Posted December 30th, 2010 at 5:05pm in First Principles
http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/checker.aspx?v=hd6UkU6UaG
The 112th Congress has an unprecedented plan. They are going to read the Constitution-the document that each member will swear to uphold-aloud on their first day. When asked on MSNBC to comment, Washington Post writer Ezra Klein replied “It’s a gimmick. I mean, you can say two things about it. One, is that it has no binding power on anything. And two, the issue of the Constitution is not that people don’t read the text and think they’re following. The issue of the Constitution is that the text is confusing because it was written more than 100 years ago and what people believe it says differs from person to person and differs depending on what they want to get done.”
Take that, foolish members of Congress! According to Klein, the Constitution is unknowable, and is only a tool for people to push through idiosyncratic policy proposals. So much for that oath.
But our Constitution’s history and origin is known. In his famous speech to the Federalist Society Annual Lawyers Convention in 1985, Former Attorney General Edwin Meese reminds us that the Constitution is not “buried in the midst of time.” It was not haphazardly written. The Constitution is a careful drafted document: the Founders “proposed, they substituted, they edited, and they carefully revised.” The Constitutional Conventions’ discussions, disputes, and compromises carefully recorded. The Father of the Constitution, James Madison, wrote comprehensive accounts of the convention. “Others, Federalists and Anti-Federalists alike, committed their arguments for and against ratification, as well as their understandings of the constitution, to paper, so that their ideas and conclusions could be widely circulated, read, and understood.” Thus, thanks to the pamphlets, letters, and well-documented debates and drafting records from the founding, the meaning of the Constitution is, in fact, knowable.
The Heritage Guide to the Constitution (published in 2005, recent enough that Klein may be able to understand it) offers a clause-by-clause explanation and analysis of the Constitution. In his opening essay, David Forte argues that “Written constitutionalism implies that those who make, interpret, and enforce the law ought to be guided by the meaning of the United States Constitution–the supreme law of the land–as it was originally written.” An originalist approach to the Constitution is not for the intellectually lethargic. The Constitution is a well-crafted document meriting a particular interpretive approach: “where the language of the Constitution is specific, it must be obeyed. Where there is demonstrable consensus among the Founders and ratifiers as to a principle stated or implied in the Constitution, it should be followed. Where there is ambiguity as to the precise meaning or reach of a constitutional provision, it should be interpreted and applied in a manner so as to at least not contradict the text of the Constitution itself.” The most interesting debates then, focus on the application of constitutional principles-not on whether these principles exist. This approach does not “remove controversy, or disagreement, but it does cabin it within a principled constitutional tradition that makes real the Rule of Law.”
Contrary to Klein’s suggestion, when the members of 112th Congress swear to uphold the Constitution, they are taking on a great and noble task. Those who seek to use the Constitution to supply definitive policy proposals will search the text in vain. The Constitution does not purport to answer every policy question, but answers the question about how problems should be approached and solved in a democratic republic.
Members of Congress must deliberate on tough issues and are obliged to consider how proposals before them accord with the Constitution. That document is not a legislative code inextricably bound to the eighteenth century, nor is it a mirror simply reflecting the thoughts and ideas of those who stand before it. It is “the supreme Law of the Land” which they are bound by oath to support and defend.
Tags: Ezra Klein, U.S. Constitution
Friday, December 31, 2010
Thursday, December 30, 2010
The Global Awakening - Alex Jones speech from Santa Cruz, CA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7nLMFHQw8g
THElNFOWARRlOR December 18, 2010 703 likes, 37 dislikes
Alex Jones gives a speech live in Santa Cruz California about the global awakening, how we as a species can take back our power and ultimately live out our destiny as free human beings.
http://www.prisonplanet.tv/
http://www.infowars.com/
Globalization and Tyranny - Dr. Stan Monteith and Sheriff Richard Mack Speech from Santa Cruz, CA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbEWMxpsEv0
THElNFOWARRlOR December 19, 2010
After an introduction by legendary conspiracy researcher Dr. Stan Monteith in which he divulges the plan to lower living standards in the United States as part of the one world agenda.
Several other guests take the stage to address the audience, including Sheriff Richard Mack.
