The evidence is clear to those of us looking at the evidence from a spiritual perspective. When we eliminate God from our culture and society, we bury our children. We bury our brothers and sisters. We bury our fathers and mothers. We bury our law enforcement officers. The first Chief Justice of our Supreme Court, John Jay, along with most of the Founders clearly stated their sentiment about the importance of Christian precepts to maintain theBlessings of Liberty,Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happinessin far less stark terms.
In The Federalist No. 2 John Jay discussed the critical nature of the maintaining our shared ancestry, language, and Judeo-Christian culture and heritage when he wrote,
“Providence has blessed (America) for the delight of its inhabitants. Providence has been pleased to give this one connected country, to one united people, a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion (Christianity with all its orders and denominations), attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs, and who, have nobly established their general Liberty and Independence.”
George Washington, our first President and theFatherof our Country, shared a similar sentiment in hisFarewell Address to the Nationwhere he wrote,
Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion, and Morality are indispensable supports. “ In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. Let it simply be asked where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.
Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its virtue? The Experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. “ Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?
œThe Experimentbegan with the Declaration of Independence; suffered and triumphed in the Revolutionary War; perfected its ideals and outline for governance with the Constitution of the United States of America; suffered through the Civil War; won two World Wars, expanded from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans, to Alaska, the Hawaiian Islands, and beyond; suffered through the Great Depression; struggled to define and refine the meaning of the Declaration of Independence phrasesall men are created equalto pursueLife, Liberty, and Happiness;and became the greatest nation in history as a result of our shared victories, trials, and tribulations. Our success as a society and nation was based on our common Judeo-Christian heritage and culture, language, political philosophy, and the system of Constitutional capitalism that evolved since colonial days.
It is significant to me that the two men, who were the first to lead two of the three branches of our Constitutional government, the Judicial Branch and the Executive Branch, said that our United States Constitution and our nation was anExperiment. For John Jay, ourExperimentisdoomedif we abandonthe moral precepts of the Christian religionwhich constitute afundamental precept of governanceunder our Constitution. George Washington wrote thatReligion, and Morality are indispensable supportsleading topolitical prosperityincluding personal prosperity and property rights, a solid personal reputation, justice, happiness, and life itself. He wrote thatProvidence (God) connected the permanent felicity (happiness) of (our) Nation with (our) virtue;and ourExperiment (will be) rendered impossible by (our) vices.In other words, both of these Founders observed that when we eliminate God as a significant influence in our culture and nation, thisExperiment,isrendered impossibleordoomed.
In contrast, progressives, most of whom are atheists or agnostics, vehemently disagree with Jay’s pronouncement thatthe moral precepts of the Christian religionconstitute afundamental precept of governance.Progressives have succeeded in their efforts to eliminate God and the influence of Christian precepts in our society and culture. Progressive efforts to eliminate God from societies began in the early 1800’s with intellectual elites in universities throughout Europe. They were most active in the areas of history, economics, political philosophy, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and the liberal arts. Marx postulated that all societies will inevitably evolve into socialists or communist societies where wealth is shared equallyfrom each according to their ability to each according to their need.The concept of social evolution was bolstered by publication of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species which postulated biological evolution. One of the first academic disciplines to fully embrace social evolution which also worked to eliminate God as an influence on their discipline was the study of law. The changes in the academic perception of the Constitution and legal philosophy started around 1870 at the Harvard Law School and spread to law schools throughout the United States.
Prior to this time, jurisprudence in the United States was modeled after British common law and the laws of England. The two most significant commentators on English law were Sir Edward Coke and William Blackstone. Both offered similar views regarding the relationship between Biblical law and the laws of England. Sir Edward Coke wrote about the nature of the human relationship to God in creation as follows:The law of nature is that which God at the time of creation of the nature of man infused into his heart, for his preservation and direction the moral law called also the law of nature.The following statement by Blackstone emphasized the critical relationship between Biblical law,the law of nature,and English law as follows:Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation (The Bible, God’s Word), depend all of human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these.
Beginning with the Harvard Law School, the philosophy of jurisprudence in the United States actively began tocontradictthe idea that human laws should reflectthe law of nature and the law of Revelation.The purpose of this teaching and philosophy was to eliminate God and theprecepts of the Christian religionfrom the practice of law. In addition, the idea of social evolution as it related to the Constitution and law was also incorporated into our system of jurisprudence. Under this concept, often calledjudicial activism,as our society and culture changes, the articles, sections, clauses, and phrases of the Constitution should be interpreted in the context of society as it is at the time. Judicial activists maintain that the amendment process outlined in Article V is slow and cumbersome; and judges must mold the words of the Constitution to fit the times. The concept of original intent orthe manifest tenor of the Constitutionis irrelevant under this philosophy of evolutionary jurisprudence.Manifest tenorreflects the definition of the words, when ratified, grammatical construction, and the contextual thought prevailing in each section of the Constitution or law under consideration. Consequently, for judicial activists, precedent and the opinion of judges about the constitutionality of law is more important than themanifest tenoror original intent or the Constitution itself.
As previously noted, academia has been at the forefront of the Marxist, Communist, socialist, progressive, critical theorist, liberal, Democrat efforts to eliminate God andthe moral precepts of the Christian religionas a dominant influence on our society and culture. The vast majority of the professors at our universities teach and promote progressive thought and ideology. Ideologically, progressives achieved aneducational dictatorshipat our universities in the humanities, liberal arts, philosophy, education, social and political sciences, and economics. Since Marxism is “a body of rational norms” that hasbeen largely assimilated into modern social sciences,our students are taught by curricula determined by left’s educational dictatorship. The applicable principles of Marxist philosophy are now taught in each liberal arts and social science discipline. In addition, by the late 1980’s, the educational dictatorship was extended to our public schools where this progressive curriculum has been taught from preschool through the end of high school. With these educational programs, each new generation of citizens becomes more tolerant of and often in favor of a more socialist society in the United States where our children are also taught to rejectthe moral precepts of the Christian religion.
With a judicial system that has worked to eliminate God from its jurisprudence for about 150 years and an educational elite that has embraced Marxist or progressive ideology for over 200 years, ourexperimentis more threatened now than ever before. Over the last 70 years, the United States has rather quickly submitted to progressives who seek to eliminate God as a meaningful influence in our society and culture. The primary target of progressives is Biblical Christianity which stresses the importance of the each individual’s personal relationship to Jesus Christ as their Savior, the traditional family with a father and a mother, personal moral responsibility, and the role of the Christian church in our society. Progressives have succeeded in eliminating prayer and other Christian activities in our schools, government agencies and property, removed displays of the 10 Commandments and other religious displays on public property, promoted a culture of death as it relates to abortion and assisted suicide, and supported sexual promiscuity and moral relativism in relation to most other personal interactions.The moral precepts of the Christian religionare no longer considered to be a fundamental precept of governance.Many Biblical Christians and conservatives fear that our great nationalexperimentisdoomed.Consequently, we bury our children, brothers, sisters, fathers, and mothers. We aredoomedto a cycle of death.
Progressive solutions to the problems plaguing our nation abound. Suggested solutions include gun control, school fortresses, welfare reform, criminal justice reform, healthcare reform, mental health programs, immigration reform, safe zones, diversity training or re-education, ending white privilege, ending our system of capitalism, instituting socialism, free college for everyone, income equality, wealth redistribution, and more federal money for everything imaginable to name a few. In my opinion, virtually every progressive solution is only considering the symptoms of our sick society. The problem we face was clearly stated by our Founders. In the words of George Washington, OurExperiment is it rendered impossible by (our) vices.
As a nation, we have worked hard to eliminate God from our culture and society and ourvices,call themwicked ways,orsin,or just plain evil, abound. Our nationalvicesare our problem; and we need a Healer. He is our God. He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, who is the solution found 2 Chronicles 7:14:
œIf my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
The question is whether or not our nation is willing toturn from (our) wicked waysand once again acknowledge thatthe moral precepts of the Christian religionconstitute afundamental precept of governance.
Our God is waiting for us to humble ourselves and turn back to Him.
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Our Founder’s nation, like every nation that cannot defend itself, maintain geographic integrity, and loses its unique culture, economic and political identity will wither away as Marx and Engels stated it. The Marxist left, whatever name they have used throughout the last two centuries, communists, socialists, Critical Theorists, humanists, progressives, liberals, or Democrats have accomplished a significant transformation of our Founder’s nation using their plan to transform America. Progressives used the tools provided by our Constitution and culture in a relentlessly incremental process to transform the United States into a nation that our Founders never envisioned.
The Founders also understood that God (Providence) had His hand on this nation.
From colonial times until the Constitution was ratified and well into the twentieth century, We the People of the United States shared a strong, significant Judeo-Christian heritage which the Founders clearly understood. In the late eighteenth century, the majority of the population was of British descent, spoke English, and attended one of the many Protestant denomination or Catholic churches. All of the universities were of Christian origin, including Harvard which was named after a wealthy preacher who gave his theological library and wealth to the university. Most of the first departments established at these universities were Divinity Schools and Law Schools. Additional universities were established after the Great Awakening revivals of the mid-eighteenth century to train more evangelists. Our Founder’s nation shared a strong Judeo-Christian heritage.
VISION FOR THE FOUNDER’S NATION
The Founders also understood that God (Providence) had His hand on this nation from the time the first colonists set foot on this continent. This sentiment was eloquently stated by John Jay, first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States of America, in The Federalist No. 2 where he wrote,
Providence (God especially when conceived of as exercising this) has blessed it (Independent America) for the delight and accommodation of its inhabitants. Providence has been pleased to give this one connected country, to one united people, a people descended from the same ancestors, speaking the same language, professing the same religion (Christianity with all its orders and denominations), attached to the same principles of government, very similar in their manners and customs, and who, have nobly established their general Liberty and Independence.
This country and this people seem to have been made for each other [by] design of Providence for a band of brethren, united by the strongest ties, should never be split into alien sovereignties.
Similar sentiments have hitherto prevailed among all orders and denominations of men among us (Parenthetical remarks added).
