This is Not the America of Our Forefathers

by

       M. Richard Maxson


     “The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands…may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” 
                                                                                            - James Madison – Federalist #47 

      Over the last 100 years, with the growth in the federal government, the Executive branch has accumulated powers so vast that Madison’s words have been reduced to an interesting historical artifact.  Congress has abdicated the major powers it was given in Article I of the Constitution. The Federal Reserve coins money and manages the economy, not the Congress.  Trade agreements with foreign nations are done by the Executive on a “fast track” with little input from Congress. The Constitution directs the Congress to “raise and support armies” and yet military base closure decisions are made by unelected commissions. The Congress is happy to let the President decide questions of war and peace; we have gone to war in Iraq again without a new resolution by Congress.  And, of course, Article I provides Congress with the authority to “establish a uniform rule of naturalization.” ( immigration )

      “There is scarce a king in a hundred who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh, get first all the peoples’ money, then all their lands and then make them and their children servants forever.”
                                                                                                                               - Ben Franklin 

      
      The Constitution separates the powers of government to protect the liberty of the American people and prevent the tyranny of a self-aggrandizing government. Attempts by the Executive Branch to assume the legislative function

deprives the People of an open debate conducted by their politically accountable representatives and is antithetical to the Constitution’s design. Today, the Executive branch has emerged as the dominant branch of government wielding immense power, and with that, the era of constitutional government has largely ended. The immensity of the Executive has transformed the Congress and the Judiciary into political irrelevancies. 


       The Legislative branch has become largely powerless due to it's obsession of getting re-elected by playing the game of spreading government monies and protection from losing any of it. The entire superstructure of the American political order is now built upon the benefit-dispensing and regulatory power of the federal government. The deepest desire of the post-constitutional congressman is not to decide the great and important questions facing our nation such as war and peace, but rather to hold hearings on the menu for school lunches, to add new benefits under Medicare, or to issue yet another press release about a newly-funded bridge for the district. 


        As America prepares to celebrate its 239th birthday, it is obvious that the country

has changed forever. The fundamental goal of the Constitution’s authors was to ensure liberty; by separating the different powers of government they barred one branch of government from having all the tools to dominate. the country. There is little hope of going back to those traditions, the ones that built this nation. The idea is poignant, but impossible.  The days of prayer in public schools, protecting unborn babies, and upholding traditional marriage are officially over. To go back would mean dismantling of the entitlement state. The idea that the American “people” would support this dismantlement, in all its particularities, is a political fantasy. Leaders of both political parties have been adding entitlements, not dismantling them. The new Amerika is the home to socialized medicine, unbridled government spending and interference, legalized gay marriage, and rampant illegal immigration.

       It’s the end of America as we know it and most Americans don’t seem to know, care, or understand the significance of what is happening around them. Life goes

on. Stores stay open, paychecks keep getting cashed, new tech toys abound faster than we can absorb them, and everyone’s favorite reality TV shows continue to fill channel after channel. Until Americans start taking their liberties seriously,and I’m not sure that will happen anytime soon, things will continue to get worse until the people determine, as they did more than 200 years ago, that they desire a government that truly represents them and respects them. That is the foundation of our freedom. Until then, those who believe in liberty must do everything they can to convince their neighbors of the importance of freedom and the dangers facing our way of life that Americans have known for over two centuries.