Free Republic

The solution to America's problems reside within the American tradition. Our latest problem, the unasked-for Obamacare, is centered around new onerous fines/taxes. Obamacare is the result of an imposed ideology that is incompatible with the American experience. Its social justice progressivism is irrelevant, hostile, and has no legitimate place here. We long ago faced a similar situation in which a foreign ideology meant taxes that couldn’t be avoided. In 1765, Parliament imposed the Stamp Act. The tax had a logical basis. Great Britain spent enormous sums to kick France out of much of North America, and a tax on those...

A few days ago CNN anchor Brooke Baldwin, speaking about the Republican House bill defunding Obamacare, commented, “Certainly not the way the Founding Fathers maybe drew this thing up.” It’s certainly a surprise to hear an anchor on CNN, an organization biased in favor of progressives, appealing to the authority of the Constitution. For a century the progressives have been telling us that the Constitution is an outmoded document from a different age, and needs to be “modernized” to meet the challenges of a new world. Listen to Woodrow Wilson in his 1913 book The New Freedom. “I am ....

I teach an American Government class for a University of Wisconsin College. The other day my supervising Professor in critiquing my class Syllabus made this statement: "I prefer that you not refer to the founders as Founding Fathers....my reason is that they aren't my daddy. My ancestors weren't even here at the time and I think calling people your daddy is not as objective as political scientists should aim to be." Ignoring his subjectivity in a number of other areas in his curriculum, for example his analysis of Wisconsin Governor Walker's Balanced Budget Act 10 smacked more of a subjective,...

A man whose wit was matched only by the looseness of his tongue, the combative John Adams quickly acquired a hefty reputation for articulate jabs and razor-sharp put-downs... 1. On Benjamin Franklin “His whole life has been one continued insult to good manners and to decency.”2. On Alexander Hamilton “That bastard brat of a Scottish peddler! His ambition, his restlessness and all his grandiose schemes come, I'm convinced, from a superabundance of secretions, which he couldn't find enough whores to absorb!”(Hamilton certainly wasn't above returning the fire.)3. On Thomas Paine's Common Sense “What a poor, ignorant, malicious, crapulous mass.”(For more...

Following a meeting with Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang today at the White House, President Barack Obama seemed to offer praise for communist revolutionary Ho Chi Minh as someone “inspired” by America’s Founding Fathers, the PJ Tatler reports. During the Oval Office meeting, Obama says he and Sang “discussed the challenges that all of us face when it comes to issues of human rights,” referring to Vietnam’s sordid record on the issue. “And we had a very candid conversation about both the progress that Vietnam is making and the challenges that remain.” When it was time to leave, Sang reportedly...

President Obama hailed hard-core communist revolutionary Ho Chi Minh today as a pretty open guy who was actually inspired by the Founders. Obama took a break from his jobs-pivot speeches to meet Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang at the White House. The pair held joint remarks in the Oval Office afterward. Obama said their first bilateral meeting “represents the steady progression and strengthening of the relationship between our two countries.” “Obviously, we all recognize the extraordinarily complex history between the United States and Vietnam. Step by step, what we have been able to establish is a degree

Radley Balko asks:Are cops constitutional? Radley Balko (born April 19, 1975 in Greenfield, Indiana) is an American libertarian journalist, blogger, and speaker. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radley_Balko

The last thing I would wish to do, as a Canadian and also as a British citizen, is dispute the worthiness of celebrating the Declaration of Independence on the Fourth of July. It is not in that spirit, but in the pursuit of historical accuracy, that I gently remind some readers of what that Declaration actually tells us. Poor old King George III — Farmer George, a stubborn, not overly intelligent person who was intermittently mad as a result of porphyria — was certainly a limited man, but was not a bad man. Yet he is denounced in the most...

The summer blockbuster “Man of Steel” reveals why Superman is an American icon, like the courageous revolutionaries who declared American independence. They couldn’t leap tall buildings in a single bound, but our founders’ steel-like resolve forged an against-all-odds victory over a Kryptonically powerful British military in pursuit of radical ideas — human liberty and self-government. Breaking with history’s repressive norms, they declared the uniquely American idea that everyone is born free and equally entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In order to prevent future Lex Luthors from tyrannizing the people, they established a constitutional system whose powers...

