Posted on 05/30/2003 11:45:30 AM PDT by Remedy
5.56mm
And I certainly know the difference between the greatest leaders America ever produced: Washington, Hamilton, Adams, Madison, Marshall and their trivial opponents whose names will become more obscure as the ages and the glory of their antagonists progress.
Hamilton and Madison were so far above the antis it is laughable. The document they produced and implemented is the greatest political work ever conceived by man. Federalist is the greatest work of policical science in the last millenium at least, no, make it the last two millenia.
I agere with all except the underlined statements, which reveal extreme and unwarranted predudice. Would the Federalist papers be the great work that they are without having to deal with anti-fed arguments. Would there even be a BILL OF RIGHTS WITHOUT HENRY?
Rights: Patrick Henry, Virginia Ratifying Convention A Bill of Rights
NARA | Exhibit Hall | The Founding Fathers
The original states, except Rhode Island, collectively appointed 70 individuals to the Constitutional Convention, but a number did not accept or could not attend. Those who did not attend included Richard Henry Lee, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Samuel Adams and, John Hancock.
In all, 55 delegates attended the Constitutional Convention sessions, but only 39 actually signed the Constitution. The delegates ranged in age from Jonathan Dayton, aged 26, to Benjamin Franklin, aged 81, who was so infirm that he had to be carried to sessions in a sedan chair. You can also read a general biographical overview of the delegates.
Patrick Henry, lawyer, patriot, and orator, was a living symbol of the American struggle for liberty and self-government. From the day in 1760 when he appeared in Williamsburg to take his attorney's examination before Robert Carter Nicholas, Edmund Pendleton, John and Peyton Randolph, and George Wythe, Patrick Henry's story is inseparable from the stream of Virginia history.
OFFICES HELD: Delegate, Virginia House of Burgesses, 1765-1775; Member, Virginia Committee of Correspondence, 1773; Delegate, Continental Congress, 1774-1775; Delegate, Virginia Convention, 1776; Governor of Virginia, 1776-1779, 1784-1786; Delegate, Virginia Constitution Ratification Convention, 1788
MISCELLANEOUS: Patrick Henry was one of the most outspoken opponents of the Stamp Act. On May 29, 1765, he introduced seven radical resolutions in the Virginia House of Burgesses. Five of the seven resolutions were adopted on May 30, though one was reconsidered the next day (after Henry's departure) and removed.
In May 1774, a message from the Massachusetts Committee of Correspondence informed Virginians of the closing of the port of Boston. The Virginia House of Burgesses set aside June 1, 1774, as a day of "Fasting, Humiliation, and Prayer" in support of the citizens of Boston. Governor Dunmore dissolved the assembly, but 89 of the Burgesses gathered at the Raleigh Tavern and, under Henry's leadership, proposed that all the colonies meet in a Continental congress.
In April 1775, shortly after news reached Virginia that American colonists had clashed with British troops in Lexington, Massachusetts, Henry learned that Governor Dunmore had seized gunpowder from the Magazine in Williamsburg. Henry collected the militia of Hanover County and marched toward Williamsburg. He sent a message to the governor demanding that the gunpowder be returned to representatives of the colony. Governor Dunmore paid the Virginians money equal to the value of the powder, then issued a proclamation outlawing "a certain Patrick Henry" for disturbing the peace of the colony.
Animal Farm
got honorable mention.Why only 10?
Frivolous Courses Pervasive at Top American Colleges Despite the failure of Karl Marx's economic theories, courses devoted to him curiously abound in literature, sociology, anthropology and a host of other areas that Marx paid very little attention to while he was alive. A sampling of courses that students can choose from include Amherst's "Taking Marx Seriously," Duke's "Marxism and Society," UC-Santa Barbara's "Black Marxism," Rutgers's "Marxist Literary Theory," and Wisconsin's "Marxism and the Black Experience." Marx's theories may be dead in Eastern Europe, but they are alive and well on American college campuses.
