What Are the Chains on the States?
The Founders learned by sad experience that the Articles of Confederation gave the states far too much power over the federal government, and this prevented the country from making progress. The challenge was to balance the power just right so both governments would function well within their own spheres of influence.
Article 1.10 puts the states under authority of the Constitution and explains what they may do. In addition, Amendments 9 and 10 gave yet one more restriction on the federal level, clarifying that powers not given to the federal government defaulted to the states or to the people themselves.
Rule By Law, Not By “Whim”
To make sure the states didn’t try to act as a separate country to the detriment of the other states, these restrictions were laid out:
•NO TREATIES: States may not enter into treaties and alliances.
•NO BULLYING: States may not instigate actions or authorize anyone to commit acts that could bring the nation into war (such as issuing letters of marque and reprisal).
•NO CURRENCY: States may not coin money or issue credit.
•DEBTS: States may not pay debts with anything but gold and silver.
•HABEAS CORPUS: States may not jail someone without a trial and conviction.
•NO EX POST-FACTO: States may not pass laws after an act has occurred that makes the act illegal.
•CONTRACTS: States may not pass laws that undo contracts or make their provisions illegal after such contracts have been agreed upon. For example, neither Congress nor state legislatures can suspend the payment of house mortgages during a depression—that is none of government’s authorized business.
•NO SNOBBERY: States may not grant titles of nobility.
•COMMERCE: States may not charge taxes (duties) on imports or exports of other states.
•FAIR FEES: States must allow Congress to control any import fees charged to offset the costs of inspecting things at the border.
•SHIPPING: States may not charge fees on ships according to their tonnage (which, of course, varies with each ship), but are required to all charge the same fees.
•MILITIAS: States may have state militias, but may not keep troops or build up a military—that is the job of Congress.
•NO WARS: States may not start a war except for self-defense. For any other purpose, Congress must give its consent.
•ALL OTHER RIGHTS ... States are responsible and obligated to handle everything else not specified in the Constitution—a privilege and right that has been foolishly abrogated and delegated to the whims of Congress.
What Are the Chains on the Judiciary?
During the Revolutionary War, the people had no top court to settle squabbles between the states. The Founders realized that some form of new judiciary had to be invented to handle national-level problems.
The Supreme Court was intended to be a third branch of the federal government, an independent branch at that. As will be discussed later, the Court quickly evolved into the last and final word on anything, including the actions of the other two “equal” branches. The judiciary became the new Ruler.
Jefferson was extremely disturbed with the Court’s role as an un-checkable ultimate authority. This, Jefferson warned, would result in the Court one day twisting and interpreting the Constitution as a means of amending it without due process, simply by reading the supreme law this way or that way. “Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution,” Jefferson warned. “Let us not make it a blank paper by construction.”292
Jefferson suggested an amendment giving power to Congress or the state legislatures to veto Supreme Court decisions, giving the people a remedy when the Court strayed from the Constitution. See Chapter 63 for more of Jefferson’s concerns and suggestions.
Rule By law, Not “Whim”
Job Description: Article 3 describes the duties of the Supreme Court and related courts in America.
•SUPREMACY: The judicial power of the U.S. is vested in one Supreme Court and such inferior courts as Congress shall establish.
•LIFE-LONG: Judges in the federal courts are appointed for life, provided they serve with “good behavior.”
•SALARIED: Judges will receive a salary that can’t be diminished during their terms.
•EQUALITY: The judiciary handles all cases of law and equality. Even though equality is not guaranteed under the Constitution, it becomes an issue when people are taken advantage of when forced into situations of hardship or misfortune. The federal court system is supposed to look at those cases, too.
•CONSTITUTIONAL: The federal courts shall deal with all questions concerning the Constitution.
•APPEALS: The federal courts must accept appeals from lower courts when the case involves enforcement or interpretation of U.S. law.
•TREATIES: Federal courts are responsible for problems arising from treaties or agreements made with foreign powers.
•AMBASSADORS: The delicate legal entanglements of foreign ambassadors and consuls shall be handled only by the federal courts.
•NON-STATES: Federal courts handle all cases involving maritime issues outside of a state’s jurisdiction (off its coastal waters, for example).
•SUING: The federal courts deal with any lawsuit or legal action involving the U.S. government.
•INTERSTATE: Problems between the states shall be handled by the federal courts.
•CITIZENS: Controversies between citizens of different states shall be handled by the federal courts.