In one sense, Republicans and Democrats are nearly the same. While they may have different philosophies that motivate their actions, the results are usually identical: An impenetrable bureaucracy that’s expensive to run and difficult to control. Sadly, it’s a trend that neither side seems interested in changing. Maybe they think we won’t notice. And maybe they’re right. I think it might be time to revise the traditional left/right political spectrum we use to describe American politics. We may need a new way to define the current political landscape, perhaps focusing less on ideology and more on the existing scene we’re...

In a commencement address to graduates of OhioStateUniversity, President Obama urged them to eschew “the deranged rantings of those who see growth of government as antithetical to human liberty.” The president warned that “this particular form of mental illness can be traced back to the Founders of this country who portrayed the modest efforts of the British Government to instill some much-needed discipline into a so-called tyranny against Americans’ supposed natural rights.” Obama alleged that “while the people of 1776 could be excused for their ignorance—after all, universal public education would not be implemented for another century or more—graduates of...

"Those gentlemen, who will be elected senators, will fix themselves in the federal town, and become citizens of that town more than of your state." --George Mason, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788

Obama: ‘I Am Constrained By A System That Our Founders Put In Place’ April 4, 2013 8:14 AM DENVER (CBSDC/AP) — Ratcheting up pressure for Congress to limit access to guns, President Barack Obama said Wednesday that recent steps by Colorado to tighten its gun laws show “there doesn’t have to be a conflict” between keeping citizens safe and protecting Second Amendment rights to gun ownership. “I believe there doesn’t have to be a conflict in reconciling these realities,” Obama said in Denver, where he stepped up his call for background checks for all gun purchases and renewed his demand...

I have made no bones about the fact that the ultimate authority on the issue of homosexuality is the Bible and it is crystal clear in condemning it. If others want to cite polls and commentaries and “experts” to attempt to bolster their claim in favor of homosexuality they are welcome to do so. However, what I find a bit disingenuous are those that will talk about rights within the context of the Constitution, which was written by men, not God as though the men who wrote it and backed it would have sided with practicing homosexuals today on the...

Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death Complete text of Patrick Henry's speech at St. John's Church in Richmond, Virginia on March 23, 1775. No man, Mr. President, thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the House. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This...

"Now that I look back to Cicero’s life and work, however, few figures from any age seem as searingly pertinent to our own social and political life"... Consider this passage from Cicero’s On Duties: Whoever governs a country must first see to it that citizens keep what belongs to them and that the state does not take from individuals what is rightfully theirs. … As for those politicians who pretend they are friends of the common people and try to pass laws redistributing property and drive people out of their homes or champion legislation forgiving loans, I say they are...

Founders Series, preserving the statement of the 1948 generation.

Part III Part I dealt with guns and the Second Amendment. Part II dealt mainly with the First Amendment. This Part III looks at the origins and purposes of the Bill of Rights and questions the direction in which our nation is headed.The Bill of Rights in generalWhen the Constitution was being considered there was opposition to inclusion of any Bill of Rights and the Bill of Rights as we now know it -- the First through Tenth Amendments -- was added not long after the Constitution had been adopted. The Founders' indifference toward a bill of rights in the...

Thursday Jan 17, Tom Brokaw was given time on MSNBC to tell the Founding Fathers the self-evident truths they laid their lives on the line for are farfetched. Are we lucky, or what? Our talking heads know so much more than the men who pledged their lives, their sacred honor to free us from the tyranny of Kings and establish real freedom. Brokaw spoke with Andrea Mitchell. He aimed his remarks at people who believe in the Constitution by saying, in a scholarly formal tone (which passes for derision in his circles), that 2nd Amendment types who say the Amendment...

... For the purpose of this article, we'll focus on AR-15s since it is what CBS calls "the most popular rifle in America" and one often designated an "assault" rifle. An AR-15 is the civilian equivalent to the military's M-16. So what's the difference? Kelly Alwood, a firearms trainer and consultant, told TheBlaze the only difference is that one [the military AR-15] is fully automatic and the other is semi-automatic [the civilian AR-15]. It's a small yet simultaneously big distinction. Firearms for use by the military are able to shoot continuously with one pull of the trigger, machine-gun style....