We invite our subscribers to watch this 3-hour plus video feature and stress that new subscribers can now enjoy a near 50 per cent discount on the month to month price by signing up today for the Christmas Special by
https://prisonplanet.tv/signup.html
Category:
Nonprofits & Activism
Lew Rockwell - DHS's Psychological Warfare Op on The People - Alex Jones Tv 1/3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKNaonDhCXs
TheAlexJonesChannel December 30, 2010
Alex talks with libertarian political commentator, activist, proponent of the Austrian School of economics, and chairman of the Ludwig von Mises Institute, Lew Rockwell. Rockwell served as Ron Paul's congressional chief of staff from 1978 to 1982.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/
http://www.infowars.com/
http://www.prisonplanet.tv/
Category:
News & Politics
Webster Tarpley and Phil Berg: Mr. Obama, "Your Papers Please
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPfM0zrDs9c
TheAlexJonesChannel December 29, 2010
Alex talks with Author and researcher Webster Tarpley and attorney Phil Berg about Chris Matthews' comments on Obama's birth certificate.
www.tarpley.net/
www.obamacrimes.com/
http://www.infowars.com/
http://www.prisonplanet.tv/
Category:
News & Politics
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
The Vacuum Under the Soetoro Sombrero
The problem with being a ‘useful idiot’ is that when you are no longer useful, you are no longer just an idiot
The Vacuum Under the Soetoro Sombrero
By Joseph A Olson, PE Tuesday, December 28, 2010, CFP
The problem with being a ‘useful idiot’ is that when you are no longer useful, you are no longer just an idiot. When a useful idiot no longer controls his niche political market, he becomes an expendable USELESS IDIOT. For Barry Soetoro this metamorphosis happened far faster than any of his supporters anticipated.
The glossy Barry façade was hastily placed on the century old, rotted progressive framework in hopes of being the final, in a difficult to control, faux democracy scam, also known as the ‘Puppet Show’. Obama was to be the stop-gap placeholder until the final ‘command and control’ structure could be completed.
Transitions of power have traditionally been a difficult time for monopolists. There is always the danger that some rouge faction could become attractive to a suddenly conscious electorate and could actually expose the fraud of the current power structure. To hedge their bets, the elitists stack the deck with two willing puppets.
The 2008 election cycle had a bumper crop of potential New World Order puppets in both the DNC and RNC primaries. The ancient McCain was chosen to play the same spoiler role that Bob Dole played with Clinton in the 1996 election. The plan: get in the ring, swing a few punches and then take a ‘dive’ for the team.
With his McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill, the McCain-Feingold defeat free speech act, and suspending the presidential campaign to vote for TARP, John had proven his NWO bonafides. This john was the hooker’s win-win fall back if the ‘main man’ stumbled on his climb up the peak. This john stayed on the NWO message after the election by assisting the Connecticut Ding Dong with the McCain-Lieberman cap and trade tax and the McCain-Lieberman police state act.
An interesting war gaming is about the NWO choice of the hope and quick-change artist from the south side over the noisy nag in the New York senate chair. In the end, ‘youthful’ carried the day because youthful totalitarians have been known to get ‘re-elected’ for decades, avoiding the change of power problem. Strict constitutionalists might mention four year election cycles and two term limits, but this assumes that martial law would allow elections.
If the entire US government were to be forcibly collapsed prior to 2012, a shiny Barry could be appointed head of the UN and the unelected One World Government. If Barry was also ineligible by foreign birth and did serve, then the NWO gang had an additional precedent for invalidating the constitution.
The Audacity of Ignorance
One of the more successful areas of Progressive mind control has been in the teaching of history. Generations of Americans have had their history rewritten right under their unconscious noses. This calculated misrepresentation then reinforces the divide and conquer goal of the elites. These distortions nurture the demented mind set of many, for example those supporters of Black Liberation Theology.
Barry’s metaphorical ‘weird uncle’ Wright is an example of the malicious mistreatment of American history. In a sermon, Dec 7, 2008 Rev Jeremiah Wright said
“This day, sixty-seven years ago we bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon….and now America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”
Actually America was bombed 67 years ago that December day, at Pearl Harbor, and the Japanese bombings occurred four years later following a conflict that Barry and Jeremiah are completely ignorant about. Americans are not a vindictive people. One must wonder why the ‘greatest generation’ was supportive, even proud of the nuclear bombing of Japan, when later generations were taught to be embarrassed.