•PROPERTIES: Controversies between citizens in the same state over lands or issues in other states may find a neutral hearing on the federal level.
•FOREIGNERS: Any individual or states having difficulties with a foreign state or group may have the case heard on the federal level.
•DIPLOMATS: Top diplomats may have access to the highest court in the land if they run into trouble in America.
•STATES: If a state is involved in a legal issue, it has the right to be heard by the highest court in the land.
•CASE LOAD: Congress may limit the number of cases appealed to the Supreme Court so the justices don’t get buried in a mountain of trivial issues that should be resolved at the lower levels.
Abolishing the Ruler
Forging all the links necessary to chain down federal power includes more than what is listed above. Additional controls can be found interlaced with other restrictions, responsibilities, and declarations throughout the Constitution. The all-powerful Ruler is prevented from tyranny and kingly dictatorship in the United States thanks to the chains put down with wisdom and foresight by America’s Founding Fathers.
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286 Bergh, et al, 14:421.
287 See the U.S. Population Clock at census.gov/popclock/
288 Noah Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language, 1828.
289 Jefferson’s Works, Official Papers, Vol. III-I, p. 148. See Federalist Papers No. 14 (eighth paragraph), No. 27 (last paragraph), No. 39 (last three paragraphs), No. 45 (ninth paragraph), and the 10th Amendment where all powers not listed in the Constitution revert to the States or the people.
290 James Madison, Veto Message, To the House of Representatives of the United States, March 3, 1817.
291 James Madison, remarks, debates on the Cod Fishery Bill, February 7, 1792, p. 429.
292 For an explanation of Jefferson’s position, see Skousen, The Making of America, p. 576.
Chapter 41: Abolishing Pillar #2, “The Caste”
The Founders disrupted the natural tendency toward divisions in society with the creation of a republic.
A republic is a state where power is held by the people, who express their desires and control through elected representatives. This
means even the smallest class in society (the individual) has a voice and someone close by to hear it and convey those concerns into the limelight of public consideration.
It Takes a Family ... Then the Village
The beginning place for ‘power by the people’ is first, the family, and then the village. Jefferson called these clusters of people wards, meaning “watched over.”
“These wards, called townships in New England,” Jefferson wrote, “are the vital principle of their governments, and have proved themselves the wisest invention ever devised by the wit of man for the perfect exercise of self-government.”293
Jefferson pointed to this strong local self-control as the means to protect freedom. “The way to have good and safe government is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the many ...”294
James Madison said that division of power is best made by putting the bulk of the power at the lowest possible levels. “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined,” Madison wrote. “Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.” (The Federalist Papers #45)
The Republican Form Works Best
Madison explained, “In a democracy the people meet and exercise the government in person; in a republic they assemble and administer it by their representatives and agents. A democracy, consequently, must be confined to a small spot. A republic may be extended over a large region.” (The Federalist Papers #15)
With the power so disbursed, the various classes cannot usurp political control to create advantages for themselves.
It’s the Law
Preventing castes was dealt with in Article 3.4: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government ....” So long as representation exists in every state and community in America, the caste system with an aristocracy at the top and a vast working class of peasants below cannot take root.
Historian Richard Frothingham pointed out how monarchs in England fought local autonomy, and destroyed it so a caste system could be created. Regarding England’s history of local control, he wrote:
“In the course of events the Crown deprived the body of the people of this power of local rule, and vested it in a small number of persons in each locality, who were called municipal councils, were clothed with the power of filling vacancies in their number, and were thus self-perpetuating bodies. In this way, the ancient freedom of the municipalities was undermined, and the power of the ruling classes was installed in its place. Such was the nature of the local self-government in England, not merely during the period of the planting of her American colonies (1607 to 1732), but for a century later.... It was a noble form robbed of its life-giving spirit.”295
Families of Tens: As mentioned earlier, republicanism or the process of elected representation, was used by Moses and then the Anglo-Saxons some 2,000 years later. Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and others who were students of Anglo-Saxon culture carried those same concepts to the Constitutional Convention. To this day Americans continue to benefit from the wisdom of that inspired system of management. It helps keep power and responsibility where it belongs: with the people, and without a caste.
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293 Bergh, Writings of Thomas Jefferson, 15:38.
294 Bergh, et al, 14:421.
295 Richard Frothingham, The Rise of the Republic of the United States, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1873, pp. 14-15.