James Madison in The Federalist No.14 was also confident that a constitution so ordained and based on Judeo-Christian morality, ethics, and law would be a model for mankind. He stated,
Posterity will be indebted for the possession, and the world for the example of the numerous innovations displayed on the American theater, in favor of private rights and public happiness. Happily for America, happily we trust for the whole human race, they pursued a new and more noble course. They accomplished a revolution which has no parallel in the annals of human society: They reared the fabrics of governments which have no model on the face of the globe. They formed the design of a great confederacy, which has been new modeled by the act of your Convention, and it is that act on which you are now to deliberate and to decide (Ratify the Constitution, Remark added).
Fifty of the fifty five men who attended the Constitutional Convention were practicing Christians including theologians, denominational leaders, pastors, and evangelists. Many were also legal scholars and attorneys. After shepherding the nation through the first eight years of our experiment, the Father of our Country, George Washington, expressed similar sentiments in his Farewell Address to the Nation:
“With slight shades of difference, you have the same Religion, Manners, Habits and Political Principles. You have in a common cause fought and triumphed together; the Independence and Liberty you possess are the work of joint councils, and joint efforts “ of common dangers, sufferings, and successes.
Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion, and Morality are indispensable supports. “ In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. Let it simply be asked where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.
Cultivate peace and harmony with all. “ Religion and Morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be, that good policy does not equally enjoin it? “ It will be worthy of a great nation, to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a People always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that the fruits of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages, which might be lost by a steady adherence to it? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its virtue? The Experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. “ Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?
The Father of our Country clearly stated that the international reputation of the United States, sound governmental policies, and the integrity of our courts were dependent on our shared Judeo-Christian religion and morality, our cultural and societal identity. In our Founder’s nation, We the People had leaders like John Jay who summarized the Founders’ view of the importance of Christianity to the successful future of the United States as follows:
No human society has ever been able to maintain both order and freedom, both cohesiveness and liberty apart from the moral precepts of the Christian religion. Should our Republic ever forget this fundamental precept of governance this great experiment will then be surely doomed.
Not only did these four Founders express this view, but virtually all the significant Founders wrote expansively about the importance of our Judeo-Christian heritage to previous success and future benefits that would come to the world as a result of the virtue and religious morality of the United States. Consequently, our Founder’s nation was a Judeo-Christian nation. In my opinion, most of the current societal, cultural, political, and legal problems in our nation are the consequence of our abandonment of Washington’s admonition concerning Religion and Morality.”
Historically, great nations deteriorate from within. Moral and ethical deterioration of cultures normally precedes political, economic and military instability. These problems often lead to the inability of nations to defend themselves against external economic or military forces. In the United States, our national greatness flowed historically from the individual and collective character, virtue, strength, and moral integrity of We the People. Our Judeo-Christian heritage, Constitution and the rule of law, and our economic system based on individual entrepreneurialism and capitalism have been largely responsible for the success of the United States on the world stage. Virtually every aspect of the historical cultural, political, and economic strength of our nation is being incrementally undermined by forces seeking to fundamentally transform the United States of America.
The preamble to the Constitution of the United States outlined five general functions of constitutional governance, 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. Only those areas of life and governance detailed in the various Articles and Amendments to the Constitution were intended to fall under the authority and responsibility of the National or Federal government. In the Founder’s nation, Tranquility, general Welfare, and the Blessings of Liberty were the responsibility of citizens, state, and local governments. The Constitution was established for a virtuous, moral, industrious, and responsible citizenry free to pursue their personal general Welfare and secure the Blessings of [their] Liberty.
In my view, one word in the Preamble to the Constitution has great significance to understanding why our Founder’s nation subsequently exceeded the expectations of the world. The word is “ordain,” to set apart for a sacred function in service of God. The Preamble states, We the People of the United States do ordain’ and establish this Constitution. This meaning for ordain is the only one that fits the context and definitions of ordain and establish found in Samuel Johnson’s 1755 Dictionary of the English Language because all of the meanings for establish are synonymous with the non-sacred meanings in the definition for ordain. If the Framers had not intended the sacred meaning of ordain, they would not have included the word establish which would, therefore, have been redundant. The Constitution was not written as a strictly secular document. The Constitution of our Founder’s nation was a document design to serve God.
During the first half-century or more of the history of our Founder’s nation, our Judeo-Christian heritage was critical to the principles and doctrines of law. Sir Edward Coke (1552-1634) wrote, The Law of Nature is that which God at the time of creation of the nature of man infused into his heart, for his preservation and direction the moral law called also the law of Nature. Similarly, Commentaries on the laws of England by William Blackstone, was a widely respected commentary on law in America. In a statement almost identical to that of Coke, Blackstone wrote, Upon these two foundations, the law of nature and the law of revelation (Biblical Law), depend all of human laws; that is to say, no human laws should be suffered to contradict these. Additionally, prior to the mid-1800’s, it is safe to assume that Constitutional manifest tenor was the basis of court decisions related to the constitutionality of laws. Manifest tenor is the readily perceived, obvious, plain understanding of the course of thought running through the applicable article, amendment, section, or clause of the Constitution in relation to the case or statute under consideration. A synonymous phrase for manifest tenor is contextual original intent. During this period in the history of our Founder’s nation, the “law of nature” which “God… infused” into the “heart” of We the people was critical to our understanding of the meaning and purpose of our laws and duties as citizens.
TRANSFORMATION OF OUR CONSTITUTION
Progressives have used several tools to “fundamentally transform America. The first, and possibly most important tool, is the transformation of Constitutional law which has had a significant effect on our Founder’s nation. In 1848, Marx and Engels published The Communist Manifesto promoting atheism and social evolution; and in 1859, Charles Darwin published Origin of Species positing biological evolution which challenged Biblical creationism. Both concepts were widely embraced by academics throughout the world. In 1869, scholars at the Harvard Law School embraced evolutionary thinking as keys to life and the law. They taught that great legal scholars and judges could develop the laws governing mankind since mankind did not need God and Scripture for guidance in law. All references to both God and Scripture were eliminated from legal education, and consequently, from the practice of law.
To accomplish this goal, these legal scholars developed the concept of case law in which legal principles, doctrines, and presidencies are developed over time by degrees through a series of cases. John Chipman Gray, summarized the concept by stating, The law is a living thing with a continuous history, sloughing off the old, taking on the new. After three to six decades of the development of legal principles and doctrines based on case law, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, summarized the legal system as follows, [Law is] simply an embodiment of the ends and purposes of society at a given point in its history, beliefs that have triumphed and nothing more. These two statements regarding constitutional law bear a striking resemblance to the following discussion of truth found in A Dictionary of Marxist Thought edited by Tom Bottomore:
The criterion for evaluating truth-claims normally is, or involves, human practice, a practicist criterion of truth. Truth is conceived as essentially the practical expression of a subject, rather than the theoretically adequate representation. Truth becomes a totality to be achieved in the realized identity of subject and object in history…. Truths are the this-worldly manifestations of the particular class-related needs and interests. Truth is an ideal asymptotically approached in history but only finally realized under communism after a practical consensus has been achieved.
Apparently, according to legal scholars, jurists, and philosophers, the Constitution, law, and truth are living things, ideas that have triumphed at a given point in history. Through case law over time, judges have transformed our Constitution and laws into a changing body of this-worldly manifestations of the particular class-related needs and interests. One could say that the Constitution of the United States of America, as envisioned by the Founders, has already withered away; or the Constitution is being transformed and will soon wither away.
Progressives have been using courts and the concept of living Constitutions to challenge long held Judeo-Christian cultural norms for decades. Consequently, progressives have used our courts to undermine the sanctity of life through abortion and right to die decisions, marriage and the traditional family through same-sex marriage decisions, biological sexuality through decisions recognizing LGBT identity and access to previously gender specific public facilities, and religious freedom in business, public schools, governmental lands and facilities, and government agencies. Our courts have been the most effective tool used by progressives to fundamentally transform the Judeo-Christian culture of the United States of America. As time passes, the United States of America is becoming less and less like our Founder’s nation.
TRANSFORMATION OF EDUCATION
The second tool used by progressives to fundamentally transform America culturally is the establishment of a public education dictatorship. Our current public education curriculum promotes progressive cultural, social, economic, and political values and principles from pre-school to Ph.D. These curricula seek to undermine or eliminate discussion of the influence of our Judeo-Christian heritage and culture, in relation to our Constitution and legal system. Curricula ignore or minimize our Founders’ emphasis on the relationship between shared moral and ethical values and cultural harmony, individual and national prosperity, and national identity and strength on the world stage. Curricula stress claimed abuses of all western civilization on the rest of the world, capitalism as a form of western imperialism a concept espoused by Marxism, the benefits of socialist systems, and the progressive cultural agenda. The left’s educational dictatorship has been extremely effective as an agent to fundamentally transform the United States of America which has less and less resemblance to our Founder’s nation.
TRANSFORMATION OF OUR CULTURE
The third tool used by progressives to fundamentally transform America culturally is our telecommunications and entertainment industry including social media and pop culture. Television, movies, and music promotes non-traditional families and include LGBT characters, single parent families, illicit sexual content including workplace affairs between co-workers and supervisors of both sexes with subordinates, violence, and murder. Christianity, the essence of our Founder’s nation, is often mocked, portrayed as a form of manipulation, or Christian leaders portrayed as criminal. Capitalism is portrayed as an evil often criminal economic system. Our government is also portrayed as a source of problems in the world. Mainstream news outlets including print and on-line sources forward narratives supporting the progressive cultural, political, and economic agenda, policies, and candidates. The advertising industry is a more subliminal medium used to promote the fundamental transformation of America.
The final tool used by progressives to fundamentally transform America culturally is legal immigration policy and border security. Between 1960 and 1970, the 1965 Immigration Act began to change the composition of the US foreign-born population. Due to the ethnic and religious strife between Balkan Muslims and various Christian sects that started WWI, the 1965 Act ended a 1924 regional immigration quota system that discriminated against Southeastern Europeans including Italians, Asians, and Africans. The previously favored regions included Northwestern Europe including the British Isles, and Canada.
TRANSFORMATION OF OUR POPULATION
“Only one other great republic has ever experienced such a change in the texture of its people ” the Roman Republic.” It failed.
