Handle Fire with Caution

Government is a tool similar to fire. It’s very useful when kept within careful limits. But if left to grow, it can do great harm.

Through most of history, in most parts of the world, government has leaped beyond a fire circle out into the forest, harming the very people who needed just a little of that power.

To some of us, the idea that the fire should be kept within safe boundaries makes natural sense. But there’s a substantial portion of the public who essentially say, “We need more fire. Go ahead and let it burn free. Sure, that’s been bad everywhere it’s been tried, but somehow we'll make it burn just right.”

We need to know the specific bounds to put upon government—and why. And then how.

Think of it as if you’ve just bought a new outdoor grill, one of those high temperature ones that can cook a steak perfectly seared outside without overcooking the inside. In other words, fire is involved. That means some danger. Really high heat. The possibility of getting burned. Fuel is involved.

When used correctly, you get delicious results, and the grill is a blessing to your life. When used casually or carelessly, it can cause burns. Maybe severe burns. Harm to people and environment. 

There’s a comic in the paper making fun of a guy, Crankshaft, who always has mishaps when he brings out the grill for the first time each summer. Some years all the neighbors require warnings. Some years the fire department is on call. Pretty much every year the grill explodes and shoots up into the sky. It’s a comic, so no lives our house are lost in the annual mishap. But you get the idea. What is supposed to be a useful management of fire turns out to be a danger.

Crankshaft comic from September 11, 2018

Often Crankshaft is found pouring lighter fluid on the grill. Too much. He doesn’t follow basic instructions or safety protocol.

If we’re looking at government as the grill—the way of using the fire for good—it would be a good idea to know enough to use it safely. We probably ought to carefully read the instruction book, and be experienced enough to understand basic safety rules such as using oven mitts and long-handled utensils to keep ourselves from getting burned.

We have an instruction book for our country. It’s the US Constitution. It’s short—about the length of a typical grill instruction manual. I keep a pocket version in my wallet.

But what did the Founding Fathers of America do before that was written—when there was “some assembly required” to come up with the right size government that would safely use the fiery power for good? They read a lot of the same things—as though they had all read the Boy Scout handbook on fire safety, plus related wilderness survival guides, and any other sources of wisdom.

The Founding Fathers were a diverse group, with a fairly wide range of educational sources, from somewhat random home tutoring and self-teaching, to a formal Harvard education. Yet, besides reading widely, they covered many of the same materials. You’d be hard pressed to find a founder who hadn’t read:

·         The Bible

·         Classic sources—in their original languages

o   Polybius

o   Cicero

o   Plutarch

o   Aristotle

·         Contemporary philosophers and historians

o   John Locke

o   Thomas Hobbes

o   Adam Smith (The Wealth of Nations, published 1776)

o   Montequieu

o   Blackstone

o   Gibbons (Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume I published 1776)

·         History

o   Greek and Roman

o   Anglo-Saxon

o   European

o   English

Books were still something of a luxury in the 18^th Century, and yet these men managed to find them in the frontier land of the American colonies—and find the best among many books. They shared them with one another. George Wythe suggested reading for Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson advised and shared books with James Madison. Benjamin Franklin had a study group of friends who studied a wide range of information. While they didn’t all know each other, living in various colonies in times when travel was a bigger challenge than today. But their reading choices were surprisingly uniform. As if a divine teacher had laid out a curriculum for them.

We can be grateful that these men understood both the dangers of too much government power (i.e., coercion, force = tyranny) and just the right amount. Harnessing just the right amount of government power was risky—but it has led to the best outcomes in human history.

In our day, at minimum we should be reading our founding documents: the Declaration of Independence, and the US Constitution. In addition, reading The Federalist Papers will give a fair amount of background to the thinking that went into the writing of the Constitution. These were newspaper editorials written mainly by Thomas Jefferson, John Jay, and Alexander Hamilton. They didn’t always agree, but they shared the idea that federalism, or distributed power, would work. Then, to see opposing views (those who were very concerned about too much government), you can try The Anti-Federalist Papers, also newspaper editorials attempting to express the dangers they thought the federalists were not fully addressing.

A more contemporary book that addresses the issues the founders faced is Skousen’s The 5000-Year Leap. And I’ve previously listed other suggestions. 

There are resources on government that I think are plain wrong, and harmful; these are about accumulating power over the masses—the opposite of what our Founding Fathers were looking for. They might be worth reading to understand the opposition, however. These include Machiavelli and, closer to our day but surprisingly relevant, Marx and Engels.

Enough time has passed that, along with a good understanding of history, we can see that the work of our founders is not simply theoretical. We can compare.

Just a decade or two ago, Venezuela was the most prosperous, modern country in South America.

screenshot from Stuart Varney report on Venezuela August 2018

Today it looks like a war zone. But without a war. The result is the burn of too much government.

