We Have a Question to Answer

by

      M. Richard Maxson

        On this weekend of our country's 240th birthday looking at the political landscape one can't help but wonder how long it will be before we realize that we are quickly going away from the Founding Fathers vision for the liberty of us all? In one of  Ronald Reagan’s most famous speeches, given in 1964 in support of GOP presidential candidate Barry Goldwater, he asked Americans if “we still know the freedoms that were intended for us by the Founding Fathers.” If he were alive today he would see that most

Americans don't. 
          

      He called it right when he asked if today’s citizens wanted to “abandon the American

revolution” and the Founding Fathers by giving power to control life to “a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol” who say they “can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.” Today, an alarming amount of Americans do want just that.


      President Thomas Jefferson started a political party based, in part, on calls to limit U.S. courts to issuing decisions only within a strict interpretation of the Constitution. America is best, President Ronald Reagan often said, was when it gets back to basics, back to the Founders’ vision, back to their original constitutional framework. Like President Jefferson, Ronald Reagan wanted to limit the

powers of the courts by having judges strictly adhere to the exact language of the Constitution. Today, that thinking, is criticized as passe'. It is now touted as a "living constitution." It does not mean what it says - it means what we like it to in our modern society. After all, it IS such an old document written by white slave owners.

      Unfortunately no matter how ingeniously designed, the Constitution and laws are not immune from fascists who, under color of law, ignore their plain meaning. Checks and balances ultimately break down if those wielding power twist, pervert, ignore, selectively enforce and flout the law. The Department of (In)Justice has been a disgrace to everything the Founding Fathers stand for.

      Anti-constitutionalists have been chipping away at the integrity of the Constitution for decades, for they prefer the forcible imposition of their own values and agenda more than they cherish liberty. Benjamin Franklin knew as well as anyone the powerful safeguards he and the other framers had imposed to maximize and preserve liberty, and yet he knew that human nature was such that this system would still be vulnerable to abuse and attack. "A republic, if you can keep it."

      More than two centuries ago, Thomas Jefferson said, "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." The process of dismantling our system has now accelerated to alarming levels. The first step is to recognize what's going on but can a people who cannot be bothered to look up from their electronic devices expect to remain a free people? Will we wake up to the extremism of the political left, which has taken firm control of today's Democratic Party. Is it possible that even some rank-and-file Democrats can set aside their allegiance to party affiliation long enough to open their eyes to it? H. L. Mencken famously said, “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.” While it was true at the time, it’s even more accurate now. 

                                        "Republics decline into democracies and democracies

                                                                 degenerate into despotisms." -- Aristotle