 07/14/2014 2:13:14 PM PDT by Jacquerie
Over the past century, progressives have demonstrated they know the nature of republics, of the dying constitutional republic they are killing, very well. In their quest to create the new man, they learned they first needed to recognize the nuts and bolts of the American Republic. Once they understood the foundation and structure of our great experiment in freedom, they could identify the critical supports, that if pulled, would collapse it.
The framing generation of 1787 fretted intensely how to form free government over an extensive territory that avoided the classic problem of republics, their degeneration into democracies in which various conflicting interest groups were constantly at each other’s throats. The resulting social turmoil reliably ended in despotism as a strongman emerged to “do something” about the violence.
Republics require a certain level of commonality among their people, a harmony of ideas and traditions. Without similar outlooks, distinct interest groups will develop, fight among each other and for dominance in the government. Recall the occasional freeper posts of 19th century elementary school primers. Children were taught the Bill of Rights and how God blessed our wonderful land. Adults with shared common values are more likely to keep self-government and be covetous of their freedoms.
Progressives long ago figured out that if this keystone to the social structure of republics could be pulled, free government, and along with it our freedoms, would soon perish.
Their destructive knowledge is on display along our southern border. Not only do millions of illiterate, unskilled foreigners strain social services, they inevitably dilute what it means to be an American. Once the tipping point is reached, in which enough people don’t think the ideals of our republic are worth promoting and defending, that’s it, game over. A once constitutional republic composed of similarly minded people becomes a democratic mob of connivers intent on “getting theirs” at the expense others.
It means our former government by consent must be replaced with one of coercion.
Progressives understand how to destroy republican freedom better than conservatives comprehend how to secure it.
Is this one a vanity?
Good post and good argument.
It would have actually helped if the Constitution itself had said some words to the effect. “... that this nation will never become a pure democracy as that will surely destroy what is being formed here today...”
Not that it would have stopped anything that has gone on, but it would have been far more interesting watching educators try to tapdance around the inevitable reading of the document in school.
You’d have to read the extended writings of the founders themselves to actually understand their opinions on “democracy”, “liberty”, and “tyranny.” And it’s easy to ignore those. Oh so easy.
Yes, thanks. Some stray synapses must have fired off.
Liberty quickly becomes libertine, and rights are read into nuances so faint as to be totally invisible to anyone capable of even a modest degree of critical thinking. When responsibility becomes duty, it is perhaps far too onerous a burden for the less informed, who do not expect any kind of answer when they use their wheedling tone, as they ask “Why?”
Whining is such an unattractive trait.
Progressives study the Constitution with great care, as they are constantly looking for loopholes, and if one does not quickly suggest itself, they re-define the words themselves. Just consider the word “welfare”. And they are still trying to twist around some new meaning of “militia”.
There’s that P word again. Let’s use the F word - Fascists.
See Browse 19th Century Schoolbooks Collection.
Scattered throughout are history and civics textbooks that teach the Constitution, and teach civics and how to be a responsible citizen.
There are also readers and books on manners.
-PJ
The greatest loophole of all is the 14th Amendment. It turns the relationship of the People and the Government inside-out through the mechanism of incorporation.
Great resource for the era in which education was uplifting and promoted virtue.
1879: Politics for young Americans
1823: The principles of the government of the United States: adapted to the use of schools
-PJ
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