THE LEFT’S ASSAULT ON AMERICAN LIBERTY
By Bill Wilson || For much of its 236-year history, the federal government has accumulated new power by whittling away at the essential protections afforded to American citizens under the U.S. Constitution.
In recent years this wholesale abandonment of our founding principles has rapidly gained momentum — accompanied by a skyrocketing government debt that now eclipses our nation’s annual gross domestic product.
“There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics,” President Reagan said in his farewell address to the nation in 1989. “As government expands, liberty contracts.”
No truer words have ever been spoken — yet in the last half-decade this nation has witnessed a stunning (and astronomically expensive) escalation of neo-fascism in America. And no political party, court nor ideological movement has proved able to blunt its building momentum.
During the debate over Obamacare — a massive, budget-busting entitlement funded with money our country doesn’t have — former New Jersey Judge Andrew Napolitano pointedly challenged then-U.S. Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., regarding the constitutionality of this socialized medicine monstrosity.
Clyburn’s response?
“There’s nothing in the Constitution that says the federal government has anything to do with most of the stuff we do,” he said.
Therein lies the root of our problem.
The overt contempt for our Constitution displayed by Clyburn and other elected officials is precisely why government has become so unruly, so fiscally unsustainable and so dangerous. Tragically for our Republic, the U.S. Supreme Court empowered this view in its Obamacare ruling — inventing a new taxing authority to accommodate this abomination rather than following the law and protecting our liberties.
Decades of legislative overreach, executive power grabs and judicial activism have steadily diminished our freedom and free markets — a disintegration that may have already reached the point of terminal velocity. Our national government now prints unlimited piles of money with no congressional oversight. It taps our phones and emails with no probable cause. It compels us to purchase products or face stiff fines. And now it wants to strip us of our right to keep and bear arms. Yet even these egregious incursions are not enough for some members of the professional left.
In a recent column published by the New York Times, Georgetown University law professor Louis Michael Seidman argues for the wholesale abandonment of the U.S. Constitution, decrying “all its archaic, idiosyncratic and downright evil provisions.”
“We have to give up on the claim that we are a self-governing people who can settle our disagreements through mature and tolerant debate,” Seidman writes. “We ought to try extricating ourselves from constitutional bondage so that we can give real freedom a chance.”
“Real freedom”? From “constitutional bondage”?
These assertions are demonstrably illogical. Arguing one’s freedom would improve by allowing government to tighten its grip is like arguing one’s breathing would improve by allowing an anaconda to do the same. Yet we are supposed to accept the ongoing suffocation of our freedom and free markets in the name of expediting a socialist agenda that is bankrupting our country? And give up more of our money — along with our guns — to the new overlords?
Like so many ivory-tower leftists whose anti-American views hold sway in Washington, Seidman sees the Constitution as something to be shaken off — like a bad cold.
Of course, what he fails to recognize is that his prescription for constitutional emasculation would kill the very source of the federal government’s power and legitimacy. Absent the Constitution, there is no government — only anarchy. One cannot destroy our founding document without destroying the nation it created (or what’s left of it). And make no mistake — once freed from any real or implied constraint, government becomes the tyranny our Founding Fathers (and most present-day Americans) fear.
In other words, it ceases to be America.
The author is president of Americans for Limited Government.
Bill Wilson is president of Americans for Limited Government. Follow him on Twitter @BillWilsonALG. This column – reprinted with permission – originally appeared on Investors’ Business Daily.
65 comments
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I’d say you must be asleep if you don’t realize what has happened to this country. Keep snoozing…
….. read and initialed
Robert can’t help it. If you know him you understand his issues.
What about the assault on our common sense by both sides? Does any politician, from the Man at the top all the way down to the Mayor of Columbia expect people not to see that 99.9% of the people we elected (or the people we elected hired, hint hint) have used their influences for their own personal and political gain. The only people looking out for the people are, well no one. So that’s that.
sadly this will never change. the political landscape is a wasteland of self interest, and it will never change back to what it should be. You might get a few people every now and then doing the work of the people, but that’s a drop in the bucket. We are too far gone at this point.