Many considered the 1965 Immigration Act to be an extension of the Civil Rights and Voter Rights legislation of the Johnson Administration granting immigration civil rights to the world by eliminating regional quotas. Although some Republicans supported the 1965 Immigration Act in its initial form, the Democrat Party promoted the bill in the legislature giving assurances that the bill would not adversely influence our nation, economy, and culture. When he signed the bill into law, President Lyndon Johnson said, “This bill we sign today is not a revolutionary bill. It does not affect the lives of millions. It will not restructure the shape of our daily lives.” Immigration Subcommittee Chairman Edward Kennedy (D-MA.) reassured his colleagues and the nation with the following:
“First, our cities will not be flooded with immigrants. Secondly, the ethnic mix of this country will not be upset. [The bill] will not inundate America with immigrants from the most populated and deprived nations of Africa and Asia. In the final analysis, the ethnic pattern of immigration under the proposed measure is not expected to change. It will not upset the ethnic mix of our society. It will not relax the standards of admission. It will not cause American workers to lose their jobs.”
Senator Hiram Fong (R-HI) testified that Our cultural pattern will never be changed as far as America is concerned.” In an October 4, 1965 article on the immigration bill, The Washington Post author wrote,
“The most important change [is that] preference categories give first consideration to relatives of American citizens instead of to specially skilled persons. This insured that the new immigration pattern would not stray radically from the old one.”
Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-SC), testified as follows: “The preferences established by this proposal are not entirely dissimilar from those which underlie the national origins quotas of existing law.” With hind sight as twenty-twenty, it seems fair to ask whether the supporters of the 1965 Immigration Act were actually honest about their claims that the new immigration policy would not alter the culture and ethnic composition of our Founder’s nation.
Some opponents and legislators asked critical questions painting a less rosy picture of the potential outcome. William Miller of New York wrote:
‘The number of immigrants next year will increase threefold and in subsequent years will increase even more.’ He asked, ‘Shall we, instead, look at this situation realistically and begin solving our own unemployment problems before we start tackling the world’s?'”
Myra C. Hacker, Vice President of the New Jersey Coalition, testified in the Senate Immigration Subcommittee hearing:
“We should remember that [the bill will] lower our wage and living standards [and] disrupt our cultural patterns. Whatever may be our benevolent intent toward many people, [the bill] fails to give due consideration to the economic needs, the cultural traditions, and the public sentiment of the citizens of the United States.”
In his 1982 book America in Search of Itself, Theodore White contradicted President Johnson’s signing-day assurance that it was not a revolutionary bill, writing that the bill was revolutionary and probably the most thoughtless of the many acts of the Great Society. In reality, critics were correct and the assurances that the Act would not upset the ethnic mix of our society were not justified as noted by the above data on the changes in foreign-born population associated with the Act.
Data from the US Census Bureau showing the region of birth of the foreign-born population of the United States is informative regarding the cultural transformation of the United States. From 1850-1960, Europeans and Canadians averaged approximately 95% of the foreign-born population. Southern and Eastern Europeans were greatly underrepresented in the US foreign-born population prior to 1960. In 1960, Europeans and Canadians comprised 75% which was a reduction of more than 15% of the foreign-born population compared to the previous 90 years. In 1970 this group comprised 61.7%; 1980, 39.0%; and in 1990 Europeans and Canadians comprised 26.9% of the US foreign-born population which was less than one third of the 1960 level and slightly more than one fourth of the 1850-1960 level. In contrast, Hispanics comprised an average of only 2.8% of the foreign-born population from 1850-1960. In 1960, the composition was 9.4%; in 1970, 19.4%; 1980, 33.1%; and 1990, 44.3% nearly 16 times the 1850-1960 average of the US foreign-born population. Asians comprised an average of only 1.7% of the US foreign-born population from 1850-1960. In 1960, the composition was 5.1%; 1970, 8.9%: 1980, 19.3%; and 1990, 26.3% which was more than 15 times the 1850-1960 average of the foreign-born population. In 1990, people from Africa and Oceania composed less than 2.5% of the US foreign-born population. By 2050, the racial and ethnic composition of the US population is expected to be 47% White, 29% Hispanic, 14% Black, and 9% Asian. According to this projection, the composition of whites will decline; the composition blacks will be stable; and the composition of Hispanics and Asians will increase. Although conservative pundits and other intellectuals agree, progressives always start immigration discussions with the phrase, We are a nation of immigrants, or We are all descendants of immigrants. What they fail to say is that, prior to the 1965 Immigration Act, we were a nation of European and Canadian immigrants; and after 1965, we became and nation of Asian and Hispanic immigrants .
Thirty years after implementation of the 1965 Immigration Act became law some conclusions are relevant to this discussion. A new era of mass immigration ensued in which country origins of immigrants changed radically. The European economy stabilized resulting in fewer European immigrants. Mass entry of people from Asia and Latin America and emphasis on family reunification ensured that these groups could bring in their relatives, freezing out potential immigrants from Europe and from other developing nations because of limits on total immigration numbers. Unfortunately, twice as many immigrants as native-born Americans did not have high school diplomas in the mid-1990’s. This contributed downward wage pressure to a growing pool of blue-collar workers competing for a shrinking number of well-paying jobs. This issue is compounded by increasing levels of illegal immigrants who also compete for these jobs.
In 2000, sociologist Christopher Jencks predicted that the US population will grow to 500 million by 2050 if our immigration policies do not change. After evaluating congressional politics, Jencks concluded that congress did not want to appear to be racist and their leaders would not direct change. Consequently, Jerry Kammer, in his 2015 concluding remarks, included a dire analysis of our national future by Theodore White concerning of the potential impact of the 1965 Immigration Act,
‘Only one other great republic has ever experienced such a change in the texture of its people ” the Roman Republic’ He then observed that ‘Rome could not pass on the heritage of its past to the people of its future’ and ultimately unraveled so badly that it could no longer govern itself. ‘
Kammer also included this contrarian and optimistic quote from a 1965 Immigration Act, 50th anniversary book, A Nation of Nations (2015) by Tom Gjelten, which disregards the lesson of Roman Empire history,
While immigration may swamp us, it may, if we seize the opportunity, mean the impregnation of our national life with a new brilliancy. It is only in the half century after 1965, with a population connected to every corner of the globe, that the country has finally begun to demonstrate the exceptionalism it has long claimed for itself.’
One Amazon reviewer of A Nation of Nations wrote,
“While Gjelten doesn’t make statements about assimilation with current tides of immigrant groups, he suggest[s] that these groups who differ more widely culturally than past [European immigrants] will ultimately accept the national ethos and fit in well.”
Apparently, like most US progressives, Gjelton and the reviewer believes that we can do things better than the Romans, the Soviet Communists, the Maoists, and the Cuban Communists, and achieve an internal globalist culture of new brilliancy and exceptionalism in the United States.
Without the benefit of actually reading his book, it appears that Gjelton does not believe that our Constitution and Bill of Rights are exceptional guidelines for governance or that turning the tide of victory in both World War I and World War II were exceptional events in world history. It doesn’t appear that he considered our Industrial Revolution, railroads, interstate highway system, technical revolution, IBM, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, and Twitter to be brilliant contributions making the United States the greatest economic power in history. As a true progressive globalist, Gjelton apparently believes that until the United States looks like the rest of the world, we cannot be either brilliant or exceptional. None of the reviews or excerpts answer the question posed by White, [With] such a change in the texture of [our] people, will the United States of America be able to govern itself? The cultural and racial diversity created by the 1965 Immigration Act has not resulted in a political and social environment of greater stability. Our educational, cultural and political elites discourage acceptance of our national ethos, our Judeo-Christian heritage, Constitutional capitalism, and individual freedom. The progressive elites consider and communicate that this national ethos is offensive to the rest of the world, especially the regions of origin for most of today’s immigrants. Under these circumstances, how can we expect these immigrants to fit in well? Under the current circumstances in which we are losing our national ethos, my fear is that the admonition of John Jay portends a dire outcome for the United States of America, Should our Republic ever forget this fundamental precept of governance this great experiment will then be surely doomed. This component of the fundamental transformation of the United States of America could help ensure that our nation will wither away. Phrased alternatively, our Founder’s nation will cease to exist.
Border security is a critical component of immigration policy. Secure borders insure that nations have control over immigration into each country. Without secure borders and immigration policies that immediately detain or expel illegal immigrants, all immigration has the potential of becoming legal immigration which is the goal for progressive open border advocates. In this situation, citizenship and related voting rights would be meaningless; the wealthy and unscrupulous could import voters to gain control of any jurisdiction; or politicians could promise immigrants free benefits for their votes. Criminals, revolutionaries, insurgents, and freeloaders as well as unskilled and skilled workers, artisans, entrepreneurs, technicians, and highly educated professionals could flow in and out of countries. All pretexts of economic, political, legal system, and numerical population stability and predictability would be eliminated. Determination of population based representation in our republic, as in the US House of Representatives, would not be fair with the fluid population possible without immigration control and border security. This would be a fundamental transformation of the United States of America; and our Founder’s nation could wither away.
TRANSFORMATION OF OUR NATIONAL DEFENSE
The final requirement necessary for nations to persist is the ability to remain strong and defend themselves against both foreign and domestic enemies. For the most part, we have adequate local, state, and national law enforcement and legal system to ensure domestic Tranquility; but this nation has a great deal of difficulty to provide for the common defense. The primary reason for this difficulty is the fact that the Democrat and Republican Parties have vastly different priorities regarding defense and domestic expenditures. The two parties seem to have vastly different ideas regarding the necessity maintaining the world’s most powerful military force that can defend our nation on multiple battle fronts and contingencies simultaneously. Progressives and the Democrat Party do not see this level of military power as a national necessity for funding compared to domestic program spending. Military power and force size was drastically decreased in the Carter, Clinton, and Obama administrations. Each of the intervening Bush Administrations and the current Trump Administration were confronted with depleted military forces which they attempted slowly rebuild throughout their Administrations. Unfortunately the overall trend in our military strength since the Carter Administration is downward in both numbers and capabilities. The problem was compounded during the last Bush and Trump Administrations by the long multi-front war on Radical Islamic Terrorism which has resulted in attrition of equipment due to fiscal constraints. With reduced force size, our military heroes are forced to deploy more frequently or for longer tours in theater. The result is combat fatigue, home front family difficulties for deployed forces, and potential reduction in re-enlistment numbers resulting in less experienced fighting forces.