What is totally lacking in the modern history curriculum is any mention of Japanese Imperialism. For centuries Japan was a homogenous, closed, yet productive society. All this changed on July 8, 1853, when Commodore Matthew Perry steamed into Tokyo Bay and shook this feudal giant awake. The Japanese quickly realized they must industrialize and colonize in order to survive.
The Japanese studied and quickly copied state of the art military equipment and methods, then set about conquering their neighbors. The Americans had established a whaling station on the deserted island of Chichi Jima, 900 miles south of Tokyo in May of 1830. On January 17, 1862, while America was fighting itself to end slavery, the new Japanese Navy had their first foreign conquest, the American farmers, fishermen and shop keepers of Chichi Jima.
China, the giant of the east had been intentionally addicted to opium by the Europeans and the better bits carved into colonies. In the summer of 1894, the Japanese invaded northern China in a sneak attack, later declared war and on April 17, 1895 signed the treaty of Shimonoseki giving them Taiwan, the Pescadores Islands and the Liaodong Peninsula.
On February 8, 1904 Japan launched a sneak attack at Port Arthur which culminated in the Battle of Tsushima on May 27, 1905. This gave Imperialist Japan the Manchuria region from Mother Russia. Ceding to the Japanese sphere of influence, western nations abandoned the Kingdom of Korea and Japan then ‘annexed’ this neighbor.
For the next forty years Japan imposed a brutal serfdom on these conquered peoples, exploiting material and slave labor for its further industrialization. When Europe descended into the madness of WW II, the British, French and Dutch lost their grip on their former Asian colonies and expansionist Japan moved further into China.
Live, bound Chinese were used for bayonet practice in what the Japanese called “bravery tests”. The decades of atrocities practiced on their Korean, Manchurian and Taiwan colonies was put to use. This the new Chinese territory failed to provide the other components of modern warfare, petroleum and natural rubber, which were beyond their reach in south Asia, so Japan felt compelled to widen its war.
The World War Two You Never Knew
While Europe was self destructing, the United States Navy was the only obstacle to Pacific expansion and Japan responded with its proven sneak attack method. This was a multi-target region wide event and left Japan as temporary masters of the eastern Pacific. The history book, “Ship of Ghosts” tells the story of captured US sailors and marines from the heavy cruiser, USS Houston, sunk in the Java Sea. For three and a half years, these men starved and labored on the River Kwai railroad through the Thailand jungle.
The book “Flyboys” tells the story of nine US airmen shot down trying to retake Chichi Jima on Sept 2, 1944. Eight of those airmen were shot down, captured, tortured and killed in actions so repugnant that the trial of the Japanese officers was ordered sealed for fifty years. Part of the reason that generations of Americans do not know about these war crimes, is that the indignation over their abuse would still be an issue today.
The book “Battleground Atlantic” provides the history of the Japanese submarine I-52 on its way to the French port of Lorient with a cargo of 228 tons of Tin, Molybdenum, and Tungsten, 54 tons of rubber and two tons of Gold. The Gold was to purchase the new Messerschmitt ME-262 jet airplane, the new V-2 rocket and material for the ‘genzai bakudan’ or ‘bomb of now’.
Both Germany and Japan had nuclear bomb programs, but both realized that a workable fission bomb would not be ready in time to prevent defeat. Hitler had tons of radioactive, but not bomb usable U-235, that could make a ‘dirty bomb’. This salt the Earth weapon would contaminate large areas for a century or more. Hitler, not willing to use himself, was willing to sell this to his ally in the east, who was willing to use this weapon.
On June 24, 1944 the Japanese I-52 was on the surface exchanging a German harbor pilot from the German submarine U-530 when they were attacked by Avengers from the US carrier Bogue and the Jap sub was sunk. On May 15, 1945, two weeks after Hitler’s suicide and ten days after VE Day, or ‘Victory in Europe’ for those new to history, there was another development. German submarine U-234 surrendered with 560 Kilograms of Uranium Oxide intended for Japanese dirty bomb use.
Japan had built four of the largest submarines in the world and these were no ordinary ships. The smaller carried two and the larger three, single engine folding wing Aichi bombers. These aircraft were to strike unsuspecting targets including the troop ships of the US landing force harbored at Ulithi Atoll, the locks in the Panama Canal and the dirty bombs for the US east and west coasts.
The Japanese had manned Kamikaze torpedoes, biological weapons and school yards full of children practicing to fight the invaders with sharpened bamboo sticks. The Emperor had prepared his nation for extermination, a logical expectation given the Japanese treatment of its conquered peoples. Of the estimated three million Chinese prisoners of war that the Japanese captured, there is ONE documented soldier who survived the war.