Even if you were to clean house from top to bottom, I have a feeling the entire new crop would only serve themselves.
….. read and initialed
Bill Wilson, the man who funds FitsNews.com and its disgusting attacks on Governor Nikki Haley. If not for Bill Wilson’s money, Will Folks wouldn’t be able to keep this site up.
Give credit where credit is due.
Howie, that isnt true. I would pay a few bucks a month to read FITS, but I wouldnt pay a penny to read The State…
There are A LOT of of ignorant voters who worship Obama as a god…
They have no idea, nor do they care, about a FREE REPUBLIC….
The US has had to take our freedom to live from the pious royalty of Euorpe, salvage indians and democrat slave-owners…
It may now again time to defeat the Tyrants and enemeies of liberty…
Salvage Indians? Great motorcycles if you can find the parts.
“Judicial activism have steadily diminished have our freedom and free markets…”. I guess in Bill’s view slavery and segregation weren’t that hard on black people; women weren’t really interested in equal rights and the suffrage; it was fine for laborers to work 60 hours a week with no safety or health considerations, or their minor children to do the same, etc., etc., etc. And of course free markets must be allowed full, undiminished freedom. How did that work out in 1929 and 2008, Bill?
See SYPs post about common sense…
Bon,
It’s doubtful that we’ve EVER had truly free markets. The regulations in place even in 29′ were astounding. If anything, the 29′ and 08′ contractions were a failure of central planning…which there was plenty of in both cases.
All that being said, there’s not much point in Wilson bemoaning an “attack” on the Constitution as it died a long time ago. Any “attack” is simply the kicking of a dead dog and doesn’t mean much in the big picture.
The constitution was a dead letter in 1865.
We have been prestending to be a union ever since.
If the federal government via federal law, executive orders, and federal courts are to decided the scope of federal powers– which it has been since 11 states were forced back into the union by violence– a act which people believe “settled” the matter of the proper relationship between the states (principal) and the federal government (agent), the union of the founders was dead, Dead, DEAD!
We made a go of it and tried our best, but let’s not pretend that the uS Constitution means anything at all to anyone in Washington, or COlumbia for that matter.
Folks, we’re on our own…
(Countdown for Lincoln preserving the union and/or it was “all about” slavery in 5, 4, 3, 2…)
Only an idiot would say slavery was not the cause of the civil war. That or a racist. Or both. Next you will say that the Nazi did not cause Wwll
“My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.” – Lincoln
The civil war was about money & power. period.
“Slavery is our King — Slavery is our Truth — Slavery is our Divine Right…”
John Preston urging the Virginia to exit the Union as SC had already done.
If anyone doesn’t think the Civil War was about slavery for Southern legislatures, read the ordnance of succession for each state. Texas’ is pretty typical:
“She (Texas) was received into the confederacy with her own constitution under the guarantee of the federal constitution and the compact of annexation, that she should enjoy these blessings. She was received as a commonwealth holding, maintaining and protecting the institution known as negro slavery–the servitude of the African to the white race within her limits–a relation that had existed from the first settlement of her wilderness by the white race, and which her people intended should exist in all future time. Her institutions and geographical position established the strongest ties between her and other slave-holding States of the confederacy. Those ties have been strengthened by association. But what has been the course of the government of the United States, and of the people and authorities of the non-slave-holding States, since our connection with them?”
“I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, [applause]—that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people” – Lincoln
That quote proves what exactly? That was in a debate with Douglas, I believe. He was running for office and nothing appealed to 19th sensibilities like hating on black folks. Besides, Lincoln never pretended it was holding the Union together. The southern states, on the other hand, made no bones about why they were leaving the Union.
“That quote proves what exactly? That was in a debate with Douglas, I believe. He was running for office and nothing appealed to 19th sensibilities like hating on black folks”
So is your suggestion that Lincoln was a liar?