Currently, our military cannot fight on two fronts, equipment is old and waring out with high percentage of the equipment out-of-service due to lack of repair and replacement parts. This problem and inadequate funding for continuing training means that many of our military unites are not combat ready. These problems have resulted in higher numbers of military training and mission related accidents, personnel injuries, and deaths in the last few years. In my opinion, this situation has the potential to become a threat to our national security due to increasing tensions throughout the world.
The threat of North Korean ballistic missiles armed with nuclear warheads capable of striking anywhere in the United States intensifies our military readiness issues. Incursion of China into the South China Sea seeking to control sea travel, trading routes throughout the south Pacific, and exert their naval power in the region is also worrying. The fact that China is expanding military forces with the goal of becoming the world’s preeminent military power is cause for additional concern. Iran’s expansion and aggression in the Middle East is troubling. Radical Islamic terrorism is growing not declining in Africa where the opportunity to train is enhanced due to weak governments unable to control terrorist activities. Other parts of the world are also subjected to Radical Islamic terrorist attacks. Threats to the safety and security of the United States of America are increasing worldwide. This aspect of the transformation of the United States of America is the most concerning to me. Without a strong military capable of defending our nation against all enemies foreign and domestic is essential to ensure that my country, the United States of America, does not wither away.
In my opinion, the progressive plan to fundamentally transform of the United States of America has been executed in an incremental evolutionary manner for approximately 170 years. The goal of this transformation has always been a unified global community and economy, a utopia, governed by Marxist principles which ensure that all people share equally in all the benefits of the world regardless of their ability or willingness to contribute to the good of the world community. Phrased another way, from each according to his ability to each according to his need wealth will be redistributed on a global scale. For this goal to be achieved, the United States of America must wither away, a really fundamental transformation. Our Founder’s nation would no longer exist.
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The Constitutional term judicial good Behavior equals opinions based Constitutional original intent.
The Constitutional term judicial good Behavior equals original intent. In my opinion, many Appellate Court and Supreme Court decisions would not be consistent with our nation’s Founders vision of judicial “good behavior.” Consequently, it is critical to ascertain the origin and meaning of the phrase judicial “good Behavior.” To progressives, judicial “good Behavior is activist court decisions that make law when the legislative process cannot, like R v Wade. To conservatives, judicial “good Behavior is judicial decisions based on the “original intent” of the Constitution and the plain meaning of the text of enacted laws. To put this in personal terms, the difference between these two perspectives on judicial “good Behavior” is the differences in the written opinions of Justice Ginsberg and Justice Scalia.
According to Article III, Section 1, the Constitutional term judicial good Behavior equals original intent in relation to term of service. The article states, The Judges shall hold their Offices during ˜good Behavior’.” Good Behavior is not used to describe either the qualifications or term of service for members of Legislative or Executive branches of the national government in Articles I and II of the Constitution, respectively. Unfortunately, the Constitution ds not define good Behavior.
The Federalist Papers, written to support ratification of the Constitution, provide the best available insight into the constitutional Framer’s meaning of good Behavior. In The Federalist No. 78 Alexander Hamilton wrote,
Judges hold their offices during ‘good behavior,’ which is the best expedient to secure a steady, upright and impartial administration of the laws.
The duty (of courts of justice) must be to declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the constitution,’ void. Without this, all the reservations of particular rights or privileges would amount to nothing.
Every act of a delegated authority (including decisions of the judiciary), contrary to the tenor of the commission (Constitution) under which it is exercised, is void.
Consequently, good Behavior, described in Article III, Section 1, is court decisions that reflect the manifest tenor of the constitution. Manifest tenor is the original intent based on the constitutional text, grammar, textural construction, and the words as defined when the Constitution and Amendments were ratified by We the People. Manifest tenor also refers to the principle train of thought or idea that runs through each article and section of the Constitution.
Hamilton also discouraged judicial activism which seeks to infer original intent regarding the Constitution or laws that extends beyond the actual text and grammatical construction of the documents. In The Federalist No. 81, he wrote,
There is not one syllable in the plan under consideration (Constitution), which directly empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the constitution.
Hamilton went on to write that court rulings that go beyond the manifest tenor of the Constitution would constitute “a series of deliberate usurpations on the authority of the legislature. Finally, Hamilton suggested that rulings outside the manifest tenor of the Constitution should lead to the important constitutional check the power of instituting impeachments, upon the members of the judicial department. Throughout the Constitutional history of the United States of America the legislative branch has failed to use the power of impeachment to control judges who do not base their opinions on the manifest tenor of the Constitution. Consequently, the Judicial Branch of our national government is an unchecked oligarchy, a flaw in our system, since the Constitution ds not specify any meaningful checks on the decisions of the Federal judiciary.
Additionally, disrespectful judicial rulings that usurp the will of We the People occur when jurists proport an ability to construe the laws according to the spirit of the constitution or craft opinions that are not based on the textural original intent, the manifest tenor of the Constitution and its Amendments. After all, We the People ratified the manifest tenor of each part of the Constitution and its Amendments. Each of the 535 members of the US Congress and the President were elected by We the People. It is the US Congress which passes legislation that becomes law when signed by the President. Consequently, State and Federal laws, and Inferior US Court opinions consistent with the manifest tenor of the Constitution, must be upheld by our courts because they reflect the collective will of We the People. The same is true of Presidential Executive Orders that are consistent with the manifest tenor of the Constitution.
Conversely, The duty (of courts of justice) must be to declare all acts contrary to the ˜manifest tenor of the constitution,’ void. When judicial rulings are not based on the manifest tenor of the Constitution, the offending jurist places their opinion above the collective wisdom of all We the People. This is true whether the opinion is that of an individual judge, a panel of judges, or a nine Justice US Supreme Court ruling, Judicial rulings that give the standing of law to progressive social policies remove the political initiative from We the People giving it to the government agencies or private entities, like Planned Parenthood, adding to Democrat power. When the elected representatives of We the People make laws about social issues, as Conservatives and the Republican Party prefer, power originates with We the People.
In accordance with Article II, Section 2, Paragraph 2 of the Constitution, President Trump has nominated Supreme Court Justices and US Inferior Court Judges that will make decisions based on originalist concepts that include manifest tenor and reject attempts to “construe the laws according to the spirit of the constitution. The Republican Senate has fulfilled its Article II Advice and Consent obligations and confirmed President Trump’s Judicial nominations. Consequently, progressive changes to our society should be decided through the legislative process where We the People, through our elected legislators, will determine what is best for We the People. An unelected Judiciary will no longer rule against the will of We the People. The Democrat Party will lose power; and, through his Judiciary nominations, President Trump and the Republican Senate returned power to We the People.
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Which mainstream? Mainstream in the United States is a political misnomer. We have at least two: the progressive left and the conservative right mainstreams.
Contrary to the opinion, hopes, dreams, and wishes of progressives and the Democrat Party, the river of political and economic life in the United States of America does not have one monolithic mainstream. The United States of America has at least two distinct and virtually irreconcilable mainstreams or currents. Consequently, no single mainstream exists. The population of the left lives in large population urban centers primarily located along our coasts, the small blue areas in the 2016 county by county Presidential Election map. The left is a philosophically Marxist, socialist, progressive, liberal, Democrat mainstream that believes in a living evolving Constitution. The left cast approximately 2.3% more popular votes for Secretary Clinton in the 2016 Presidential election. The right mainstream covers the vast majority of the nation, the red counties of the 2016 Presidential election map. In the Constitutional Electoral College, voters on the right gave President Trump 306 Electoral votes compared to 234 votes for Secretary Clinton, a 13.3% majority. The right is philosophically conservative supporting capitalism, the importance of our Judeo-Christian heritage, individualism and personal responsibility, Constitutional “original intent,” fiscal conservatism, and limited government.
In discussions of the Federal Judiciary, especially the Supreme Court, only the left makes the statement that the nominee must represent the œmainstream of America. Since no mainstream exists in the river of political life in the United States, the statement by Democrat Senators regarding Judge Neil Gorsuch is nothing more than demagoguery. They need to stop deferring from reality and state truthfully that they would only be satisfied by a Supreme Court Justice nominee who is philosophically Marxist and a judicial activist. It sounds so all inclusive, but the statement includes only the left’s mainstream. Members of the Democrat Party simply need to state their position openly and honestly. We the People, in the “Deplorable Class,” do not like “Establishment Speak.”
Members of the Democrat Party need to understand one thing. No one political mainstream exists in the United States of America.
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In my opinion, the left, Marxists, communists, and progressives of the world were not fighting the same Cold War that the United States and our allies were fighting. For the left, the strategic “Cold War”is a philosophical ideological “Cold War.” With this thought and the recent death of Fidel Castro in mind, it seems an appropriate time to consider the place of Fidel Castro, in the world and the nature of the Cold War. After his revolutionaries defeated the Cuban dictator Batista, Castro openly embraced communism. He nationalized the economy of Cuba and sought support from the communist regime in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), the Old Soviet Union, today’s Russia. He brutally eliminated political opposition. With the support of the Soviet Union, Cuba became the center for communist revolutionary expansion into several countries in Latin America. Probably the most notable was Venezuela. The communist dictator of Venezuela nationalized the country’s oil industries which had been developed by North American and European petroleum companies. Cuba allowed the Soviet Union to position nuclear missiles on the island nearly bringing the world to a nuclear disaster before the missiles were removed from Cuba. The fall of the USSR effectively ended Soviet financial support of the Castro regime, and greatly reduced Cuba’s influence in the western hemisphere. From this perspective, Fidel Castro was a central figure in the Cold War in the Americas.
To me, the Cold War was a geopolitical, economic, militaristic contest between the United States and the USSR, the two dominant nuclear powers of the world at the time. These two powers competed to bring allies into their spear of influence throughout the world. The Cold War ended when the United States and our allies were victorious after fall of the USSR. Dismantling the USSR in non-Russian Eastern Europe completed the process. Although the USSR was a totalitarian communist regime, it was not the only totalitarian communist regime in the world. China, North Korea, Vietnam, the communist regimes of the Eastern European Soviet bloc, Cuba, Venezuela and several other countries in Latin America were also totalitarian communist regimes. Without the support of the USSR, Eastern European countries overthrew their communist governments embracing various forms of democracy.