The Japanese toll on American, British, Australian, New Zealand, Thai, Burmese and Gurkha soldiers are just somewhat better. The world’s only wartime use of atomic weapons saved far more lives than it cost, the painful reality hidden by deceitful historians. You will not learn a lot of true history sitting in Rev Wright’s church, however, he may be right on another bit of history.
Rev. Wright claims that the US government was to blame for the crack cocaine epidemic and that appears to be correct. There are plausible connections with the one airman who was rescued from Chichi Jima and the CIA- Contra weapons and this ongoing nation’s drug scandal. This same airman surpassed Neville Chamberlain as the greatest coward in history, selling a billion Chinese into slavery during Tiananmen Square.
History will repeat itself only if you let it. If you learn nothing from the Chinese opium dens, then you will see crack houses and meth labs in your neighborhood. If you cannot see greedy emperors running your government, then their pending sneak attacks will steal your nation. Ignorance is man’s deadliest sin. Overcoming ignorance is freedoms greatest weapon. Sharpen your mind and help us defend this sacred land.
The Vacuum Under the Soetoro Sombrero
By Joseph A Olson, PE Tuesday, December 28, 2010, CFP
The problem with being a ‘useful idiot’ is that when you are no longer useful, you are no longer just an idiot. When a useful idiot no longer controls his niche political market, he becomes an expendable USELESS IDIOT. For Barry Soetoro this metamorphosis happened far faster than any of his supporters anticipated.
The glossy Barry façade was hastily placed on the century old, rotted progressive framework in hopes of being the final, in a difficult to control, faux democracy scam, also known as the ‘Puppet Show’. Obama was to be the stop-gap placeholder until the final ‘command and control’ structure could be completed.
Transitions of power have traditionally been a difficult time for monopolists. There is always the danger that some rouge faction could become attractive to a suddenly conscious electorate and could actually expose the fraud of the current power structure. To hedge their bets, the elitists stack the deck with two willing puppets.
The 2008 election cycle had a bumper crop of potential New World Order puppets in both the DNC and RNC primaries. The ancient McCain was chosen to play the same spoiler role that Bob Dole played with Clinton in the 1996 election. The plan: get in the ring, swing a few punches and then take a ‘dive’ for the team.
With his McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill, the McCain-Feingold defeat free speech act, and suspending the presidential campaign to vote for TARP, John had proven his NWO bonafides. This john was the hooker’s win-win fall back if the ‘main man’ stumbled on his climb up the peak. This john stayed on the NWO message after the election by assisting the Connecticut Ding Dong with the McCain-Lieberman cap and trade tax and the McCain-Lieberman police state act.
An interesting war gaming is about the NWO choice of the hope and quick-change artist from the south side over the noisy nag in the New York senate chair. In the end, ‘youthful’ carried the day because youthful totalitarians have been known to get ‘re-elected’ for decades, avoiding the change of power problem. Strict constitutionalists might mention four year election cycles and two term limits, but this assumes that martial law would allow elections.
If the entire US government were to be forcibly collapsed prior to 2012, a shiny Barry could be appointed head of the UN and the unelected One World Government. If Barry was also ineligible by foreign birth and did serve, then the NWO gang had an additional precedent for invalidating the constitution.
The Audacity of Ignorance
One of the more successful areas of Progressive mind control has been in the teaching of history. Generations of Americans have had their history rewritten right under their unconscious noses. This calculated misrepresentation then reinforces the divide and conquer goal of the elites. These distortions nurture the demented mind set of many, for example those supporters of Black Liberation Theology.
Barry’s metaphorical ‘weird uncle’ Wright is an example of the malicious mistreatment of American history. In a sermon, Dec 7, 2008 Rev Jeremiah Wright said
“This day, sixty-seven years ago we bombed Hiroshima, we bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon….and now America’s chickens are coming home to roost.”
Actually America was bombed 67 years ago that December day, at Pearl Harbor, and the Japanese bombings occurred four years later following a conflict that Barry and Jeremiah are completely ignorant about. Americans are not a vindictive people. One must wonder why the ‘greatest generation’ was supportive, even proud of the nuclear bombing of Japan, when later generations were taught to be embarrassed.