If you want to see the result of too much government even here in our country, take a look at Detroit. I wrote about that here. Last night a friend shared with us a video from early in Steven Crowder’s career, a short documentary on Detroit. And, in the spirit of supporting free speech, after he’s been censored online, I believe unfairly, I’ll end today’s piece with that cautionary tale.

Essential Religious Freedom

“Here is my creed. I believe in one God, the creator of the universe.

That he governs it by his providence. That he ought to be worshipped.”
—Benjamin Franklin

 

One of the basic principles of civilization in the Civilization Sphere of the Spherical Model, is that “every civilization is a religious civilization. This absolutely does not mean state-sponsored religion or lack of religious freedom; in fact, the opposite is true. Freedom of religion is essential, and the flourishing of religion in general must be encouraged.”

I came across a brief video, from People of Faith; Clay Christensen, professor at Harvard Business School, tells the story of a conversation with a Chinese Marxist student. Here’s how he relates the conversation:

Some time ago I had a conversation with a Marxist economist from China. He was coming to the end of a Fulbright fellowship here in Boston. And I asked him if he had learned anything that was surprising or unexpected. And without any hesitation, he said, “Yea. I had no idea how critical religion is to the functioning of democracy."

“The reason why democracy works,” he said, “is not because the government was designed to oversee what everybody does, but, rather, democracy works because most people, most of the time, voluntarily choose to obey the law. And in your past, most Americans attended a church or synagogue every week, and they were taught there by people who they respected.”

My friend went on to say that Americans follow these rules because they had come to believe that they weren’t just accountable to society; they were accountable to God.

My Chinese friend heightened a vague but nagging concern I’ve harbored inside that, as religion loses its influence over the lives of Americans, what will happen to our democracy? Where are the institutions that are going to teach the next generation of Americans that they too need to voluntarily choose to obey the laws? Because, if you take away religion, you can’t hire enough police.

Here’s the short video, if you’d like to see it, rather than just read:

 

In The 5000-Year Leap, by Cleon Skousen, the requirements of a civilizing religion (from Benjamin Franklin’s description) are summarized:

1.      There is a Creator who made all things, and mankind should recognize and worship Him. [first 4 of the 10 Commandments]

2.      The Creator has revealed a moral code of behavior for happy living which distinguishes right from wrong. [the rest of the 10 commandments]

3.      The Creator holds mankind responsible for the way they treat each other.

4.      All mankind live beyond this life.

5.      In the next life mankind are judged for their conduct in this one.

Beliefs can’t be imposed; they have to be real, and chosen. Our founders knew this when they made freedom of religion the first of the basic God-given rights included in the Bill of Rights.

When the original Constitution was written, it didn’t have those first ten amendments. It was assumed that these were so basic to everyone’s understanding that they were a given. But some of the founders (Edmund Randolph, Governor of Virginia, among them, who had been instrumental in forming several parts of the Constitution) decided they couldn’t ratify the Constitution until the Bill of Rights was included—because there could come a day when the minds of the people didn’t keep alive these beliefs.

And they were right. Here we are in a day when, even with the clearly written Bill of Rights, our government tries to parse and peel apart those God-given rights to usurp authority the people have not granted.

One case to watch is the Hobby Lobby case, coming up in March. In short, Hobby Lobby—a family-owned corporation of Christian people, always run with Christian principles, even closing on Sundays—is being forced to act against their conscience to pay for employee insurance that includes birth control, including abortifacients. (I wrote about this in more detail here.)

The dictatorial administration fought giving exemption to churches, and failed. And it is trying to avoid giving exemption to corporations that aren’t actually churches (such as parochial schools, or, a current case of Little Sisters of the Poor, which provides care to the elderly) but are incorporated separately from a church. The administration is likely to lose that battle as well; you have to admit it looks bad to force nuns to pay for someone's abortifacients.

But the Hobby Lobby case claims that anyone who forms a corporation for commerce purposes has no religious rights—because a corporation is a fictional entity without the ability to have moral beliefs. Unless the corporation is a religious entity. Or unless the corporation is formed to accomplish primarily religious-related purposes, perhaps. [There’s a good discussion of both sides, from Hugh Hewitt’s show February 5^th, with John Eastman and Erwin Chemerinsky.]

And, of course, a corporation is required to behave according to any moral purpose the government decides is required—such as eliminating racism, or avoiding harm to any species the government deems significant, or abiding by any of hundreds of thousands of regulations the government defines as morality simply by making them law. In other words, what this government is trying to do is force upon every American who engages in commerce the “moral values” of the government.

