Constitution Class (Part 1/7) - Property and Your Rights

I received word today that Michael Badnarik, the 2004 Libertarian Party candidate for President, self-described iconoclast, and self-made expert on the Constitution, property rights, liberty and freedom, had a heart attack while at an event in Wisconsin. I thought this would be a good time to re-watch his classic 7 part series on the Constitution and liberty, available on Google Video.

Here is Part 1 which deals primarily with the concept of property and how property relates to liberty.

Texas Congressman almost gets it

Rep. Lamar Smith, a San Antonio-area Republican, recently said of ACORN:

Not a penny of taxpayer's dollars should go to fund an organization that time and again has abused federal funds and the American people's trust.

I agree with the gentleman from San Antonio. We should immediately stop funding the US Government, an organization run by criminals that constantly abuses federal funds and violates the American people's trust by violating our civil liberties; that spreads death and destruction throughout the world in the name of "democracy"; that steals from the poor through the printing of paper money; that places the ambition and materialistic desires of evil politicians above the liberty of the people; and which fails to fulfill the one moral and desirable function of government in a free society, which is to protect individual liberty.

What is Law?

The proper role of government in a free society is to defend individual rights. Governments do this through application of the law; without government there would be no law.

But what is the law? And by whose authority does government enforce laws? Frederic Bastiat provides the answer in his essay from 1848 entitled The Law.

Existence, faculties, assimilation — in other words, personality, liberty, property — this is man.

It is of these three things that it may be said, apart from all demagogue subtlety, that they are anterior and superior to all human legislation.

It is not because men have made laws, that personality, liberty, and property exist. On the contrary, it is because personality, liberty, and property exist beforehand, that men make laws.

What, then, is law? As I have said elsewhere, it is the collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense.

Nature, or rather God, has bestowed upon every one of us the right to defend his person, his liberty, and his property, since these are the three constituent or preserving elements of life; elements, each of which is rendered complete by the others, and cannot be understood without them. For what are our faculties, but the extension of our personality? and what is property, but an extension of our faculties?

If every man has the right of defending, even by force, his person, his liberty, and his property, a number of men have the right to combine together, to extend, to organize a common force, to provide regularly for this defense. And what is property but an extension of our faculties?

Collective right, then, has its principle, its reason for existing, its lawfulness, in individual right; and the common force cannot rationally have any other end, or any other mission, than that of the isolated forces for which it is substituted. Thus, as the force of an individual cannot lawfully touch the person, the liberty, or the property of another individual — for the same reason, the common force cannot lawfully be used to destroy the person, the liberty, or the property of individuals or of classes.

For this perversion of force would be, in one case as in the other, in contradiction to our premises. For who will dare to say that force has been given to us, not to defend our rights, but to annihilate the equal rights of our brethren? And if this be not true of every individual force, acting independently, how can it be true of the collective force, which is only the organized union of isolated forces?

Nothing, therefore, can be more evident than this: The law is the organization of the natural right of lawful defense; it is the substitution of collective for individual forces, for the purpose of acting in the sphere in which they have a right to act, of doing what they have a right to do, to secure persons, liberties, and properties, and to maintain each in its right, so as to cause justice to reign over all.

Walter Williams on Mao, Stalin, Lenin, and American Academia

Posted by Tom Sawyer.

Professor Williams is the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University and for several years served as the Chair of that department. His weekly columns appear in 140 newspapers nationwide.


Go here to see a list of books written by Walter E. Williams.

The following is a portion of his most recent column. Click here to read the entire thing.

Walter Williams: Alan Kors, University of Pennsylvania history professor, gave the evening's keynote address. What he revealed about the dereliction and character weakness of academics, intellectuals, media elites and politicians is by no means complimentary, but worse than that, dangerous. Professor Kors said that over the years, he has frequently asked students how many deaths were caused by Joseph Stalin and Mao Tsetung and their successors. Routinely, they gave numbers in the thousands. Kors says that's equivalent to saying the Nazis are responsible for the deaths of just a few hundred Jews. But here's the record: Nazis were responsible for the deaths of 20 million of their own people and those in nations they conquered. Between 1917 and 1983, Stalin and his successors murdered, or were otherwise responsible for the deaths of, 62 million of their own people. Between 1949 and 1987, Mao Tsetung and his successors were responsible for the deaths of 76 million Chinese.

Professor Kors asks why are the horrors of Nazism so well known and widely condemned, but not those of socialism and communism? For decades after World War II, people have hunted down and sought punishment for Nazi murderers. How much hunting down and seeking punishment for Stalinist and Maoist murderers? In Europe, especially Germany, hoisting the swastika-emblazoned Nazi flag is a crime. It's acceptable to hoist and march under a flag emblazoned with the former USSR's hammer and sickle. Even in the U.S., it's acceptable to praise mass murderers, as Anita Dunn, President Obama's communications director, did in a commencement address for St. Andrews Episcopal High School at Washington National Cathedral where she said Mao Tsetung was one of her heroes. Whether it's the academic community, the media elite or politicians, there is a great tolerance for the ideas of socialism -- a system that has caused more deaths and human misery than all other systems combined.

