Yes, it is another political/social rant. The kind that always earn me comments about being cold hearted, un-Christ like, or other adjectives people like to use when they disagree. Maybe this one will be different, maybe not.
What is prompting me to write this one is the fact that a judicial activist (an ideologue wearing a black robe) has decided that his opinion is worth more than the 7 million voters he just overruled.
We had a proposition on the ballot here in California, to define marriage as between a man and a woman in our state constitution. Proposition 8 added these words to our state constitution:
Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California
Now, one would expect that I might be against gay marriage as a Christian; after all, the Bible has several passages denouncing homosexuality. I am not writing this as a Christian, I am writing this as a citizen, and my Christian faith requires that I be a good citizen.
I have made it abundantly clear that I am a right wing conservative, something that my left wing brothers and sisters in Christ seem to be offended at, not because of my actual positions, but because in their perception, most Christians are right wing and seem to question the faith of left wingers, or at least, regard them with suspicion. Maybe that is true, but please do not think that I question the faith of those on the left. Whether one considers oneself left wing or right wing is irrelevant to me, what matters to me is things like right and wrong, practicality or impracticality, and law or lawlessness.
It is this last aspect that I am addressing here this time. Some refer to the U.S. as a democracy. This is not accurate, but its system does have a strong democratic component. We are a constitutional republic. What does all of this mean? Our roots derived from the fact that most of our early founders and residents, before we were a country, came from England. England was a monarchy, a country ruled by a king. Our founders were so distressed by the abuses of the monarchy – heavy taxation and religious bias from ruling authorities, that they finally rebelled. These men and women put everything on the line to achieve the right to be self-governing. The fought a war with their own countrymen, lost fortunes, land and family, all for the belief that the natural state of man, as intended by God, was to live lives of morality and responsibility free from the tyranny of a human king or ruling class. Democracy could have achieved that goal, but the founders saw a danger in democracy. In a democracy, the people rule. They implement laws through the vote of the majority. The founders believed that the danger of a democracy was that laws would be no better than the quality of character and sophistication of the voters. In other words, if the majority of the people proved to be unknowledgeable or of poor character, the resulting laws of the country would reflect this. In order to minimize this unfortunate side effect of direct democracy, a system of government where a constitution was the highest human law of the land was implemented. This law would be written, maintained and modified by representatives of the people; these representatives were to be democratically elected.
The hope was that those who chose to be representatives would have to be people of knowledge and character, in order to have the confidence of the people, and earn their vote. Voting was not a right bestowed upon everyone. It was recognized that certain classes of people, were more likely to be educated. Certain classes of people, would be funding the government, and had an extra stake in the country. The concern that led the founders to go this way is perhaps best illustrated by hypothetical example.
One could imagine, for example, that 80% of the people might be of low economic means. These people might desire a better standard of living. See the 20% who are well off, the 80% might decide to tax away the wealth of the 80%, to appropriate the benefits of wealth for themselves. If this were done without the legitimacy of law, we would call the confiscation of property “theft”. In essence, a democracy has the potential to make theft legal. While it might seem fair to have people of equal means, in practical terms, the rich provide jobs for the poor. Confiscate the wealth, and you destroy jobs, and ultimately, a lower standard for living for all.
Therefore, recognizing the dangers of democracy, the system was improved to make it a bit less dangerous. Furthermore, the government was split up into three branches, the legislative branch (those who write the actual laws), the judicial branch (those charged with trying actual cases in and rendering judgments in accordance with the intent of the laws) and the executive branch, The president and his staff and departments under his leadership, (functions as the chief executive officer of the country), in charge of enforcing the law, the military, and foreign affairs.
These three departments were created so that power would not be concentrated in any individual or ruling group. The goal in our form of government is to insure that the country is governed from the bottom up, not from the top down. The will of the people is superior to the will of a ruling class. That is the theory upon which our form of government is based.
None of what I have told you, is subject matter, it is only background, a framework from which we can understand the actual topic I have chosen to ponder and share.
The topic is Tyranny. People in other parts of the world would laugh to know that I hold that the United States is governed by tyranny. Certainly, it is not 100% true, but just as certainly, it is the direction we are headed. We have, though our choices in elected officials, slowly moves this country toward tyranny. We do not notice much, because we have a nice tyranny, not one bent on abusing us and harming us in a way that we would notice, but it is tyranny just the same.
The individual states were robbed of their right to self govern, and choose for themselves whether they wanted to allow abortion as a legal option. This was done by a judicial ruling, not through an act of legislation. In essence, a court held that abortion was a constitutional right. Looking over the constitution, you will find no mention of the topic of abortion, one wonders then how it could be a constitutional right. Furthermore, the 10th amendment declares, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
That is clear is it not? If abortion is neither delegated to the United States, nor prohibited to the States, then the States or the people get to decide what they want to have, it is not an area of federal concern.
The government has many laws about religion, placing limitations on what places of worship can or cannot do, creating tax exemptions for churches, restricting prayer in school or religious symbol on public property etc.
Look at the 1st amendment, in part it says: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”.
Again, it is quite clear. If congress shall make no law prohibiting the establishment or exercise of religion, then why are there such restrictions? Now notice, that is say congress shall make no law. This, in accordance with the 10th amendment, leaves such matters to the states. Indeed, in the early days of our country, many states required a statement of faith, for one to hold public office. However, the federal government has again, overstepped it’s bounds, and just does what it wants to. This is tyranny.
Taxation. Power is granted to the Federal government to levy taxes. However, it is not empowered to do things that the constitution does not grant it as it’s role. Therefore, most everything that the federal government spends money on (think of the hundreds of social programs), it has no legal authority to do. For the government to confiscate money and then spend that money in ways that the government is not authorized to do, and that the people were never allowed a choice in, is again, tyranny.
What set me off was this court decision to hold a law about marriage as unconstitutional. The constitutionality of this law has already been looked over, tested and found to be in harmony with the constitution by a great number of legal minds. The judge himself in this case, is a self-proclaimed homosexual. It seems to me, that if he were a man with honor, instead of a man with an agenda, he would have excused himself from the case because of a conflict of interest. Whether gays should or should not be allowed to marry, is not at all my point or issue. My issue is with an individual deciding that he can use his position to override the will of the people. There are so many of these types of issues, that I see where states and individuals are losing their rights to a few who think they should decide for the rest of us what is right or lawful.
It is tyranny, and I am tired of it. I want my country back. The person currently occupying the Whitehouse is in my opinion, the biggest tyrant our country has seen since we won our independence.
Are we reaping our just rewards for abandoning God in this country, or is it just the result of lazy, selfish, and ignorant people not caring to preserve the things that made this country work so well for so long? I think it is a little of both, and I think the cures are obvious. However, I am not very optimistic that we will do what it takes. We have failed to pass on values, and we have failed to encourage values in those who immigrate to our country. I fear that our moral, political, and fiscal destruction is no longer in question, the only question is, “How fast will we fall”.