We are at the precarious position of being at the mercy of the judiciary again. It will always be wrong for government to force Americans to pay for something against their own conscience, regardless of what the Supreme Court rules. While Hobby Lobby (my personal favorite “toy” store), is continuing to do business as if it will win the case, if the SCOTUS rules against them, they would rather cease to do business than comply.

What Obama deems a necessary moral practice—third-party payers to accommodate women having sex to avoid pregnancy—is irrelevant to Hobby Lobby’s human board members, even if a court decides there is an overriding government interest that nullifies their religious freedom. (Such overriding interests do exist. For example, human sacrifice in the name of religion would be proscribed, and there are limits to the use of psychotropic drugs in certain Native American religions.) But it’s hard to wrap a reasonable mind around the Court’s reading the First Amendment with Obama’s skewed view.

Nevertheless, the very fact that we have a tyrannical chief executive trying to assert that his preference overrides the beliefs of people of faith is a dangerous position to find ourselves in. It is time to pray—and trust that the Lord will show us the way out of this savage tyranny and back up into freedom and civilization.

In honor of Ronald Reagan’s birthday today, we’ll close with some of his words:

“What America needs is spiritual renewal and reconciliation—first, man with God,

and then man with man.” (Campaign stump speech, 1976)

 

Going around this country, I have found a great hunger in America for a spiritual revival; for a belief that law must be based on a higher law; for a return to traditions and values that we once had. Our government, in its most sacred documents---the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and all—speak of man being created, of a Creator; that we’re a nation under God. (Reagan-Anderson presidential debate, September 21, 1980)

Without God, there is no virtue, because there’s no prompting of the conscience. Without God, we’re mired in the material, that flat world that tells us only what the senses perceive. Without God, there is a coarsening of the society. And without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure. If we ever forget that we’re one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under. (Speech at the Ecumenical Prayer Breakfast, Republican National Convention, Dallas, TX, August 23, 1984)

Happy 225th Birthday

Photo from Wikipedia

Today marks two and a quarter centuries for our Constitution. Worth celebrating.

The Constitution itself is a quick read; I carry around a pocket copy. And while the language is now a little challenging, because of changing language over time, it is still pretty clear. Where there are questions about the meanings of words and phrases (i.e., “general welfare”), we have plenty of original sources to give us the founders’ understanding of what they were saying.

I’ve been enjoying opportunities this past year to improve my understanding of the Constitution. Hillsdale College is a great source. A year ago it did a free online seminar. That turned into a free online course last winter, Constitution 101, including lectures, readings, online discussions, and quizzes, just like you would expect from a course on campus. And if that weren’t already above and beyond the call of duty, they are now offering a follow-up free online course, Constitution 201 (see links listed below). In this one, they are looking at the comparison of Constitutional ideas and “progressivism,” the philosophy that has crept into government since the early 1900s.

In the second week’s lecture R. J. Pestritto, an expert on Woodrow Wilson, talks about Wilson’s view of one of our founding documents, the Declaration of Independence. Wilson said we should disregard the beginning as irrelevant; the rest of it is a list of grievances of import to those particular people at that time. Wilson asserts that such a list is the concern of every people in its day, and that’s what government should deal with—meeting the requests of the governed. But here is what he disregards:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed….

What Wilson disregards is the philosophical rationale for government, that it exists to secure our God-given rights. So he disregards God-given rights; he disregards the limited purpose of government. For a very smart man (the first PhD college professor type ever elected to the White House), he misses not just an important point, but the very essence of government's purpose.

So it shouldn’t be surprising that, when it came to the Constitution, Wilson thought the separation of powers was an inconvenient limitation on presidential powers. Usurpation of power by the exxecutive is particularly relevant today.

As Americans, I think we are beginning to wake up to the value of our brilliant Constitution. If you (or someone you know) are among those just waking up, the starting point is that above section of the Declaration, and this Preamble to the Constitution:

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

If you can understand these brief writings, you can understand the basic purpose and limitations of government.

When you’re ready to understand more, I suggest:

·         The Five Thousand Year Leap, W. Cleon Skousen, covering the 28 principles understood by our founders, that still need to be understood today.

·         The Federalist Papers, essays written during the time of the Constitutional Convention, explaining the ideas being written into the Constitution, asking for a strong enough but limited federal government.

·         The Anti-Federalist Papers, essays written during the time of the Constitutional Convention warning against too strong a federal government.

·         Hillsdale College Constitution classes (all free, but you are welcome to donate, all available on demand from original presentation and afterward):

o   Introduction to the Constitution, a five-part lecture series covering basic principles.

o   Constitution 101, a ten-part online course on the meaning and history of the Constitution.

o   Constitution 201, a ten-part online course, currently underway on the progressive rejection of the founding and the rise of bureaucratic despotism.