Academics, media elites and leftist politicians both in the U.S. and Europe protested the actions and military buildup of President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall and ultimately the breakup of the Soviet Union. Recall the leftist hissy fit when Ronald Reagan called the Soviet Union the evil empire and predicted that communism would wind up on the trash heap of history.

Professor Alan Kors did not say this but the reason why the world's leftists give the world's most horrible murderers a pass is because . . .

Well, don't you want to know why? To find out what Professor Williams's answer is, go to the column and read it.

Buy Insurance or Go To Jail

Posted by Tom Sawyer.

For the first time in the two hundred thirty-three years of the Republic, the federal government in Washington, D.C. is poised to mandate by law that citizens (subjects) purchase a commodity. Why has this never happened in the past? There is a simple answer. It is against the law. It is unconstitutional. That little wrinkle will not stop this government however. The House, under Speaker Nancy Pelosi, has already passed such legislation. They did it while you were enjoying your weekend last Saturday and, hopefully (in their minds), not paying attention.

Is this the kind of transparency Obama promised? Is this the kind of health care reform Obama promised? Witness this short video.



Then there is this video, also short.



Obama, of course, is complicit.



Besides not answering the question, and thus answering it by his silence, this is the most ridiculous argumentation imaginable. Does he apply this reasoning when it comes to welfare? providing of services for illegal aliens? This man's whole ideology and political career is based upon requiring a few responsible people to carry the load for those who are irresponsible. And, now he wants people to start being responsible or he is going to fine them?

But is it fair to send people to jail who refuse to buy a government-mandated commodity? Nancy Pelosi thinks so:






The thirteen colonies declared independence from the crown for lesser grievances.

Walter Williams on the American Idea

Posted by Tom Sawyer.

It is no coincidence that I am often re-posting columns and embedding videos produced by Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams. I do so because these two men consistently prove themselves to be among the best and most relevant thinkers on the right. Here, again, Walter Williams gets to the heart of the problem with the Obama administration, this Congress, and our thinking about them. At issue is the Constitution. At stake is the Constitution. At stake is the Republic itself.

And now, Walter Williams:

Americans are harder workers, more philanthropic, individualistic, self-reliant, anti-government than people in most other countries. We’ve turned what was an 18th-century Third World nation into the freest and most prosperous nation in mankind’s entire history. Throughout our history, United States has been a magnet for immigrants around the world. What accounts for what some have called American exceptionalism?

We Americans, as human beings, are no different from any other people, including Germans, Russians, Chinese, Africans and other people who have produced tyrannical regimes such as those of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Idi Amin. As such we are just as capable of committing acts of gross evil that have been a part of mankind throughout his history. We’ve not been a perfect nation but we’ve never approached the level of hideousness seen in other nations. That’s despite the fact that our population consists of people who have for centuries been trying to slaughter one another in their home countries, whether it’s between the French and Germans, English and Irish, Japanese and Chinese, or Palestinians and Jews, Igbos and the Hausa of Nigeria. Thrown into the American mosaic are religions that have been in conflict for centuries such as Catholic and Protestant, and Christian and Muslim. The question is: Why is the United States an exception and will it remain so?

At the heart of the American idea is the deep distrust and suspicion the founders of our nation had for government, distrust and suspicion not shared as much by today’s Americans. Some of the founders’ distrust is seen in our Constitution’s language such as Congress shall not: abridge, infringe, deny, disparage, violate and deny. If the founders did not believe Congress would abuse our God-given rights, they would not have provided those protections. After all, one would not expect to find a Bill of Rights in Heaven; it would be an affront to God. Other founder distrust for government is found in the Constitution’s separation of powers, checks and balances and the several anti-majoritarian provisions such as the Electoral College and the requirement that three-quarters of state legislatures ratify changes in the Constitution.

The three branches of our federal government are no longer bound by the Constitution as the framers envisioned and what is worse is American ignorance and acceptance of such rogue behavior. Look at the current debate over government involvement in health, business bailouts and stimulus packages. The debate centers around questions as whether such involvement is a good idea or a bad idea and whether one program is more costly than another. Those questions are entirely irrelevant to what should be debated, namely: Is such government involvement in our lives permissible under the U.S. Constitution?

That question is not part of the debate. The American people, along with our elected representatives, whether they’re Republicans or Democrats, care less about what is and what is not permissible under our Constitution. They think Congress has the right to do anything upon which they can secure a majority vote, whether they have the constitutional or moral authority to do so or not. What Congress does have is the brute force to enforce compliance with their unconstitutional acts. You say, "What do you mean, Williams?" Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution grants Congress the power to tax and spend for the enumerated activities therein. Every American is duty bound to pay his share. Congress has neither constitution nor moral authority to take the earnings of one American for the benefit of another American. What do you think will happen to you if don’t comply, say with Congress' demand that part of your earnings be taken to bail out a failing business? You’ll see all the brute force that you want to see and if you resist too much, death is not off the table.

We are losing what’s made our country great. Instead of moving toward greater liberty, we’re moving toward greater government control of our lives.