What is totally lacking in the modern history curriculum is any mention of Japanese Imperialism. For centuries Japan was a homogenous, closed, yet productive society. All this changed on July 8, 1853, when Commodore Matthew Perry steamed into Tokyo Bay and shook this feudal giant awake. The Japanese quickly realized they must industrialize and colonize in order to survive.
The Japanese studied and quickly copied state of the art military equipment and methods, then set about conquering their neighbors. The Americans had established a whaling station on the deserted island of Chichi Jima, 900 miles south of Tokyo in May of 1830. On January 17, 1862, while America was fighting itself to end slavery, the new Japanese Navy had their first foreign conquest, the American farmers, fishermen and shop keepers of Chichi Jima.
China, the giant of the east had been intentionally addicted to opium by the Europeans and the better bits carved into colonies. In the summer of 1894, the Japanese invaded northern China in a sneak attack, later declared war and on April 17, 1895 signed the treaty of Shimonoseki giving them Taiwan, the Pescadores Islands and the Liaodong Peninsula.
On February 8, 1904 Japan launched a sneak attack at Port Arthur which culminated in the Battle of Tsushima on May 27, 1905. This gave Imperialist Japan the Manchuria region from Mother Russia. Ceding to the Japanese sphere of influence, western nations abandoned the Kingdom of Korea and Japan then ‘annexed’ this neighbor.
For the next forty years Japan imposed a brutal serfdom on these conquered peoples, exploiting material and slave labor for its further industrialization. When Europe descended into the madness of WW II, the British, French and Dutch lost their grip on their former Asian colonies and expansionist Japan moved further into China.
Live, bound Chinese were used for bayonet practice in what the Japanese called “bravery tests”. The decades of atrocities practiced on their Korean, Manchurian and Taiwan colonies was put to use. This the new Chinese territory failed to provide the other components of modern warfare, petroleum and natural rubber, which were beyond their reach in south Asia, so Japan felt compelled to widen its war.
The World War Two You Never Knew
While Europe was self destructing, the United States Navy was the only obstacle to Pacific expansion and Japan responded with its proven sneak attack method. This was a multi-target region wide event and left Japan as temporary masters of the eastern Pacific. The history book, “Ship of Ghosts” tells the story of captured US sailors and marines from the heavy cruiser, USS Houston, sunk in the Java Sea. For three and a half years, these men starved and labored on the River Kwai railroad through the Thailand jungle.
The book “Flyboys” tells the story of nine US airmen shot down trying to retake Chichi Jima on Sept 2, 1944. Eight of those airmen were shot down, captured, tortured and killed in actions so repugnant that the trial of the Japanese officers was ordered sealed for fifty years. Part of the reason that generations of Americans do not know about these war crimes, is that the indignation over their abuse would still be an issue today.
The book “Battleground Atlantic” provides the history of the Japanese submarine I-52 on its way to the French port of Lorient with a cargo of 228 tons of Tin, Molybdenum, and Tungsten, 54 tons of rubber and two tons of Gold. The Gold was to purchase the new Messerschmitt ME-262 jet airplane, the new V-2 rocket and material for the ‘genzai bakudan’ or ‘bomb of now’.
Both Germany and Japan had nuclear bomb programs, but both realized that a workable fission bomb would not be ready in time to prevent defeat. Hitler had tons of radioactive, but not bomb usable U-235, that could make a ‘dirty bomb’. This salt the Earth weapon would contaminate large areas for a century or more. Hitler, not willing to use himself, was willing to sell this to his ally in the east, who was willing to use this weapon.
On June 24, 1944 the Japanese I-52 was on the surface exchanging a German harbor pilot from the German submarine U-530 when they were attacked by Avengers from the US carrier Bogue and the Jap sub was sunk. On May 15, 1945, two weeks after Hitler’s suicide and ten days after VE Day, or ‘Victory in Europe’ for those new to history, there was another development. German submarine U-234 surrendered with 560 Kilograms of Uranium Oxide intended for Japanese dirty bomb use.
Japan had built four of the largest submarines in the world and these were no ordinary ships. The smaller carried two and the larger three, single engine folding wing Aichi bombers. These aircraft were to strike unsuspecting targets including the troop ships of the US landing force harbored at Ulithi Atoll, the locks in the Panama Canal and the dirty bombs for the US east and west coasts.