The sight of the representatives of various national gun groups sitting down to negotiate with the Vice-President of the United States over more firearms restrictions was infuriating. What were they even doing there? What is there to negotiate? The terms of surrender? Why do these people always think they need a "seat at the table"? Don't they realize that there are some tables you should never sit at? Sorry, but what Sam Adams called the first law of nature is not negotiable. We either maintain our God-given, unalienable, natural right to self-defense or America has ceased to be.   America's...

THOMAS JEFFERSON is in the news again, nearly 200 years after his death — alongside a high-profile biography by the journalist Jon Meacham comes a damning portrait of the third president by the independent scholar Henry Wiencek. We are endlessly fascinated with Jefferson, in part because we seem unable to reconcile the rhetoric of liberty in his writing with the reality of his slave owning and his lifetime support for slavery. Time and again, we play down the latter in favor of the former, or write off the paradox as somehow indicative of his complex depths. Neither Mr. Meacham, who...

In the 1760s, the British fought a world war, partially to defend her American colonies from French encroachment. When they tried to unfairly raise taxes to pay for that war, American colonists objected, so the British solved the problem in a way that suited the times: They merely mandated that virtually all American commerce must move through London. Everything had to be exported to London and imported from London… so that the king would be sure to get his cut. The colonists objected, and started a war of independence over it, because the king had them chained; this coastal nation...

The only legitimate purpose of government is to secure the rights that you already have as a free-willed creation of God. For over 200 years, we have forgotten what the Founders wrote about the purpose of government in the Declaration of Independence. Its purpose is not to control us and keep our elected officials in power, although that is exactly what it has become in practice. The purpose of government should always be to secure our rights! Government is not to be an agent of control over our lives. Instead, government is to be a defender of our rights- a...

Few matters ignite more controversy than America’s Christian roots. The issue reverberates anew this electoral season where the faiths of both major candidates have been questioned. Religion imbues politics. The battle over America’s beginnings muddles wishful hero worship with efforts to commandeer America’s past so to steer her future. The most vocal proponents of Christian America and their counterparts advocating a completely secular state necessarily cherry-pick data to prove exaggerations while discarding inconvenient details. By transforming our Forefathers into faithful servants of Christ the Religious Right risks compromising the biblical message. Baptist theologian Al Mohler warns advocates of Christian America...

I recently had a nice conversation with an old friend Grif, who now lives in Kentucky. He has been struggling some lately in finding the best way to sell conservatism, while avoiding the ‘warts’ if you will. As the discussion progressed it was clear that most of the ‘warts’ revolved around religion. My first instinct is that it sounds like he needs to be selling Christ and not Conservatism but I will defer for now. My advice to him was to ‘sell the sizzle’. It used to be the #1 rule in marketing; I suppose it still ranks up there...

Recently, an article appeared in Fredericksburg.com, complaining about a Fourth of July ad run by Hobby Lobby that included several quotes reflecting the religious heritage of America. (Several of Hobby Lobby’s different holiday message ads can be seen here). The Fredericksburg article claimed that three of the historical declarations made in the ad were inaccurate, but historical documentation demonstrates that it is the critics and not Hobby Lobby who were errant in their claims. A. Complaint in Article: As referenced in the ad, John Jay did write a letter in which he declared it "the duty, as well as the...

Our founders wrote more on the issues of modern times than people perhaps realize. The words used are simply different, sometimes being more complex or sometimes outdated. In a letter to John Taylor, John Adams wrote some things about John Jacques Rousseau and the distortions of reality that took place in the French Revolution: (in section III) (Alt. link) That all men are born to equal rights is true. Every being has a right to his own, as clear, as moral, as sacred, as any other being has. This is as indubitable as a moral government in the universe. But...

Freemasonry has not figured prominently in most of the displays and debates on slavery and abolition in 2007. Yet the society was an important eighteenth century institution and one whose extensive archives have the potential to offer interesting - and sometimes unfamiliar - insights into social processes and relationships that shaped the Atlantic world of which slavery and abolitionism were prominent features. This review of the exhibition at the Library and Museum of Freemasonry begins to uncover this complex and sometimes ambiguous history. As well as being an age of slavery, slave-trading, slave resistance, abolitionism and eventual abolition, the eighteenth...