During the height of the Cold War, Nikita Khrushchev, leader of the USSR said, communism will outlast capitalism, not We will bury you!”
However, several powerful totalitarian communism regimes still exist in Asia and Latin America and communist revolutionaries still battle to control countries in some parts of the world. It seems appropriate to ask a question. Did we actually win the Cold War? We certainly did not eliminate totalitarian communist regimes and revolutionaries as a threat and influence in the world. Perhaps a more important question to ask is this. Did we understand the nature of the Cold War from the strategic perspective of our Marxists, communist enemies. In a 1960’s speech at the United Nations, Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev used a phrase that was translated We will bury you!” A better translation of the phrase is, communism will outlast capitalism. From the standpoint of Marxist philosophy expressed in The Communist Manifesto, Khrushchev’s phrase provides a simple strategic description of the goal of communism or Marxism for the world. Khrushchev was not speaking of a geopolitical, economic, militaristic contest, he was speaking of an evolutionary paced contest of philosophy and ideology, Marxism versus capitalism. Given the attitude of millennials in the United States toward Marxist ideas underpinning communism, socialism, progressivism, and liberalism, or the brutality of totalitarian communist regimes, and their lack of understanding of capitalism and this nation’s Judeo-Christian heritage, we should ask this question. Was Nikita Khrushchev correct when he said, Communism will outlast capitalism?
In my opinion, the Marxist of the socialist, progressive, liberal movement certainly out foxed the conservative capitalistic thinkers of the United States and the world. One of the principal objectives of America’s Crossroads is an informative discussion of the goals and tactics of the left as they seek to convert capitalistic societies, especially the United States, into Marxist societies. Pragmatists of the left have been formulating and slowly teaching and implementing their ideas since the early 1800’s.
When considering the question,is Marxist philosophy the basis for leftist ideology, it is important to understand that Marxist philosophy has been largely integrated into the modern social sciences. Ideas like wealth redistribution, progressive taxation, curtailing or eliminating inheritance rights, diminishing the influence of Biblical Christianity, eliminating or degrading the Biblical family among other topics are all concepts now embedded in liberal arts and social science curricula at all stages of our education system. Competition, individualism, self-confidence, personal responsibility, and strong moral and ethical values are critical elements to successful capitalistic societies. The Biblical Christian church and family are institutions where these values are taught and modeled for children by church leaders and parents. The role of the individual in Biblical Christian culture and Marxist or progressive culture is antithetical in nature. Before a society like the United States with a strong Judeo-Christian heritage and capitalist economy can be converted to society based on Marxist philosophy, the population has to embrace Marxism. To accomplish this goal, the left has achieved an educational dictatorshipwhere their ideas are taught in virtually all the liberal arts and social science curricula throughout the educational system. Marxist progressives have accomplished many of their objectives toward globalism in both domestic and foreign policy in the United States.
Finally, it is my opinion that the left has even managed to integrate its philosophy into jurisprudence in the United States. In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, legal progressives slowly started to substitute case law and the opinion of judges about the Constitution for the manifest tenor and original intent of the Constitution. Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in Marbury versus Madison was critical to this evolution in jurisprudence. Consequently, this shift in the Supreme Court’s attitude towards the Constitution exposed a flaw in our Constitution. There are no meaningful constitutional checks or balances on the decisions of the federal judiciary. Marxists and progressives on the left have succeeded in using this flaw to enact laws and regulations that could not be instituted through the legislative process.
Since the people of the United States of America have failed to understand the Cold War from the perspective of the Marxist or the socialists, progressives, and liberals, We the People are close to losing the real Cold War, the philosophical battle between communism or Marxist philosophy and capitalism. The extremely important philosophical or ideological “cold war” is not over; and, in my opinion, capitalism and conservative Judeo-Christianity is losing.
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The Trump Train carries a larger portion of the total conservative movement and forgotten Democrats. Looks like the track gs to 2024.
The Trump Train movement envisioned and then activated by Donald Trump may be what Tea Party founders wished they had formulated. In my opinion, the reason Donald Trump succeeded where others failed, is the fact that the Trump Train carries a larger portion of the total conservative movement and forgotten Democrats. The leaders of the Tea Party movement restricted their vision to balanced budgets, a smaller less intrusive government at all levels, and reestablishment of constitutional original intent rejecting social and religious conservatives. President Elect Trump asked evangelicals, labor oriented Reagan Democrats from the Rust Belt, and the Fly Over rural voters to climb aboard the Trump Train. Additionally, Trump’s call for economic reforms, lower taxes, and regulatory reform, incorporated significant elements of the Tea Party agenda. All of the other groups were left out or marginalized by the Tea Party movement, the Democrat party, and, during the last two cycles, the Republican Party.
For followers of Biblical Christianity, evangelicals, the fact that President Elect Trump asked them and important Catholic leaders to formulate religious advisory groups is extremely encouraging. He quickly demonstrated an understanding that religious liberty has been under attack by the courts at all levels, government at all levels, and the left’s educational dictatorship. Trump’s list of potential Supreme Court nominees also encouraged the support of evangelicals. Consequently, he received the highest level of support from the evangelical communities of the last four Republican Presidential candidates. This masterfully crafted coalition on board the Trump Train ushered in the Trump Presidency.
Biblical Christians aboard the Trump Train will watch the actions of President Trump in his first hundred days, first year, and first two years with hope, prayers, and wary skepticism. In my opinion, President Trump is on a very short leash. My prayer is that he will only tug lightly on that leash and succeed beyond all our hopes and prayers.
SO FAR, THE TRUMP TRAIN HAS ENOUGH BELLS AND WHISTLES TO GET US TO 2024.
THEN IT WILL BE PENCE24 GIVES US 8 MORE. WHAT A FEDERAL COURT SYSTEM THAT WILL BE!
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The terms amoral, unethical, unlawful, and anarchy represent a progression and degradation of societal behavior and cultural norms. It is my contention that virtually every segment of society, culture, and the population in general in the United States is currently in one or more of these stages of degradation. Politics now includes anarchy based on video releases showing that rioters have been hired by one party to disrupt campaign events of other parties. The idea that politics is a blood or combat sport demonstrates clearly that morality, ethics, and lawful behavior are the tactics of political losers. Politics is now amoral. Some businesses are amoral, unethical, and unlawful. Such businesses could be called godless immoral capitalists. These businesses constitute one of the left’s greatest arguments against capitalism. Some communities in our largest cities are characterized by anarchy at best and urban warfare at worst. The sexual assault environment on far too many of our nation’s college campuses could be termed sexual anarchy. Unfortunately, these problems have been a part of humanity from antiquity. Left to our “raw nature,” humans are at best amoral.
Adam Smith wrote that one of the primary functions of government is controlling the raw nature of man especially as it pertains to business and commercial ventures. Such control would extend to labor management relationships, business competition, and fair and equal access to capital and land. In spite of the fact that progressives view themselves as good and virtuous, they think that legal control of the “raw nature of man” should extend to economics and virtually all aspects of society and human interaction except sexuality and abortion. In their amoral view, the rest of humanity, including the religious, lacks virtue and sufficient intellect to control their “raw nature.” Since Biblical Christian intellect is clouded by a restrictive institutionalized moral code and outmoded view of human interactions and personal responsibility, our approach to controlling the “raw nature of Man” is not acceptable to progressives. This has been the view of philosophers on the left for at least two centuries.
Many on the left are members of various organized religious groups. Many of these groups are among what Christian conservatives term cultural Christianity. They often pick and choose what parts of the Bible they consider relevant today which contributes to the general amoral societal attitude. One prominent Democratic activist even stated that there should be a revolution in the Catholic Church because it was not sufficiently democratic. That is to say religion, Christianity, should become amoral and accept the current mores of society.
On the other hand, followers of Biblical Christianity understand that Christianity is a relationship with Christ as Lord and Savior for the purpose of individually sharing the love of Christ and serving the world in Christ’s name. Christianity is not a social club or a business. Biblical Christians understand that God’s word expressed in the Bible is our guide for service and morality. Biblical Christians understand that Jesus meant what he said in the following statement:
Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets, I have not come to abolish them but to fulfilled them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commandments will be called great in the kingdom of heaven (Mathew 5:17-19, NIV).
The teachings and laws of Christianity do not change as cultural mores change. This is the major difference between Biblical Christianity and cultural Christianity. It is the difference between Christian morality and ethics and the amoral nature of society today.
In Biblical Christianity, the concept of repentance, turning away from a lifestyle and associates that lead to temptation and violation of God’s laws, becomes a natural act of love through Christ. When a woman was caught in the act of adultery and brought before Jesus for condemnation, Jesus told her accusers that the one who is without sin should start the punishment of the woman. After her accusers all left, Jesus forgave her and admonished her to repent saying,
Go now and leave your life of sin (John 8:11b, NIV).
The woman did repent and soon became an important member of the early Christian church. Biblical Christians follow Christ and the teachings of His Word, the Bible.
Understanding that there is nothing new under the sun when it comes to human behavior, many believe that the pace towards social and behavioral anarchy in our nation is increasing at an exponential rate. Mass media, telecommunications, the news media, pop music, the movie industry, the Internet, and social media all promote various levels of amoral, unethical, and unlawful behavior leading to many of the aspects of anarchy observed in our society today. Behavior that was once illegal is now legal. Language and Behavior that was once considered immoral is now accepted and commonplace. In addition, both our courts and the education system have condoned and in some cases promoted the increasing amoral nature of our culture. Moral relativism has become a hallmark of our culture, education system, and the legal system.
Progressives have long sought and promoted the decline in morality that is taking place in our country today. Two examples from the philosophical left include Marx and Bukharin. In his section of The Communist Manifesto titled Proletarians and Communists Marx wrote the following regarding religion, especially Christianity:
Communism abolishes eternal truths, it abolishes all religion, and all morality, instead of constituting them on a new basis; it therefore acts in contradiction to all past historical experience.