Lincoln was a politician of his time and he certainly changed his tune from audience to audience.
In any event, the South’s exit from the Union was what set off the Civil War – Lincoln certainly didn’t want a war. Their reasons for succession are the genesis of the war and that reason was slavery. They didn’t necessarily think he would abolish slavery, though many did believe that, but they believed their political clout and the material progress of the South depended on the expansion of slavery west and even South. They didn’t deny that fact.
So if Lincoln was a liar as you suggest it would be pretty hard for any of us to truly know why he spearheaded the effort to stop the South from leaving the Union, don’t you think? Including the idea that “didn’t want a war”.
I don’t know, I think that the basic notion that you “can’t leave” is the antithesis of freedom(and that goes for the slaves too!).
slavery wasnt under threat until after the war had already begun, lincoln didnt end slavery in northern states. you should read some periodicals instead of your middle school history book and a movie made by holywood that has the same bias as tehran making a movie about hitler.
the war of northern agression was about just that, the south decided that as soverign states (as defined by the constitution) they no longer approved of the federal govt, and set out to create a new govt (as defined by the constitution) and when the north set up a blockade in the port of charleston and then reenfocred it with more troops after lincoln had promised withdraw it was fired upon.
the desolution of the union wouldnt have mattered at all if it had occured on the mid west or far western states, but because at that time the vast majority of raw materials and food were created by the south and northern manufacturers depended on them to create their goods to sell back to the south at higher prices (similar to how britain used the colonies before the american revolution) it could not be permitted. in both cases it led to war, in both cases the victor spun it to sound more story book than it actually was. the root cause is money and taxes
Lincoln’s sincerity is irrelevant. His reason for keeping the Union together is pretty self-explanatory.
The South’s even more so.
The constitutionality of succession is beside the point. Plus, it’s never been adjudicated. I’m not a legal scholar and have no idea, though the seizure and attack on federal property seems pretty clear-cut. It was a dumb idea and galvanized the rest of the country which had previously been ambivalent about war. Good call, SC.
“His reason for keeping the Union together is pretty self-explanatory.”
What was that reason?
Charlemagne,
Thanks for your carefully vetted thoughts on the matter. Pffft. Your post is so factually flawed I don’t have time to deal with it point by point. I will, out of annoyance, hit a few of the bigger stinkers.
One, Lincoln certainly never agreed to withdraw from Sumter. The debates within the administration and the correspondence with Pickens are still extant. I’ve read all of them along with all dispatches from Moultrie and Sumter. They show only that Lincoln was cautious and that Pickens was a pigheaded idiot.
“slavery wasnt under threat until after the war had already begun, lincoln didnt end slavery in northern state”
Well no shit. But with each passing year, the power of the slave states waned. The writing was on the wall. Slavery required continuous expansion as it exhausted the soils and was also pushed out by primogeniture. Lincoln’s election, which was precipitated by the walk out at the Democratic Convention, was proof that the South’s power was in rapid decline. As the Southern Rights Association would put it: “We regard the position of the Southern States in this Confederacy as degraded and ruinous. The manifest tendency of those systematic aggressions which they have suffered for many years past is to subvert the institution of slavery. . . We see no remedy and no safety for the South in the present Union.”
Next, “vast majority of raw materials and food were created by the south and northern manufacturers depended on them to create their goods to sell back to the south at higher prices.” Ugh, negative. The south didn’t provide substantive food stuffs to the North. Quite the opposite. The Midwest provided wheat while produced staple crops that were often sold in your Europe.
In any event, I have a PhD in History and wrote a very long history for the NPS on Fort Sumter. It’s being hammered into a book – and is very overdue – that you buy sometime this spring. It’ll be a real page turner.
obviously to preserve the union so he could increase taxes on agriculture to provide tax breaks to manufacturers.
Atleast thats what the primary period evidence suggests, but my 6th grade history teacher might disagree
“I have a PhD in History and wrote a very long history for the NPS on Fort Sumter.”