Once someone uses the term “states’ rights” these days, the following conversation is seemingly inevitable: Person 1: “State’s rights!? Like the Confederates believed in? What, are you a racist!?” Person 2: “No, I’m not a racist! I just think that the federal government is too strong, that’s all! States have rights too, we’re supposed to have a FEDERAL system!” Person 1: “Oh, sure! You just think that the states need the RIGHT to discriminate against minorities!” Obviously, that was an overly simplified (and poorly scripted) conversation. My point is that most people automatically associate the term “states’ rights” with some...

Every July much is said by eloquent historians, civic and religious leaders, and—thanks to blogs and social media—Americans everywhere, about the Declaration of Independence, the meaning of the American Experiment, and the price of freedom. Independence Day is a moment to be grateful for the blessings of liberty and to remember the gifts many sacrificed so much to leave us. But this year we also mark the 180th anniversary of the death in 1832 of the last surviving signer of the Declaration. Charles Carroll’s life spanned nearly a century. By the fiftieth anniversary of July 4, 1776, Carroll had outlived...

Atheists are determined to rewrite American history to further their ungodly purposes. Consider the “Freethought of the Day,” published on this Fourth of July by the so-called Freedom from Religion Foundation, which is based in Madison, Wisconsin, which describes itself as the nation’s largest association of “freethinkers,” including atheists, agnostics and skeptics: “On this date in 1776,” reads the atheist Freethought, “Thomas Jefferson’s ‘Declaration of Independence was adopted… Its secular purpose was ‘to dissolve the political bands,’ and it inaugurated the anti-biblical idea that ‘governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Finally,...

As the nation celebrates American liberty on the Fourth of July each year, it would be appropriate for all Americans (including those who have come here from other nations in search of that same freedom), first of all, to reflect on the Christian foundations—including genuine creationism—on which our nation was built. In a previous article on this theme (see the July 1996 Back to Genesis article, “Sweet Land of Liberty�), it was noted that many of the founding fathers of our country were strict creationists and that this fact was reflected in the Declaration of Independence itself. In this article,...

Film directors, authors, journalists and socialites who raised £200,000 to secure Julian Assange bail face losing thousands after the WikiLeaks founder breached his bail.

These men are blemishes at your LOVE feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm---shepards who feed only themselves. They are clods without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted—twice dead. Jude 1:12 Our Founding Fathers gave us all the weapons we need to protect our Country from another Monarchy. Whether that Monarchy is a Dictator, a King or Premier they had the Biblical wisdom to protect us from the enslavement we are beginning to witness. America has allowed her freedom to be compromised for decades from both Democrat and Repub presidents and it is...

In "Charters", James Madison wrote the following: In Europe, charters of liberty have been granted by power. America has set the example and France has followed it, of charters of power granted by liberty. This is what makes modern revolutionaries so backward. They are stuck on stupid in old-think - that is, that power grants liberty. If only government could get bigger, we could grant the rights to _________________ for whatever special interest group they have in mind at the moment. Like the "right" to healthcare. In the comment "America has set the example", he makes it clear that it's...

An excellent organization helping to preserve our founding principles, particularly appropriate on this anniversary.

Not long ago I made an entry titled "Woodrow Wilson absolutely hated the principles of the Founding Fathers", well, I am no fan of any progressive. They are all dangerous to me. So Wilson attacks the founding and I'm going to call it as it is. The same is said for Roosevelt. Progressivism is America's cancer and it's not just in one party. I came across an article on The Heritage Foundation titled "Progressivism: Still Dangerous After All These Years, which is primarily about Roosevelt. In it, they highlight one of the things that came out of Roosevelt's pie hole:(Direct...

“Politics and religion don’t mix” is an ill-conceived America adage that has been passed from generation to generation. It is false an ideology and an essential reason why America, the greatest nation on earth has fallen to its knees spiritually, morally, and economically. The Founding Fathers never envisioned an America where the Bible was out-of-bounds when defining public policy. They unabashedly called upon the name of the Lord God Almighty for His providence and applied His principals when forming the Constitution of the United States of America. Their words speak for themselves: • George Washington: ”Whereas it is the duty...