The Japanese had manned Kamikaze torpedoes, biological weapons and school yards full of children practicing to fight the invaders with sharpened bamboo sticks. The Emperor had prepared his nation for extermination, a logical expectation given the Japanese treatment of its conquered peoples. Of the estimated three million Chinese prisoners of war that the Japanese captured, there is ONE documented soldier who survived the war.
The Japanese toll on American, British, Australian, New Zealand, Thai, Burmese and Gurkha soldiers are just somewhat better. The world’s only wartime use of atomic weapons saved far more lives than it cost, the painful reality hidden by deceitful historians. You will not learn a lot of true history sitting in Rev Wright’s church, however, he may be right on another bit of history.
Rev. Wright claims that the US government was to blame for the crack cocaine epidemic and that appears to be correct. There are plausible connections with the one airman who was rescued from Chichi Jima and the CIA- Contra weapons and this ongoing nation’s drug scandal. This same airman surpassed Neville Chamberlain as the greatest coward in history, selling a billion Chinese into slavery during Tiananmen Square.
History will repeat itself only if you let it. If you learn nothing from the Chinese opium dens, then you will see crack houses and meth labs in your neighborhood. If you cannot see greedy emperors running your government, then their pending sneak attacks will steal your nation. Ignorance is man’s deadliest sin. Overcoming ignorance is freedoms greatest weapon. Sharpen your mind and help us defend this sacred land.
Nullification in 2011
Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 2lst Century
Nullification in 2011! By Alan Caruba Tuesday, December 28, 2010
CFP
The great issue of our times is the same great issue of the 1830s. The question is whether Congress can pass legislation or the President issue executive orders that are not authorized by or consistent with the Constitution?
The federal government is a republic composed of separate and sovereign republics.
What recourse do the States have individually and in combination when the central government acts in a fashion that is contrary to the limits and enumerated powers of the Constitution?
The answer, other than an appeal to the courts, is nullification. This term is defined as the assertion that States can and should refuse to enforce unconstitutional federal laws.
This is no trifling matter.
In the past two years since the advent of the Obama administration, the federal government has seized control of one sixth of the nation’s economy, asserting control over the provision of healthcare.
It seized control of General Motors and Chrysler auto manufacturers, arbitrarily casting aside the rightful expectations of their bondholders and other creditors.
It has imposed absurd and invasive demands on air travelers.
It is considering a United Nations treaty that would render the Second Amendment null and void.
It has sued Arizona for enacting an immigration law that mirrors its own.
It is attempting through the FCC to assert control over the Internet.
In the 1860s the issue of state’s rights led to the Civil War.
One hundred and fifty years ago, on December 22, 1860, the State of South Carolina declared its independence and seceded from the Union. It did not arrive at this decision overnight. In fact, on December 10, 1832, President Andrew Jackson issued a proclamation to South Carolina disputing its right to nullify a federal law.
A South Carolina convention had declared that the tariff acts of 1828 and 1832 “are unauthorized by the Constitution of the United States and violate the true meaning and intent thereof and are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State.”
Subsequent to Jackson’s proclamation, Congress passed the Force Act that authorized the use of military force against any State that resisted the tariff acts. A compromise engineered by Henry Clay resulted in the tariff of 1833, designed to reduce southern objections. South Carolina ended its nullification effort, but by 1861 it would no longer bend to the mandates of the federal government.
Contrary to some historical reinterpretation, the Civil War was all about State’s rights. Though President Lincoln opposed slavery, he did not introduce the issue into the conflict until after the awful slaughter on the battlefields that led to the Emancipation Proclamation. It came three years after the war had begun and was intended to introduce a moral dimension to the conflict. Slaves, however, were only freed in the Confederate southern States.
There are many issues worthy of nullification these days.
At the top of the current list is Obamacare and the fact that some twenty States have filed suit against its enforcement clearly demonstrates (1) an intense rejection of it and (2) the willingness of States to use the judicial system to seek relief.
Beyond that, we have entire federal agencies that have no legitimate basis in the Constitution.
The Department of Education should be abolished. The Constitution makes no mention of education as a federal concern. It was and should be up to the States and local communities to oversee general education. Part of the controversy raging these days concerns teacher’s union contracts that are contributing to the bankruptcy of many States.
The Department of Energy, created by executive order, should be abolished. States should have the right to determine how their natural resources should be either protected or utilized. Requiring states to use so-called alternative (wind and solar) energy is seriously wrong.