In the 1983 publication, A Dictionary of Marxist Thought, the editors discuss a treatise on historical materialism by Nikolai Bukharin, who wrote,
religion (especially Christianity) must be opposed actively since it would take too long for it to die out of its own accord (p. 415).
In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the philosophy behind legal education began to change in a similar manner. The concept that the manifest tenor of the Constitution, the original intent, was the standard for evaluating the constitutionality of statutes and the mention of God and Biblical precepts was eliminated as valid principles in understanding the law. Changes in the precepts and understanding of law started at the Harvard Law School and soon became the standard in the teaching and practice of law at all our universities and courts. The new amoral standard was that case law and precedent was more important than the manifest tenor of the Constitution. Two statements by legal scholars and jurists demonstrate this point. John Chipman Gray, summarized the concept by stating,
The law is a living thing with a continuous history, sloughing off the old, taking on the new.
Approximately 50 years later, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Supreme Court Justice from 1902-1932, offered a similar view of the law stating,
[Law is] simply an embodiment of the ends and purposes of society at a given point in its history, beliefs that have triumphed and nothing more.
In the 150 years since this concept was introduced, the Federal and State Courts have been used to alter the Original Intent or manifest tenor of the Constitution, set legal precedents, and overrule the will of We the People and the legislative process.
It is my opinion, that increasing the incivility and coarseness of our culture was part of the progressive plan to change the United States of America. Our nation is becoming more and more amoral, unethical, unlawful, and anarchistic. The role of Biblical Christianity and the Biblical family which teaches individual responsibility and accountability is incompatible with the progressive vision for a global society and global wealth redistribution. Progressives have a plan and a vision for our country. They feel that they are patriots seeking the best future for the United States of America and the world.
Progressives prefer an amoral society devoid of deep Christian influence.
The founders of our nation also had a plan. Our two founding documents the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States of America are the foundation of their plan. The 85 detailed essays on the Constitution known as The Federalist Papers were a commentary on the Constitution written in support of its ratification. Many conservatives feel that these three works delineate the best and brightest future for the United States of America and serve as a model for all who desire freedom for themselves and their country regardless of where they are in the world. We are also patriots.
The question is, which vision will prevail, the amoral progressive vision or the Founders’ vision? Every person in the United States of America has that critical choice to make in each and every election.
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An Amendment is a Constitution solution that would control judicial activism.
In my opinion, We the People are living under a flawed Constitution. The lack of provisions for the legislative and executive branches of the federal government to override or veto Federal Court decisions constitutes a flaw in our Constitution. We the People and the executive and legislative branches are at the unchecked mercy of the federal judiciary. The federal judiciary from the lower courts to the Supreme Court is the only branch of the federal government that is unrestricted by effective constitutional checks and balances. Similar situations occur regarding most of the high courts of the 50 states. Both state and federal courts have over ruled the votes of We the People regarding both referenda and state constitutional amendments. With increasing frequency over at last 100 years or more, our courts disregard the original intent or manifest tenor of Constitutions. These courts value court precedents and current cultural mores over the words, phraseology and construction, original intent or manifest tenor of the Constitutions or sections of the Constitutions involved. The absence of meaningful checks and balances on judiciary rulings demonstrates that we have a flawed Constitution. One argument for an unrestrained court system is to protect We the People from the tyranny of the majority. It seems to me, however, that the system currently constitutes the tyranny of the minority over We the People. Courts at all levels use legal precedents and current cultural mores to pick winners and losers regardless of what their respective Constitutions might say.
The Establishment Clause of Amendment I of the Constitution is only 16 words long. It has an establishment phrase, and a free exercise phrase. Supreme Court decisions regarding the place of religion in our society disregard the free exercise phrase. The Establishment Clause states, Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or the free exercise (of religion) thereof . These decisions misuse the wall of separation, phrase found nowhere in the Constitution, taken from a letter to the Danbury Baptists of Connecticut written by Thomas Jefferson. In these types of decisions, the courts conveniently forget that Amendment I also prohibits laws, or court decisions, that restrict the free exercise (of religion) thereof…. Another example of our flawed Constitution is a group of decisions by our courts which disregard the manifest tenor and original intent of the Constitution involved eminent domain.
The lack of Supreme Court checks and balances resulting in our flawed Constitution was debated during the ratification process of the Constitution. The opponents to ratification, known as Anti-federalists, agreed that the federal courts would have the power to declare statutes unconstitutional, but were concerned that this would give the federal courts too much power and endanger the freedom of We the People. Robert Yates pointed out the fact that we would have a flawed Constitution if ratified as written when he argued:
“The supreme court then have a right, independent of the legislature, to give a construction to the constitution and every part of it, and there is no power provided in this system to correct their construction or do it away. If, therefore, the legislature pass any laws, inconsistent with the sense the judges put upon the constitution, they will declare it void.”
Thomas Jefferson, third President of the United States, agreed with the Anti-federalists. After the landmark Marbury v. Madison decision, giving the Supreme Court authority to rule on the constitutionality of laws enacted by the legislative and signed by the executive branches. Jefferson disagreed with Marshall on four separate occasions. In 1815, Jefferson wrote to W. H. Torrance:
“The question whether the judges are invested with exclusive authority to decide on the constitutionality of a law has been heretofore a subject of consideration with me in the exercise of official duties. Certainly there is not a word in the Constitution which has given that power to them more than to the Executive or Legislative branches.”
In an 1819 letter to Spencer Roane, Jefferson wrote,
“In denying the right [the Supreme Court usurps] of exclusively explaining the Constitution, I go further than [others] do, if I understand rightly [this] quotation from the Federalist of an opinion that ‘the judiciary is the last resort in relation to the other departments of the government, but not in relation to the rights of the parties to the compact under which the judiciary is derived.’ If this opinion be sound, then indeed is our Constitution a complete felo de se [act of suicide]. For intending to establish three departments, coordinate and independent, that they might check and balance one another, it has given, according to this opinion, to one of them alone the right to prescribe rules for the government of the others, and to that one, too, which is unelected by and independent of the nation. For experience has already shown that the impeachment it (Constitution) has provided is not even a scare-crow . . . The Constitution on this hypothesis is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shape into any form they please.”
Similarly, Jefferson wrote an 1820 letter to William C. Jarvis stating,
“To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions [is] a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges are as honest as other men and not more so. They have with others the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps. Their maxim is [good justice is broad jurisdiction], and their power the more dangerous as they are in office for life and not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves.”
Finally, in 1825 Jefferson wrote a letter to Edward Livingston where he stated,
“This member of the Government (Supreme Court) was at first considered as the most harmless and helpless of all its organs (branches). But it has proved that the power of declaring what the law is, ad libitum, by sapping and mining slyly and without alarm the foundations of the Constitution, can do what open force would not dare to attempt.”
Jefferson was convinced that we have a flawed Constitution.
Abraham Lincoln expressed similar concerns about the potential for a flawed Constitution in his First Inaugural Address as follows:
I do not forget the position, assumed by some, that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court; nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding. At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the Government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made, in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.”
Since the early 1900s, judicial activism, failure to make decisions regarding the constitutionality of law based on original intent and the manifest tenor of the Constitution, has become more and more common. Consequently, the dire warnings cited above by Robert Yates, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln, were quite prophetic. We have a flawed Constitution.
Impeachment of federal judges is the only constitutional means for the legislative branch to exert checks and balances over the federal judiciary. In 1819, Jefferson described the impeachment remedy as follows:
For experience has already shown that the impeachment it (the Constitution) has provided is not even a scarecrow The Constitution on this hypothesis is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shift into any shape they please.
Therefore, the opinions of both federal judges at all levels and state judges demonstrate that the Constitutions are a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary, which they may twist and shift into any shape they please. Jefferson’s assessment of this check and balance on the judiciary accurately describes the behavior of our courts for at least the last 50 to 100 years demonstrating the nature of our flowed Constitution.
The main reason for this problem is that impeachment of judges is even more complicated than impeachment of other civil officers. The Constitution defines impeachment in Article II, Section 4, which states, The president, vice-president, and all civil officers of the United States shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors. The terms of service for the President, Vice President, Senators and Representatives are limited and specified by the Constitution. In contrast, federal judges serve for life as described in Article III, Section 1, of the Constitution which states,
The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one supreme court and in such inferior courts as the congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behavior.
This Article adds the qualification during good behavior not used in either Article 1 or Article II of the Constitution which describe the qualifications and terms of service for the legislative and executive branches. The critical question regarding impeachment of federal judges hinges on the meaning of during good behavior. The Constitution provides no insight into this question. However, The Federalist Papers contain lengthy discussions of this matter exerted below. In The Federalist No. 78 Alexander Hamilton wrote,
Judges who may be appointed by the United States are to hold their offices during good behavior, which is certainly one of the most valuable of modern improvements in the practice of government. In a republic it is a no less excellent barrier to the encroachments and oppressions of the representative body. And it is the best expedient to secure a steady, upright and impartial administration of the laws.
The judiciary will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them. The judiciary… has no influence over either the sward or the purse.
The complete independence of the courts is essential in a limited constitution. Limitations of this kind can be preserved in practice no other way than through the medium of the courts of justice; whose duty it must be to declare all acts contrary to the manifest tenor of the constitution void. Without this, all the reservations of particular rights or privileges would amount to nothing.
Every act of a delegated authority (including decisions of the judiciary), contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void.
Consequently, good behavior, described in Article III, Section 1, is court decisions that reflect the manifest tenor of the constitution. When judges make decisions contrary to the manifest tenor of the constitution, they should be impeached under this concept of checks and balances on the power of the judiciary. Following this reasoning, such decisions would be included in the impeachable category of high crimes and misdemeanors. They are crimes against the will of WE THE PEOPLE expressed in the Constitution and the Amendments ratified by WE THE PEOPLE.
Defining the phrase, manifest tenor of the Constitution, is critical to answering the question, Is our Constitution flawed? The phrase manifest tenor has two parts. Manifest describes the detailed organization or construction and grammar of the Constitution. Manifest also includes the words (as defined at the time the Constitution was written), phrases, clauses (both dependent and independent), sentences, and paragraphs of each Article and Section of the Constitution. The order of appearance of words, phrases, clauses, etc. are relevant in discussions of the relationship between the meaning of manifest and the original intent of the Constitution. Tenor refers to the principle train of thought or idea that runs through each section and article of the Constitution.