Children Removed From Obese Family

Posted by Tom Sawyer.

(Another Reason Not To Emulate Europe)

Appalling. Read this from the London Daily Mail.

Short clip:

An obese couple’s seven children are all to be taken into care after their newborn daughter was removed over fears she would become dangerously overweight.

Three children had already been removed by social services before the infant was taken from her mother within hours of her birth.

Now her ‘heartbroken’ parents have learned that their three other children will be taken away from them too.

They say the children of the so-called 'fat family' are being removed over fears they would also become clinically obese.

Before she became pregnant, the mother, 40, who cannot be named for legal reasons, weighed 23st. (322 lbs.)

Removing children for obesity, or even 'potential' obesity . . . coming soon to an America near you. This is horrid, absolutely horrid--tyranny at its worst. A favorite C.S. Lewis quotation comes to mind right now.

“Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”–C.S. Lewis

But in this case (and soon to be in our case) it will not simply be a matter of the moral superiority which the Left oozes from its very pores, but it will also be a matter of fiscal responsibility. After all, we cannot afford to pay for the extra medical costs accrued by such morally repugnant personal health decisions as overeating. Am I wrong?

Socialized medicine, it is evident, is an excuse for the oligarchy to stick its nose into and control nearly every aspect of the individual's life and makes the individual, every individual, a ward of the state. The state which provides you your health care rules you and owns you. You are its slave and will live as it says.

Cap and Trade 2009

Well, it happened. I heard it on the radio about 5:40pm CDT. Another large piece of our liberty was sold down the river and probably for less than thirty pieces of silver.

While most of America was obsessing over the death of a psychologically disturbed pop star, the U.S. House of Representatives rushed through, and got passed by a narrow margin, an energy tax bill that will cost thousands of jobs and hundreds of thousands of dollars.


But don't feel too bad. Government just got bigger . . . and more intrusive . . . and richer . . . and . . . isn't that the goal of this Congress and administration anyway?

Government wins, the individual gets screwed. Welcome to 21st century America.

These people have no shame.

What's worse--the bill passed by seven votes, eight of which were Republicans. When I find out their names I will post them here. It is bad enough when Democrats sponsor and pass tripe like this--they were born stupid. But when Republicans are involved it makes my stomach wretch. You can't belong to the party of Reagan and do this. It's like a Jew selling gold swastikas on a chain . . . the ultimate betrayal. I hope this traitorous octuplet suffer a very painful, agonizing, miserable, horrible (political) death.

Only my better nature caused me to return to that previous sentence and add the word "political." But, honestly, in my heart I left it out.

Another victory for tyranny.

The Republic for which it stands (Who is Tom Sawyer?)

"I pledge allegiance to the flag
And to the Republic for which it stands . . ."

That Republic no longer exists.

It has been replaced by a monolithic government which robs men of wealth, property and liberty. That monolithic federal government so little resembles the Great Republic of Washington, Jefferson, and Adams that these men would not even recognize it. Their Republic has died the death of a thousand cuts--none of them budget cuts to be sure.

Individual liberty is on the run. No longer in fashion, she has fled in search of a defender, a protector, a refuge. She finds it nowhere, not in either major political party, not in any major city, not in any newspaper or major media outlet. Those who still love her are few and those among them brave enough to stand up for her are impugned barbarously. Tyranny is now in vogue and woe be to those who oppose that ravenous beast.

I am one of those.

Am I a right-wing nut job--a conspiracy theorist who believes the world is run by Jewish bankers or the Illuminati or Bilderbergers? No. People who believe in vast conspiracies are idiots, even if they happen to be First Lady or Senator from New York or Secretary of State. No conspiracy theorist here.

Am I a militia member? Nope. Those guys need to get a brain too.

What am I then?

I'm fed up, that's what I am. I'm fed up with career politicians who exist to serve themselves and their own greed and power at the expense of taxpayers. I am fed up with a federal bureaucracy which gets more bloated by the minute, sucking the private sector dry. I am fed up with Washington/New York/East Coast/Hollywood elitists who think they exist to run (read: ruin) our lives. I am fed up with the lies these elitists feed me every day and expect me to believe thinking I must be as stupid as they are.

For what do I stand?

I stand for the individual--his life, his liberty, his property, his pursuit of happiness. I stand for states' rights, once regarded as sacred, now no longer in existence. I stand for de-centralized government. I believe in free speech, free press, freedom of religion, freedom to assemble and redress the government for its abuses, gun rights, freedom from excessive, unjust, and abusive taxation, and freedom from the tyranny being perpetrated on this once great land by a mob of elitist so-called progressives who meet regularly in a swamp area known as Washinton D.C. in order to conspire to take away those liberties which we as a nation once valued above our own lives.

If Thomas Jefferson were alive today he would be leading another rebellion.

I am not here to start or lead or even join a rebellion. What I am here to do is to stir up enough trouble for those Washington D.C. parasites that they will have to deal with an educated populace--armed with truth and angry for liberty. I am not for armed resistance. I am for civil disobedience. The difference between those two is the difference between Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.

Enough is enough.