Chapter 42: Abolishing Pillar #3, “All In Common”
Of all the socialistic promises made to lure people into surrendering their rights, the promise to deliver something they didn’t earn has been the most difficult to eradicate.
The proper role of government is to ensure equal rights, not equal things.
At the foundation of all socialist thought is the stated goal of taking from the “haves” and giving to the “have-nots.” The Founders called this “leveling.” The fiction that equality in things is in some way possible is dismissed out of hand by the lessons learned at Jamestown, Plymouth, and all other times and venues where it has been tried. The Founders were determined to save America from falling for that one again. Samuel Adams said,
“The utopian schemes of leveling [redistribution of the wealth], and a community of goods, are as visionary and impracticable as those which vest all property in the Crown. [These ideas] are arbitrary, despotic, and, in our government, unconstitutional.”296
Ownership is Necessary for Life: John Locke (1632-1704) explained that there is a proper and necessary role for private property to achieve lasting prosperity and freedom. To begin with, he said, mankind’s greatest common gift is this earth and all that it contains.
“God, who hath given the world to men in common,” Locke wrote, “hath also given them reason to make use of it to the best advantage of life and convenience.”
Locke said that the Creator’s command to have “dominion” over the earth and to “subdue” it required exclusiveness over property:
All property lawfully acquired and developed is an extension of that person’s life, energy, and ingenuity.
To destroy or confiscate another person’s property is an attack on the life of that very person.
“Every man has a property in his own person,” Locke said.
Whatever a person removes out of the common storehouse of nature, and mixes with it his own labor, thereby makes it his property: “It is allowed to be his goods who hath bestowed his labor upon it, though, before, it was the common right of everyone,” Locke said.
For example, a man comes upon a tree in the wild. He turns it into lumber, makes a table and chair, and sells them. It is his labor that made the tree of value in the marketplace, and by natural law no other person has the moral right to deprive him of that property without his permission and without a fair compensation.297
“The supreme power cannot take from any man any part of his property without his own consent,” Locke said. “For the preservation of property being the end of government, and that for which men enter into society, it necessarily supposes and requires that the people should have property, without which they must be supposed to lose that [property] by entering into society, which was the end for which they entered into it.”298
If property rights are destroyed, the lessons of history teach that there must follow a series of consequences that no one wants. Without property rights—
1.The incentive to develop property is smothered. New ideas, improvements, labor-saving devices, cures for disease, multiplying the quality and production of food, etc., withers and dies. The people descend into a desperate hand-to-mouth existence.
2.The industrious are deprived of the fruits of their labors and freedom of choice. Without an incentive to create a surplus, the industrious don’t, and the great motor that powers the world dies.
3.Desperate mobs combine in various forms to go about confiscating by force whatever they please.
4.People are compelled to live out their days on bare subsistence levels because accumulating anything invites attack.
The Right to Property: Justice George Sutherland of the U.S. Supreme Court made an important distinction about property rights that reflect the Founding Fathers’ position:
“It is not the right of property which is protected, but the right to property,” he said in New York in 1921. “Property, per se, has no rights; but the individual, the man, has three great rights, equally sacred from arbitrary interference: the right to his life, the right to his liberty, the right to his property... The three rights are so bound together as to be essentially one right. To give a man his life but deny him his liberty, is to take from him all that makes his life worth living. To give him his liberty but take from him the property which is the fruit and badge of his liberty, is to still leave him a slave.”
Property Rights N
ecessary to Freedom
John Adams made it clear that the right to property was the most important foundation stone for liberty.
“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. Property must be secured or liberty cannot exist.”299
James Madison said the same thing in his Essay on Property (1792) where he rejected all excessive spending and future raids on the U.S. people and treasury in the form of taxation:
“Government is instituted to protect property of every sort.... This being the end of government, that alone is not a just government, ... nor is property secure under it, where the property which a man has in his personal safety and personal liberty is violated by arbitrary seizures of one class of citizens for the service of the rest.”
And from these building blocks of freedom came these declarations inside the Constitution and Bill of Rights:
Intellectual Property: “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.” (Article 1.8)
Equal Taxation (Property): “... Direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States ... according to their respective Numbers ....” (Article 1.2.3)
Taking Taxes (Property): “No Capitation, or other direct Taxes shall be laid, unless in Proportion to the Census or Enumeration herein before directed to be taken.” (Article 1.9)
Property Rights: “...Nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation.” (5th Amendment)
Seizure: “The right of the people to be secure ... against unreasonable searches and seizures ...” (6th Amendment)
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