Sunday, March 28, 2010

Open Letter to the citizens of the United States of America:

Thomas Jefferson to [Major} J.Cartwright 1824

It(Our Revolution)….presented us an album on which we were free to write what we pleased. We had no occasion to search into musty records, to hunt up royal parchments, or to investigate the laws and institutions of a semi-barbarous ancestry. We appealed to those(laws) of nature…

This is the opening paragraph of Thomas Jefferson’s letter to Major Cartwright, then both in the eighties; it says much about the founding fathers in their efforts to form a new nation. If you take the words as written it gives credence to the thought that the founding fathers having fought the Revolutionary War to free this country were not about to look to the King of England and English Common Law as the bases for our new nation. The words themselves say that in the first sentence of the paragraph; when Jefferson says that the revolution “presented us an album on which we were free to write what we pleased”; meaning they had no obligations other than to the new nation and it’s people. Hence it really says that the common laws of England would not be the common law of the new nation.

The new common law of the new nation then would flow from our constitution as written, and then ratified by the various states. Yes, English common law was still uses and practiced in the various states at the time, but did not flow to the newly formed federal government; conversely over time was replaced by common law as derived from our constitution, and the individual state constitutions as drafted, and ratified by the people of each state. So state laws flow then from those state constitutions; some states are still Commonwealths, either based on English or French common laws as adopted by those states.

In the second sentence, we get further insight to the notion that the founding father were not about to dig into the musty royal parchment on which the King’s Law was written; as Jefferson said “laws and institutions of a semi-barbarous ancestry”; meaning they were not about to repeat those mistakes.

For those of you who would like to read the rest of Jefferson’s letter to Cartwright it is available on line; just type in heading to your search engine and it will bring it up.

Why did I start out this blog entry with the above excerpt from Jefferson's letter? It is the basis of my next thoughts on where our nation has been, or come from, in the last 108 years.

We, our nation, is, by the drafting and ratification of our constitution, a Constitutional Republic, a nation of laws derived from our constitution.

We are not a Constitutional Democracy; we are not a Democracy.

Why do I say that? If you read the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and our Constitution, as drafted and ratified, you will find no mention of democracy anywhere therein.

Our founding fathers were intent on giving all of us a form of government that would endure the test of time. And they did this with great intellect, thought and common sense.

There are those among us who see a much different constitutional document, a flawed document because they see the United States of America as an uncooperative international road block to where they believe our nation should be headed in the context of “Globalization”, “The World Order”, and other names of similar orders; which when you analyze it is exactly what our founding fathers were protecting our new nation from; as long as we as a nation would stand up, and defend our constitution rights as is was written, “One Nation Under God”. The pledge allegiance to our flag sums it up quite well; “and to the Republic for which it stands”. You will notice it does not say democracy, but does mention God!

Just ask yourself how many assaults have there been in your lifetime to change the Pledge of Allegiance by those who want it to say something different?  Or not said at all in our schools.

There have been those in the life of our nation who would have liked us to be something different; and there are many movements within our nation that still espouse those desires today; they are progressives, secular progressives, socialists, communists, marxists, and others; but the group that has posed the greatest risk to our nation, and our constitution, are the Progressives; the movement, born in 1912, have slowly and methodically over the last 108 years work to get their leaders elected to political offices across the nation; they are highly regarded and intelligent people of all political parties; they are liberal, they are conservatives, they are doctors, lawyers, educators, and they all have one thing in mind; change our constitution to say what they want it to say; not what the founding fathers wrote. They want control of the nation and its people since they know what is better for us than We the People" do.  When you confront them they will deny they are part of the movement; but all ones needs to do is watch what the do, not what they say; their actions betray theirfaçade.

The Progressives, as I said, come from all walks of life, they are your local elected officials, your school board directors and members, your next door neighbor, your best friend (except when it comes to politics); it has been one hundred eight (108) years in the making, just look around you, does our nation look like the nation our founding fathers envisioned for us; I think not. We are lucky in one aspect of our lives, we live in sovereign states, and the federal government can only do to us what our state governments allow them to do; and that is remediable at the ballot box each election, which puts control close to home.

The Progressives would like all of us to believe that our constitution is flawed, that in modern times it needs to be changed to reflect modern times. The founding fathers realized this in their drafting of the constitution, and that adjustments may be necessary, from time to time, and thereby provide the mechanizim to make changes through the amendment process.

What the Progressives, and others, do not like about that process is the requirement of ¾ of the various states must ratify any amendment before it can become the law of the nation; thereby guaranteeing that “We the People” have a voice in any change, and any new law that stems from the constitution did not become the law as dictate of any one branch of government. Remember, that which is not delegated to the federal government by our constitution is reserved to the various states.

The movements in the United States today by the “Tea Party” and other, is a reflection of what our federal government and elected officials have done to our nation, and us, and it has been very so evident since the 2008 election. These movements also reflects pent up dissatisfaction over the years because of those elected officials and representative who no longer pay attention to those who elected them and are self serving in their own right.

WE NEED TO TAKE OUR NATION BACK!!