During the process of ratifying the Constitution, both the Federalist and Anti-federalist often based their discussions on whether a clause of phrase in a particular part of the proposed Constitution was independent or dependent based on punctuation, grammar, and tenor of the overall part of the Constitution being debated. The Constitutional Convention had a committee on form and grammatical construction that presented the final, carefully written, Constitution draft to the Constitutional Convention. The manifest tenor of the Constitution was paramount in the draft they presented for approval.
Hamilton carefully discussed this expansion of impeachable offenses for the Federal Judiciary in The Federalist No. 81. First, he discussed the importance of the language of the Constitution when he wrote,
In the first place, there is not one syllable in the plan under consideration, which directly empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the constitution. I admit however, that the constitution ought to be the standard of construction for the laws, and that whenever there is an evident opposition, the laws ought to give place to the constitution.
Hamilton continued his discussion of impeachment of federal judges in The Federalist No. 81 as follows:
And the inference is greatly fortified by the consideration of the important constitutional check, which the power of instituting impeachments, in one part of the legislative body (House of Representatives), and of determining upon them in the other (Senate), would give to that body upon the members of the judicial department. This alone is complete security. There never can be danger that the judges, by a series of deliberate usurpations on the authority of the legislature, would hazard the united resentment of the body (Legislative Branch) entrusted with it, while this body was possessed of the means (impeachment) of punishing their presumption by degrading (removing) them (judges) from their stations (the court).
Throughout the Constitutional history of the United States of America the legislative branch has failed to use the power of impeachment to control judges who do not base their opinions on the manifest tenor of the Constitution.
John Marshall, fourth Chief Justice of the Supreme Court served from 1801 to 1835. His, 1803, opinion in Marbury v. Madison gave the federal judiciary its first taste power over the legislative and executive branches regarding Constitutionality of laws. However, his carefully crafted opinion was strictly based on the manifest tenor of the Constitution. The opinion refers to the Constitution and the law under consideration within the context of manifest tenor of the Constitution.
Exerts from Marshall’s opinion (Marbury v Madison) demonstrating how the manifest tenor of the Constitution impacted his decision follow:
If it had been intended to leave it in the discretion of the legislature to apportion the judicial power between the supreme and inferior courts according to the will of that body (the legislature). it would certainly have been useless to have proceeded further than to have defined the judicial power, and the tribunals in which it should be vested. The subsequent part of the section is mere surplusage, is entirely without meaning, if such is to be the construction. If congress remains at liberty to give this court appellate jurisdiction, where the constitution has declared their jurisdiction shall be original; and original jurisdiction where the constitution has declared it shall be appellate; the distribution of jurisdiction made in the constitution, is form without substance.
It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect; and therefore such construction is inadmissible, unless the words require it. That they should have appellate jurisdiction in all other cases, with such exceptions as congress might make, is no restriction; unless the words be deemed exclusive of original jurisdiction.
When an instrument organizing fundamentally a judicial system, divides it into one supreme, and so many inferior courts as the legislature may ordain and establish; then enumerates its powers, and proceeds so far to distribute them, as to define the jurisdiction of the supreme court by declaring the cases in which it shall take original jurisdiction, and that in others it shall take appellate jurisdiction, the plain import of the words seems to be, that in one class of cases its jurisdiction is original, and not appellate; in the other it is appellate, and not original. If any other construction would render the clause inoperative, that is an additional reason for rejecting such other construction, and for adhering to the obvious meaning.
That the people have an original right to establish, for their future government, such principles as, in their opinion, shall most conduce to their own happiness, is the basis on which the whole American fabric has been erected.
If, then, the Courts are to regard the Constitution, and the Constitution is superior to any ordinary act of the Legislature, the Constitution, and not such ordinary act, must govern the case to which they both apply.
(Any other) doctrine would subvert the very foundation of all written constitutions.
It is a proposition too plain to be contested, that the constitution controls any legislative act repugnant to it; or, that the legislature may alter the constitution by an ordinary act.
The oath of office, too, imposed by the legislature, is completely demonstrative of the legislative opinion on this subject. It is in these words: ‘I do solemnly swear that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich; and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge all the duties incumbent on me as according to the best of my abilities and understanding, agreeably to the constitution and laws of the United States.
Thus, the particular phraseology of the constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the constitution is void, and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument (the Constitution) (Italics highlight references to the ‘manifest tenor of the Constitution’).
Marshall pointed to the judge’s oath requiring them to uphold the Constitution; and to the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution, which lists the “Constitution” before the “laws of the United States affirming the importance of the manifest tenor of the Constitution.” Based on Marshall’s analysis, when judicial decisions are not based on the “manifest tenor of the Constitution,” we have a flawed Constitution.
The change in judicial philosophy from the concept that the manifest tenor of the Constitution should dictate judicial opinions, demonstrated by Marshall in Marbury v. Madison, to the concept that precedent, previous judicial opinions, and the changing mores of societal behavior take precedent over the Constitution began in the middle of the nineteenth century. After the Enlightenment, the philosophical, scientific, and psychological works of Marx, Engels, Darwin, and Freud were rapidly embraced by the academic elite in the Western world. By 1870, Harvard University and the Harvard Law School fully embraced these concepts. Contrary to earlier teaching, references to God and Scripture, as well as Constitutional Original Intent were eliminated from legal education and the practice of law. The concept of case law to develop new doctrines and principles incrementally over time was also introduced at Harvard. The rest of the nation’s universities followed suit. John Chipman Gray, summarized the concept by stating,
The law is a living thing with a continuous history, sloughing off the old, taking on the new.
Approximately 50 years later, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Supreme Court Justice from 1902-1932, offered a similar view of the law stating,
[Law is] simply an embodiment of the ends and purposes of society at a given point in its history, beliefs that have triumphed and nothing more.
In the 150 years since this concept was introduced, the Federal and State Courts have been used to alter the Original Intent or manifest tenor of the Constitution, set legal precedents, and overrule the will of We the People and the legislative process. The result is a flawed Constitution.
As a result of the changes in judicial philosophy since Marbury v. Madison, judges at all levels have misrepresented Marbury v. Madison in a way that allows them to ignore the manifest tenor of the Constitution. Current court opinions do not follow the model, for decisions based on the manifest tenor of the Constitution, provided by Marbury v Madison. In my opinion, the modern courts have totally disregarded the fact that Marshall’s opinion was based strictly on the manifest tenor of the Constitution providing little, if any, content that empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the constitution.
Consequently, the judicial branch has gradually increased its power into what some consider an oligarchy. Judges claim to have the ability to construe the spirit of the Constitution when there is not one syllable in the constitution that gives the courts such power. The following Jefferson 1820 warning is relevant:
“To consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions [is] a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy,
Indeed, Jefferson correctly described the situation in the United States of America today. Jefferson continued, his warning concerning our flawed Constitution,
Our judges are as honest as other men and not more so. They have with others the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps (the judiciary).
In a 1987 New York Times article titled, “Notes on Bicentennial,” the Bicentennial of the Constitutional Convention, by Stuart Taylor Jr., Taylor quoted Thurgood Marshall from a speech he gave in Hawaii where Marshall said the following:
“I do not believe that the meaning of the Constitution was forever “fixed” at the Philadelphia convention…. Nor do I find the wisdom, foresight and sense of justice exhibited by the framers particularly profound. To the contrary, the government they devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments, the Civil War and momentous social transformation to attain the system of constitutional government and its respect for the individual freedoms and human rights, we hold as fundamental today.”
Marshall discredited the Framers’ “foresight and sense of justice” when he disregarded the amendment process outlined in Article V as “foresight and sense of justice.” On the contrary, the Framers understood that change was inevitable and provided for a mechanism to update the Constitution. Progressives believe the Constitutional Amendment process is too cumbersome; and judges should just render decisions that change the “law” to match their idea of what “law” should be not what the constitution allows. Marshall’s condescending tone toward the Constitution’s Framers was amplified when he also said “nor would they have accepted… a woman and the descendant of an African slave” as Justices on the Supreme Court. Marshall’s disdain for the text of the Constitution and the the Framers “foresight and sense of justice” is typical for progressive judges at every level in our nation today.
The facts; that we now view judges as liberals, moderates, or conservatives; conduct vehement partisan arguments about conformation of judges in the Senate; and sight the party affiliation of the presidents nominating judges; validate Jefferson’s fears about judges, the federal courts at all levels, and state judicial systems. Indeed, George Washington, the Father of our Country and our first President, shared similar concerns about potential problems related to political parties in his farewell address to the nation.
It is my contention that the concept, of the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Amendments formulate the basis for governance in our country today, is a modern myth. Rather than holding up a copy of the Constitution claiming it as their guide for governance, politicians should drive a semi-truck full of judicial opinions into the venue where they are speaking, open the trailer doors, and point the piles of paper containing judicial opinions as their basis for governance. Under the current system, precedent, the opinion of judges, new societal mores, and new insights of judges into the meaning of our constitutions and bills of rights are now the basis of the rule of law in the United States of America and all 50 states. The actual constitutions are, in practice, almost meaningless.
The legislative branch of the federal government has failed to utilize the constitutional process of impeachment of federal judges who failed to rule on the constitutionality of law based on the manifest tenor of the Constitution. Unfortunately, the Constitution provides no other remedy to protect We the People from the federal courts in this situation. Solving this problem would require a Constitutional Amendment.
Therefore, it is my opinion that,
“We the people of the United States of America live under a flawed constitution lacking executive or legislative checks or balances on judicial decisions in which judges no longer follow constitutional original intent in their rulings.”
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Contrary to popular conservative thought, in the United States, our progressive domestic policy is a practical reality. Marxism, the philosophical basis for progressive ideology, is a social theory asserting that all property and wealth will be held in common, and as Marx stated it, from each according to his capacity, to each according to his need, wealth will be distributed equally among all people. The editors of A DICTIONARY OF MARXIST THOUGHT, 1983, asserted that Marxism is not dead; but, Marxism is a body of rational norms that have been largely assimilated into modern social sciences and incorporated into a great deal of our domestic and foreign policy practices.