Fortunately, the spelling of “secession” wasn’t a requirement for the PhD or the NPS.
i dont mean to impugn your dignity as a phd, but how many of your sources are primary, as a history phd i imagine the majority. how many of them are representitive of southern opinions and from southern sources, in order to give an honest representation i would hope roughly half. how many of those southern ariticles did you read without a predisposed bias, removing yourself from your own emotions and trying to understand what actually happened and what was said between the lines on both sides?
Nice catch, Spelling Bee. Being a product of SC public schools, I often make those mistakes. I have auto-correct on my computer and often just click. Bad habits. Thank God for editors and smart girlfriends.
In any event, almost all are primary sources and the southern perspective is far more interesting.
And to answer ?, it might be the cynic in me, but I will answer concisely: Legacy.
Oh, sorry, forgot to add – I agree tax policy before the war was definitely slanted to the North and emerging manufacturing interests. And tax policy after the war was punitive and absolutely crippling to the South. That we agree on.
In my current occupation, I get so few opportunities to engage in these debates, so I’d like to thank the King of the Franks and ? for indulging me.
Another point we agree on: These absolutely no doubt that historians have discounted the South’s contributions to American history and have systematically scrubbed out SC’s primary role in winning the American Revolution. It’s a form of historical and academic malfeasance that has only recently been rectified, and in a limited way.
Any spelling mistakes are fair game. Have at.
UNtil you free yourself of Lincoln and his establishment of a NEW nation premised on the notion that might makes right. The country of the founders was rooted in law, tradition, and state sovereignty.
The can be no rule of law where might makes right. There can be no constitution if the federal government can decide the limits of its own power.
Slavery? We’re all slaves now!
Correction: Until you free yourself of Lincoln and acknowlege that he established a NEW nation premised on the notion that might makes right, you cannot honestly access the current situation.
America is beautiful…It always has been…
And when we throw Obaama, the latest version of Salvery, onto the ash-heap…we’ll chalk up another ignorat @$$-hole who thought he wsa smarter than the founders…
We’ve seen worse and more formidable enemies…
The Left are Cowards. they’ll NEVER fight the way the NAZIs did, even though they are as dangerous, if not more…
But Freedom, w/ God’s help, will defeat Liberalsim…it always wins…
sorry, kid…i’m on vay cay!
I know: the media was drooling over you (or FITS version of you) from Hawaii…
Daytona, bitches!
How can you attempt to call people ignorant when this is the way you present yourself?
“And when we throw Obaama, the latest version of Salvery, onto the ash-heap…we’ll chalk up another ignorat @$$-hole who thought he wsa smarter than the founders…”
Also, cool out with your Hitler fetish. You are going to give real Republicans a bad name. Too late.
SR: You’re as stupid a wanna-be as there is…
The reason you HATE me: is because you’d love to be able to think (and articulate) like I can….
But you are a Leftwing NAZI….and the Stupid, like you, let the media and DNC think for them…
If you aspire to be me…Disavow the Ignorance of liberalism…that’s a start…
I’m not sure you can develop intelleigence…but at least be smart enough to listen to people like me…
Only our own little Sarah Palin, our own little village idiot and political Nostradamus would respond to an individual who has just called them out on numerous spelling and grammatical errors would respond with..”The reason you HATE me: is because you’d love to be able to think (and articulate) like I can….” followed by the inevitable Nazi and Obama reference..stay priceless dimwitted one….stay true to those little voices in your head. Go Sarah go.
Truly unbelievable, Bigums!
….. somebody already said it:
“An honest politician is one who when he’s bought – stays bought”
Politics:
“A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles”
“The highest calling to the lowest falling”
“In politics nothing is contemptible”
Maybe SC can just team up with Georgia, Alabama and MS and leave the Union. It would save other tax payers a lot of money that these moocher states take every year.
Staes forced back into the Union through violence. What violence? They could have returned peacefully if they wanted to – just abolish slavery, allow fo equal rights and return to the Union free of charge. Those 11 states elected to rebel – commit a wholesale act of treason. They paid for it. Unfortunately, the rest of us are all still paying for it.
