RALLY AT THE BREACH!! - A Note on the U.S. Constitution

On September 17, 1787, the Constitution of the United States was signed.  Today, the Republic that was then founded in liberty is dead.  It will only live on if we recognize the enemies within, such as US Congress.  The only chance of restoring the Republic is in the hearts of the people.

"America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." - attributed to Abraham Lincoln at age 28

There's an interesting essay that the great American thinker Lysander Spooner once penned in 1867 entitled "No Treason."   To very briefly summarize this document, Spooner points out that there is no treason committed by those who disagree with Constitution of the United States. Recently a friend brought this up to me for a rather heated debate – which might have something to do with the fact that my pen-name since I started writing is "the Champion of the Constitution." (photo)

This article is my attempt to recap this conversation and add some points I've had after some time for reflection. While I concede the point that there is no treason in disagreeing with the Constitution – although it's quite different if you happen to be a politician who swore to uphold it - it is my firm belief that in our day and age we must rally around the Constitution.

First, yes, it is true that neither I nor you signed the Constitution.

Yes, it is also true that neither did our parents or grandparents.

And, yes, it is even true that those writing the Constitution could not possibly have represented the assent of all their constituents. Even if we did assume our ancestor's assent, there is a lot of false logic in the statement that just because they approved it that the document should be binding for all future generations.

Where I could not convince my friend was the principle that the Constitution is NOT the authority over her life, it is simply the law meant to CONSTRAIN the actions of government.

For that matter, what IS Government? Most, including myself two years prior, when the word 'government' is heard conjure up images of the President, a judge, Congress in session, or, more commonly, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Timmy "Turbo Tax" Geithner or Ben Bernanke. These people are not the Government to me, and I also include Congressman Ron Paul, whom I hold in much higher regard than the aforementioned, in that statement.

To me, Government is certainly NOT any single person or group of people. Government is a principle - the Rule of Law. The American Government exists - simply and solely - to protect the freedom of the individual.

I do not blindly adore the Constitution. Speaking for myself personally, I could do without the 16th, 17th, and 18th Amendments!  No, what I really champion is the rule of law.  What was the promise that was made and signed by a group of beleaguered and desperate patriots who – truth be told - were not fully backed by all their peers in the summer of 1776?

The Declaration of Independence was the promise to setup a new government to protect individuals from tyranny following the revolt. The Constitution of the United States was the fulfillment of that promise, the creation of a supreme law that would bind the hands of government.

Now, while I in actuality profoundly respect the opinion of my friend, we must reexamine our current situation.  We are not exactly in a blissful meadow where we have the luxury to daydream up a theoretical anarchic scheme and then live happily ever after.  For while there is no imperial monarch from some far-off island imposing his tyranny upon us all, our greatest enemies are not hiding in desolate mountains or the sands of some far-flung desert!

No, our true enemy is the enemy domestic. Many who walk the halls of Washington, D.C. are far greater threats to our liberties and prosperity.

They have left our borders as sieves, protected by non-military personnel from the so-called Department of Homeland Security.

We no longer have a Department of Defense – we have a Department of Offense, a Ministry of War, that has launched preemptive, unconstitutional, and illegal wars of aggression, most egregiously in Iraq.

Our enemies try to operate the national economy as if it were a machine, and not a complex biological system of individuals working together to mutually improve our lives.

These enemies have substituted irredeemable bits of depreciating paper for the lawful money guaranteed to us by the Constitution, coins of gold and silver.

They have spit upon the standards of human dignity by torturing others in our name.

It is a fact that if they had been forced to abide by the Constitution, their schemes would have failed or been much harder to implement. Those elected to Govern us have broken their oaths and must be removed and replaced with those who will not.

To all who will listen or read this, we must rally to the breach!  We must rally to the Constitution or else be culled out, divided and neutralized. If I may continue my analogy in this article "Ron Paul's rEVOLution Versus the "One Ring" of the Federal Reserve", the battle to restore the Republic is figuratively no different than the Battle of Helm's Deep from The Two Towers. Halfway though this video clip, an army of orcs breached the fortress walls by blowing it up, just as our public officials have breached a gigantic hole in the Constitution.  I say we must meet them at the breach, and thrust them out of office.

They will do whatever they can to remain in power, to control us by debasing our money and frittering away our civil liberties as if they were garbage. They will use the typical stratagems – divide-and-conquer through terms meant to confuse like "conservative" and "liberal", diversions by using hot-button topics like abortion and same-sex marriage, and prey upon our differences in race and creeds in attempts to turn us upon ourselves.

Well, the enemies domestic are on notice that they have a stalker.  I plead with you to join with me and become a Champion of the Constitution yourself.

Please decide for yourself whether I am correct as I believe the time is near at hand that will decide our fate - to enslave and destroy ourselves and our children or herald a new dawn for our Republic.  The choice is ours.

In Liberty,

Jake Towne, the Champion of the Constitution

 

Originally published May 28, 2009

 

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An aside on the Lincoln quote I paraphrased - I have not been able to source it, so that's why it reads "attributed."  The closest I found was this "Lyceum Speech" which Lincoln made at the age of 28.  An excerpt that I think is worth dwelling on for a moment in relation to the above article is below. (photo)

The reader should take note that just because I quote others, it does not necessarily mean I agree with them whole-heartedly.  While Lincoln was a fantastic orator - like the current President, there are many acts he did that are quite questionable.  Due to time constraints on my research, I remain uncertain as to Lincoln's possible role in instigating the Civil War.  I am also afraid the infamous "greenbacks" and National Banking System put in place in 1863 are not to my liking. 

 

"Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step over the ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never!—All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth in their military chest; with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a Thousand years. At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide."

I know the American People are much attached to their Government;--I know they would suffer much for its sake;--I know they would endure evils long and patiently, before they would ever think of exchanging it for another. Yet, notwithstanding all this, if the laws be continually despised and disregarded, if their rights to be secure in their persons and property, are held by no better tenure than the caprice of a mob, the alienation of their affections from the Government is the natural consequence; and to that, sooner or later, it must come...

The question recurs, "how shall we fortify against it?" The answer is simple. Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;--let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children's liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap--let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs;--let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become thepolitical religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its altars."