Likewise, the Environmental Protection Agency, also created by executive order, has so exceeded its original mandate that it has become a lethal threat to the economy and the welfare of all Americans.
Nullification should be utilized to rid us of these and other federal entities that overstep their mission, threatening the Bill of Rights and other constitutional limitations and freedoms.
To learn more about the nullification movement, visit the Nullify Now website and the website of the Tenth Amendment Foundation.
This nation has been heading toward nullification since the 1930s when many of the Constitution’s restrictions of federal power were cast aside. This has brought the nation to the brink of financial collapse. To save it, nullification may be required.
Editor’s note: To learn more about this topic, Tom Woods has written “Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 2lst Century.”
© Alan Caruba, 2010
Nullification in 2011! By Alan Caruba Tuesday, December 28, 2010
CFP
The great issue of our times is the same great issue of the 1830s. The question is whether Congress can pass legislation or the President issue executive orders that are not authorized by or consistent with the Constitution?
The federal government is a republic composed of separate and sovereign republics.
What recourse do the States have individually and in combination when the central government acts in a fashion that is contrary to the limits and enumerated powers of the Constitution?
The answer, other than an appeal to the courts, is nullification. This term is defined as the assertion that States can and should refuse to enforce unconstitutional federal laws.
This is no trifling matter.
In the past two years since the advent of the Obama administration, the federal government has seized control of one sixth of the nation’s economy, asserting control over the provision of healthcare.
It seized control of General Motors and Chrysler auto manufacturers, arbitrarily casting aside the rightful expectations of their bondholders and other creditors.
It has imposed absurd and invasive demands on air travelers.
It is considering a United Nations treaty that would render the Second Amendment null and void.
It has sued Arizona for enacting an immigration law that mirrors its own.
It is attempting through the FCC to assert control over the Internet.
In the 1860s the issue of state’s rights led to the Civil War.
One hundred and fifty years ago, on December 22, 1860, the State of South Carolina declared its independence and seceded from the Union. It did not arrive at this decision overnight. In fact, on December 10, 1832, President Andrew Jackson issued a proclamation to South Carolina disputing its right to nullify a federal law.
A South Carolina convention had declared that the tariff acts of 1828 and 1832 “are unauthorized by the Constitution of the United States and violate the true meaning and intent thereof and are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State.”
Subsequent to Jackson’s proclamation, Congress passed the Force Act that authorized the use of military force against any State that resisted the tariff acts. A compromise engineered by Henry Clay resulted in the tariff of 1833, designed to reduce southern objections. South Carolina ended its nullification effort, but by 1861 it would no longer bend to the mandates of the federal government.
Contrary to some historical reinterpretation, the Civil War was all about State’s rights. Though President Lincoln opposed slavery, he did not introduce the issue into the conflict until after the awful slaughter on the battlefields that led to the Emancipation Proclamation. It came three years after the war had begun and was intended to introduce a moral dimension to the conflict. Slaves, however, were only freed in the Confederate southern States.
There are many issues worthy of nullification these days.
At the top of the current list is Obamacare and the fact that some twenty States have filed suit against its enforcement clearly demonstrates (1) an intense rejection of it and (2) the willingness of States to use the judicial system to seek relief.
Beyond that, we have entire federal agencies that have no legitimate basis in the Constitution.
The Department of Education should be abolished. The Constitution makes no mention of education as a federal concern. It was and should be up to the States and local communities to oversee general education. Part of the controversy raging these days concerns teacher’s union contracts that are contributing to the bankruptcy of many States.
The Department of Energy, created by executive order, should be abolished. States should have the right to determine how their natural resources should be either protected or utilized. Requiring states to use so-called alternative (wind and solar) energy is seriously wrong.
Likewise, the Environmental Protection Agency, also created by executive order, has so exceeded its original mandate that it has become a lethal threat to the economy and the welfare of all Americans.
Nullification should be utilized to rid us of these and other federal entities that overstep their mission, threatening the Bill of Rights and other constitutional limitations and freedoms.
To learn more about the nullification movement, visit the Nullify Now website and the website of the Tenth Amendment Foundation.
This nation has been heading toward nullification since the 1930s when many of the Constitution’s restrictions of federal power were cast aside. This has brought the nation to the brink of financial collapse. To save it, nullification may be required.
Editor’s note: To learn more about this topic, Tom Woods has written “Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 2lst Century.”
© Alan Caruba, 2010