Pragmatic efforts to hasten evolution toward the global society envisioned by Marxists began in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Following publication of The Communist Manifesto and Origin of Species, the concepts of atheism, and both societal and biological evolution became more widely embraced by academicians in the United States and the world. Liberal and progressive scholars began to dominate the social science faculties of most universities in the United States. This was particularly true in mass communication disciplines such as journalism, liberal arts and social sciences including psychology, psychiatry, sociology, philosophy, performing and visual arts, economics, and law.
By 1870, Harvard University and the Harvard Law School fully embraced these concepts. Contrary to earlier teaching, references to God and Scripture, as well as Constitutional Original Intent were eliminated from legal education and the practice of law. The concept of case law to develop new doctrines and principles incrementally over time was also introduced at Harvard. The rest of the nation’s universities followed suit. John Chipman Gray, summarized the concept by stating,
The law is a living thing with a continuous history, sloughing off the old, taking on the new.
In the 150 years since this concept was introduced, the Federal and State Courts have been used to alter the Original Intent of the Constitution, set legal precedents, and overrule the will of We the People, and the legislative process. In many instances, liberals and progressives have used both Federal and State Courts to accomplish their progressive social objectives when We the People do not support their proposals. The United States Supreme Court decision, in favor of same sex-marriage opposed by We the People in numerous state referenda, is a prime example. In my opinion, many Federal Court decisions have been aided by incorrect application of the Supreme Court Marbury v. Madison decision. Court decisions of this type make progressive domestic policy the law of the land. In my view, such decisions are inconsistent with judicial good behavior.
Much of our progressive domestic policy is already Marxist.
In the United States, liberals and progressives in the Democrat Party and moderate or liberal Republicans have introduced and passed legislation, and developed progressive domestic policy positions and programs that individually and collectively quicken the pace at which wealth is spread among all people in our country and eventually the world. The goal is that each state, including the United States of America, eventually withers away. Wars, depressions, recessions, and periods of substantial economic growth cause ebbs and flows in progress toward the world they envision.
The section, of The Communist Manifesto titled Proletarians and Communists, provides strategic details for incremental progressive domestic policy initiatives that gradually eliminate capitalism and private property. Marx wrote,
These measures will of course be different in different countries.
Nevertheless, in the most advanced countries (like the United States) the following will be pretty generally applicable:
“Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.” (All added parenthetical remarks in this section describe existing progressive domestic policy . Federal regulations, especially environmental regulations, limit uses of private lands regarding mineral and petroleum extraction, forestry, range and grazing management, agricultural practices crop choices and subsidies, and watershed management. Local and state zoning ordinances limit the uses made on private property. Each of these limitations restricts the way private property can be used, increases production costs, and in land uses related to energy, mineral extraction, and agriculture increases fixed living costs for citizens. For some industries, regulation ads costs sufficient to degrade their competitiveness in the global market. When these costs are combined with high US labor costs and taxes, some industries moved offshore to survive. Each of these factors is an incremental step toward abolition of property and use of property for public purposes.)
“A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.”
(In the United States the concept of progressive taxation is now ingrained in our political and economic discourse.)
“Abolition of all right of inheritance.”
(In the United States, gradually increasing death or inheritance taxes are incrementally moving toward abolition of the right of inheritance. The progressive purpose of these taxes is to instill the idea that abolition of all right of inheritance is one of the ways for the rich to pay their fair share in the progressive plan to redistribute wealth from each according to his capacity, to each according to his need.)
“Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.”
“Centralization of credit in the hands of the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.”(The United States Federal Reserve Bank controls interest rates, the amount of currency in circulation, and federal laws place strict controls on the banking and securities industries. However, the government does not control the flow of capital with an exclusive government monopoly.)
“Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.”(Many large metropolitan areas in the United States have government owned mass transit train and bus systems. Many politicians are proposing high-speed train systems funded and operated by either state or federal governments.)
“Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of wasteland, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.”(Although Federal regulations, especially environmental regulations, do not constitute state ownership of factories and instruments of production they do constitute state control of factories and instruments of production. Air and water pollution regulations often limit the type and/or size of industrial plants built on private property and emission levels for carbon fuel engines. These regulations ensure clean air and water. The issue is that technology allows pollutant detection at increasingly lower contamination levels, and thus, more stringent regulations are mandated, even when the requirements are below safe limits. The result is increased costs that can make the industry products too expensive to be economical. Local and state zoning ordinances limit the uses of factories and instruments of production on private property. For some industries, regulation ads costs sufficient to degrade their competiveness in the global market. When these costs are combined with high US labor costs and taxes, some industries must move offshore to survive. Each of these factors is an incremental step toward abolition of property and use of property for public purposes.)
“Equal liability of all labour. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.”(Local, state, and federal minimum wage laws and proposals supporting mandated profit sharing incrementally promote the idea of equal liability of all labour. During the formative years of the labor movement, communists and socialists played major roles organizing workers, gaining recognition and legal status for unions, and securing higher wages and better benefits for union membership. Unions have made great strides toward Equal liability of all labour. The high cost of labor in the United States caused many of our industries to move overseas or fail because they were unable to compete in the global market against competitors with lower labor costs. In the United States, unions have strong support from the political left.)
“Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more equable distribution of the population over the country.”
“Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production.” (In the United States, progressives have established an educational dictatorship. Socialists and progressives in the Democrat Party are proposing free or highly subsidized secondary education for all or at least families below a threshold income level. This is an expansion of government-sponsored loan programs and progressive style wealth redistribution. Abolition of children’s factory labor was a goal that should have been supported by all. Children’s factory labor was abhorrent and a blot on capitalism. The fact that Marx added the qualifier, in its present form, is a blot on Marxist philosophy. ).
Free education for all children has been promoted in our country since colonial days. Sound agricultural and renewable natural resource practices have been promoted for at least 150 years. Both are essential for a flourishing, capitalistic, constitutional republic like the United States of America.
The left, regardless of the terms used to describe their ideology, Marxist, communist, socialist, progressive, liberal, moderate Democrat or liberal Republican, follows a specific societal plan to incrementally or evolutionarily change and the world into the global economy envisioned by Marx. The left thinks and plans in evolutionary terms and is secure with an evolutionary pace, at least 170 years, in their journey toward a society where from each according to his capacity, to each according to his need, wealth is distributed among all the people. Once progressive domestic policy normalizes wealth redistribution in most countries, the left will turn to their final goal for foreign policy. The left, Marxists, will turn to formulating policies that cause states or countries, including United States of America, to “wither away.”
Our ordained Constitution is not secular. It provides a system of governance set apart to serve God.
Progressive pundits and commentators on the left claim that the Constitution of the United States is a totally secular document because it contains no reference to any deity. However, it is my contention that our ordained Constitution includes the word “ordain” for a specific purpose. Our ordained Constitution provides a system of governance set apart to serve God and bring glory to his Name.
Supreme Court Justice Scalia stressed the importance of the meaning of the words found in the Constitution as they were defined when the document was written, original intent. Fortunately, Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary of the English Language (London, 1755), is accessible today. Johnson’s dictionary was the preeminent dictionary used by the majority of Americans when both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States of America were written. This dictionary defined the words used by our nation’s Founders and the Framers of our Constitution.
The Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America reads,
WE THE PEOPLE of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common Defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain (set apart to be an instrument for the service of God) and establish this CONSTITUTION for the United States of America.”
Johnson defined Ordain as follows:
TO ORDAIN, v. a. [ordino, Lat. ordonner, Fr.]: 1)To appoint, to decree; 2)To Establish; 3) To settle, t0 Institute, to set in office; 4) To invest with ministerial function, or sacerdotal power.
Meletius was ordained by Arian bishops, and yet his ordination was never questioned.
When Johnson defined ordain as To invest with ministerial, or sacerdotal power, his definitions of sacerdotal and sacred are essential to understand the definition of ordain and the Framers use of ordain in the Constitution. These two critical words were defined by Johnson as follows:
SACERDO’TAL. Adj. [Sacerdotalis, Latin.] Priestly; belonging to the priesthood.
If ample powers, granted by rulers of this world, add dignity to the persons entrusted with these powers, behold the importance and extent of the sacerdotal commission.
SACRED. Adj, [Sare, French; Sacer, Latin.]: 1)Devoted to religious uses; holy; 2)Dedicated; consecrate; consecrated.
The fact that sacred and sacerdotal share the same Latin root, Sacer, is a clear indication that our ordained Constitution was intended to be set apart, consecrated, as an instrument for the service of God by its Framers and the citizens who ratified the Constitution.
Johnson’s definition of the word establish found in the Preamble immediately after ordain is further evidence that the Framers of the Constitution used ordain as a clear statement that their vision of the Constitution as a document set aside for the service of God. Johnson defined establish as follows:
TO ESTABLISH. v. a. [etablir, French]: 1) To settle firmly, to fix unalterably; 2) To settle in any privilege or possession, to confirm; 3) To make firm; to ratify; 4) To fix or settle in an opinion; 5) To form or model¦.”
All five meanings of establish; in Johnson’s definition were synonymous with the first three, meanings Johnson’s definition of ordain. Had the Framers intended the secular meaning of the word ordain; to appoint or decree, to establish or settle, or to institute, they would not have also included the word establish in the Preamble of the Constitution. That would have been unnecessarily redundant. Concise construction, words, and grammar, were important considerations to the Framers.
Again, the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America states,
WE THE PEOPLE of the United States, ¦do ordain and establish this CONSTITUTION for the United States of America.
In my estimation, based on the definition “ordain” and the definition of the words used to define the spiritual connotation of “ordain,” the original intent of the Framers for the Constitution, was to devise a system of governance that would bring glory to God. The Founders provided We the People with our ordained Constitution.
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The evidence is clear to those of us looking at the evidence from a spiritual perspective. When we eliminate God from our culture and society, we bury our children. We bury our brothers and sisters. We bury our fathers and mothers. We bury our law enforcement officers. The first Chief Justice of our Supreme Court, John Jay, along with most of the Founders clearly stated their sentiment about the importance of Christian precepts to maintain theBlessings of Liberty,Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happinessin far less stark terms.