As for the Constitution – it sets forth the principals and process for governing – it does NOT provide prescriptive decisions to be followed blindly or literally. If you need that in your day-to-day – try the Koran, the Torah or he Bible. The founding fathers all had Bibles (maybe even a few Torahs and Korans) and they elected to leave them at home when they drafted the Constitution.
“Staes forced back into the Union through violence. What violence?”
You win the knee slapper award of the day. Kudos.
Can you make Holocaust denial equally funny?
slavery wasnt abolished in the northern states, are you suggesting that certain states dont have the same constitutional rights as others?
If we could get terrorists to start reading these comments then maybe they would be laughing too much to plant IEDs…..
“For much of its 236-year history, the federal government has accumulated new power by whittling away at the essential protections afforded to American citizens under the U.S. Constitution.”
Strange that Mr. Wilson failed to enumerate what liberties were under attack. Last I checked, over the past 236 years the Federal Government has removed chattel slavery and expanded the right to vote from a very few to virtually everyone. Additionally, the incorporation of the US Bill Rights, a slow process, expanded rights to American citizens even when those rights were not in their state legislatures. (Before writing something stupid, try googling Incorporation of Bill of Rights)
But you’re right, nothing screams tyranny like Obamacare. First they came for the Jews, then they came with affordable healthcare.
“But you’re right, nothing screams tyranny like Obamacare. First they came for the Jews, then they came with affordable healthcare.”
So what is it that’s going to make health care affordable? I’m curious specifically as to what is going to do that.
In other words, “Obamacare” is not enough for me as far as an answer goes, because I think a certain level of specificity is important.
‘m a contractor. It’ll make it more affordable for me. The fact they didn’t go after the drivers of inflation in healthcare is the law’s biggest flaw, which are many.
“In other words, “Obamacare” is not enough for me as far as an answer goes, because I think a certain level of specificity is important.”
Bingo.
So you are skeptical of it working?
well, it made it more expensive for me. Zero sum game.
Yes. And think it was an enormous mistake to tackle healthcare when the economy was on the mat. I also thought TARP was like throwing money down a rat hole.
I don’t disagree with your viewpoint.
However, you could legitimately argue that taking more money from people in the name of “lower costs” when you know they aren’t going to be lowered certainly is a form of tyranny.
Only if you water-down the definition of tyranny.
“oppressive or unjustly severe government”
That’s one of the definitions of tyranny. Forcibly taking money from people under the guise of helping them and then not doing so seems to qualify in my world view.
Obviously there’s room for disagreement.
Taking the free riders off the system should theoretically lower rates, but gov’t movement into healthcare has always driven up costs. That’s not say that it’s not a cost worth paying – most Americans think Medicare is worth it (my father’s recovering from cancer and would definitely agree). But we’ll see.
Reminder to BigT: ======= F-L-A-S-H—C-A-R-D-S
SECRET REVEALED:
I hired a cute girl (a refugee) to follow BigT’s comments – she calls me on the phone and reads them to me with her imperfect English which, as I hear it from her lips, I then understand what he is trying to say. Although sometimes this cute girl is reduced to tears, which I regret for putting her through this torment. By the way, she is saving her money to enroll in remedial English courses. God bless her! She is truly trying very hard.
Just checking in, transfered to a new job and was working at B&CB and didnt wanna get in trouble for coming on here. Now were a new agency and ill press my luck until i get told otherwise.
Looking forward to civil discourse from yall and rants from BigT once again
Hellfire! BigT never stopped. Welcome back.
Hey Bill, maybe you should take a course in constitutional history and law and then you might sound like you know what you’re talking about. As it is, you sound like just another incoherent RWNJ.
Good Lord, when I saw the “Wilson: . . .” I thought, “Jackleg Joe, or his junior unit? Why that’s got to have some great comments!”
But some other Wilson.