To the Founding Fathers, America’s success depended on religion and morality. ____________________________________________________________ In 1787, several of the greatest minds America has ever produced gathered in Philadelphia for what became known as the Constitutional Convention. Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and Gouverneur Morris, all there to write a Constitution, knew they were sailing in uncharted waters—embarking on a bold new plan to establish a federal government for the purpose of unifying the colonies under one nation. After the Constitution became supreme law in the U.S. on March 4, 1789, America quickly ascended to astonishing heights, becoming the most...

For the next week, I will be publishing excerpts from my soon-to-be released book, "America's History is His Story!" These were written as a favor for a friend of mine, who started a Christian radio station in West Virginia. And at the time of their writing, I had no thought of ever publishing them in book form. There is one of these brief essays for every day of the year. They are intended to be read on the radio on a daily basis, to establish the fact that America is indeed a Christian nation. I hope you find them both...

Thomas Jefferson was only 22 years old when the Son’s of Liberty raised the “rebellious stripes” to the top of the Liberty Tree in 1765. Ten years later he would draft the Declaration of Independence defining in timeless prose the rights of all men to be free. But his wisdom may have been even more evident when in his Inaugural Address in 1803 he warned against the redistribution of the fruits of free enterprise. He said “To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare...

In recent days, in the midst of people of different faiths celebrating the religious High Holidays of Christmas and Hanukkah, there have been extraordinarily brutal mob frenzies over the chance to buy assorted products. People have been beaten and killed in the pursuit of the most insignificant of material items. I have heard many different explanations. Of course, I prefer my own. “We The People” have let the individual down. “We The People” have allowed the lives of the everyday citizen of America to become valueless. The beauty of the American experiment is that as equals, we could live completely...

On September 17, 2010 President Barack Obama spoke to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute 33rd Annual Award Gala. During his speech – reading from a teleprompter – he quoted from the Declaration of Independence. Here is what he said: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, endowed with certain unalienable rights, life and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Perhaps his teleprompter or his brain just can’t handle the phrase “endowed by our Creator!” The Declaration of Independence defines the Constitution philosophically and spiritually, therefore in Beauty and its Author. “Progressives” have argued...

Between 1764 and the Declaration of Independence in 1776 Americans produced a rich series of pamphlets and resolutions listing their grievances against the central government of the British Empire. As I have pointed out before, reading those pamphlets is very helpful in understanding what the Constitution really means. And ignorance of them contributes to common constitutional mistakes. These pamphlets are particularly useful in comprehending the Founders’ version of federalism. This is because the constitutional balance between states and federal government partly reflected what the Founders had wanted the balance to be between colonies and imperial government. One of the most...

Former Republican Speech writer Peggy Noonan has a column in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal entitled ”The Divider vs. the Thinker”—“While Obama readies an ugly campaign, Paul Ryan gives a serious account of what ails America.” Really? What choice does Obama have? That is what you do when you don’t have any legitimate successes. Without the sub-heading I would have absolutely no idea who or what Ms Noonan was talking about, until I was 2/3rds of the way through the piece. Although, I must admit that the title intrigued me and in it she asked an important question: ”What was the...

Exodus 20:17 “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that [is] thy neighbor’s.” No. I am not about to turn my collar around and climb back into my pulpit. If this piece turns out to be a sermon, then – so be it. The Bible verse above is, in fact, the Tenth Commandment. Those of the Judeo-Christian faith understand covetousness to mean: reprehensible acquisitiveness, excessively and culpably desirous of the possessions of another, or — just plain envious...

Hard-Headed Idealist The man who drafted the Bill of Rights later helped Thomas Jefferson conduct a back-channel propaganda war.. Yes, George Washington was the father of our country, but who fathered its politics? Certainly not Washington, who detested the very notion of partisanship and did his best to govern as First Magistrate, above the interests of "faction." His successor, the honest but hyper-irascible John Adams, was temperamentally incapable of cold political calculation, one reason that he was so vulnerable to attack during his single presidential term. Thomas Jefferson, who cultivated an above-the-fray, nonpolitical persona, had a keen private appreciation of...

Thank you for your invitation to be here today and I am very honored that you should ask me not only to join you in the observance of Constitution Week, but also permit me to express my respect and admiration for Hillsdale College and to thank each of you for everything you have done to make their tireless efforts possible. Now, I confess that I am not able to call myself a Hillsdale graduate nor can I lay claim to any formal affiliation with you. But, nonetheless, I come here as a very great beneficiary of your commitment to the...