Bizarre Classes Proliferate on America's 'Elite' Campuses Marxism, environmentalism, homosexuality, multiculturalism, and feminism now dominate the curricula of many elite colleges and universities. Critics contend that these areas of study are often intellectually vacuous, politically-charged, or both.
Pedophilia 101 at Cornell Students at Cornell University are used to courses like "Spike Lee Films," "Concepts of Race and Racism," "Whose Families? Whose Values?," "Domestic Television," "Music and Queer Identity," and "Introduction to Sexual Minorities."
Indeed, as Campus Report has chronicled, even the most cursory perusal of the Ithaca, New York school's course catalog reveals a burgeoning curriculum of frivolous, politically-charged, and downright bizarre classes. The university's administration, engaged in an indefatigable crusade for "diversity," has given free reign to the faculty to incorporate its every radical whim and every extreme agenda into the classroom. The results have been striking. There are courses at Cornell that artfully breach every imaginable-and many unimaginable-standard of most students.
One recent offering, however, has crossed the threshold from the merely absurd to the potentially dangerous.
The syllabus for "The Sexual Child" reads like a veritable who's-who of pro-pedophilia academics and activists. Among the authors presented in the course are Theo Sandfort, formerly on the board of directors of Paidika, a pro-pedophilia magazine based in Amsterdam; Daniel Tsang, the author of AIDS Taboo, purports to deliver an "academic" analysis of pedophilia; Pat Califia, a self-proclaimed "sexual outlaw" and author of the essay "The Age of Consent: The Great Kiddy-Porn Panic of '77" and the book Macho Sluts; and Havelock Ellis, author of "The School Friendships of Girls" and a reputed eugenicist.
Other than Gilder, excellent additions.
How About having them all read the Constitution then they could read the books that made it possible
Only half would vote for Constitution
Sigh -- sometimes I think I'm about the only person who recognizes that the characters in Atlas Shrugged as as they are because the book is an *allegory*.
I have no argument with the point of the book but it is not significant enough to even consider on a list like this.
On the contrary, it deserves a spot on a list like this not because it's a fine example of flowing English prose (although it is quite good for an author whose first language was not English), but because it lays out the consequences and motivations of socialism in a comprehensive way that has never been equaled before or since. Like "1984" did for totalitarian communism, no non-fiction essay could cover the same issues and bring it home, in human terms (both in the toll on lives and the human characteristics which bring them about) as well as an insightful novel could.
The "two minute hate" scene in "1984" explains more about propagandistic scapegoatism than any amount of non-fiction discussion of the topic. And likewise for countless scenes in "Atlas Shrugged".
Like Aesop's fables (themselves allegories as well), a properly set up fictional scenario imparts more understanding in a few paragraphs than entire books of philosophy (including Rand's own philosophy books, which are dry, windy, and dull). This is why "Atlas Shrugged" is a "must read" -- it contains *countless* lessons about socialism and other forms of human enslavement (including the voluntary kinds), as well as ways to break the cycle.
I've lost count of the number of people who have suddenly "gotten" conservative economic philosophy after reading this book.
Look at the skill difference between Orwell and Rand. No comparison imo. And G.O. says it all in 1/3 the length.
Similar messages, but *not* identical. "1984" focuses mostly on the totalitarianism itself. A lesser attention is paid to the economic aspects, and what is covered is pure communism. Nor is there much attempt to cover how the society became so enslaved in the first place. "Atlas Shrugged", on the other hand, covers *socialism* (and no, that's not identical to communism), and more importantly, how it attempts to creep into and take over capitalism with smiling promises of being more "fair" when it is anything but. After reading "Atlas Shrugged", the reader will be well innoculated against the was that socialism tries to worm its way into, and take over, capitalism -- and why such "reasonable" changes must be fought tooth and nail.
Try Henrietta Mears What the Bible is All About or John R.W. Stott Understanding the Bible
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.